A Bride's Story Volume 1

By Kaoru Mori, released in English by Yen Press

A Bride's Story is the story of Amir Halgal, a young lady of 20 years sent of from her tribe to an arranged marriage in the 19^th century on the silk road. Her husband is 8 years her younger and we follow her and him as she adjusts to her new life in the village. Over these 5 chapters we are treated to some of the more splendid bits of manga story telling out there, resulting in a book that is a great read.

One of the first things you'll notice with Mori's work is the detail in the design work of the manga. The panel lay out here is breathtaking, as the full page spreads give pull you into the action and the pacing of the story. Design work is elegant and beautiful, resulting in some of the most beautiful clothing designs I've seen in a manga for awhile. And the full page spreads are a delight to see as they help convey the setting in a way few comics and manga do.

Of course all this would be for naught if the characters weren't good, and luckily here we have a great lead. Amir is a strong, interesting character who get to know first through a well done action scene of her hunting a rabbit on horseback. Over these pages we get to see how resourceful she is and her skill and toughness. Her softer side is shown later in the volume when she takes care of her husband Karluk, worrying more about him than her own healthy.

Karluk is well done here as well, portrayed nicely as a man between his youth and soon to be blossoming adulthood. He is unsure in places, but is also strong when he needs to be. It is to Mori's credit that the relationship between the two is handled in a mature way, as we feel the care between them as well as the issues they must face.

Yen Press did a bang up job with this volume, as the hardcover is one of the more beautiful for a manga release I've seen. The paper quality is top notch and the art work is reproduced sharply. Add in a fabulous translation by William Flannagan and you have one of the better English titles on the marketplace. Yen should be congratulated for releasing and doing such a high quality job on this title.

A Bride's Story is the type of manga I'd love to see more of in English. A mature, slow paced story told beautifully through some breathtaking full page spreads. There isn't much else like this out there in English and it deserves to be read by everyone. My highest recommendation to pick up and read.

20th Century Boys Volume 14 review

By Naoki Uraswa, Published in English by Viz Media

                With the passing of friend in the last volume, one would think the next volume would be tying up loose ends. But as Urasawa has done throughout 20^th century boys he ends up again twisting expectations and in the process of answering some questions creates even more suspense. It makes for another good volume, though the constant reveals are starting to wear just a bit thin in places. 

                The volume starts with the massive public memorial for friend, and the friendship parties continued internal purge of less than loyal members.  Manjome is at a loss at what to do, though some want him to become the leader he is lost without friend. So he decides to head into the virtual world of 1971 to seek answers.  Kanna and Yoshitune have the same idea, and convince Koizumi to head back to friend land as well. Yoshitune and Kyoko than end up heading back to 1971 together to search for answers as well, with eventually Kanna joining them as well. 

                In terms of plot this is a light volume as it feels like everything is mostly setup here. We do see Kami-sama in the past running a bowling alley and how Manjome first met friend. But in terms of big plot development we don’t have lots here. We do have nice bits of character moments, including when Kanna runs into Kenji and Donkey in the past. It gives the series a chance to catch its breath a bit, which is nice given the pace of the last few volumes. 

                Things pick up again though when we see what Donkey saw in the high school class room back in 71. Here Manjome, Kanna, Koizumi and Yoshitune see the origin of friend and see him come back to life. His return to life is less dramatic than one would think, but seeing him remove the VR headset from Manjome is a powerful scene. And it’s a pretty good cliff hanger going into the next volume. 

                Uraswa is still a top notch master of suspense as he slowly ratchets up the tension in the volume until the dramatic return of Friend. But the story is also starting to strain a bit under the massive weight of the plot twists and turns the genre calls for. Hopefully this is the start of the end as any more plot reveals will start to lose its impact and the character drama would start to take a back seat to plot. That’s usually when this kind of work starts to lose its impact and the reader becomes numb to the shocks and turns. 

                But 20^th century boys isn’t there yet and is still one of the better reads published in English. Viz again has done another great job adapting the work, as it’s very readable and does a good job of explaining any cultural bits. As long as the end is near we should be in for a great ride.

