Demons who snack on dreams… vampires who suffer from split personalities… cougars who run major corporations. These are just a few of the characters you’ll encounter in this month’s column, as Chloe Ferguson and I post a fresh crop of shojo and seinen reviews that includes volume two of Metro Survive (DrMaster), volume two of Nightmare Inspector: Yumekui Kenbun (Viz), volume one of Red Angel (DMP), volume one of Two Flowers for the Dragon (CMX), and volume one of Ultimate Venus (Go! Comi).

Metro Survive, Vol. 2

By Yuki Fujisawa
DrMaster, 208 pp.
Rating: 15+

The second volume of this balls-to-the-wall disaster drama pits Mishima and his ragtag band of fellow survivors against a posse of club kids and wrestlers under the spell of two pimp-tastic host club owners. (One sports a fur that would be the envy of Joe Namath, the other a white suit pilfered from the Superfly prop trailer. Both look freshly pressed, despite the rivers of gasoline, sewage, and blood flooding the basement levels of Exopolis.) Artist Yuki Fujisawa doesn’t waste a panel as he steadily escalates the conflict to a point of almost unbearable tension. Though he attempts a few curveballs, the basic plot is fairly predictable, with expendables meeting gruesome ends while principals take turns demonstrating hidden reserves of selflessness and courage. Fujisawa wisely brings the story to a close at the end of volume two with a final act that will please—if not surprise—readers. As I noted in my review of volume one, the big drawback to Metro Survive is the art. Frankly, it’s ugly, with too many speedlines, too many muddy backgrounds, and too many characters drawn in a cartoonish manner. If you’re not a stickler for pretty pictures, however, you could do a lot worse than this brutally efficient two-volume thriller, which reads like a Quentin Tarantino remake of Earthquake.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

Nightmare Inspector: Yumekui Kenbun, Vol. 2

By Shin Mashiba
Viz, 184 pp.
Rating: 13+

Nightmare Inspector is an exceptionally good retread, filled with lush visuals. The premise—a tea house with a resident baku, or dream eater, that will attend to customers’ supernatural needs at a price—calls to mind obvious comparisons to xxxHolic, but the series’ artistic tone strikes a different note. Fans of the latter may identify similar story strengths and weaknesses with the former, namely in the dark, one-shot nature of each anecdote and the generally cynical take on human nature. The stories are small, deliciously well-done tales of human viciousness and supernatural personification, in which everyone from the dead to ordinary household objects may show up with a request. That said, Nightmare Inspector’s dogged adherence to single, thirty-page tales must ultimately diversify if the series wishes to sustain readers’ interest beyond a single volume.

Even if the plot setup doesn’t compel you to pick up a copy, the art alone should prove enticing. Striking an Art Nouveau balance between Far East and Victorian West, the swirling colors and dreamy screentones create an ambiguous world in which menace hides behind the fantastic. Manga-ka Shin Mashiba turns mediums and styles into key story elements, generally to impressive ends. A middle story in which charcoal drawings play a key role is one of most ingenious uses of art to further story seen in quite a long time. Nightmare Inspector’s formula may have been done before, but this stylish series still manages to prove its shelf-worthiness several times over.

–Reviewed by Chloe Ferguson

Red Angel, Vol. 1

By Makoto Tateno
DMP, 176 pp.
Rating: YA (Young Adult, 16+)

Mika and Eru are twin vampires with a most unusual arrangement: the two share a body, variously manifesting themselves as a comely girl (Mika) or an androgynously beautiful boy (Eru). The two use their good looks to lure victims into their web—or at least, that’s how the volume begins, with a story told from the perspective of one of their conquests. None of the subsequent chapters live up to the promise of the first, as manga-ka Makoto Tateno reduces Mika and Eru from agents of destruction to passive observers of other vampires’ tortured relationships. The final plot twist takes the cake for sheer absurdity, suggesting that Tateno should spend less time trawling New Age sites for angel lore and more time actually consulting a Bible for the low-down on Satan’s heavenly exile. Though some reviewers have praised the art, I found it paradoxically busy and plain, with too much attention lavished on costumes and hair and not enough on backgrounds, faces, or basic anatomy. (All of the characters have the kind of razor-sharp chins and beanstalk necks I associate with CLAMP’s debut work.) I give Tateno credit for trying to put her own stamp on the gothic vampire romance—her vamps have beautiful red wings, for example—but wish she’d spent more time developing Mika and Eru into genuine characters instead of allowing them to remain blood-sucking ciphers.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

Two Flowers for the Dragon, Vol. 1

By Nari Kusakawa
CMX, 192 pp.
Rating: Teen

Shakuya, the plucky protagonist of Two Flowers for the Dragon, belongs to a powerful clan boasting both human and dragon bloodlines. As a child, her parents selected a fiancé for her. When he went AWOL, Shakuya cast her lot with a new suitor, only to have her original husband-to-be resurface with no memory of his past. You don’t need to be a folklorist to guess where this old-as-the-hills story is headed: Shakuya announces a contest to determine which of her two beaus will become her husband, using a pair of magical tattoos to gauge her feelings for each.

The plot mechanics are a little creaky, especially the contrast between Shakuya’s amnesiac fiancé—a dashing rogue with flowing locks and the kind of cocky demeanor that rankles and intrigues at the same time—and her new man—a Dudley Do-Right who can be as stiff as Al Gore on the 2000 campaign trail. The art, too, is so-so. Readers of The Recipe for Gertrude and The Palette of 12 Secret Colors will quickly discover that Nari Kusakawa has a limited repertoire of character designs in her arsenal. Yet Two Flowers of the Dragon leaves a fresh, vibrant impression. Part of the story’s appeal is attributable to Shakuya, who’s smarter and more self-possessed than most shojo heroines; one of the series’ running jokes is that she’s actually more powerful than either Lucien or Kuwan. (She can transform into a badass dragon, capable of smoking anyone in her path.) The series’ other great strength is the way Kusakawa uses slapstick and supernatural intrigue to reveal her characters’ true emotional states. Even a gambit as shameless as introducing two button-cute tiger cubs serves a genuine dramatic purpose, showing us how protective and solicitous Shakuya really is. The bottom line: Two Flowers for the Dragon surprises and delights, even when it follows shojo formula to the letter.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

Ultimate Venus, Vol. 1

By Takako Shigematsu
Go! Comi, 192 pp.
Rating: Older Teen (16+)

Sometimes promotional copy can be misleading. After reading the back cover of Ultimate Venus, for example, I concluded that Takako Shigematsu had updated Pygmalion for the shojo set by making the Henry Higgins figure young and sexy, rather than fussy and middle-aged:

Poor Yuzu is an orphan who’s too clumsy to hold a job. She’s reduced to living in a playground—until a handsome stranger named Hassaku informs her that she’s the heir to a fortune, and whisks her into world of wealth, power, and more hot suitors than she can shake a scepter at! But there’s a catch: Hassaku must turn this klutz into a lady of refinement, or Yuzu will lose everything!

