Going to the "Manga Dogs"!

Welcome back toYaruki-Man-Manga!  Today I will be reviewing one of master manga-ka Ema Toyama's sillier works, Manga Dogs.

I picked up the first volume just because it was new at the bookstore, and now we're into Vol. 2.  It's not a great series, but not a bad one, either.

Think Ouran High School Host Club, dipping an occasional toe into Bakuman territory.

Our heroine is the published and serialized manga artist Kanna Tezuka, who joins a new manga class at her school in order to improve her quality of work.  (One of the big things in this story is that her bizarre Buddhist statuary-inspired romantic comedy manga always has one foot out the door of cancellation.)

Kanna is a standard professional, "only sane man" type of heroine, a la Haruhi Fujioka and such like.  This provides nearly all of the story's comedy, as she is constantly faced with the ridiculous actions of the three boys in her class (who are also the only other students).  None of them have ever even written a manga before, yet they continue to make wild, totally unrealistic claims of reaching the top in Jump.

It doesn't hurt that all three of them are marginally average-looking boys, but Kanna is not interested in a 3D romance.

The story is very slow to move anywhere and there's no real drama a la her previous works (I Am Here and Missions of Love), but the comedy works a little bit to make up for it.  It's a gag manga, pure and simple.  Some of the references are a little on the esoteric side (such as all the main characters being named after or having names similar to favorite manga artists of yesteryear), but that only adds to its niche appeal.

I can only hope that there is more serious talk about manga creation moving on, as it would really help sell things as being a bit more realistic, working to create a nice contrast between the out-and-out silliness that we see on nearly every page.

Long story short-looking for manga-themed comedy and brainless beauty boys, look here.  Want an actual story that moves ahead, try one of Toyama's other works.  This is good for killing 30 minutes or so, but I for one can't really see myself buying it at this point.

"No. 6 Post" (Not Actually Post #6)

Hello again, manga fans.  I was just down at my local bookstore again yesterday, and I saw that the final volume of No. 6 (or, as I like to call it, 200 pages of Ho-Yay) had released, so I thought I'd blog about it.

In the seemingly Utopian city of No. 6 (implying that there are at least five others out there), everyone follows the rules, everyone is happy, and there is no strife that anyone can see.  Of course, us being as genre savvy as we are, we just know that this is not the case.

Four years before our story starts, a young boy named Shion (which is apparently now a unisex name) meets a mysterious outlaw named Rat.  (Now, I know what you're thinking, and it used to confuse me too: his name in the original Japanese is Nezumi, which means "rat".  A possible reason why they romanized it as Rat is that he is almost bonded with a series of small mice who do his bidding and send messages.) 

In a sudden and blatant violation of the rules, Shion decides to harbor Rat by letting him in through the window.  In the end, the jaded Rat leaves Shion with a few words to try and make him question his life before escaping.

Four years later, Shion encounters Rat again after he is blamed for a death involving a mysterious Progeria-like disease attack.  And just when he had been named among the chosen future elites, too!  It is soon revealed to us that the leaders of No. 6 are testing the disease by using a certain strain of bee to deliver it.  Unfortunately, the bees cannot be used to target anything in particular.

(Also, these same bees are apparently injected into the heads of certain citizens early on as a sort of experiment in mind control.  These bees seem to be what keeps most of the populace so docile.  One diseased bee stings Shion, nearly costing him his life and changing his hair to the white that you see in the picture.)

Rat leads Shion to the outside world, where all citizens who live outside No. 6's walls are lying in squalor.  When No. 6's officials can't find Shion, they take his childhood friend Safu (another weirdo name) as a captive.  Shion and Rat, along with friends Dogkeeper, Rikiga and the city-bound rebel Yomin (they just keep coming) break into the high security prison (which is, for some reason, the true brain of the No. 6 system) to try and save her, but they are too late.

In the end, their resulting destruction of the prison not only permanently takes down the crooked No. 6 system, but also releases the "Spirit of the Forest" Elyurias, which No. 6 has apparently taken captive to try and control the aforementioned bees, who then proceeds to wreak havoc.  Rat, being both an excellent singer and the last remaining survivor of Elyurias' "Forest People" who were slaughtered in her taking, is then conscripted to sing her a song of peace and save the day.

