Wild Act 4
Posted: August 18, 2009 Filed under: Wild Act 2 Comments »Rie Takada – Tokyopop – 2004 – 10 volumes
So. Something that this book made me think about. A plot device that has fallen out of favor, but I believe was very prevalent in 90s manga, was twisting the story so that the main couple were somehow siblings. Normally, this only applied to crazy marriage between parents and having the main couple be step-siblings (ie Marmalade Boy), and I don’t think very many of these made it into English, but even without blood relations between the characters, I still hate this plot device.
It snuck into Wild Act, which I adored for the chemistry and healthy sexual attitudes between the two main characters (“healthy” in the sense that they are frank about their desires, not because they do it all the time). Now… ugh. I want it not to be true, and I hope desperately that it is not, but I also don’t want to sit through several volumes of uncertainty. On one hand, the plot is moving much faster than I thought it would (the whole thing with Akira Nanae was cleared up within 4 volumes, the couple has hooked up, et cetera), but on the other hand, I’m not exactly sure where the plot will head for the other six volumes if it doesn’t linger on the question of “Are they are aren’t they?”
To be fair, I saw this coming during the second volume. It was pretty obvious that was where the story was headed in volume three. All the same, I was hoping I was wrong.
Bah. But it’s still pretty addictive, so I’m sure I’ll see it through to the end unless it handles the whole incest thing with less tact than I hope.
Hmm. I don’t think that plot device has quite fallen out of favour—I can still think of plenty of newer titles that use it, at least the step-sibling angle of it (Devil Does Exist, Me and My Brothers (both series I enjoy despite the device), and about a million titles (mostly one-shots or shorter stories, it seems to me) that aren’t licensed. Maybe it’s more that it’s become such a well-known device that it’s not generally taken seriously in series that use it? Like, there’s usually about half a second of “But he’s my brother! well only sort of because we’re not actually related! i guess that’s okay then!” and then the series veers off into blissful shoujo la-la-land (or something).
Anyway, I agree that it’s a pretty annoying gimmick. I’ve read some of this series too, and I definitely agree with you about its likable aspects, but sometimes I wish shoujo manga didn’t try so hard to create unnecessary drama…
Thanks. I hadn’t seen it very often lately, but it occurs to me now that I tend to avoid any series that even contains the possibility of going down that road, so my cluelessness of its modern applications may just have something to do with that. I figured it might just have been a manga-in-English thing too, since it seems like the type of device that’s just too easy to pass up. It tends to stop things dead for me when it appears, though I have enjoyed one or two series that used it.
I keep meaning to read The Devil Does Exist. I love the covers, and it sounds like my type of story. I think I hesitate whenever I go to buy the first volume because of the whole “antagonist living in her house will turn into a potential love interest”-thing, but I know I’ll pick it up eventually.