While the blurb is an accurate summary of the volume’s first thirty pages, the story takes an abrupt detour from the “Street Where You Live” to Knot’s Landing, as Yuzu discovers her extended family will stop at nothing to prevent her from inheriting her grandmother’s corporate empire. Hassaku morphs from etiquette coach to bodyguard, trailing Yuzu everywhere she goes to prevent an unscrupulous aunt or cousin from nabbing her. Making his task more difficult is Yuzu herself; earnest and naïve, she’s quick to judge and even quicker to fall in love, traits that guarantee she’ll need rescuing at the end of every chapter.

If the main story line is strictly paint-by-numbers, the subplot involving Yuzu’s grandmother is not. Shigematsu portrays her as a sexy business woman in her forties, the kind of sleek, powerful character that Barbara Stanwyck or Ellen Barkin was born to play. Throughout the volume, Shigematsu dangles the possibility that Hassaku and Yuzu’s grandmother have a more intimate bond than employee/employer—a pairing that’s supposed to make the target audience feel sympathy for Yuzu. For those of us entering cougar territory, however, the scenes with Yuzu’s grandmother are a blast of fresh air: funny, outrageous, and a potent reminder that confidence is much more sexy than fumbling, self-effacing naivete. If Shigematsu ever does a spin-off project featuring Yuzu’s grandmother, I’ll be the first to buy it.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

Enchanter, Vols. 5-8

By Izumi Kawachi
Published by DMP
Rated: YA (For Young Adults 16+)

On the one hand, Enchanter features a sensitive male character, Haruhiko, who spends a lot of time dwelling on his romantic feelings. He believes there’s one true love for him, which causes much frustration as he’s constantly surrounded by shapely beauties and sexual come-ons.

Yet Enchanter isn’t as tacky as it sounds, mainly because the sexual elements are done for laughs. Indeed, this series is gratuitous to the point where it borders on parody; if I had a quarter for every flash of underwear by Eukanaria – a voluptuous demon and the lead female character – all four volumes I read would have paid for themselves. But I will admit that by the time I was finished, I found I had developed a genuine affection for Enchanter, which had nothing to do with cheap titillation as much as the interesting relationships between characters.

Haruhiko is both a high school student as well as an “enchanter,” a crafter of magical weapons used by demons. In the world of the series, demons constantly contract with humans presumed to have enchanting potential, exchanging them mystical power for their services. These close bonds frequently lead to the two parties becoming lovers, as was the case with Eukanaria and a human named Fulcanelli.

Unfortunately, Fulcanelli met with an untimely demise, leaving Eukanaria searching for a new host for his soul. Haruhiko seems like the perfect vessel, but the rules of soul-transfer require him to have sex with someone first, so Eukanaria is constantly trying to help him win over Yuka, his crush and slightly-older teacher. He claims to only have eyes for her, despite comely demons and fellow enchanters repeatedly piquing his interest. Further complicating the picture is some tension between him and Eukanaria, who bears more than a passing resemblance to Yuka, as does he to Fulcanelli (The personalities between doppelgangers are totally different, of course; otherwise there’d be no obstacle keeping Haruhiko and Eukanaria from simply ending up with each other).

Basically, Enchanter takes high school soap opera clichés – Boy A likes Girl B; Girl C likes Boy A; Boy A takes part in a craft fair to impress Girl B; etc. – and splices them with magic and occasional monster-fighting. Those looking for non-stop action may be disappointed, but the slapstick humor does get kinetic at times. The series actually works better as comedy, since Haruhiko’s raging hormones, romantic uncertainty, and seemingly-relentless fantasy life about Yuka help keep the tone light.

But what makes Enchanter especially interesting is the use of the demon/enchanter contract to reflect the entire spectrum of interpersonal relationships. There’s a demon and enchanter who both have trouble expressing how much they really care about each other; a character who contracts with a demon to try and make Haruhiko jealous (which only results in her constantly berating the demon, who acts thoroughly morose in response); and a diametrically-opposed demon and enchanter couple whose incompatibility literally causes them to bump heads. However, like any storyteller skilled with metaphor, writer/artist Izumi Kawachi knows how to effectively disguise the subtext so casual readers are only seeing cool fight scenes.

I also liked how Eukanaria, who could have been depicted as a mere sexpot, is quite possibly the most complicated character in the series. True, she’s frequently crass, but shows a surprisingly vulnerable side in volumes five through eight, in which we also learn how different her relationship with Haruhiko is from hers with Fulcanelli. Some readers will be impressed by the different sides Eukanaria shows. Others won’t be able to turn their eyes away from the gratuitous panty flash, and that’s probably okay, too.

Volumes five through eight of Enchanter are available now.

IWGP: Ikebukuro West Gate Park, Vols. 1-4

By Ira Ishida
Published by DMP
Rating: Mature (18+)

Who is IWGP intended for? Most likely, male audiences age 18 and above, who like their mystery fiction tinged with sex and violence. There’s a lot of that in the four volumes released so far, and even if IWGP’s macho streak seems a bit much at times, at least writer Ira Ishida keeps things moving at a brisk pace.

Based on a Japanese television drama, which in turn, was based on a novel, IWGP follows a group of urban youths who want to have a good time, but inevitably get embroiled in adventures involving the underworld. The main character is the street-smart Makoto, who at the beginning of volume one rescues a girl named Hikaru from some hoodlums on New Year’s Eve. At the titular Ikebukuro West Gate Park, they hook up with Makoto’s skirt-chasing buddy Masa and Hikaru’s friend Rika. Some wacky supporting characters are also introduced, including an otaku named Shun and Takashi, the dandyish leader of a local street gang.

For a short while, volume one coasts along on the sheer excitement of being young and good-looking. However, just when the reader might start confusing this with some teenage romance manga, Ishida reveals IWGP’s dark side.

Makato and friends live in a world where every pretty face hides some sinister secret, and if that sounds like the jacket blurb for a hard-boiled detective novel, it’s a fitting comparison, since IWGP certainly has crime fiction elements: the tough, cocky protagonist; criminals in supporting roles; bittersweet, if not altogether tragic endings. But at the same time, Ishida conveys a sincere message about how valuable friendships are, and there’s plenty of wacky humor and flashy art by Sena Aritou to balance out the sober codas.

It should be noted, however, that the friendships IWGP values most are those between men, which is consistent with the series’ emphasis on male toughness. Because Shun is the least masculine of Makoto’s group, he is often teased and made fun of. The only woman to break into the male circle is a character named Sachiko, but as it happens, Sachiko, who appears in volume three, underwent gender reassignment and is now as much a skirt-chaser as the other guys.

Generally, women are the reason Makoto and his friends get mixed-up in yakuza, drugs and prostitutes. Of course, these are pulp-style teenage girls, so their public faces never reflect their true feelings, and even more interestingly, there is a recurring theme that these females cannot be trusted. But even assuming IWGP exists in some hard-boiled version of reality, where normal women are too soft to survive without cunning or deception, what happens to them borders on misogyny. If you’re a female character in this world, you must be either mentally unstable, a sex worker, a bitch, or some combination of the three. At the very least, you must be a victim.

