Double Posting: Part Deux

And here I am, ladies and germs, posting the second part of that "double posting" thing I promised you yesterday.  Did you miss me?

Anyway, on the same bookstore trip where I discovered "Tomodachi Monster" (still in the mail, by the way), I also ran across a relatively interesting-looking new series called "Real Account".

In a world where nearly everyone is online and linked up near-constantly through a social media site called Real Account, a loner named Ataru Kashiwagi lives alone with his sister, consoling himself with all of his many online friends.  (Gee, I wonder where we've seen that trope before?)

Anyway, all of a sudden, people from all over Japan (and I think the world, too) find themselves sucked into their phones and into a mysterious new world called Real Account (I think).  There they meet our antagonist, pictured above, the mysterious Marble.

In the "real world", Marble is just the cute mascot for the Real Account site.  Here, however, he is a misanthropic, near-omnipotent yet playful force akin to Koro-Sensei from Assassination Classroom (one of my favorites).  One by one, Marble kills and judges the users, slaying them with tentacles at blinding speeds whenever they fail at one of his sick, deadly online games or hits a total of zero followers.

Along the way, Marble exposes online frauds for public shaming and forces the greedy and the desperate to beg on bended knee and promise the world to their followers if they don't unfriend them (but if their online friend dies, the followers will die as well, so it's a sadistic choice if ever there was one).  He laughs at these actions, claiming that "this is how humans really are".

Basically, it's like a cross between "Doubt", ".hack" and "Battle Royale".  We don't know what Marble is or who is doing this or how, but that's just part of the fun.  And there's a really creepy-cool part at the end of Volume One where Marble (up to this point a solely virtual being) appears in the real world to come after Ataru's sister.

The story is the main focus here, really: following Ataru and his fellow users as they struggle desperately to survive through Lord knows how many deadly online games while despairing over who could betray whom.  And Volume One also has a nice scene where a hottie strips down to her underthings and tells all her followers that she'll take it all off once she reaches a certain number of them.

It pretty much hits every target, save for martial-arts fantasy violence.  (Sorry, ladies and germs, but that's just the way it goes.)

Hope you've enjoyed this special double posting, and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

Double Posting Time!

Hi, everyone!  I'm sorry I haven't gotten the chance to just spend all day at the bookstore for a while, but I can still remember the last time I went, just a week or so ago.  And boy, do I have some new manga to share with you!

In apology for the lateness and lack of posting, I'd like to try and attempt a "double posting" of sorts.  I have some things to do today for dinner, and not an infinite amount of time to do them in, so I won't actually be posting a double article today, but I will instead be attempting to post articles both today and tomorrow.

(Maybe making this promise will force me to actually stick to a plan for a change...)

Anyway, moving on.

You guys notice our little friend at the top of the page?  You like him?  Well, his name's Peke and he is one of the titular "Tomodachi Monsters" from today's article.  Shy, friendless Wataru Narimiya (I think that was his name) finds him one day in the woods out behind the school.  But only Wataru can see him.  That is, Wataru and all the other kids out there who have similar "Friend" monsters.

This series has been described as a darker, more realistic take on things like Pokemon and Digimon, and with good reason.  It also has some parallels to Zatch Bell (at least, so far): The monsters and children are actively battling to kill each other for reasons unknown.

And man, is it bloody!  One kid with a cutting-type Friend actually slices a girl's head into bits, and we're left with lovely shots of skull and musculature and skin just falling away from the spot where her cranium used to be.  And then there's the kid who gets his neck snapped...and the one whose Friend enables him to control corpses...

Think of this series as Zatch Bell meets Pokemon, with a tiny hint of Magical Girl Apocalypse in there, too.  As well as a hint of Puella Magi Madoka Magica, as it's insinuated that having a Friend and using it to battle slowly kills your own sense of empathy and humanity.

At this point, we don't know what Friends are (though I'd bet money they're at least semi-imaginary), and we have no idea why they're fighting.  But I assume that will all be cleared up soon enough.

This series is the first one in a LONG while that I have actually decided to purchase and own.  Hopefully my Amazon order containing Volume One will be here soon.

My only complaint is that I've seen on the internet that the series has already run its course after only three volumes.  There's so much potential there, and I just hate seeing it go to waste.

But, with any luck, those two remaining volumes will be just as fun and interesting as this one was.  Go out and get yours today!

(Just don't expect any little virtual pet games or keychain buddies...)

No Secret-This Series is Good!

Greeting once again, everyone, and welcome to the New Year 2016!

And, as we're lucky enough to have it, a week or so ago I discovered a new series at the bookstore that I want to share with you.

If you haven't heard of it already (or haven't guessed by the title and picture), today's review is of Eiji Masuda's "My Monster Secret".  (Or Jitsu wa Watashi Wa, if you prefer.)

High school student Asahi Kuromine (another series with cool and unusual names, which I love) is completely hopeless at keeping things a secret.  It's not that he has a big mouth and goes blabbing to people or anything; it's just that his poker face is more like an open book.  If you ask him if he likes somebody, his face will instantly give it away.

You get the idea.

