A Blue Moon Has Risen Again!

 

 

Hello, readers.

 

Guess who's pounding away at the keys of a brand-spanking new laptop, little internal motor just purring away?  I'll give you a hint: he's the man sitting at the keyboard and the one writing this to you right now.

 

And, in more important news: A shopping trip yesterday led me in the direction of a far-off library, so as best to combine with our trip to the big-box store.  Not expecting to find much, I was pleasantly surprised to find a copy of Spy Family Vol. 1 on the shelves.

 

 (And, yes, I know there's an X in there between Spy and Family, but, until I hear otherwise from an official source, I'm going to pronounce it and write about it in the same way as we do Yoshihiro Togashi's Hunter Hunter, without the X.)

In a world that greatly resembles 20th century Europe, the neighboring nations of Westalis and Ostania are currently engaged in a sort-of-Cold War involving espionage.  Westalis' top agent is a cool and professional man known only by the codename Twilight.  In order to get close to a reclusive rabble-rouser (cool alliteration completely unintended), Twilight's managers have tasked him with taking both a wife and child (as his own fake family, not as hostages) in order to get close to him at the private school his child goes to.

Unknowingly joining Twilight (alias Loid Forger) in this endeavor are the socially-clueless Yor (the sham wife) and the adorably precocious Anya (the daughter).

Oh, but what's this-Yor is secretly an assassin and Anya's secretly a telepath?!  And none of these fake family members know any of these secrets about each other?!

 

Why, what wacky hijinx will ensue!

 

In all seriousness, this manga series is actually better than I thought it would be, and I already thought it would be pretty good (for a reason that I will mention below).  The art is good, the action scenes are simple enough to follow and the humor is en pointe in the standard Japanese style (everything is going smoothly until something outlandish occurs out of nowhere and then we laugh at it).

 

But the character work is where Spy Family really shines.  Twilight is more than just an efficient and professional spy-he's a man from a war-torn country who had a rough childhood and wants to make sure no one else in Westalia winds up with a childhood as rough as his.  Yor at least appears gullible enough to believe the strange lies that Twilight comes up with for his spy-related escapades, is embarrassed to have once worked as a whore, and does all of her assassin work to help pay for and educate her unseen little brother.  And Anya is as well-written as any average, non-magic kid: book-dumb and eager to live with Twilight and Yor because she sees living with them as an adventure.

 

(Albeit because she's a mind reader and knows right away that they are a spy and an assassin, respectively.)

 

And there may be even more just waiting to be discovered behind these facades.  For example, Anya is stated to have gained her powers from an accident at a research facility, which she escaped from.  She has also been adopted out of the orphanage where Twilight finds her many times, but always to be returned for unknown reasons.  Plus she has surprisingly little state/social data, even for an orphan.

 

 But they all slowly grow to love each other.

 

In conclusion, let this image tell you more about the tone of the story than I ever could...

 

During a firefight to escape his enemies, Twilight liberated a stolen diamond ring.  But he lost it.  Instead, he makes his proposal with the firing pin from a hand grenade.  He makes his marriage vows, however fake, to Yor as he almost casually flings the grenade into the enemy, overlaid with the image of a proper man placing a proper ring on a proper woman's finger, culminating just as the grenade explodes.

 

Now that...that is art, my friends.

 

PS: As I said earlier, I already knew of this manga's existence, from a Youtuber I follow named Mother's Basement.  Check him out in the link below, and maybe watch his "Must Read Shonen Jump Manga" video to learn more about this and other new noteworthy Shonen Jump manga: https://www.youtube.com/c/mothersbasement/videos

Definitely Not An 8 Out Of 10

Let me be right up front with you: I did not care for Naruto, nor Boruto.  I mean, everything was fine at the beginning (and who doesn’t love the Sexy Jutsu?), but then it became all political and introduced too many intricate rules for the ninja jutsus and I just couldn’t any more.  If memory serves, I didn’t get much farther than the exam arc before I called it quits.

And Samurai 8: The Tale of Hachimaru wasn’t exactly an easier read.  Concepts are introduced well before (by which I mean “long before”) any sort of explanation of them, so I had to stop with every other sentence to try and remind myself what a “key” was or what a “samurai soul” was.