Excel Saga Volume 22 - Review

By Rikdo Koshi, Released in English by Viz Media

      Volume 22 of Excel Saga continues to start the beginning of the end of the series. The plot is heavy in this volume once again as Rikdo starts laying the ground work for the final arc. Not that the silliness of the earlier volumes is forgotten, instead it is ramped up even more in places. In the end it makes for a healthy mix of story and chaos that makes Excel Saga such a fun read.

      We begin the volume with Excel and Elgala continuing to hideout on the river bank. Here we get to see the start of a running theme in this volume, Excel's manic genius making insane yet reasonable plans based on the situation. She still acts on crazy logic and her loyalty to Il Palazzo, but more often than not her actions are based on sound logic. Excel easily notices that she is under surveillance on the river bank and decides to do some spying.

       She heads back to Shiouji's lab and flashback to her time as Teriha. She ends up getting captured by Matsuya and company, which leads to the start of Matsuya starting to steal the volume. Her questioning of Excel and stating her motivations of her actions (she just wants to live a normal life) lead to some great comedy. Not to mention she has the best kiss of the manga, as she and Iwata finally kiss. But just not in the way anybody would expect, except it makes perfect sense for the manga. Her reaction to being kidnapped by Excel is also awesome, making her the character of the volume.

      Shiouji also has a few good moments, as he does some field work spying on Excel. He also lays out his motivations as well, being cryptic much to the annoyance of Matsuya and Excel. We get more hints that his mother, Miwa, may be the true ring leader of the chaos in the series. And he also gets involved in a rather amusing fight with Elgala near the end.

       

        But perhaps the best part of the volume was the Excel/Robot Excel fight where Excel easily beats her robot double. We learn a lot about the robot here, in between some amusing domestic scenes of her living together with the across girls. And we end the volume with her holding a fainted Hyatt being run into by Watanabe. We end the volume with him powering up which is a fairly mean cliff hanger and makes me wish we didn't have top wait 6 months to a year for the next volume.

         For fans of the series this is more of what makes Excel Saga really good. Rikdo ability to mix plot with absurd satire and silliness is in full effect here. And once again Carl Horn does another bang up job translating the jokes, making it one of the better reading titles in English. Plus the oubliette section is an amazing read as always, with some great insight into Japanese culture and translating. It may be hard to track down (Volume 2 is hard to find/expensive) but if you do give the entire series a read. Excel Saga is one of the better comedy manga published and it deserves to be read by more people.

Oh My Goddess Volume 38 Review

By Kyosuke Fujishima, released in English by Dark Horse

At 38 volumes Oh My Goddess is the longest running English manga in North America. By now the readers should have a good idea with what they are getting out of the series, and what the series should produce. It's the closest thing to comfort food the manga industry has out there. Sadly no matter how much you like the dish, sometimes the comfort food can end up being very bland. And volume 38 is very much a forgettable volume except for the final chapters at the end.

The bulk of this volume is spent finishing off the Chrono arc started in the last volume. She is almost finished gathering the remnants of the song program, but needs to get the last part which is stuck in Vesper. Sadly Chrono has a fear of cats and is unable to take the song out of him using normal means. Keiichi and Belldandy suggest tackling it from a different perspective, and Keiichi shows how Chrono can use rhythm in another fashion.

What follows is Chrono using martial art to dance and take the song fragment out from Vesper. It does lead to an amusing scene of Chrono using a Hadoken on Urd, but for the most part it's pretty paint by number for this series. Chrono and Belldandy work together to finish the task, Chrono learns an important lesson about herself and things continue on at the temple as they always do. Though Belldandy hugging Keiichi was cute.

The problem is not so much that we've seen this plot before in the series, if you've been following along for this long you should be used to it by now. No what makes the start of the volume drag is that Chrono is pretty uninteresting as a character. From her wearing a maid outfit to her fear of cats, Chrono feels like Fujishima stuck in a variety of moe tropes to form her character. It makes her a bland lead for an arc, especially compared against Lind and Peroth. The fact the arc was pretty uninteresting doesn't do her any favours either. It's not a bad read, but an easily skip-able chapter in the series all the same.

