Dokebi Bride 1-6 by Marley: B

Dokebi Bride is very difficult to describe because it’s a little bit like a lot of things, but isn’t fully any one of them. On the surface, it’s the tale of a girl named Sunbi Shin who can see spirits, and those are a dime a dozen, though few incorporate myth and folklore so creatively. In later volumes, it morphs into the story of a supernaturally gifted protagonist who travels and somehow helps to ease the problems of others; I’ve never read Mushishi, but wouldn’t be surprised to learn the vibe is similar. At its core, though, it’s the story of a girl who has been deserted by those she loved and is angry about that and who tries to act as if nothing really affects her.

As we learn in the first volume, Sunbi has been raised in a rural village by her grandmother after the death of her mother. She and her grandmother, the village shaman, are close and Sunbi learns all sorts of things about dragon spirits and feeding sea dokebis. Unfortunately, she’s ostracized in school for her strangeness and learns to hide her ability to see spirits. Upon her grandmother’s death, Sunbi moves to Seoul to live with her father and his new family where she could not possibly feel more unwanted.

Sunbi has bigger problems than her new living arrangements, however, as she seems to have no defense against the spirits that she encounters every day. An untimely encounter with a spirit at school only serves to ensure that her ostracism continues and the only friend she makes is Taehoon, a boy who’s interested in some weird energy fields around Sunbi that he’s picked up on a special camera. After a particularly traumatic spiritual visitation results in a devastating loss, Sunbi finally decides to take some action. After consulting with a professor of folklore, she performs the ritual to summon dokebis and ends up forming a contract with the strongest one of the lot, whom she names Gwangsoo. The generally comedic Gwangsoo considers Sunbi his bride, and has a vision of her as some kind of warrior, though she doesn’t seem to be aware of these facts just yet.

With Gwangsoo at her beck and call, Sunbi has more confidence and random spirits leave her alone. She also starts helping people, beginning with the spiritual problem keeping Taehoon’s mother’s restaurant from prospering and, after leaving her father’s house when another shaman comes to claim her grandmother’s artifacts, extending to runaways with violent tendencies and a woman who blames her disabled mother for all of her life’s difficulties. Meanwhile, a mysterious guy shows up and moves in with Sunbi’s family in Seoul and something strange is going on with her right arm.

As a character, Sunbi is the personification of prickly, as if she’s refusing to let anyone in after the pain of losing her loved ones. She refuses to lean on others, even though her stepmother does try (through regrettably manipulative ways) to get her to confide in someone, and is disinterested in her surroundings. After losing the shamanic artifacts, the last mementos of her grandmother, she runs away but not before the spirits attending the shaman tell her that all of the pain and suffering she’s enduring is serving to make her better able to understand those who have lost and been hurt.

As Sunbi heads out on the road, this new compassion doesn’t manifest right away, but by the end of volume six she seems to be a little bit more kindly disposed to those around her, though noticeably more towards creatures than other humans. It’s when she’s with Gwangsoo, for example, that she seems the most relaxed: she can’t trust people, but she trusts him. The art reflects this too, actually, with the creatures beautifully drawn (particularly the dragon in volume one) but humans far less so.

While Dokebi Bride is always interesting, occasionally fascinating, and sometimes very moving—and ought to be read if only for Gwangsoo and his brethren, who would be right at home in the movie Labyrinth—it does have some problems. My main issue with it is that all six volumes feel like exposition to a bigger story that hasn’t yet begun. A lot of plot threads have been advanced—Sunbi as warrior, the itchy patch on her arm, hints at a significant role that she’ll play—but they don’t seem to go anywhere. For the first four volumes I felt pretty secure that Marley was going to get to the point someday, but after the fifth volume and its wholly unpleasant detour into the life of a girlfriend-abusing former runaway I am not so sure. It seems to be back on track with the sixth volume, but many unexplained elements remain.

Also, while I am usually delighted when a series doesn’t insult a reader’s intelligence and allows them to figure things out for themselves, I find that I actually want a bit more spoonfeeding from this series. A large portion of my synopsis, for example, is what I suppose happened based on observing the events rather than what I know happened based on a character remarking upon it in any way. The story doesn’t come right out and say, for example, why Sunbi is no longer plagued by spirits. It’s an extrapolation that I’ve made and can only hope is correct.

Dokebi Bride is definitely unique, and I feel safe in recommending it for that fact alone, but be forewarned that it might not be the most satisfying reading experience you’ve ever had. Maybe it’ll turn into something amazing down the line, if it’s ever continued, but so far it hasn’t quite managed it.