In a bizarre blending of two completely different genres, we are introduced to the legend of the warrior god Fudo Myo-o, some kind of space samurai who “saved the stars” a long, long time ago?

Some peas should not be mixed with some porridges.  At least, not unless you can seamlessly blend them together well.  And, well, Samurai 8 was just weird in both ways.

We enter on the sick and weak boy Hachimaru, who was apparently playing the online video game that the whole introduction took place in (which should be kind of a red flag right there).  He lives with his father in the small house that is all he’s ever known because of all his physical deficiencies.

And there’s also this robot dog called a “holder” that he built named Hayataro who meows instead of barks for, frankly, some of the only comic relief to be found in this slog of words.

Anyway, while his protective doctor father is off collecting parts for his intensive care machine, Hachimaru plays a standard game of fetch with Hayataro.  But, this time, Hayataro bring back a much larger ball: a daruma doll.  When Hachimaru tries to make a wish on it, the ball opens to reveal a small, cat-like creature that calls itself Daruma.

It also claims to be a samurai.

It turns out that Daruma was once a proud and honored space-samurai who was placed in the body of a cat robot.  And he was the one who created the game Hachimaru was playing earlier and distributed it in the hopes of finding a worthy samurai to aid him in his journeys.

One thing leads to another and we follow the journey of Hachimaru as he is implanted with some kind of cyborg spine called a “key” that somehow turns his body into a cyborg and turns him into the real samurai he’s always wanted to be.

This series, suffice it to say, has some problems.  There was the aforementioned “too much show long before telling” problem, plus we don’t have much idea at this moment where exactly the story is going.  The dialogue and storytelling is too wordy, plus the action scenes are too hard to keep track of who exactly has done what and how.

The one good part about Samurai 8 was the character work.  Daruma makes for a good, enigmatic master for Hachimaru, albeit one who occasionally slips in weird references to underwear in his lessons.  Hachimaru himself is understandable as a boy who has always wanted to see the world but can’t (which I myself can relate to for reasons I won’t discuss here), and his father is realistic and believable as the caring parent with a mysterious past who doesn’t want his son to get hurt out there.

I myself argue with my father and brother a lot, so I can see myself in the way Hachimaru yells at his father, but also in how he always feels bad later on and considers to himself about apologizing.

And Hayataro is the standard loving dog with few comic or unbelievable eccentricities other than the meowing.  Even if he can somehow turn himself into a giant dog-horse cyborg steed thing that shoots lasers out of his mouth.

Well, I guess Masashi Kishimoto’s talents had to be put to good (?) use somewhere ever since Naruto ended.  Just don’t expect me to be spending any money on it.

New Post! "Not Exactly A Visual Paradise"

Is anyone still there?

Dear readers, due to the Spring 2020 outbreak of Covid-19, I have found myself in a bad position to visit my local bookstores or even the library.  And, for that reason, I have been remiss for the last 2-3 months in my posting about new and exciting manga I've been reading.

Now, for the record, I could have gone to the library (if only to pick up pre-ordered books curbside), and I actually have on and off for a while, but it's just different when you can't go inside and browse around.  And, frankly, trying to find out what new stuff they've got in, with their system, was just too much work.

But then I heard that the physical library had actually opened up a month ago, and thus I made the bold decision to pull a swift surgical strike just a few days ago.

My discovery of new manga Jigokuraku "Hell's Paradise" was the result.

Violent excommunicated ninja Gabimaru the Hollow is set to be executed by decapitation.  But the blade mysteriously fails and shatters against his skin.  After failing to die in executions by fire and being drawn and quartered, respectively, he is suddenly issued an imperial pardon, along with dozens of other murderous criminals from all across the land.

It turns out that the emperor (the fictional Tokugawa Nariyoshi, not the real 11th Tokugawa shogun Ienari) is funding an expedition of criminals, "Suicide Squad"-style, to a mythical land beyond the Southwest seas to recover the elixir of immortality.  Many men were sent before, but all returned in serious body horror shape, crumbling into masses of roots and flower petals.

The one or ones who return to the shogun with the elixir will be granted free pardons to go off on their merry way unaccosted.

Traveling with these condemned men and women are the Yamada Asaemon executioners, who are to keep them in line and make sure that their hands are bound.  One such member of this elite family is Yamada Asaemon Sagiri (or just Sagiri, as I will now call her), the only female member that we know of, who struggles with the weight of taking lives and the mighty if chilling reputation of her family.