Anyway, one day after school, he encounters the above silent-type schoolgirl Yoko Shiragami.  With wings.  And fangs.  That's right: Yoko Shiragami is a vampire.  Biggest secret ever, right?

Most people would imagine that she'd be doomed now, her secret being kept by the most transparent man who ever lived.  But instead, Kuromine devotes himself to keeping her secret like he's never kept any secret before.  (He likes her.  Plus, if she's ever found out, her father will pull her out of school.)

Attempting to thwart Kuromine's intentions is the sadistic newspaper gossip rag reporter Mikan Akemi.  She is a great villain.  Her paper prints gossip rag fodder, even if it's made up, and not even for the reasons of journalistic integrity; she just wants to see people suffer.  (How she hasn't been found out and fired by the school, I'll never know.)

Also joining Kuromine as characters are a sadist teacher who picks on him just as much as his closest friends and an emotionless rule-enforcer girl who's actually an invading alien robot.  And it looks like there are other monster girls on the way, if the images I've seen in Google Image search are any indicator.  Just how many secrets can Kuromine keep before he cracks?!

As I've said, the characters are well-written and unique, the story is interesting and seems to be going good places, and the not-conventionally-attractive artwork for Shiragami the female protagonist just puts it over the top.  She's not your typical vampire, either, which is good.  And I love how it hasn't yet degenerated into a distracting T&A fest like Love Hina (which was good in its own right) or Monster Musume (which has gotten to the point where it detracts from what little, paper-thin story there is).

I say we pick give this a read, and that we make no secret of it!  (...I'll stop with the "secret" now.)

Thus Far, A Riddle

It took a while for me to find anything really new and exciting-looking at my local B&N (that's Barnes and Noble to most of you), but yesterday I saw a title that I think I'd heard of before: Akuma no Riddle.

It's apparently recently been made into an anime and dubbed by Funimation.

Anyway, the basis of the story is that there are several color-related classes at a certain all-girls school.  Mojyo, I think the name was.  Unbeknownst to most, however, the Black Class is composed of twelve assassins and their target: the seemingly-unknowing Haru Ichinose.

She's cute, funny and kinda stupid, and she refers to herself by name all the time in the manner of a very young Japanese child.  Perhaps she's trying to be cute?

The assassins themselves all seem to come from dark and disturbing backgrounds, which I'm sure we'll see further as the series progresses.  There's a girl who changes personalities at night, just for starters.  That was the one who really stuck out for me the most.

Our target is also initially being pursued by cold new transfer student Azuma Tokaku, the best student in another elite assassin class.  Or was it an assassin school?  I can't remember. 

Anyway, by the end of the first volume, Azuma has, for some reason, announced a desire to protect Haru from their classmates, rather than competing with them to kill her.  But is she only saying this to try and get close enough to kill her?  Given what this series has been like so far, I wouldn't put it past her.

Not too much happens from chapter to chapter.  It almost reads like a slice of life boarding school manga, aside from the occasional cold analysis of an assassination and finding the target.  I like assassin stories as much as the next guy, but thus far it seems like a less-funny version of Assassination Classroom (which I love!) with possibly one or two shades of Strawberry Panic thrown in there.

But, given the story we've set out so far, with luck we'll soon see some more fighting and/or crafty assassination attempts.  With luck, we'll also see more of the girls' personalities.  That should help us tell them apart.

I think I'll take a look at the anime, but I'll also continue reading the manga as well.  The first volume wasn't much, but it piqued my interest.  Will it pique yours?

Up, Up and Amazed!

Hello once again, dear readers!

My apologies for there being such a long period between updates, but I haven't exactly been reading a bunch of new manga lately, what with there being so many pre-existing series that keep getting new volumes out all the time.

In retrospect, I could've done Tokyo Ghoul.  It's been so long that it's hard to remember what I've started since our last update.

But lately my local library has gotten in Vol. 1 of "My Hero Academia", so I'm going to go with that.

In a world where 80% of the population has superpowers, everyday human child Izuku Midoriya dreams of someday becoming a hero anyway, despite the fact that he possesses no powers.

But, one day, a liquified bad guy accosts Izuku and he is saved by famous Silver Age hero All Might.  In his haste to question All Might on the validity of a non-powered person becoming a hero, Izuku inadvertently releases the villain and later winds up on the front lines of the ensuing crisis.  All Might appears once again to save the day, but he witnesses Izuku's boldly charging in to save a classmate.  This gives the secretly breaking down All Might the proof he needs to select Izuku as his next successor.

The big thing about All Might's power is that it can be passed down, each inheritor growing stronger from the strength of the previous and all those he's saved.

And thus begins our unlikely hero's journey to true heroism.

The story itself is good, the characters so far aren't too bad.  Some of the names are weird (Izuku for the main hero, Ochako Uraraka for the heroine.  Seriously.  Ochako.  That isn't even a real name.)

It's like Tiger and Bunny, or X-Men or something, but mixed more with the traditional Japanese school setting.

But what I really liked about My Hero Academia was how it played with the traditional Western superhero and Japanese shonen manga tropes.