It’s possible the creators are simply pandering to their male audience, but when there are panels showing sprawled-out women who have been raped and strangled, or are otherwise being abused, it raises questions about whether this is indeed genre convention or if something else is up.

All four volumes of IWGP are available now.

Family Complex

By Mikiyo Tsuda
DMP, 192 pp.
Rating: 13+

Sometimes when I complain to Hal Johnson about my mundane problems he mocks me, saying, “Oh no! My diamond shoes are too tight!” Family Complex is a one-shot filled with diamond-shoe-stories.

Akira Sakamoto is the only normal-looking kid in his family of beautiful people. The Sakamotos are stared at in public, as strangers whisper about Akira’s odd appearance in his fantastic clan. If the whole volume were about Akira’s mental trauma, it might be good – instead, Akira quickly realizes how much his family loves him and where he fits in over a single chapter.

The remainder of the chapters focus on other family members’ boring troubles – the elder sister is hot, but in a Takarazuka way. Akira’s older brother is constantly pursued by hundreds of girls and uses Akira on a fake date in order to pretend he’s gay (basically it’s an order of fujoshi, with extra fujoshi on the side). Ten-year-old Fuyuki Sakamoto has problems with pedophile flashers, but that’s way too much drama for this book, so Tsuda focuses on Fuyuki’s comical love life instead.

Tsuda’s Princess Princess nearly killed me. In both titles, Tsuda comes up with an interesting premise, and then totally drops the ball to focus on characters’ emotional inner lives, which are not nearly troubled enough to make for compelling reading.

Family Complex includes a long true-story chapter about one of Tsuda’s retinas detaching. This bonus story contains more conflict, more drama, and more risk than Tsuda’s fictional work! One morning Tsuda wakes up seeing “floaters.” She visits her local doctor who tells her to go to the emergency room, but Tsuda, a workaholic manga artist, does not realize the danger she’s in and goes home overnight to work some more. Thanks to the delay in treatment, Tsuda’s eye surgery is long and painful, and her recovery time is protracted.

You know what’s ten thousand times more interesting than a story about “My super-cute family loves me too much?” A story about the details of eye surgery! The eye surgery story was missing backgrounds and poorly drawn, but I’m willing to cut a lot of slack, because for god’s sake, she could have gone blind!

Tsuda also includes a few extra stories about hanging out with yaoi artist Eiki Eiki, and again, these shorts are way more interesting than Tsuda’s fictional stuff.

Both Tsuda and Eiki Eiki will appear at Yaoi Jamboree this year.

Family Complex is available now.

Speed Racer: Mach Go Go Go, Vols. 1 & 2 Box Set

By Tatsuo Yoshida
DMP, 600 pp.
Rating: 13+

I did not watch the Speed Racer cartoon growing up, nor have I seen the new film (described as “not unlike being punched in the eyeball with a neon hammer” by Zac Bertschy of ANN), and to be honest I’m not interested… but I am interested in manga from the 1960’s - very interested.

DMP has painstakingly restored Speed Racer (some pages more painstakingly than others), which originally ran in a newspaper¹. Unable to obtain the original art, they were forced to work with scans of published material. On some of the pages DMP’s pain shows. The overall presentation of the two volume set is lovely, with great covers and a nice design. There is a forward by Peter Fernandez, the voice of Speed and the director of the American dub, however, I would have liked more cultural notes and supplementary material.

On a narrative level, volume one works better than volume two. Rookie race car driver Speed drives through several stand-alone adventures, including saving his father’s secret engineering plans written in invisible ink on the Mach 5’s windshield and an exciting (yet ridiculous) race through a volcanic tunnel. In my favorite chapter Speed drives blind while Racer X acts as his eyes. Volume two relies too much on recently installed gadgets to get the Mach 5 out of trouble. The stories become even more ridiculous: Speed is identical to an Arab prince who enjoys racing; Speed is recruited as an official driver for the FBI to stop terrorists.

Racer X appears in surprisingly few adventures, and his “mystery” is abruptly resolved in the last two pages. It’s as if the series was suddenly cancelled and Yoshida had to wrap up the plot.

Spritle and Chim-Chim have mercifully small roles. Trixie’s involvement is minimal.

Nothing in Speed Racer resembles actual car racing. I’m pretty sure that race car drivers never stop mid-race to get out of their cars and chat. One adventure features several drivers dying while attempting to jump a gorge. I know racing is dangerous, but…

Compared to my reading of modern manga, I found I had to slow down and really look at the panels to understand the plot. My theory is that in more current titles the text describes the action more often and relies less on the art to carry the reader through the sequence, but I would love to hear other reviewers’ thoughts.

Overall, the series is little more than the ethereal remnants of past pop culture. Speed Racer was clearly intended as disposable entertainment of its day. Imagine finding a 1960s Styrofoam cup from McDonald’s in the street. It’s fascinating because it should have disintegrated long ago, but look how the design sense and materials have changed over the years!

¹ My source on the newspaper origins of Mach Go Go Go is a mention of it at a DMP panel at New York Comic Con, but I’m having trouble verifying the manga’s origins on the [English language] internet.

Speed Racer: Mach Go Go Go is available now.

What manga will you be reading one year from now? Viz, Del Rey, Yen Press, DMP, Dark Horse, and CMX unveiled the titles they hope you’ll purchase, from adaptations of popular anime series to works by established masters. Below is a run-down of the day’s big licensing news.
(Continued)

The big story this week: edu-manga. Korean company YKids released six new titles on Wednesday, all designed to trick reluctant readers into learning a little more about history and literature. (I’d say that YKids “carpet bombs,” “blitzes,” or “storms” the manga aisle, but two of the twentieth century’s most notable pacifists are profiled in this batch of books, making that martial imagery a little too… vehement.) Three are biographies of major historical figures—Leonardo da Vinci, Mother Teresa, and Nelson Mandela—while three are adaptations of kid-lit classics Daddy Long Legs, The Prince and the Pauper, and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. While I’m a proponent of intelligent use of comics in the classroom, I’ve been a little underwhelmed by previous YKids titles which seemed, frankly, too cheesy to pass muster with the under-twelve set. I’d love to hear from parents or teachers who’ve had more experience with these series: do they pique kids’ interest in reading? What age group is best served by them? And how do the adaptations compare with the originals?

For those of us with more grown-up tastes, the pickings are much slimmer. Your best bets are DMP’s deluxe, two-volume Speed Racer: Mach Go Go Go box set, which reprints the original series’ entire run, and the eighth volume of Viz’s Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs (Viz). Granted, I’m a little biased—I’d describe myself as a “dog otaku” if that didn’t sound so unsavory. (For the record, my dog does not own any sweaters, t-shirts, costumes, hats, goggles, or other accessories—she’s strictly a leash-and-collar girl.) But I’m not the only one in my household who enjoys this canine-centered soap opera:

I’ll be back next Monday with a super-sized edition of the Weekly Recon that includes reviews of Kaze no Hana and Kieli, as well as several other new and recent arrivals. Stay tuned!