This series had a few holes in it and it took kind of a long time (relatively speaking), but it wasn't so bad.  The dystopian atmosphere was a little cliched, but thankfully nowhere near as dark and sinister and monstrous as some others (The Capitol).  It was more like The Giver, also in the fact that Shion and Rat's conflicting personality types place us heavily on the scale of optimism vs. pessimism, a thing you don't usually find in the kind of manga I read.

The manga's biggest draw was probably the amount of pure emotion and outright Ho Yay between Rat and Shion.  They're both relatively attractive, they both care about each other yet aren't afraid to say what they really think, and they're complimentary in that "opposites attract" way.  They even share a few kisses over the course of the story, although their is no out-and-out (if you'll pardon my unintentional pun) mention of their actually being gay for each other.

Although there is one scene early on where Safu asks Shion if he wants to try sexual intercourse, but he reacts like a typical nerdy boy who is just simply overwhelmed by her sudden statement.  He doesn't exactly say no, but he doesn't say yes, either.

All in all, this manga wasn't too bad of a way to kill time, but there are many better works out there.  I certainly couldn't see myself buying it, and I don't think I'll read it again any time soon. 

Maybe once so much time has passed that I've forgotten how the story goes.

Three Little Words: "Magical...Girl...Apocalypse!"

Is it just me, or does she really look like The Creepy Girl from "Frankenweenie"?

 Anyway, this entry's focus is another new book that I just picked up at the bookstore today: "Magical Girl Apocalypse".  The title itself is a perfect example of mood whiplash, and the cover, if I recall correctly, prominently features our little friend here.  (So right away we know it's gonna be good.)

Like Light Yagami, Takao Kasuga and Kyon before him, protagonist Kii soon learns to be careful what he wishes for when he complains that his world is boring.  All of a sudden, he and his classmates are sent into a Bizzarro World alternate version of Deadman Wonderland where nearly everyone is massacred by the titular Magical Girl.

(Mind you, the girl herself is never given a name.  I only call her that because it is not only eponymous, but the only thing we ever hear her say is "magical".)

What follows is a bizarre cross between a zombie movie and an alien invasion, like an episode of Puella Magi Madoka Magica gone horribly, horribly wrong.  Not only do the people killed by the magical girl come back as psychotic zombies with her body and mannerisms but their own faces, but...she isn't the only one!  From a magical circle floating in the sky above town, hundreds of other zombie-like magical girl creatures fall to Earth and begin killing and infecting every human in sight.

Kii survives with an ever-dwindling cast of classmates who are gradually picked off one by one.  Early on in the story, he declines to save the adorable Tsukune from their high school bullies, only to find himself ironically traveling with all three girls as the situation deteriorates.  This serves to add heart to the story, a la Cage of Eden and Deadman Wonderland.

The concept is certainly unique, as are the different varieties of the deadly magical girls.  The action sequences where our heroes club to death (?) or run over the zombie hordes are simplistic and easy to follow, so I don't have to find myself mentally telegraphing how a certain move was pulled off, so that's a plus.

With Attack on Titan, we don't know what the Titans are or where they came from-all we know is that they want to eat humans.  The magical girls are similar, but different in the fact that we don't even know what they want.  That gives them a creepy mystery feel, without the unexplained aspect/feeling that we get from the Titans.  Their more human appearance also works in this regard.

My brother has followed the series chapter by chapter online, and he says that even up to then, he has no idea where exactly the writers are going.  But I'm feeling like I'll take my chances!

(Let's just hope it doesn't get all political and talky like Attack on Titan did.)

Pick up a copy today!

Review: "Food Wars"

I make no secret of it: I really love "Toriko".

It's a series about cooking and preparing new and fantastic foods, but also doing lots of butt-kicking and teaching science, too.  And it's full of really deep and interesting characters.  All it's really missing is a few more hot chicks, but I guess we can't have everything.