Luckily the final 3 chapters of the book pick up steam with what looks to be a better arc. We again focus on Hild, which is good as she is one of the better characters. It seems like she is the target

of a coupe from her second in command, Hagal. It actually works, and we are left with Chibi-Hild in the human world forced to go to Belldandy and Keiichi for help. All the while Hagal is starting her take over of Hell, including trying to bring her reign to Earth.

We haven't seen much of Hagal yet, but what we have seen already pegs her as a great character. Her design has just the right amount of sinister to it pegging her as a bad guy in the series, and she has a great comedic exchange with Hild's captain of the guard. We also get shown a glimpse of her power which does have some promise to provide some spice to the series. She almost steals the show here, but that honour goes to Sayoko again in this volume as she gets her wish granted in a hilarious way.

Oh My Goddess! Volume 38 shows the perils of a long running series, but it also shows why it is also still a good read. For as much as the first half drags the second half moves along briskly and sets up the potential for an interesting story arc. It won't win any new readers, but despite its faults it can still be one of the more pleasant reads if you are used to its pace.

Twin Spica Vol 1 Review

                By Kou Yaginuma, released in English Vertical Inc.

                                Asumi Kamogawa’s past and future in Twin Spica volume 1 is tied to the stars. She dreams of going to space and takes the exam for Tokyo’s space school behind here fathers back. But the tragedy of her past is also tied into space. Both are explored here in an excellent opening volume of the manga that combines hard sci-fi with whimsical fantasy and a bitter sweet look at the past.

 

                For this manga Kou Yaginuma goes with a cartoonish look, which is jarring at first but fits the tone of the story greatly. It gives the opening story a dreamy, fairy tale look as our heroine is talking about her exam with what appears to be her imaginary friend Mr. Lion. And yet when we learn of the first failure of the Japanese space program the art style holds up and adds to the drama and heart break of the series. 

                It continues when we follow Asumi to space school. She is placed with 2 strangers, Kei Oumi and Marika Ukita, and they are forced to take a 7 day isolation test by working together to create a domino exhibit.  In between the three of them working together flash back to more of Asumi’s past and the fate of her mother.

                It can be hard to mix different genres together, but Yaginuma does to great effect in the second half of the volume. The flashbacks to Asumi’s past tug at your heart but also fill you with hope. And the test in the room is the perfect mix of human drama as Asumi and Kei butt heads with Marika yet the three of them rise to the challenge and finish the test. It’s a typical genre trope, but it works to great effect and the flashbacks give it added weight and drama. And it sets up the next volume nicely by making us want to read more about the girls in space school. 

                Kou Yaginuma has done a great job setting up his world in this volume. By mixing in the spiritual, almost fantasy like elements at the end with the sci-fi edge gives the series a unique feeling. The pacing is perfect and the characters are endearing and draw your interest easily. And you really want to read more after finishing the 1^st volume, which is the sign of any good manga. 

                Vertical once again picked another top notch manga to bring over, and their translation is top notch. It read very smoothly in English and never drags. It’s a great read for all ages and is one of the better sci fi manga series being published in English. It is a series any manga or sci-fi fan needs to check out.

K-on anime Volume 1 Review - Bluray

Released on Bluray in North America by Bandai Entertainment

    Finally, after exploding in popularity in the Internet we have K-on on BluRay/DVD in English. It’s been awhile in coming, and I suspect it took a bit as the slow down in the industry and other popular net shows not selling well with the market shrinking. (I’m looking at you Nanoha). And it’s safe to say it was worth the wait as this is one of Bandai’s better releases.

    The plot is pretty simple, if non-existent for the most part. Yui Hirasawa is starting high school and wants to join a club. She picks the light music club as she thinks it’ll be easy and she can play castanets. The light music club needs a 4th member to avoid being disbanded, so of course they accept her. And with that we have the start of their adventures.

    And that is it for plot in the series, if you want more in your anime you will need to look elsewhere. But K-on avoids falling into the trap other, similar ‘Moe’ shows fall into by having really interesting characters. Yes Yui, Mio, Ritsu, and Mugi are all simple tropes at the start. Yui is the airhead, Mio is the shy type, Ritsu is the hyper character and Mugi is the rich girl. But as the show goes along they develop and grow making them into fully fleshed characters.