SHIPPING THIS WEEK:
Cipher, Vol. 11 (CMX)
Hana-Kimi, Vol. 23 (Viz)
Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs, Vol. 8 (Viz)
Kaze no Hana, Vol. 1 (Yen Press)
Kieli, Vol. 1 (Yen Press)
Magical JXR, Vol. 2 (UDON)
Manga Great Figures in History: Leonarda da Vinci (YKids)
Manga Great Figures in History: Mother Teresa (YKids)
Manga Great Figures in History: Nelson Mandela (YKids)
Manga Literary Classics: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (YKids)
Manga Literary Classics: Daddy Long Legs (YKids)
Manga Literary Classics: The Prince and the Pauper (YKids)
Speed Racer: Mach Go Go Go Box Set, Vols. 1-2 (DMP)
Spiral: Bonds of Reasoning, Vol. 3 (Yen Press)
Street Fighter III Ryu Final, Vol. 2 (UDON)
Variante, Vol. 3 (CMX)
The Wallflower, Vol. 15 (Del Rey)

I found it a bit hard to find a good list of Yoshinaga’s work online in English, even on Wikipedia. Here is a list by year scraped together from Anime News Network’s Encyclopedia. (Pssst, DMP… ask your intern to log onto the ANN database and update it. Your Yoshinaga titles are under-represented!)

The Moon and the Sandals (1996)
Truly, Kindly (1997)
Solfege (1998)
Ichigenme…the First Class is Civil Law (1998)
Lovers in the Night (1999)
Garden Dreams (1999)
Antique Bakery (1999-2002)
Gerard & Jacques (2000)
Don’t Say Anymore, Darling (2004)
Ohoku (2005)
Flower of Life (2006)
Kinō Nani Tabeta (2007)

I’m looking forward to Ohoku, a matriarchal fantasy set in feudal Japan. Ohoku was the Winner of Excellence Prize of the Manga Division at the 2006 Japan Media Arts Festival. Kino Nania Tabeta? sounds like a fun return to hot guys eating delicious food.

The best page I’ve found dedicated to Yoshinaga is the The Fumi Yoshinaga Resource Index.

–Erin F.

Antique Bakery (DMP)

If I were to try explaining why the Antique Bakery is so damn tasty, I’d probably express it as a recipe:

2 cups passionate dialogue
2 cups hot men
1 cup mouth-watering pastries
½ cup interesting clientele
¼ cup yaoi
dash of humor
dash of melancholy

In a more analytical moment, however, I’d attribute Antique Bakery’s appeal to its characters; Yoshinaga assembles one of her most memorable casts in this four-volume work. There’s Keisuke, the bakery’s cranky owner, who was kidnapped by a cake-loving fanatic when he was a child (don’t ask—somehow it makes sense in the context of the manga); Ono, the pastry chef, former high school classmate of Keisuke, and “gay of demonic charm” (even straight men are helpless in his presence); Eiji, a cheerful young boxer who becomes Ono’s apprentice; and Chikage, a simple-minded but sweet friend of Keisuke who never, ever takes off his sunglasses.

Most of the series charts the ups and downs of Keisuke and Ono’s friendship, a friendship freighted with some serious baggage: on the last day of high school, Keisuke rudely rejected Ono’s advances, nearly breaking his spirit in the process. Yoshinaga enlivens her narrative with numerous subplots, some humorous–Chikage develops the hots for Ono–some serious–Ono must decide whether to reconcile with an abusive ex-boyfriend–and some downright delicious. Though there’s a lot of shop talk about the merits of various ingredients and the virtues of French pastries, Antique Bakery is, at heart, a slice-of-life drama about friendship. (I’d say, “male bonding,” but there isn’t much in Antique Bakery, and what little there is… well, it’s tame, even by daytime television standards.) If you’ve been wondering why so many reviewers have been singing Yoshinaga’s praises, why not start your survey with this delightful series?

–Katherine Dacey

Don’t Say Anything More, Darling (DMP)

The title is shouted at the end of the first chapter: “Don’t Say It! Don’t Say Anything More!” This bizarre short story anthology goes from fun and pleasant to weird and morbid at exactly page 72.

In the first fun short story (and my favorite), a 29-year-old “parasite single” doctor must come to terms with his feelings for his starving artist gay best friend from high school. Meanwhile, the doctor’s parents attempt to arrange a marriage. It’s cute and fun, with some sexy sex scenes.

The second story, “My Eternal Sweetheart” starts off fun: a rich orphan with a severe immune problem is confined to his mansion. Fortunately, he lives in an android-rich future, where his brother designs sexaroids to keep the lonely teen company. It’s pretty imaginative, although more than a little weird, but the story goes horribly wrong at page 72 when the boy starts killing the sexaroids! Brace yourself for a serious “WTF” twist ending.

The remaining shorts get weirder and more depressing: In “One May Day” a widower professor takes a second wife, but after one terribly faux pas they break up. In “Fairyland” a youth counselor thinks he’s the last person on earth until he meets the bullied teen who wished (successfully) for everyone in the world to die. In “Pianist,” a former pro piano player (who happens to be homosexual) considers suicide.

The story about the pianist has me really worried about the rules of yaoi. A younger man is about to sleep with the pianist when he suddenly freaks out:

“If you want to be the bottom at your age, then find yourself another old geezer like you, man! But if you’re still thinking, ‘Oh I wanna be held in the arms of a pretty young boy,’ then - I suggest you PAY for one.”

Does this imply the prettier, younger partner is always the uke? Do only ukes get cuddled? I think everyone needs cuddling sometimes!

I can see some patterns coming up in Yoshinaga’s work. “My Eternal Sweetheart” features the same 3-year age gap as Gerard and Jacques, as well as a fantasy premise. “One May Day” reminded me a bit of Garden Dreams.

I loaned this volume to a friend, and she concluded the shorter Yoshinaga’s works, the weirder they are. I really, really enjoyed the title story, “Don’t Say Anything More, Darling,” and I wish it were an entire series. Everything else in the book is downright unsettling. Nevertheless, Yoshinaga is a more accomplished storyteller here than in Solfege or Garden Dreams.

–Erin F.

Flower of Life (DMP)

I had a hard time getting into Antique Bakery and took a break between volumes two and three, but with Flower of Life I read each new volume immediately and with fannish rigor. I keep recommending it to people, including guys, but I have a hard time convincing them there’s no yaoi involved. Two of the characters are otaku, so as with Genshiken, I’m showing favoritism towards otaku-centric titles. I can’t explain what the title means, except as a reference to the protagonist, who struggled with cancer but enters high school healthy and filled with the enthusiasm of youth… This is a title about happiness.