Now, you may be wondering-Why is Flatware Moth going on about Toriko when this is supposed to be a review of Food Wars?  Well, to tell you the truth, going by what I've read, the two series aren't that incredibly far apart.

(Okay, granted, there's no real butt-kicking going on in Food Wars, but, again, I guess we can't have everything.  It at least sort of makes up for it by pouring on the hot fanservice from our main female antagonist.)

Soma Yukihira (another weird name, am I right?) is the son of a high-class master chef who spends his days running a small family-style restaurant.  Combining the right mix of serious and oddball, he is a blunt and funny character who fluctuates between serious about his cooking and being silly enough to repeatedly combine fishy ingredients and sweet ingredients into dishes that he knows will taste bad, just for laughs.

Anyway, his father has been called away to prepare meals for major hotels in major cities all around the world.  To light a fire under his son Soma, he enrolls the boy in the prestigious (and snobby) Totsugeki Saryo Culinary School, which spartanly pushes its students until only the best of the best are left standing.

Enter our heroine Erina, a refined palate who is apparently near-impossible to please and always demands the very finest foods and ingredients.  And guess what Soma likes to use?  (Big hint: not that!)  As he continues in his adventures at the school, Soma's cooking and his cooking philosophy continue to worm their way into both her heart and her mind.  (Only the first volume, and even I can see that!)

This manga taught me what the heck an aspic is, as well as how to jerry-rig a pork roast with nothing but potatoes, mushrooms and thick-cut bacon.

That being said, there is a major flaw in the storyline, as a bitter friend of mine pointed out upon reading it: Soma's father is actually a world-renowned chef.  Doubtlessly, then, people would recognize his son's name and not treat him as the common peasant that they do.  From my friend's point of view, Soma Yukihira apparently has everything, and people like my friend always want to see that kind of "spoiled hero" character go down hard, crashing and burning.

But I admire people like Soma, people who strive hard to achieve their dreams and continue to show up those who insult them or stand in their way.  It makes me want to try harder, as well as to actually find myself something to try at.

(Once again, I only picked this series up because it was new at the library.  Back when I first saw it at the bookstore, I didn't really think too much of it, just going by the blurb on the back.  Perhaps there's a lesson there.)

"Attack on Titan" Review

Hello, out there.  If you couldn't already guess from the picture (or the title), today I will be reviewing Attack on Titan, one of the biggest smash-hit anime I've ever seen.

In a strange new (possibly future) world, mankind has been eaten and hunted to the brink of extinction.  By what, you ask?  By creatures like our little friend I have pictured here-the Titans.  These colossal humanoid creatures are nigh-indestructible, unpredictable and hungry for human flesh.

The final vestiges of humanity have retreated into a massive city with three protective walls.  This is where our story begins.

Hero Ehren Yeager, his cowardly genius friend Armin Arlehrt and the moderately-attractive Mikasa Ackerman have all joined an expedition/Titan-repellent force known as the Survey Corps.  This motley crew of warriors in their gas-powered, super-jumping flight gear, is sworn to defend their city from those few Titans who break through, as well as to try and take back their world.

Ehren, Armin and Mikasa are also doing this to take revenge on the monsters who slaughtered their family and friends several years before the story actually started.

Along the way, we also discover the existence of people who can transform into Titans (for good or evil) and a fanatical cult dedicated to worshipping them [the Titans].

All in all, it's a pretty decent series, as far as I'm concerned, though that isn't to say that it's not without its faults.

Somehow, despite the amount of time that the series has gone on, the Internet is still saying that there is no new information on the actual Titans themselves.  Their existence and where they came from remains a complete mystery, which is infuriating to me.  I like to have things explained for me right away, and to have the answers to all my questions delivered right to me and all wrapped up in a nice little bow.

That, and the series itself (at least the manga) seems a tad bit slow-moving.  Perhaps it's that the still and silent manga can't really convey all the "whoosh" and all the explosions and what-have-you in a way that I can really appreciate.  I still have yet to watch the anime, though I will most likely be watching it as the Funimation dub.  To me, as a manga, it pretty much seems all military-like: "This operation will take 15 minutes that we don't have, and it will take X minutes for Group Y to move to Point Z", etc.

