Black Bird 5

Kanoko Sakurakoji – Viz – 2010 – 11+ volumes

This series is one of the more… er, trashy, maybe, that I’m really into right now. Reading it, I know in some ways it isn’t good. For instance, the first half of the volume is mostly about whether or not Misao and Kyo can or will have sex. Then it switches gears, but sex is never far from either of their minds, nor do people around them ever stop talking about it.

I’ll freely admit to liking characters like Kyo, who have no problem with sexual flirtations around their special lady. Kyo’s toned it down a lot in this volume, since now he “can’t” have sex with Misao, but he’s the same type of character as Domoto from Butterflies, Flowers. Neither is flirtatious in a sleazy way, but still off-putting to the girl on the other end and a little funny. It works better in Butterflies, Flowers since that series is less dark and, frankly, better, but seeing it here on occasion still makes me smile.

This volume is still pretty drama-tastic, what with the sex agonizing and the fact they can’t have any affecting Kyo’s “leader” status in the Tengu clan. He’s also getting hit with a lot of pressure from home to seal the deal, so to speak. He does take Misao home with him, but mostly to settle the rights to the leadership position once and for all.

Hm… fun new characters this time around include Ayame, Sagami’s wife. She’s great, a very sick lady that still loves her husband very much. Her cheeriness is very welcome in the series’ world of dour, beautiful men. It’s a shame that the series has such a huge cast that goes mostly unused, though. I do hate it when stories like this have such a huge cast, because you don’t need more than a few core people to move the story, and having an entourage of eight men just seems excessive. Part of that problem is solved by having three members of the entourage played by young triplets, who are cute and/or mascots and don’t really need to be distinguished from one another, but there’s still a lot of faceless bishounen wandering around.

And the story… yeah. They, uh… have to have sex. But can’t. And that’s the gist of it. Make of that what you will. They are “settling” things with Kyo’s brother, currently, which will probably involve a lot of blood and fighting and angst.

Despite all its bad points, I still find myself ridiculously addicted. I do like the relationship between Kyo and Misao, which turns away from its hero/victim mechanics from the early volumes and becomes more sincere and earnest here. Plus, being a girl, I like romantic angst, regardless of context. I also love folklore-based stories, and although the magical parts still don’t really play a part, the fact that Kyo is a tengu demon is still extremely cool. I know that most people dismissed this series, and that’s fair, but there’s something about it that’s appealing to a die-hard shoujo fan that doesn’t like to think too hard about the story. Plus… I’ll be honest, the sex stuff is usually glossed over in most series like this, and it’s a little refreshing to see it out in the open. Even if I did just trash FY for doing it so excessively (in my defense, it was because multiple characters were trying to rape Miaka for, like, three volumes. Kyo and Misao’s situation is different).

There are better series out there, but Black Bird has just the right mix of my favorite things to make me look forward to every new volume. I just got volume 6 in the mail, so I’ll probably be reading that today or tomorrow.