–Erin F.

Fumi Yoshinaga’s geek-centric comedy focuses on a group of teens who invite their new classmate to join the manga club. Not much actually happens in Flower of Life; most chapters consist of passionate conversations between club members about—what else?—manga. Yoshinaga has a wonderful time poking fun at otakudom (including her usual bailiwick, boy’s love) while respecting the intensity and sincerity of her characters’ feelings. The result is both moving and laugh-out-loud funny. You’ve never seen a cultural festival storyline quite like the one in volume two… trust me on this one.

–Katherine Dacey

Garden Dreams (DMP)

Garden Dreams is an odd, unsatisfying collection of stories about a handsome musician who, courtesy of the Crusades, finds himself living in a foreign country with a kind but handsome nobleman who’s several decades his senior. Most of the book is devoted to a rather convoluted story in which the nobleman’s tragic past is revealed; like Gerard (of Gerard and Jacques fame), the baron has an unhappy marriage in his past that has predisposed him to prefer male companionship.

Anyone hoping for a good helping of smut will be sorely disappointed by Garden Dreams, as Yoshinaga never turns up the heat beyond a mild simmer—there’s far more explicit homoeroticism in, say, Tokyo Babylon or To Terra. Readers who favor Yoshinaga’s engaging talkfests over her boudoir tales will also be disappointed in Garden Dreams, as the characters never rise beyond the level of type; their conversations are rather banal and uninteresting, as is the unnecessarily twisty story that the nobleman relates. The artwork, like the plot and characters, doesn’t make much of an impression. Yoshinaga does little to situate her story in a specific time or place, save for a few concessions to period costume and instruments. (She earns a solid A in organology from this musicologist in training.) The sameness of her character designs is especially evident in the characters’ profiles and jawlines; the men and women would be interchangeable if not for their costumes.

It’s true that second- or third-rate Yoshinaga is still better than the majority of licensed manga on bookstore shelves, but when compared with her best work, Garden Dreams seems average at best.

–Katherine Dacey

Gerard and Jacques (BLU Manga)

Gerard and Jacques is a two-volume yaoi romance set in France just prior to the French Revolution. Jacques is sold into prostitution at age sixteen by his aristocrat parents. Gerard is a commoner who has made it big selling romance novels; he is Jacques’ first and only client at the whorehouse. The next day, by coincidence, Jacques is hired as a servant in Gerard’s mansion. Their formerly intimate relationship turns platonic until volume two, which is set three years later.

I was mislead by the Overlooked Manga Festival and assumed Gerard and Jacques was all sex scenes interrupted by political and economic lectures. Instead, the two books more closely follow the format of Moon and Sandals: volume one is mostly plot and volume two has more sex. However, the opening sex scene in volume one is surprisingly graphic, I mean, a sixteen-year-old is sodomized in the first twenty pages! I started the book on the subway, but opted to read the rest of the series at home!

The plot unfolds in four major sections. In the first quarter Jacques learns how to be a servant, leaving behind his aristocratic life. In the second quarter, we are given a jumble of flashbacks to Gerard’s past—he hates aristocrats and sleeps exclusively with young boys because his ex-wife was a huge aristocratic jerk. In the third quarter, Jacques’s pent-up sexual desire causes him to blow up in cartoon-y explosions until he learns to masturbate. The fourth quarter follows Gerard and Jacques as they struggle to survive the Reign of Terror.

The art is as accomplished as Antique Bakery. Gerard’s design is particularly dashing, with his eye-patch and scar. Characters’ costumes are detailed and work quite well. Backgrounds are a bit lacking, especially in volume one. Pre-revolution era France as a setting calls for lush post-Rococo interiors, but we’re lucky if Yoshinaga draws a decent fireplace.

A story set in this time period in France ought to be rife with scandalous sex, but Yoshinaga is no Marquis De Sade. More scandalous than Gerard’s deviant sex life is the attitude of his ex-wife toward her child. True love is valued more deeply in the story than deviant sex. The villainous members of the aristocracy appear incapable of love, and are given due punishment.

Although the plot structure is uneven, overall I was amused by the series. It lacks the personal moments of Flower of Life or Moon and Sandals in favor of fantasy-history. Gerard and Jacques is more compelling and coherent than Garden Dreams or Don’t Say Anything More Darling. I recommend it for its high amusement factor as well as the explicit sex.

–Erin F.

Ichigenme: The First Class is Civil Law (801 Media)

One of the things that distinguishes Fumi Yoshinaga’s work from that of other yaoi artists is her love of dialogue. In works like Antique Bakery and Flower of Life, she reminds us that conversation can be an aphrodisiac, especially when two people are analyzing a favorite book or confessing a mutually-shared passion for art, cooking, or manga, forging a connection and establishing the roles they’ll play (dominant or submissive) in the subsequent relationship. True to form, the sexiest scenes in Ichigenme: The First Class Is Civil law are, in fact, conversations between law professors and their students. We feel the erotic charge of more experienced scholars engaging their protégés in intense debates over legal procedure and philosophy, even when the topics themselves are rather dry.

Unfortunately, this kind of intensity doesn’t carry over to the other scenes of this two-volume series. Yes, there’s plenty of bedroom action as the carefree Tohdou helps his uptight, closeted classmate Tamiya explore his sexuality, while Tohdou’s brother—also gay—seduces a semi-closeted member of the law school’s faculty, but it’s all rather formulaic and vaguely drawn to avoid running afoul of obscenity rules. Yoshinaga is enough of a storyteller to make these scenes an integral part of Tamiya’s self-discovery process, rather than simple exercises in titillation, but the story still wants for more dramatic tension; all that talking, while interesting and maybe even sexy, never really leads anywhere.

–Katherine Dacey

Lovers in the Night and Truly, Kindly (BLU Manga)

Though I’m an enthusiastic champion of The Antique Bakery, and Flower of Life, I’m less excited about Fumi Yoshinaga’s straight-up yaoi. Gerard and Jacques, for example, struck me as an ungainly hybrid of not-very-sexy sex scenes and speeches cribbed from Rosseau for Dummies, while Ichigenme: The First Class Is Civil Law seemed like a poor girl’s Paper Chase. The overlapping Lovers in the Night and Truly, Kindly fall somewhere in between Antique Bakery and Ichingenme on the steaminess scale, but suffer from many of the same problems found in Yoshinaga’s more explicit titles.

Truly, Kindly is an is an anthology of seven stories, from a coming-out tale set in present-day Seattle to a going-straight (as in abandoning a criminal past… ahem) story set in Meiji-era Japan, while the stories in Lovers in the Night focus on two characters introduced in the final chapter of Truly, Kindly. (A butler with an eye patch and a young nobleman who likes to pout… are you beginning to see a pattern here?) Despite the diverse array of historical backdrops and storylines, Truly, Kindly induces déjà vu with its recycled character designs, clumsy socio-political lectures masquerading as conversation, and the “I didn’t realize how much I liked you until you forced yourself on me!” epiphanies that her uke characters experience. The last three stories—all of which take place in the years leading up to the French Revolution—exhibit another of Yoshinaga’s shortcomings: her inability to integrate tidbits on Versailles and Voltaire into a narrative without stopping it dead in its tracks. Though utterly forgettable, Lovers in the Night earns higher marks than Truly, Kindly for emphasizing steamy encounters between beautiful men in period costume over long-winded political discussions.