Some people call this horror, but it hardly seems that way to me.  In point of fact, I only picked it up a year or two ago at the library just because it was something new on the shelves.

It isn't great, but I'll stick with it.  I leave you people free to take it or leave it as you please.  Let's hope that the anime version is good.

Manga Review: "Deadman Wonderland"

I was just down at Barnes and Noble the other day, and I saw a new volume of this series.  A few days later, I find that same volume available at my local library.

I think it came out a few years ago here in America, but then died out or something.  But it's recently made a comeback, especially with the Funimation dub of the anime coming out a year or two ago.  Greg Ayres, man.  That guy is good.

And, so we're all clear, we are talking about the blood-slinging adventure-horror series known as Deadman Wonderland.

Ordinary middle school student Ganta Igarashi is enjoying an ordinary day at school.  Suddenly, a mysterious humanoid creature only known as "The Red Man" somehow floats up to the third-floor window, breaks in, and violently slaughters all of Ganta's classmates using some unknown power.

Wrongly framed for the incident by a phony lawyer who is actually a crooked prison administrator, Ganta is sentenced to life imprisonment in the titular prison of Deadman Wonderland.  There, he discovers that The Red Man left him with some of his own powers during the attack, and Ganta is thrust into a series of life and death battles with similarly-powered fellow inmates known as Deadmen.  All the while searching for the one who slaughtered his friends.

The entire anime series only lasted for 12 or 13 episodes, but they were pretty good.  Unfortunately, it only covered material from the first 4 or 5 volumes.  They still had much further to go.  That is, at least according to the wikia.

I enjoyed Greg Ayres' portrayal of Ganta, first thing.  But then I began watching the drama and intensity unfold.  The battles are excellent, as well.  In point of fact, the blood-based Deadman powers from this anime directly influenced the abilities of Demon Sword wielder Chrona from Soul Eater, another series which I enjoy.

You wouldn't think there was a heck of a lot you could do with blood alone, but you'd be wrong.

Now that the anime is finished, I look forward to seeing how the story moves forward in the manga, beyond the place where the anime left off.  Reading how it all goes on the wikia is just too time-consuming, taking what you learn from one article and trying to connect it to the next.

Unlike Sword Art Online, this is a series that I highly recommend.

"Sword Art Online" Review

Hi!  Flatware Moth here, reviewing something that he just found new in the Graphic Novel section of his local library.

Sword Art Online has apparently become majorly popular for some reason, but, frankly, I just don't see it.

The story itself is an odd mix of the cliched and the stolen.  Anyone remember .Hack?  The one with the really realistic game that people could log into?  Well, that's about half the story.  The other half (or some other fraction of it, because the whole thing just feels like a big mishmash) is sort of "Battle Royale" -ish, in that the game's designer made it without a Log Off button.  The players are now trapped inside the game and must battle their way through 100 levels of a floating castle-world-thing in order to escape.

And, true to video-game-becomes-real-life cliche, if you ever die in the game, you die for real.  It's the price you pay for being hooked up to in neurologically and made to feel and taste every aspect of the game world.

The story itself is told in a very odd way.  We start with a flashback of everyone logging in and being told the story by the game's enigmatic creator.  We then flash forward to two freakin' years later, when everyone in the game is now coming closer to achieving their impossible task.  (And, also in accordance with the falling-into-another-world cliche, some people in Sword Art Online are quite content not to go home.)

Kirito, the hero, is a loner with a dark past who falls in love with a moderately attractive female knight named Asuna.  Their interactions are yet another facet to this confusing story, where they fall deeply in love (almost entirely off-screen) and come together to find their way out of the game.

I was never really a fan of .Hack, and this series only seems to be a sappier, somewhat darker version of that.  True, The World was in certain danger in .Hack, but at least the players could log out whenever they wanted to.

Here, people die by the thousands, we wallow our way through pages and pages of angst and regret, no real answers are given, lots of time is skipped, and all the action sequences go by too fast for me to really understand how the characters pulled off some of their moves.

