The last few weeks have found me in tough grader mode, as I’ve doled out my share of Cs and Ds to new manga that underwhelmed me with their confusing plots and muddled art. To dispel lingering rumors that I am, in fact, a distant relative of Oscar the Grouch, I’ve dedicated this week’s column to three books I’d recommend to anyone: volume one of Blood+ (Dark Horse), volume three of Gon (CMX), and volume seven of Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs (Viz). And if dogs and dinos aren’t your bag, you’ll find plenty of other great books on the new arrival rack, from the third volume of critically acclaimed Mushishi (Del Rey) to the twelfth volume of Kekkaishi (Viz), a series I never tire of championing. Need persuading? Then consider Shaenon Garrity’s glowing endorsement of this totally engrossing shonen series:

The premise sounds like something that could be developed into a pulse-pounding adventure/horror series, but that’s not the way the manga plays out. It’s a little quieter, a little quirkier, and, at least to my mind, a lot more interesting… What I like about Kekkaishi is that the whole defending-the-sacred-site plot quickly falls out of focus and becomes a backdrop for all kinds of episodic, mostly character-driven adventures: funny stories, creepy stories, tragic stories. The characters have unexpected quirks and undiscovered layers.

Let’s hope Viz has the good sense to license the anime… soon. I’m jonesing for a Tokine lunchbox.

SHIPPING THIS WEEK
Alive: The Final Evolution, Vol. 3 (Del Rey)
Apothecarius Argentum, Vol. 4 (CMX)
Be With You (Viz)
The Drifting Classroom, Vol. 10 (Viz)
Everlasting Love (DMP)
Golgo 13, Vol. 13 (Viz)
Hana-Kimi, Vol. 22 (Viz)
Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs, Vol. 7 (Viz)
Kekkaishi, Vol. 12 (Viz)
Kitchen Princess, Vol. 5 (Del Rey)
Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Vol. 6 (Dark Horse)
Mushishi, Vol. 3 (Del Rey)
Naoki Urasawa’s Monster, Vol. 13 (Viz)
NOW, Vol. 3 (Infinity Studios)
The Palette of 12 Secret Colors, Vol. 2 (CMX)
Path of the Assassin, Vol. 9 (Dark Horse)
Rod Espinosa’s New Alice in Wonderland (Antarctic Press)

Blood+, Vol. 1

By Asuka Katsura
Dark Horse, 208 pp.
Rating: 14+

The received wisdom among otaku is that anime based on manga may, in fact, be as good if not better than the original source material, while manga based on anime are often hastily conceived, poorly executed products designed to capitalize on a franchise’s popularity. I’m happy to report that Blood+ is a stellar exception to the rule, proving that even the most faithful adaptation can be as satisfying—if not more—than the original.

For those unfamiliar with the Blood+ franchise (or Blood: The Last Vampire, a series of manga, anime, and movies that relate an earlier chapter in the saga), the story goes something like this: Saya, a seemingly ordinary high school student, lives with a foster family on Okinawa. Though her general disposition is cheerful—even ditzy—Saya can’t shake the feeling that her persistent amnesia is, in fact, protecting her from memories of a terrifying experience, a feeling exacerbated by sudden, incomprehensible flashbacks to jungle combat. With monsters. (Actually, hematophagous monsters, according to the Wikipedia.) A passionate kiss from a sexy, cello-playing stranger unlocks Saya’s memories, revealing that she is actually a sword-wielding crusader with the unique ability to slay these blood-sucking creatures. Saya must then decide if she will team up with the “tall and flawlessly handsome” Hagi to fight chiropterans, or if she will remain with her adoptive family in the hopes of leading a normal life.

If the story’s premise evokes hundreds of other manga about average janes who manifest world-saving powers, its political subtext and crisp artwork leave a powerful impression. Blood+’s treatment of US-Japanese relations is about as subtle as MW’s, positing that American military forces have been conducting sinister genetic experiments on Okinawan soil. Yet this conspiracy adds a much-needed element of interest to a very tired plot, giving voice to Japanese ambivalence about America’s continued military presence. The artwork, like the multi-layered plot, enhances the series’ appeal. Asuka Katsura captures the look and feel of the anime—from its tropical setting to its elongated, stylized character designs—without slavishly reproducing the early episodes cell by cell. Her fight scenes are a model of clarity and economy, suggesting the intensity of combat without excessive reliance on speed lines.

But what I like best about Blood+—and where I think the manga improves on the original anime—is its unapologetic mixture of balls-to-the-wall action, family drama, and romanticism. All of these elements are present in the anime, but its languid pace and tin-eared voice acting often pulled me out of the story. The manga, however, moves more briskly, with Atsura achieving a better balance between domestic drama and chiropteran slaying. The manga’s other great advantage over the anime is that Hagi seems mysterious and sexy instead of a preposterous, cello-playing conceit (a characterization reinforced by Crispin Freeman’s arch, bored line readings). My only question: how does Hagi bow with that bandage-wrapped hand?

Volume one of Blood+ is available now.

Gon, Vol. 3

By Masashi Tanaka
CMX, 140 pp.
Rating: Teen (Violence)

The latest volume of this wordless series features three of my favorite stories: “Gon Goes Down the Big River,” a travelogue documenting Gon’s encounters with Amazon dwellers fierce and friendly; “Gon Goes Mushroom Hunting,” an amusing tale in which Gon consumes vast quantities of toadstools, with predictably psychedelic results; and “Gon Fights With Wolf Brothers,” a poignant story that pits a litter of orphaned pups against a tiger. Masashi Tanaka’s artwork is old school in the best sense, employing cross-hatching and delicate lines in lieu of screentone to create volume and depth. His panels are astonishingly detailed yet never fussy or poorly composed—if anything, Tanaka’s technique yields sharper images than the contemporary practice of mixing computer-generated fill with hand-drawn lines. Though Tanaka endows his creatures with unusually expressive faces, he resists the urge to fully anthropomorphize them; their behavior seem species-appropriate. (The elephants don’t wear spats or drive automobiles, the dogs don’t pretend to be World War I flying aces.) His restraint inoculates Gon against a terminal case of the cutes, resulting in a sometimes funny, sometimes violent look at various animal habitats through the eyes of a Jurassic auslander.

Volume three of Gon is available now.

Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs, Vol. 7

By Yukiya Sakuragi
Viz, 222 pp.
Rating: Older Teen

Each volume of Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs follows a similar formula, mixing a few chapters of comic relief with longer story arcs dramatizing a Serious Problem (e.g. puppy mills) or showing us how a Woofles pup finds the perfect home. Volume seven opens with a textbook example of the latter, a shamelessly manipulative story of a bereaved little girl who forms a sudden attachment to a dachshund puppy. This story epitomizes what’s good—and bad—about Inubaka. On the plus side, the artwork is clean and cute, emphasizing the vulnerability of kid and dog; we want this sad little girl to find solace in canine company. On the minus side, Yukiya Sakuragi packs this brief episode with enough melodrama for a Victorian potboiler: was it really necessary for the girl’s brother to have been run over by a school bus right before the mother’s eyes? Or for the girl to believe the dachshund is the reincarnation of her brother? Great merciful heavens—Dickens never tugged so shamelessly on the heartstrings, and he trafficked in orphans! Still, it’s hard to dislike a series that manages to educate and entertain at the same time, especially when the basic curriculum promotes the dog-tested, Cesar Milan-approved formula of discipline, exercise, and love in equal measure.

Volume seven of Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs is available now.