Still, there’s something endearing about Yoshinaga’s insistence on creating characters with real emotional lives and realistically handsome faces in a genre known primarily for its man-on-man action—it’s as if someone forgot to tell her she was writing porn, for pete’s sake.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

The Moon and Sandals (DMP)

Fumi Yoshinaga is the darling of the manga blogging world. Jason Thompson likes her, Shaenon Garrity likes her, and even Katherine, who doesn’t read much yaoi, likes her. So how does The Moon and Sandals compare with her other work: is it better than Antique Bakery? Not really. Is it as charming as The Flower of Life? Not exactly. Is there a lot of explicit gay sex? Why, yes there is!

There are five major characters. Kobayashi is a high school kid who falls for his world history teacher, a young man named Mr. Ida. Out of a naive bravery, Kobayashi goes to Mr. Ida’s house to make a move on him, only to be interrupted by Hashizume, Ida’s lover, who announces that he has quit his job to come live with Ida. Kobayashi runs out of the house, embarrassed. On the rebound, Kobayashi starts to fall for Toyo Narumi, a blonde boy nicknamed “Giant”. Giant hasn’t come to grips with being gay just yet. To complicate matters further, Giant’s little sister Naru has a crush on Kobayashi.

The Moon and Sandals gets a higher score from me for dealing with gay issues in a refreshing, realistic way. Hashizume must adopt Ida as his brother so landlords will rent to them. Kobayashi is not sure how to perform gay sex and buys a book from Ni-chome (Tokyo’s gay district) so he can do it with his boyfriend. Giant hurt a boy he liked in junior high just to prove to his classmates that he wasn’t gay. Characters discuss coming out to their coworkers and families. Even when Yoshinaga’s characters are standing outdoors dramatically in a typhoon and sustaining blood-drawing injuries while confessing their love, there is a certain honesty to her characterizations. Moments that would be melodramatic elsewhere are somehow believable here.

I only have a few hesitations about The Moon and Sandals. Ida and Hashizume get un-officially married before they have sex, but after they’ve been living together for months. It seems unrealistic in a yaoi title with realistic elements. Darker-haired characters fall for lighter haired characters as per strict yaoi genre conventions. Yoshinaga’s character designs are all similar. That said, if you like Fumi Yoshinaga, or yaoi, or both, I think you’ll like The Moon and Sandals.

–Erin F.

Solfege (DMP)

In this one-shot boy’s love romance, Kugayama, an elementary school music teacher, falls for Tanaka. Tanaka is a junior high student whom Kugayama is tutoring get into a music-focused high school. “Solfege” as defined in the book, is the study of music, specifically transcribing music by ear and singing. Tanaka begins showing signs of delinquency, skipping school and skipping music lessons. Due to a turbulent home life, Tanaka relies more and more on Kugayama for emotional support. Even after getting in to his music high school of choice, Tanaka comes to Kugayama for a place to stay when his nightclub hostess mother has men spend the night. Tanaka lives with Kugayama for a year while his mother is hospitalized.

The story focuses on Kugayama as he takes advantage of Tanaka’s desperation and neediness. Kugayama knows his relationship with Tanaka is morally wrong. However, as the become live-in lovers, the elementary school choir improves, and Kugayama realizes his quality of life has gone up with love.

The backgrounds are sketchy to the point of being non-existent at times. Flipping back through the book again I can almost forgive the white backgrounds for Yoshinaga’s expressive linework. The character designs are typical of Yoshinaga’s work; A light-haired teacher takes advantage of a naive tall brunette - it’s always a naive tall brunette. I was particularly enamored of Tsumoir’s hair (the only girl character) early in the book, but at the end she’s got a ridiculous perm.

Instead of dwelling on the forbidden-ness of the relationship, Yoshinaga sketches interpersonal moments in a very long term on-again off-again relationship. The jumps in time over eight years are a bit overwhelming, if not unbelievable. The story begins in an ordinary place - Tanaka is not a particularly talented singer, Kugayama is not an extraordinary teacher. Things take a turn for the fantastic as Tanaka becomes a famous singer in Italy and Kugayama is violently attacked by an ex-lover. Fortunately (or perhaps ridiculously) Yoshinaga does not seem capable of writing a truly tragic ending.

Compared to other Yoshinaga books, the characters in Solfege eat fewer delicious foods (there is one hotpot scene). It’s missing the humor of Flower of Dreams and it’s not as bizarre as Garden Dreams and not as sexy as The Moon and Sandals. Nevertheless, Solfege is an amusing one-shot. It’s a very middle-of-the-road work for Yoshinaga, but a very satisfying read compared to other BL one-shots.

–Erin F.

This month’s Manga Minis column has enough high-fallutin’ cultural references to please even Harold Bloom. Whether or not he’d cotton to the actual manga reviewed—which include the eleventh volume of Claymore (Viz), the eighth volume of Nana (Viz), the first volume of Vampire Hunter D (DMP), Y Square (Yen Press), and the second volume of Zombie Loan (Yen Press)—remains to be seen. Our February feature is notable also for its contributors. Joining me and Erin are Chloe Ferguson, the newest member of the Manga Recon team, and Ninja Consultant Noah, Erin’s podcasting partner-in-crime (and life). Welcome, Chloe and Noah!

Claymore, Vol. 11

By Norihiro Yagi
Viz, 192 pp.
Rating: Older Teen (16+)

Pity the poor, medieval villagers of Claymore. Their town is infiltrated by shape-shifting yoma, they have no choice but to hire mercenary warrior women toting enormous swords—who are themselves half-demons—from a shadowy Organization, and pray that should the whole thing go south, they aren’t left with something infinitely worse on their hands. “Battle not with monsters,” warns Nietzsche, “lest ye become one.” It’s a lesson these “silver-eyed witches” know all too well; for if a Claymore pushes her supernatural powers too far, the yoma within overtakes her soul and she transforms into a creature far more powerful and hideous than a yoma: an Awakened One.

Volumes 1 - 10 of Claymore chart the progress of Clare, a tenacious but low-ranking member of the Claymore order, who adopts the orphaned boy Raki after a yoma she is sent to kill first devours his parents. As a child, Clare herself was taken under the wing of a Claymore, whose death at the hands of a colleague-turned-Awakened One has led Clare to swear vengeance, and often requires her to tackle foes far beyond her weight class. This leads to her partial Awakening, and results in an uneasy relationship with the Organization, whose inclination, it seems, is to eliminate any of their agents they deem on the verge of losing control and going rogue.

