Seimaden 1
Posted: April 6, 2010 Filed under: Seimaden 10 Comments »You Higuri – CMX – 2005 – 10 volumes
My love for Ludwig II has prompted me to go back and look at some of Higuri’s other series. Perhaps I should have started with Gorgeous Carat, but I love demons, so Seimaden was the way to go.
This is more or less her debut work (there’s a prequel volume floating around that looks like it came out the same year), and you can more or less tell. You can also tell that this was a product of the early 90s, though the art has aged extremely well over the years. There are illustration techniques that date it (some of the poses, free-floating “shoujo” panels, the fact that Laures is gigantic compared to everyone else), but as a fantasy series, it doesn’t really have any story elements that date it.
It’s an awful lot like RG Veda. Higuri’s style is very much like CLAMP in this work (at this point, they were working for the same publisher and in some of the same magazines), and RG Veda’s fantasy themes, costumes, and fatalistic love triangles are all in here. RG Veda was in the middle of its run when this started, but I don’t know how popular it was. Popular enough to replicate? Probably not, especially with CLAMP on board at the same publisher. I think big romantic fantasy like this was just popular in the early 90s. I have very little evidence to back this guess aside from RG Veda, Seimaden, Basara and Fushigi Yugi, but the latter two were very popular.
And after all that explanation, all I’m going to talk about is how I was disappointed that this suffered from debut series problems. I love demons, and Laures is a kind of king demon, but not even he is saving this first volume for me. There is a very stale setup involving a heroine named Hilda who has lost her memories, a dark-haired bishounen who is her protector, and a “good guy” that shows up later to “save” her from the dark-haired bishounen, who is apparently evil but doesn’t seem like it. They all have a past, and the dark-haired bishounen (Laures) has done some bad things, but it’s pretty obvious he’s not completely evil. Most everything else, including Hilda’s memories, are left a big mystery to be filled in later. Mysteriously, the summary on the back of the volume gives most of that mystery away.
It’s pretty bland, but it’s not good form to blame the first volume of a fantasy series for a boring set-up. Especially a romance, and especially an older series. I picked up the first three, so I’m going to hold off on judgement until I finish the third. We’ll see how much the characters and plot develop by then.
…I was disappointed surprised that there wasn’t even a hint of BL in this first volume, especially given Higuri’s other work. I had to slash Laures and Roddrick in my head. This tells me I am further down the fujoshi road than I care to admit.
ah!!!!!!!!!!! im so sad u didn’t like it! as much as i did. i’ve only read two volumes but i do really like it. i’ve never read anything by her before so maybe that helps….wahh!!
I’m sorry. ^_^; I thought since it was a little older it might have a slow start, so that’s why I picked up three at once. I liked it a whole lot better than Cantarella so far, and I am looking forward to the other two volumes I have.
[...] Tower (Manga Xanadu) Diana Dang on vol. 1 of Rosario + Vampire (Stop, Drop, and Read!) Connie on vol. 1 of Seimaden (Slightly Biased Manga) Emily on Seiyuu Ka-! (Emily’s Random Shoujo Manga Page) Connie on [...]
lol. and i’m really interested in cantarella. but i’ve read u’re reviews so im wary…
Dude, don’t worry about the Shonen-ai. Once Zadei shows up, it’s Teteiyusu x Zadei gloriousness up the wazoo. They’re the only reason to read Seimaden, IMO. I pretty much ignored Hilda and Laures because of them.
Higuri CAN’T make a series without boy love. It’s like a curse placed on her by the God of yaoi.
Oh, and I also can forget Karon and Rod (gotta love that name). And the creepy count who kidnaps Laures for his “collection.” LOL.
I can’t remember (which is sad, because I just finished another volume), is Teteiyusu the servant with the wings that releases Zadei? I could see that, although the servant seems to be leaning more towards Laures where I’m at in the story.
I’m digging the count. He’s pretty twisted, and made the story much more interesting.
I pretty much agree with you about Higuri, though. Even something that seems relatively straight and seinen like Night Head Genesis turns a little slashy in her hands. Nothing wrong with that, especially in Night Head Genesis’s case, because that’s the only thing that series has going for it.
Yeah, Tetei is the winged servant. And yes, he has a crush on Laures, which pisses the fuck out of Zadei and leads to all sorts of awkward situations.
I was thinking about picking up NHG, but just from looking at it for three seconds I thought it seemed pretty generic. I’d rather her finish Gorgeous Carat II (if she hasn’t already).
I still need to pick up some of her more overt BL. I’m a little shy of Gakuen Heaven because of the video game connection, but I should try Gorgeous Carat. It’s pretty much what I imagine her being best at.
Somewhere around here, I do have Crown and Angel’s Coffin, but neither one of those are really grabbing me at the moment.
Angel’s Coffin and Crown are also pretty generic. Actually I think most of her series are, IMO, but the pretty boys just keep us coming back for more. Though I thought Ludwig II was rather well done.