For example, in the battle I mentioned above, one would usually expect the main protagonist to somehow unlock some hidden power he'd never even known about and use it to thwart the villain.  This does not happen.  The mentor character, at the cost of damaging himself, jumps in to save the protagonist after witnessing that he has heroic qualities in him.

Also, Izuku isn’t just GIVEN a special power (which, of course, he can’t control), but he instead earns it, doing hard labor for almost a year in order to ensure that his body and mind are worthy of it.  That being said, he doesn’t somehow manage to become a hero through hard work alone, either.

It's very (or at least slightly) unlike what you usually see in comic books, regardless of where they came from geographically, and so I would recommend this series to any of my manga-reading friends.

Pervy Prison School

Dear Readers,

My apologies, but I have been neglecting this blog recently.  I've somehow kept forgetting, no matter how many new manga/anime I've started.   I think I've even finished the entirety of the Viz translated Bleach since my last post!

And now, without further ado, my review of what is apparently the hot new anime this season: "Prison School".

When I initially read the summary on Wikipedia, it didn't seem all that bad.  I was picturing a combination Deadman Wonderland/every pervy manga series ever, but what I got was something...slightly different.

In a school with over 1000 female students, the rules have recently changed to make it coed.  We follow these five new male students: Kiyoshi the normal guy, Gackt the Three Kingdoms geek, Joe the shadowy guy, Shingo the bleach blonde and Andre the fat guy with the freaky little face.

A peeping incident goes horribly wrong one night (and just after Kiyoshi finally got a date with one of the girls!) and the hot student disciplinary council throws all five of them into the "school prison".  There they are abused and forced into hard labor.

Therein lies the difficulty: Kiyoshi escaping in time to meet the girl on the appointed date.  A date, of course, on which he still happens to be in prison.

The setup sounds pretty basic, but there are some serious problems here.  I have no problem with nudity fanservice (from the girls), but there's a lot of really gross stuff in there too.

One part of the plan involves faking a trip to the bathroom and then sneaking out through an air duct.  This requires the use of an MP3 player to provide the sounds of someone making a bowel movement.  And, if that weren't gross enough, in order to get the sounds just right, Gackt actually shits himself in class and records the sounds.

There is also a scene of a girl peeing, the other boys' desires to be dominated and humiliated by the hot glasses-wearing girl pictured above, and an unfortunate shower scene that winds up insinuating that Kiyoshi and Gackt are gay.  Plus Andre's tiny face on his giant body is really freaky, especially with his English Funimation voice.

A big part of the puzzle is that there is some supernatural element that seems to be there, but not quite.  The girls are not allowed by the rules to fraternize with the boys, or else they'll be thrown in the prison as well.  And they are especially wary of talking to them in front of the school's crows.

This is because one of the council girls is rumored to be some sort of "crow user" and does indeed find out about the peeping incident through them somehow, but, at least in the first volume, this is never brought up again.

The only strange thing seems to be the prison setting.

I almost don't want to continue reading it, because of all the gross parts and the fact that it can really only end one of two ways.  But stuff with logistics like this isn't all bad now and again.  And I'm a little intrigued as to exactly which way the series will end.

You can read it if you want; just don't expect a lot of really good hot chick fanservice.

"Hardly The Greatest Show On Earth"

This particular entry may come off as a mite bit odd to some of my more long-time readers.  The last time I was down at the bookstore, I saw that the manga version of Karneval had released in English.  However, unfortunately, I did not have enough time to read it before we had to leave.  So I decided to content myself with watching the anime, which I knew had been released in English by Funimation.

In a strange, European-inspired world, a mysterious organization known as Kafka seeks to accelerate the evolution of humanity into high-powered monsters called Varrukas through drugs.  The national defense force known as Circus seeks to stop them.

A mysterious boy named Nai, searching for his lost patron, carries with him a bracelet-shaped ID from circus when he meets hard-hearted thief Gareki.  Suddenly pursued by a Varruka, they quickly encounter Circus and begin searching for both Kafka and the missing patron.

The voice acting in this anime is passable, particularly its use of Greg Ayres as Gareki and two voice actresses from Haganai (Sena's and Kobato's).  Story and action-wise, it reminded me pretty much of almost Black Cat meets Sakura Wars.

Perhaps I should clarify: Circus is called Circus because, for some reason, in addition to keeping the peace, they also see fit to put on parades and stage shows and such-like for the populace of wherever they happen to touch down.  But, unlike Sakura Wars, it doesn't seem to have anything to do with increasing their spiritual powers for combat.

Maybe it's because I didn't watch every single episode back-to-back, or maybe it was just the limitations of it being condensed into a single 13-episode anime season, but I didn't really feel like I could connect to any of the characters.  It was good to see Gareki starting to find a purpose, but that was about it.  Most everyone's backstories and motivations felt more than a little cliched, and the battle sequences weren't really anything to write home about.

If you liked Black Cat enough, then maybe you would feel some attraction towards this awkward knockoff.  Don't get me wrong: I did enjoy Black Cat, but Karneval (if you'll pardon the pun) simply fails to perform to their standard.