Dokkoida?! 3

Yu Yagami / Taro Achi – CMX – 2008 – 3 volumes

Did I say something bad about this series after I read volume two? I may have. I think I may have been in some sort of cranky, manga-hating mood when I read it. I will freely admit that there’s nothing terribly deep about the series, and that most will probably not like it, but man was this book a lot of fun.

The one-off chapters continue, highlighting one of the handful of major characters, but the fun it had with cliches was more obvious this time. As all the characters leave simultaneously and conveniently together, they all comment on how strange it is that they all go to the same vocational school/are in the same class/have work at the same time/teach at the same school. We are spared the hijinx at the school itself in favor of the swearing rabbit character foiling a burglar space villain.

Another good reason for the good one-shots this time around were the amusing theme villains. The burglar villain fits in with the chapter where the rabbit is left home and has to convince the burglar to rob every lousy apartment in the complex, a villain resembling Oscar from Rose of Versailles is crying themed and tells sad stories (based on a litany of real-life sad stories that made me laugh), and the final villain is a pea-man that tries to kill people with a giant potato monster. His theme isn’t really that funny, actually, but it’s still a little amusing.

And the character-centric stories are a lot more cute. The stuck-up princess villain has a conference where she pretends to not love her baby brother, everyone at the Cosmos house comes to Suzuo’s rescue when his grandpa tries to take him back to the tea plantation, and there’s a cute chapter with the gruff girl trying to keep her kimono nice, eventually having it torn to shreds by a weapon that is so gentle it only tears clothes.

And the ending was very sweet. It takes up about the last third of the book, and even though there were one or two too many characters, and not much of an ongoing plot, the conclusion was still really great. It makes me happy when sentai comedies have such triumphant endings.

Another fine detail: the rabbit character, who had a Kansai accent in the original, was made to swear excessively in the English version. This is the best rendition of a Kansai accent I have ever seen, ever. Hands down. Everyone should do this from now on. I don’t care if it’s inappropriate in the context of the series.

I still like Heroes are Extinct a little better, but this is a pretty close second. The third volume is great, and I think the novelty of the premise did wonders for the first volume. I do love sentai comedies for their self-awareness and bizarre elements in general, and they are rare in English (this is more… tokusatsu, I think, but whatever). I tend to dislike comedy manga, but for some reason, these sentai series get me every time, no matter how vaguely crappy they may be (Imperfect Heroes is, uh, not very good). We must embrace them when they appear, so that we can get to the good stuff like Shinesman.*

*This will never happen, ever.