As I said before, it all just feels like a weird mishmash of fantasy, sci-fi and romance, mostly made up of ideas stolen from better works.  There's a sexy scene of Asuna in her underwear, but that didn't really seem like enough to really try and undo the overall suck factor of what I've just read.

There's a novel out there too, I think.  But my advice: go read something else.  Black Butler just put out its 17th volume; go read that.

"Nisekoi" Review

Wouldn't you know it: The last time I posted, I couldn't think of anything to write about, hence why I posted about Seven Deadly Sins.  But a recent trip to the library showed me a new volume of another series I'd been meaning to blog about, but had forgotten.

The name is Nisekoi, by a person named Naoshi Komi.

Our hero is high school student Raku Ichijo, the son of a violent yakuza family who only wants to live a sane and decent life.  He secretly pines for childhood friend Kosaki Onodera.  And, ten years ago, he made a promise with a little girl, whose name and face he can't remember, and received a special locked pendant, of which she holds the only key.

All of a sudden, into his life comes the brash and athletic Chitoge Kirisaki.  After getting off on the wrong foot, his family reveals that she is also the daughter of a powerful yakuza family, and that the two must be married in order to maintain a fragile peace.

 So, not only does this throw cold water on Raku's chances with Onodera, but there is also the problem of Chitoge's bodyguard Claude, who instantly sees that something is not right with their so-called "relationship".

In true romantic comedy style, several hints are dropped as to who exactly his promise girl may be.  A new suitor named Seishiro Tsugumi (Chitoge's other bodyguard/reverse trap) is introduced in Volume 2, clearly leading us to believe that more and more people after the fated couple will start to appear soon.

Now, I know what you're all thinking: this sounds like some sort of Love Hina Lite.  And it sort of is, albeit with much less fanservice (given Komi's unsexy art style.).  But I liked Love Hina, and not just for all of its fanservice (of which there was a LOT!).

I've heard that it's gone on for over 100 chapters in Japan, with no ending or resolution in sight.  Now, I like my stories tied up and explained with a nice fancy bow on top.  So we can only hope that the mysteries will be revealed some day.  (And it would be pretty ironic if Raku wound up getting together with Onodera after all, despite her not being the female lead.  Totally unexpected.)

One thing that really gets me, aside from the similarities to Love Hina, is the sheer amount of strange names that all the characters are given (Ruri, Raku, Chitoge, Claude, Kosaki, etc.).  Claude isn't even Japanese, and I'd never heard of some of those other names being used before, either.  Now, I love unusual names as much as the next guy, but that's usually more when I'm the one creating/assigning them.

But I do love Mafia/Yakuza stories, so let's hope that things continue forward on that point, as well.

Review: "Seven Deadly Sins"

Konnichiwa, everyone!

It's been a while since I've been down to the bookstore, so I couldn't really recall any new manga that I'd read off the top of my head.  So I figured that I'd review one of my recent favorite series instead.

Seven Deadly Sins is a weird magic-y knight manga set in a world quite unlike our own.  In the kingdom of Brittania (I believe it was), ten years prior, a group of powerful knights known as The Seven Deadly Sins were unjustly framed for murder and forced to flee the kingdom.  In their absence, a group of evil knights (ironically referred to as The Holy Knights) have taken the king hostage and forced the people of the land to prepare for war.

Princess Elizabeth, our main heroine, is forced to leave in search of the missing Seven Deadly Sins, who many believe are the only ones who can save the kingdom from the Holy Knights.

The first one she meets is our main hero, the perverted Luffy-ish tavern owner Meliodas.  He too is searching for his fellow Deadly Sins, through the use of information gathering and his mobile bar, which sits atop of a giant pig.  The pig's child, a talking boar named Hawk (funnier when romanized has "Hork", sounds like "pork") provides a loyal friend for him as well as mild comic relief.

Meliodas had his memory erased by one of his fellow Deadly Sins at around the time the murder took place, so he may also be searching for them in order to recover his memories.

Now, these stories are actually pretty fun.  Thus far, we're moving a mite bit slowly on meeting new Deadly Sins (thus far, the brash giantess Diane and the enigmatic former prisoner Ban), but the Holy Knights are popping up like daisies, and they have some really cool powers.  Thus far we have a lightning guy, a bug tamer a'la Tommyrod from Toriko, an illusion guy and an invisible guy.