The manga has some good world-building, as well as a general message of growing stronger by working out one's own feelings and accepting them.   Gabimaru tried to leave his village because he wanted a normal life with the simple woman who opened his heart.  Sagiri struggles with doubt in her skills and the fear of actually taking lives.  Neither side wants to kill, but they know they must.

The body horror of the transformed people is great, and we even get a little fanservice from Sagiri, albeit only in her inner monologue scenes.  And the character work is great, even down to the evil shogun, who watches gleefully as the assembled prisoners fight to the death and narrow themselves down to 10.

One downside is that, given the scratchy artwork and static nature of manga, some of the battle scenes unfold with only the wariest of readers being able to understand what just happened.  Plus Gabimaru's first major battle against a weapon-maniac named Warped Keiun, finishes completely offscreen, with only a giant body pierced through with all of his former weapons at the end of it.

Jigokuraku makes for an interesting, if weird, read right up until the end.  Because, just when we think we've seen the weirdest this volume can offer, some things that look like a cross between a Hollows and Titans go lumbering by and we end on some of our heroes preparing to fight them.

Long story short, I recommend this manga for the time being.

And, in closing, may I just say that I wish the best to you and yours during this time of global pandemic and hardship.  Just remember: as long as there's a tomorrow on the calendar, there's always hope that things will turn around.

God bless.

Jujutsu Kaisen Review

And, in yet another manga series reviewed simply because it was new on the shelves at my library, I bring you the official Yaruki Man-Manga review of Gege Akutami’s “Jujutsu Kaisen”.

Ordinary high school student Yuji Itadori is kind and simple, but also very strong.  Several sports teams have attempted to recruit him, but Yuji is fine using his after-school time filling out a space in the local occult research club.  I think it was a bit unclear as to whether or not he actually believes in such things, but he is soon left with no other option when one of their cursed items turns out to be real and the breaking of its seal releases monsters that attack them.

Yuji and his friends find themselves saved by a jujutsu practicioner named Megumi Fushiguro (male), but not without a cost.  When Megumi finds himself overwhelmed, Yuji winds up devouring the cursed object, a finger of evil curse god Ryomen Sukuna, in order to take its curse energy into himself and use it to fight back.  This not only gives him the ability to take on curse monsters hand-to-hand, but also the split personality of the evil god himself.

And, if that wasn’t enough, that curse energy being inside him means that, when he dies, the curse energy also dies.  Guess who has to hunt down the other 19 (yes, 19-Sukuna had four arms) fingers in order to contain them…and then be executed?

(Side note: On my first read-through, I thought the name Ryomen Sukuna sounded familiar.  It turns out that I’d seen him referenced way back in Ken Akamatsu’s Negima about a decade ago.  So points for using somewhat-recognizable Japanese folklore that isn’t too mainstream.)

This series reminds me a lot of early Bleach with its wacky characters, seemingly simple premise, sense of comedy, magic system and even its art style.  But there’s also the “using evil to fight evil while slowly being taken over by it” concept like you’d find in Seraph of the End or Black Clover or Gleipnir, with a touch of the Cardcaptor Sakura-esque “gotta catch ‘em all” concept and the “potentially doomed/condemned protagonist”.

Yuji makes for an enjoyable main character who accepts things being as they are, but is also not a complete idiot in the process.  Think Luffy, but with the physical strength of Chad and the immense untapped potential of Ichigo.

Bleach itself was a pretty okay read that felt novel and new back when it first released in English (although wasn’t that around the same time we were reading Shaman King?), and this series so far seems like basically the same series with some different window dressing.

Not that that’s a bad thing, mind you.  But I suppose we’ll see if Jujutsu Kaisen also slowly declines into just the heroes rushing off into serious battle after serious battle with no time for levity in-between threats.

(And, may I just say that Bleach really shone as an anime?  I believe it may have been my first introduction to the Funimation English dubbing deities that are Michelle Ruff, Stephanie Sheh and Johnny Young Bosch.)

"Happiness" Was Just Okay

Greetings, my adoring fans.

I know it’s been a while since we last spoke (hell, it’s practically March already), but there have just been so few new quality manga available at my local bookstore.

So…many…isekai.