Volume 11 finds Clare fighting shoulder-to-shoulder with her fellow Claymores against a large contingent of Awakened Ones in the frozen northern town of Pieta. Normally solitary, the creatures have joined together for unclear reasons and are grinding their way through the female warriors with blood-drenched abandon. Clare takes on Rigaldo, the Silver Eyed Lion King (!), who proves to be more than she can possibly handle without far exceeding her limit. The Awakened Ones fall upon the remaining fighters, and Raki, now unknowingly in the company of the monster who slew Clare’s foster mother, is hundreds of miles away.

The body count is so high, and speed lines drawn with such reckless abandon it can sometimes be difficult to follow the action; not to mention that each Claymore is more or less identical but for a slightly different hairstyle. There is much meat to this volume however, and very little dead air. When the fighting is over, the action immediately gives way to intrigue as the machinations of the Organization and the ambitions of the most powerful Awakened Ones are revealed.

If you’re not a fan of this series, no amount of oversized sword-swinging or spontaneous dismemberment contained herein will make you one; but if you are a fan, you will certainly not want to wait until July 2008 for the next volume.

–Reviewed by Ninja Consultant Noah F.

Nana, Vol. 8

By Ai Yazawa
Viz, 192 pp.
Rating: Mature

A soap opera is only as good as its most recent plot twist, and in volume eight of Nana, Ai Yazawa uncorks a doozy: Hachi discovers she’s pregnant. Forced to accept the consequences of her boy-crazy behavior, Hachi must decide whether to remain with new love Nobu or return to Trapnest hottie Takumi. (I just love typing that phrase—kudos to the copy editor who coined it.) Yazawa does an excellent job of evoking Hachi’s loneliness and fear, using spare, stripped-down layouts that make Hachi look small and overwhelmed by her surroundings. When Yazawa puts words into Hachi and Nana’s mouths, however, the results are less effective, reading more like an earnest public service announcement about birth control than real-life drama. Though these exchanges have a didactic quality to them, they do serve an important role, reminding us that Hachi has reached a crucial moment in her adult life: she can no longer afford to be the sweetly feckless groupie who avoids responsibility through her bed-hopping and job-hopping. What she decides to do next, and whether Nana will support her choice, should provide plenty of dramatic grist for at least five or six volumes.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

Vampire Hunter D, Vol. 1

By Saiko Takaki
DMP, 250 pp.
Rating: Older Teen

Vampire Hunter D is Saiko Takaki’s debut manga, commissioned by DMP in America. Takaki writes about his experiences drawing the book in the author’s notes - DMP gave almost no editorial feedback, only artistic notes, as poor Takaki stumbled in the dark, writing the entire book in one go and balding from stress. The road to editing manga is a long one, and although DMP and Tokyopop have taken their first steps into the field, they still have a lot to learn.

I can’t remember if the manga closely follows the plot of the movie and I’ve never read the novel series. There is considerably less evil-dinosaur and random-demon fighting in this manga version of the story, but rest assured it still takes place in 12,090 AD with plenty of cybernetic horses. For an analysis of Adam Smith’s invisible hand theory as it relates to the vampiric aristocracy, be sure to check out this podcast.

The plot is obviously like a Western: the mysterious dhampir D rides into town and offers to protect the orphaned Doris and her younger brother. Doris has been bitten by the vampire Count Lee, who has an eye to marry her—if the townfolk don’t kill Doris with torches and pitchforks first. Doris’s little brother is a stereotype and the love story is painstakingly predictable.

The artwork uses a lot of heavy lines, giving the book a dark look and feel. The figure drawing is very accomplished, and Doris’s breasts are very, very accomplished. She appears naked at least twice, and occasionally a sound effect appears near her bust. Whether it was intentionally comedic or not is up for debate. The story reads like a rough draft of a much better story. The chapter divisions seemed clunky as the book plodded on. The dialog read very smoothly and I enjoyed the purple-edged pages, but otherwise, I’d recommend reading the original novels and seeing the films instead.

Reviewed by Erin F.

Y Square

By Judith Park
Yen Press, 184 pp.
Rating: Older Teen

Judith Park takes a stock manga premise—boy-crazy teen seeks love coach—and turns it on its head. Her protagonist, Yoshitaka Kogirei, isn’t a ditzy, love-starved girl, but a wannabe ladies’ man whose cheesy pick up lines, lecherous behavior, and crude language send his classmates running for the exits. Enter Yagate, a new student who’s an immediate hit with the girls. After watching Yoshitaka offend yet another prospective date, Yagate agrees to mentor Yoshitaka until he can make a love connection on his own.

From a tonal perspective, Y Square reads like a shonen romance with a healthy dose of fan service, including a textbook example of the I-saw-you-naked scene. The artwork, however, has a distinctly shojo feel. If Park’s style were more polished, this hybrid aesthetic might seem innovative instead of incongruous. But her indiscriminate use of screentone and her frequent juxtaposition of crude sight gags with girly, floral backgrounds make for a visually chaotic layout. The other major drawback to Y Square is its lead character. Though Yagate insists that underneath Yoshitaka’s “tough shell” is a “heart full of charm and romance,” Park does a poor job of showing the reader that Yoshitaka is, in fact, a decent guy who just doesn’t know how to talk to girls. (He behaves like a boor throughout the entire volume, insulting girls who rebuff him and announcing that “watching porn” is one of his hobbies.) Still, Y Square does have some genuinely funny moments as Yagate tries to smooth out his protege’s rough edges with advice pilfered from Queer Eye for the Straight Guy: The Fab 5’s Guide to Looking Better, Cooking Better, Dressing Better, Behaving Better, and Living Better. Too bad it didn’t seem to sink in.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

Zombie Loan, Vol. 2

By Peach-Pit
Yen Press, 194 pp.
Rating: Older Teen

Now into its second volume, I’d love to say that that Zombie Loan took the potential fun parts of volume one and ran with them. Regrettably, this is not the case, and creative collective Peach-Pit sells its title short by busting out clichés en masse while attempting to wrangle with a convoluted central plot. Protagonist Michiru’s acquisition of a backbone is a welcome change, but there’s not much movement on any character front throughout the book particularly those of equally important zombie hunters Shito and Chika. Instead, Peach-Pit shunts two new characters into the fray in the form of an… erm, overly friendly female dorm mate of Michiru’s and Shiba, an old friend of Chika’s who serve little purpose other than to stir up some superficial controversy. The title’s obligatory dose of creepy is supplied by a maniacal serial killer named “The Butterfly” who engages in everything from cult killings to illicit zombie manufacture. Of course, it’s up to our young protagonists to track down and eliminate the aforementioned killer, whose Raskolnikov-esque street wandering tendencies keep him popping up all over the book. Now if only Peach-Pit would stop impeding their progress with boatloads of tired clichés, the protagonists might actually be able to spot him…

–Reviewed by Chloe Ferguson

For this column I got to read two books by publishers I haven’t read much from: Go! Comi and Yen Press. It occurred to me later that King of the Lamp is kind of the girl’s equivalent of Sundome. It’s just a theory… Without further ado, here’s Heroes Are Extinct!!, Vol. 3, King of the Lamp, and Sundome, Vol. 1

Heroes Are Extinct!!, Vol. 3

By Ryoji Hido
DMP, 200 pp.
Rating: 13+

This tokusatsu parody manga wraps up in volume three, released on January 15th.