Originally, I had just picked it up because of a fanservice-y chapter I'd seen online where Elizabeth and Diane are shrunk out of their clothes by a magic mushroom creature.  But now I'm more than a little hooked on where the story is going.  The characters maintain a decent degree of interesting and original (save probably for the nearly-useless Hawk, whose only skills are his nose and his appetite for food scraps).

Only one real problem that I can see: I took a look at the wikia because I was wondering just how many more Holy Knights were on their way, and they have the Deadly Sins outnumbered by four to one, if not more.  And, since they say that even one of the Holy Knights alone is enough to rival an entire army, I can definitely foresee things getting worse for our heroes before they get better.

Until next time, saraba!

Let The Blog Begin-UQ Holder!

Welcome, everyone.

My name is Flatware Moth (an anagram).  Many years ago, I started a blog on this site with the exact same name for a college computing course.  Only recently have I decided to start it back up again.

Here I will leave my honest reviews for the various graphic novels and manga that I've picked up.  Maybe my reviews will be useful to you, maybe they won't.  It's your call.

Before I begin, please allow me to explain the pun in my blog's title.  Yarukiman-man is a Japanese phrase which means "pumped up" or "motivated".  I guess you can say that this blog is my attempt at being yarukiman-man about manga (hee hee).

Now then, without further ado, here is my review of the latest manga series by legend Ken Akamatsu-"UQ Holder".

Akamatsu's work began with A.I. Love You, the tale of a computer nerd who brought his hot virtual girlfriend to life.  He then continued on with award-winning love comedy Love Hina, and the strange semi-magical fantasy school life Negima.

This is the semi-continuation of the latter.

Decades in the world of Negima's future, the grandson of former protagonist Negi Springfield is being raised on Earth, when much of the world's population lives on top of a magic tower in space (I guess it makes sense in context?).

His legal guardian following the deaths of his parents is one of ten-year-old teacher Negi's former students, the semi-evil Evangeline A. K. Mcdowell, who now lives under the name of Yukihime.

Now, Evangeline is an immortal and a very powerful wizard with a high bounty on her head.  Long before our story began, she promised Negi's grandson Touta that he and his friends could leave their small rural village and head for the space tower once they could defeat her in battle.  With a little help from a "magic app" (?), they manage to give her a good showing, but still lose.

Following that, the man who gave them the app reveals himself to be an immortal hunter after Yukihime's head.  He mercilessly mutilates both her and Touta.  While seemingly dying, Yukihime reveals to Touta (who has no memories from before he was twelve, following the incident that killed his parents) that she secretly made him a partial immortal right before she took him in.

With the hunter about to kill Touta's close friends, the situation forces her to make Touta into a full immortal, never aging and never growing up.  The villain is then promptly defeated and Touta and Yukihime depart for the tower.  Along the way, they meet and befriend the immortal hunter Kuromaru (after a quick fight with him, that is).

As I see it, really knowing this work seems to require having read all of Akamatsu's previous work Negima.  I read it for a while at the beginning, of course, back when it was a simple slice of life school/magic comedy (note that I did not say "magic school").  But then it started introducing serious bad guys and a whole magic world and all sorts of weird rules for magic, so I just gave up after, like, Volume 20.

I have no real idea where this story is going, but I think I'll continue reading it for a while longer, or at least until the official English translations stop making sense to me.

As I see it, Akamatsu should really stick to semi-realistic, non-combat related love comedies like Love Hina.  Making all these rules and making so much reference to a previous work only serves to alienate first-time readers like myself, who never finished the difficult work in question.

(Also, a note for all you horn-dogs out there: this series, while it does contain a fair amount of nudity and fanservice- and not just with the females, for a change- it contains nowhere near the amount that we've previously seen in Love Hina and Negima.  That's probably because we haven't seen too many female characters yet, but I wouldn't exactly be holding my breath, if I were you.)

And now I take my leave.  But, rest assured, I will return sporadically to post some new reviews.  See you then!