So, even though it’s not necessarily “new”, I bring you my review of Shuzo Oshimi’s vampire horror manga “Happiness”.  (And yes, I did only pick it up because it was new on the shelves of my local library.  So sue me.)

You may remember this author/artist from his other series “Inside Mari”, which I believe I topped off last year’s posts by reviewing, and from his even earlier psychological horror work “Flowers of Evil”.

Note that I specify “psychological horror”, because that is, up until this point, Mr. Oshimi’s bread and butter.  His works don’t usually fall into the realm of action or serious gore, so I found myself pleased with how he carries off both of the former in this new and current work.

Makoto Okazaki is your typical loser, shorter than his classmates and easily pushed around by them (and, yes, just like all his other protagonists, he’s also a low-key pervert hiding behind an innocent mask).  One night, on his way to return a DVD to the Japanese equivalent of RedBox, Makoto ignores the warnings of his concerned Mom to be careful and runs into some trouble.

As it turns out, his Mom was right to be concerned.  Apparently, there’s been a mysterious murder committed right nearby where Makoto is going to be headed.

And then anime happens.  (Or manga.  Whatever.)

Long story short, a mysterious yet pretty fanged girl draws his blood out of him.  And, unlike many other, sanitized versions of vampire where it’s played only for hotness, this blood frenzy is graphic and painful for poor Makoto and played entirely for horror.

The girl asks him if he either wants to die or else become like her.  Not knowing, Makoto begs for his life and the girl leaves.  He passes out and wakes up in the hospital from his gushing neck wound.  He is later discharged with only an acute light sensitivity and a strange thirst for his troubles.  That is, until he gets to school, where his bullies mock him for being attacked by a girl.  In the hallways, Makoto finds himself assaulted by the scent of blood, mostly from girls who are presumably on their periods.  The overwhelming sensations cause him to stumble in front of his bullies while he takes their orders, only making things worse with them.  But, this time, Makoto fights back and manages to bloody his opponent Yuuki’s nose with a single punch.

When he tries, overwhelmed and unsuccessful, to attack a girl, a Ms. Yukiko Gosho, she plays it off as him sexually harassing her and quickly turns into the messed-up bully girl from Flowers of Evil.

A few years ago, I read another manga with a much similar premise called Kuro Zakuro, except the vampires were more Hollow-like creatures called Ogres and the protag became one by swallowing one of their creation seeds in his sleep, but you get the idea.

In the aforementioned, the protag found himself overwhelmed by his desires for violence and meat.  In Happiness, we can also see Makoto becoming overwhelmed by his desire for blood, but in a very different way.  We don’t just hear him inside his head crying out for blood; we see it visually as his world distorts around him, denoting his confusion and placing us, somehow, even more in his head than any mere thoughts could.

(That is, we the readers know it all represents his desire for blood; we ended Volume One with him still in the dark over what he is and what has happened to him.)

Another thing that sets Happiness apart from other monster transformation manga is that we also get to see the aftermath of the fight from Yuuki’s point of view.  By the end of Volume One, his girlfriend Nao has enlisted Makoto to come save him from some other bullies because his loss of confidence has turned him into their new punching bag.

Thus far, the series breaks little new ground in the monster transformation horror genre, but, as I’ve said, it is interesting to see such a story put in the hands of Shuzo Oshimi.  I predict lots of psychological horror, tortured whining and pervy fanservice before the series reaches its end.

That being said, this will probably be another series that I only pick up/notice whenever it’s new at the library and not one that I will excitedly scan the bookstore shelves for every other month or ever think to own.

But, if you happen to disagree, then by all means pick up a copy for yourselves.

"Inside Mari" Review

(Before we get started, YES, I know this is the visual for the cover of Vol. 2, but this was the most reasonably-sized "Inside Mari"-related image that Google Images could get me.)

That being said, we now come to our final manga review of the year, for Shuzo Oshimi's "Inside Mari".

This creator has already given us the psychological horror greats of "Happiness" and "The Flowers of Evil", so this reviewer came into this series with slightly-higher expectations than usual.

The blurbs made it sound like this would be just another body-swap manga, but, then again, this is Shuzo Oshimi we're talking about; surely it can't be that simple.

And it isn't.