Katherine and I have reviewed the previous two volumes here and here and a little bit here.

I found volumes one and two had good moments, but the simplistic, hastily-done, anime-style art really bothered me. For most of the team working on the manga, this was their first professional work. The original concept was intended as a pitch for an anime series. I think I would have liked this as an anime OVA rather than a manga series. By volume three the art improved greatly, but I never found the character designs appealing.

In volume three the Bazue Empire attacks earth for real–unlike in volumes one and two where aliens Cassiel and Jude faked an invasion to play Power Rangers with earthlings. We learned in volume two that Cassie is actually from Earth. It’s a cute twist, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say that is totally racist. Cassiel would have been a more interesting character if he really was an alien bent on creating heroes to protect earth based on a love of Japanese television.

I really couldn’t get into the Bazue Army political drama which opens volume three. I couldn’t remember the various generals from the other volumes, and I even confused Jude and Aster! Had I read the entire series at once, or followed it in a weekly magazine, I might have had an easier time of it.

I was more interested in the Earth Terra Force characters than the Bazue military royalty. Unfortunately, Terra Force gets very little face-time in this volume.

The conclusion is satisfying and over-the-top, and fits well with the rest of the story. Despite the bad art, Hido’s love for the characters and the genre flow out the pages. In some ways, it’s similar to watching the original Doctor Who series: the writer’s love pours through in the best episode, despite the extremely poor special effects.

Nevertheless, I can’t imagine why anyone other than Mike Dent, the tokusatsu podcaster, would buy this series, especially at a higher-than-average cover price of $12.95. Statistically, there may be many Mike Dents in the world, but I’m not confident the real Mike Dent will like the series. I plan on sending it to him as soon as this review is posted.

King of the Lamp

By Takako Shigematsu
Go! Comi, 200 pp.
Rating: 16+ (Older Teen)

I haven’t read much by Go! Comi! A.I. Revolution and Love Master A fell a little flat. I was pleasantly surprised to find King of the Lamp to be a light-hearted and bizarre anthology of smut. Unfortunately it’s more fun to summarize than to actually read, since the over-toned art really drags the book down.

Rather than a traditional genie, a king is sentenced to live in a lamp as punishment for having a harem of 1,000 stolen women. Instead of granting wishes outright, the King demands payment; a kiss for small wishes, and second base for larger favors. In each chapter the King grants the wishes of a different client/girl/victim.

The King must help out 1,000 girls to free himself from the lamp. He helps three in this volume, leaving only 986 girls to go. The rest of the book is padded out with a short story about a girl who is adopted by a pair of un-aging male incubi. The girl falls in love with one of them after coming of age. (WTF SRSLY: “You are my adopted daughter but since you’re 18 now let’s get it on.”)

Takako Shigematsu, who is also the author of Tenshi Ja Nai!! (I’m No Angel), adequately portrays the King’s character as a prankster without delving too deep. The bulk of the girl cast is not terribly interesting. At first I expected monkey’s paw endings to each girls’ wish. Every chapter could easily become “comeuppance theater” but it doesn’t. For example, in one chapter a girl is jealous of her sister’s boyfriend. When the boy goes blind temporarily because of an accident, the girl wishes for her sister’s voice so she can care for her crush in the hospital. In comeuppance theater the boy might marry the girl’s sister after regaining his sight, but in King of the Lamp, the boy realizes he has fallen in love with the other sister. They then have sex, which is how every chapter ends.

The paneling is not terribly adept - in one scene a girl drops a tray of hospital food which is abruptly cleaned up by the next page. The action wasn’t clear and I read the sequence twice to understand it. Many pages look crowded or cluttered. The high point of the art is the King’s character design. He’s a hottie, but his tanned skin ultimately adds to the over-toned look of the book.

The make-out scenes are surprisingly graphic compared to the manga I usually read. Nothing ridiculously explicit happens and for the most part the sex is off-camera, but holy crow, his face is in her crotch there…! Instead of anyone learning a lesson, each story ends with the happy [teenage] couple getting it on.

Slightly amusing but ultimately forgettable, smutty but not pornographic, King of the Lamp could have a sequel, but stops just short of the King reaching his goal.

Sundome, Vol. 1

By Kazuto Okada
Yen Press, 208 pp.
Rating: M (Mature)

When I first started reviewing for Manga Recon in 2005, I hadn’t read much manga. My early reviews dwelled on the different methods of handling sound effects–I used to enjoy Del Rey’s best, but now I like Viz’s full translation for faster reading. This is my first Yen Press title. Yen translates sound effects in teeny-tiny letters in the gutters between panels, beginning each translation with “SFX:”. I found this distracting, it slowed me down as I read the “SFX” acronym aloud in my head.

Some of the dialog was printed too close to the binding, and I couldn’t open the book wide enough to read it. This would be a bigger problem if I were reading the book standing on the subway, however, since Sundome is explicit I didn’t take chances. My decision was justified: The book features drawing after drawing of erections (in jeans) and… let’s just say “c_m_l t___s”.

Hideo Aiba is a member of the “Roman” club in his high school. Roman in this instance means “Romance,” therefore, the club “researches” ghosts, aliens, and mysteries. Virginity is required for membership, so all the members are total losers, and all males, until Kurumi Sahana transfers in.

The attractive (although frankly creepy) and popular Sahana attaches herself to the Roman Club, and specifically Aiba. Sahana kicks off a bizarre relationship with Aiba, whom vows never to sleep with, however, she promises to torture Aiba to the point of near-ejaculation. Sundome, in Japanese, literally means “stopping the moment before,” as explained in the useful translator’s notes.

Sahana coerces Aiba into a number of extremely physically painful situations–sticking a nail in his penis, being crushed by a member of the judo club–and then rewards him with a semi-sexual favors, like untying the side of her side-tying underwear. Aiba decides this is better than being rejected, and despite the genital bleeding, he misses Sahana desperately the first day of summer vacation.

I found the book neither funny nor titillating. Everything is toned too dark, and the characters designs are unappealing. Sundome seems to (ironically?) stop at the point just before it would be truly ugly or cute or sexy or funny. The front cover is kind of sexy, but the pin-up chapter break drawings of Sahana wearing transparent underwear just get weirder and grosser as the book proceeds.

Although I’m not the target audience for this, I do enjoy bawdy sexual humor, like Golden Boy, Ping Pong Club, High School Girls, Beavis and Butthead, Superbad, and most Adult Swim shows, but I’m not sure who would want to pay $12.99 for this. At least DMP’s $13 books have dust jackets.