    This is best shown in the third episode where Yui has to take a make up test. Yes we have the usual study jokes seen in manga, which still work as everyone has trouble studying at some point. But where as other lesser shows would have had Yui barely pull a pass or fail again, here we have Yui pass with a 100. It’s a small thing, but in any show the small things build up to make a better whole. We see that in episode 4 where Mio finds and old tape of the band performance. It’s played for a joke, but than it becomes motivation for the band. The fact when the metal lyrics start up its used for a joke again just make it even better.

    It helps that this is a genre Kyoto animation has become a master of, taking their experience from Haruhi, Full Metal Panic Fumoffu, and Lucky Star and using it here. The animation is clean throughout and the pacing is perfect for the series. It’s slowly paced in the right parts, which makes the character moments really work. But they can pull out the frantic Lucky Star style when needed. In fact it’s balance that makes K-on better than Lucky Star for me. Lucky Star was perhaps more laugh out loud funny in places, but the Otaku based humour only really worked once. Here the character growth makes K-on so much better to watch again.

    The Bluray is bright and shows the colours really well and makes it worth paying the bit extra to get it in HD. It helps that the series was broadcast in HD so it gets a non up converted release. Sound on the Japanese track is a solid stereo mix that is listenable but won’t tax your sound system. The subtitles are well translated enough and readable in even the brightest scenes. A little more black outline would have been nice but other than that it was readable.

    K-on is well worth picking up if you like the slice of life school comedy genre. Even if you’ve grown tired of it, like I have, it still is worth watching. It’s so well done and has really good characters you can’t help but like it.

Karakuri Odette

By Julietta Suzuki, published by Hakusensha in Japan. Published in English by Tokyopop

    In Manga we have seen plenty of series deal with the story of a robot trying to become or fit in as a human. From the original Astro Boy all the way to Chobit’s the classic sci fi story has seen plenty of pages and ink. So it’s a pleasant surprise to find that the 6 volume shoujo Manga Karakuri Odette is a great, refreshing read in the genre.

    Our lead is Odette Yoshizawa, who wants to go to school to see why she is different from other humans. Her creator, Dr. Yoshizawa, relents and enrols her but on the condition that she poses as a human. So none of her other classmates know she is an android. Well except for Asao Kurose, the school delinquent who finds out that Odette is an android and reluctantly helps her out and keeps her secret.

    What makes this series click though is the mixture of shoujo and sci-fi themes creating a unique story. Odette trying to fit is very much like a teenager trying to growing up and find their way in the world, and in this way it’s clear that she is very much human from the first story on. It makes her attempts to fit and be like others all the more funny and charming. This is best shown in Volume 5 where she refuses to use her strength so she doesn’t appear to be a gorilla girl, much to Asao’s chagrin as he’s locked in the storage shed with her.
   
    And when we get to the romance, which starts in Volume 3, Odette is as blissfully naïve as almost any teenager is. How she ignores the fact another android Chris and a human Yukimura Akihasa have a crush on her, while also not admitting that she is developing a crush on Asao is amusing. Asao’s and Odette’s interactions really shine here as they are great together, even if Asao doesn’t openly admit it.

    Suzuki’s also managed to balance the comedy and drama bits perfectly for the series, making for a enjoyably quick read. The short length helps, as the plot never has a chance to drag and the ending comes at just the right moment in the series. The bits of drama are all great and do not go overboard like some shoujo does. And the ending with Asao graduating and leaving Odette behind, but Odette wanting him to stay is funny and heart-warming at the same time.

    This and the Secret Notes of Lady Kanoko (and indeed early series like Marmalade Boy) are some of the shoujo series that Tokyopop really specialised at getting out. Yes they published a lot of bad series as well and Stu Levy made quite a few publishing errors. But it’s clear they had editors that had a keen eye for good, short shoujo comics. Here’s hoping they find work elsewhere in the industry as we can use more series like Odette in English.

    But for now you can do your best to track down Odette before it goes out of print. If you like good shoujo comedy with a hint of drama and sci-fi than Karakuri Odette is a great series to pick up and read.