Manga Review: Nephilim, Vol. 1

Nephilim, Vol. 1

By Anna Hanamaki
Aurora Publishing, 192 pp.
Rating: Older Teen (16+)

Screwball comedy? Gender-confused bodice-ripper? Homage to Moto Hagio? In a word, yes—the very silly but totally entertaining Nephilim is all those things. All it needs to put it over the top is a mangafied likeness of Fabio on the cover.

The story focuses on Gai, a studly soldier, and Abel, a waifish creature who’s male during the day and female at night. The two meet cute, manga-style: on a moonlit night, Gai spies Abel bathing in a spring. In a vain effort to restore her compromised honor, Abel grabs a knife and lunges at Gai without pausing to grab a towel or a kimono. (Not to worry—Abel never flashes more than a bellybutton at readers, thanks to some strategically places tresses. Janet Jackson might find Nephilim instructive.) After failing miserably, Abel begins trailing Gai everywhere he goes, vainly waiting for another opportunity to strike. Gai, for his part, finds Abel’s unwavering commitment to killing him a sure sign that they’re meant for each other. As their romance blossoms, Abel confesses the real reason she must kill Gai: if she fails to do so, she’ll die from The Curse, an affliction that befalls Nephilim who’ve been seen in their true, i.e. nocturnal, form.

I’d be the first to admit that Nephilim isn’t a good manga in any conventional sense of the word. The art, for example, is uneven. Manga-ka Anna Hanamaki draws handsome faces and gorgeous hair, but has difficulty creating visually distinctive backdrops—or even deciding in what century the story takes place. (Some scenes are set in what looks like feudal Europe, others in what appears to be a modern American city, complete with its own Holiday Inn.) The characters, too, leave something to be desired. Though Gai seems smitten with Abel, the pairing isn’t convincing. We never learn what he sees in her—frankly, she seems like a pain—nor do we learn enough about him to guess at the attraction: does she remind him of his mother? his first love?

I still liked it.

To get in the right frame of mind to read Nephilim, I strongly encourage you to recreate the summer camp experience: find a few giggly friends, turn off the lights, bust out the flashlight and the contraband candy. You may discover, as I did, that Nephilim reminds you of the tawdry paperbacks that everyone stowed under their mattresses—books filled with overripe dialogue, ridiculous plot twists, and steamy encounters (or what passed for a steamy encounter in the estimation of an inexperienced fourteen-year-old). Yes, my inner snob is embarrassed to admit just how much I enjoyed Forever and Sweet Valley High: Playing With Fire back in the day. But boy, were they fun to read, offering unadulterated escapism in a neat little package—just like Nephilim.

Volume one of Nephilim is available now.