Our ostensible hero Isao Komori is a college dropout NEET who yearns for a chance to go back and build himself a better life from back in high school.  And, speaking of high school, he has also gotten into the habit of noticing a certain high school girl at the local mini-mart now and then.

And here we have the first point where we begin to deviate from the formula.

Isao, for all his faults, is not a pervert (at least, not yet, anyway).  He does not lust after this girl, this Mari Yoshizaki.  He does not desire her physically or even approach or talk to her.  He knows how this could be misconstrued and how any physical attraction he might feel towards her would be wrong.  And, when he does find himself in her body the next day, he makes no attempt to look at her naked or watch her body urinate or in the bathtub or anything like that.

Normally, any male character in a body-swap manga would be doing exactly those things (to a degree), which is quite refreshing, given the "played for horror" perverted nature of Oshimi's male protagonist back in "The Flowers of Evil".

And another deviation is that, when Isao in Mari's body confronts his own former body at the mini-mart, it is NOT Mari inside!  We don't exactly know who it is, but whoever it is does not react like the body-stolen Mari-turned-Isao would react.

Mari.  Is.  Gone.

And thus begins the main conflict of the story: navigating a strange new social landscape in a new body, while keeping a secret, while trying to find out what happened to the soul/mind/spirit of the real Mari Yoshizaki.

That's right-this change between bodies isn't a body-swap.  It's an outright takeover!

This series moves about as slowly as "The Flowers of Evil" did, but that's a small price to pay for an interesting twist on the body-swap story, not to mention Oshimi's usual artistic flair and horror writing style.

Volumes One through at least Three are out in English now at your local bookstore, so here's another shining review from yours truly!

Have a great rest of the year!

Ain't She Cute?

This, ladies and gentlemen, is Ms. Kuroe Akaishi, the heroine of today's reviewed manga "Kaiju Girl Carmelise".

But don't let her looks fool you-she can transform into a massive, city-destroying beast.

And I'm not talking figuratively!

You see, for some unknown reason, whenever she becomes stressed, Kuroe here begins a slow transformation into a giant, scaly, Godzilla-esque monster.

Sadly, when Kuroe was little, she confessed her feelings to another little boy and her hands turned into claws, leaving both her and the boy in question with serious trauma.

Since then, she has become a bitter and lonely shell, "Psycho-tan" to her classmates.  In this respect, she reminds me very much of Tomoko Kuroki, the socially-awkward heroine of "Watamote".  But all of this changes one day when she catches the attention of local high school modelling pretty boy Minami Arata.

Minami used to be overweight back in the day, so he knows how it can feel to be judged solely on the outside.  He, naturally, sees into the broken heart of Kuroe Akaishi and begins to arouse certain feelings within her.

You can see where this is going...

This series was written and drawn by the great Spica Aoki, creator of "Beasts of Abigaile", another great series I liked.  But this series has its share of differences to her previous work.

For example, as of the end of Vol. 1, Kuroe (or "Harugon", as her monster form is known, because the location it first appeared was Harumi Town or the Harumi river, I forget which) seems to be the only person in the world at this time with such a problem.  There is no community of other non-human monsters here for Kuroe to find solidarity and support with.

There is also a tad more humor present in Kaiju Girl Carmelise, from the oblivious Kuroe, caught up in her own lovey-dovey world of imagining Arata-kun, accidentally destroying buildings and getting shot by the army (and not knowing!) to the crazy kaiju fangirl Manatsu, in love with "Harugon", who even sleeps in a bag shaped like Mothra's larva form.

When she/it first appears, Kuroe worries that she/it has come to do battle with her!

And, for those pervs out there like me, we get a lot more fanservice here than we did in "Beasts of Abigaile", Kuroe's clothes never coming along for the ride when she transforms.  And her clothing still runs the risk of damage whenever she transforms, not only when she goes full kaiju.

For example, when she grows a tail she has to hide, we get a gorgeous glimpse of her naked butt cheeks when it sucks back into her, having ruined her gym shorts.

While the series thus far does seem to be running a little thin on plot, such is almost beside the point at this point.

Long story short, for all its well-written characters, its unique premise, and, yes, even the fanservice, Kaiju Girl Carmelise is the first manga series in a long while that I not only want to follow, but actively want to own!  It's in my Amazon Shopping Cart!

But is it in yours?  Let me know!