Banana Fish 7-8 by Akimi Yoshida: A

September 6, 2010 by 23 Comments

In these two volumes, Ash largely leaves the follow-up concerning Banana Fish to reporter Max Lobo and his colleague, Steve, and instead sets his sights on exacting bloody vengeance against Arthur, a former member of Ash’s gang who betrayed him. At first, it seems like two major events are going to complicate things for Ash—namely, that he’s the prime suspect in the arson at Dino Golzine’s mansion and that Dino has traded a sizable contribution to a politician’s campaign in exchange for legal custody of Ash.

Ash, however, neatly sidesteps both threats, executing a two-pronged financial attack against Dino and fooling the cops into thinking he’s the privileged son of a banker. This leaves Ash free to order a massacre, culminating in a riveting one-on-one (at least, it was supposed to be) fight between Ash and Arthur in a deserted subway station. Meanwhile, Ash attempts once again to get Eiji to return to Japan, though not before revealing some of his pain and vulnerability to him.

We see so many different sides of Ash in these volumes. When he’s alone with Eiji he allows himself to cry over what he’s become, sharing memories both painful and amusing (the pumpkin story!), and reveals that he never once wanted to be “exceptional.” Ash is too pragmatic to indulge in wishes, but one gets the sense that if he would let himself dream, he would want a quiet life where he’s free to be a kid, which is exactly what he gets by being with Eiji. There’s an extraordinarily touching scene where he simply needs Eiji’s presence so much that he asks him to stay with him a while, and Eiji, with a look of profound peace upon his face, replies, “Forever.”

Things can’t stay so calm, however. Eiji, confused by how Ash can sob into Eiji’s lap one moment and kill someone the next, takes issue with Ash’s cold-blooded vengeance. “Which is the real one? Or do they both exist side by side in you, without contradiction?” he thinks at one point, and he’s not even privy to the third side of Ash—the absolutely brilliant one who not only orchestrates the attack on Dino but is able to analyze the political situation prompting some high-ranking officials in the US government to employ Banana Fish for their own ends.

Simply describing some of these scenes is not doing them justice. What emerges is a fascinating portrait of an intelligent and wounded young man who is absolutely determined to survive the hand he’s been dealt, and conceals his hurt and insecurities under a veneer of coldness. Ash is prepared to send Eiji away because his friendship is dangerous to him, but if he succeeds he would also be sending away his one outlet, the one person in front of whom he doesn’t need to pretend to be okay. Ash is a broken badass and man, who would have thought I could love him more now than I did after volume six? And yet I do.

I only wish the art were better. It might just be me, but I do think that Ash is drawn much more handsomely now than in early volumes, and looks especially snazzy in his glasses and designer duds while posing as the rich kid. Unfortunately, black characters still look pretty awful, though one new black character—Cain, the leader of a neutral gang—is a great new addition to the cast. I hope he sticks around. Too, a lot of times characters shown in profile look like they have pillows shoved up under their shirts. What is up with that?

It’s always hard not to continue to the next volume when I get to the end of an installment of Banana Fish, but this was harder than most. Still, I don’t want to get too far ahead of the roundable discussion, which you should keep an eye out for at Manga Bookshelf.

Filed Under: Manga, Shoujo Tagged With:

When the Heavens Smile by Aki Senoo: B+

September 4, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Book description:
Takagi, a rather cute and innocent guy, is best friends and classmates with Kumoi, a tall, intellectual guy. One day, Takagi is stunned to find a pencil sketch of a man between Kumoi’s notebook pages that resembles his older brother… who passed away six years ago! Could Kumoi have possibly known his brother?

Review:
I’ll admit that what initially appealed to me the most about When the Heavens Smile was its pretty, muted cover. It was quite a pleasant surprise to find that all eight of the stories within are quite good.

A common theme for the collection seems to be “friends in love,” though this isn’t true for all stories. “Fragment,” for example, is the tale of two students who meet, feel a connection, and give in to their impulses before they even learn each other’s names. “Absolute Condition” is about gentle-seeming Kusaka who turns out to be a closet mole fetishist and “Sirens” is about a high-school student and his relationship with an older man (though it’s clear that it was the student who made the first move). The first two are particularly good and both feature a take-charge uke.

The first of the “friends in love” stories is “I Love Strawberries the Most, Followed By My Dad,” which is a very sweet story with another take-charge uke. I love how the boys compare their affection for each other to how much they love various fruits. “Fever Mark” features another pair of friends becoming more, and “That Which Falls From Heaven” and “That Which is Still Here” are about Takagi and Kumoi who share a chaste love while being watched over by the ghost of Takagi’s elder brother.

My very favorite story in the collection concerns men rather than boys and is called “I Can’t Remember Now.” Midori works in a bar, and his friend Katsuhiro comes in constantly and gets plastered. Every time, Katsuhiro professes his love to Midori and tries to grope him, and all the other employees just assume they are a couple. Alas, Katsuhiro remembers nothing the next morning, which is painful for Midori since he does have feelings for his friend. Eventually, Midori can’t take it anymore and puts some distance between them. When a tipsy Katsuhiro tracks him down, Midori forces him to sober up before they can talk and, of course, they end up happily in bed with Katsuhiro comically uncertain if that was their first time or not.

Senoo’s art suits the stories well and there were several panels I had to pause and admire, even though the style is simple and backgrounds largely nonexistent. I like the character designs, and too I liked that none of the sex scenes (all of which are consensual, incidentally) are explicit. They’re plenty sexy as they are, without the need for details and slurpy sound effects, because the characters are interesting and their connections meaningful.

On the whole, this was exactly the sort of BL I like most; I hope more of Aki Senoo’s work is licensed in the future.

Review copy provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Boys' Love, Manga, Short Stories Tagged With: ,

Bakuman。1 by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata: B+

September 3, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Moritaka Mashiro is bored. For his fourteen years of life he’s merely gone along with the flow, a path which is destined to end with him becoming a normal white-collar worker. He doesn’t want this, but sees no alternative until Akito Takagi, the top student in class, notices Moritaka’s artistic skills and proposes that the two team up to create a manga. Moritaka is resistant at first—he’d much rather loaf around and play video games—but when the object of his affections (and aspiring voice actress), Miho Azuki, agrees to marry him when his manga becomes an anime, he is suddenly unstoppable.

Moritaka expects resistance from his family—after all, his uncle essentially killed himself by trying to become a successful manga artist—but they’re surprisingly supportive and it turns out that his uncle’s studio has been preserved, untouched, since his death. I absolutely adore the chapter where Moritaka and Akito rush to the studio for the first time—it is seriously a manga-lover’s dream. Not only are there plenty of artistic supplies, but there are shelves upon shelves of manga (“for reference”) as well as neatly organized boxes of storyboards and final drafts. All of the scenes with the boys working on their story—they decide to submit a final draft for consideration by the end of summer break—are absolutely fascinating and bring home just how grueling creating comics can be.

There are a couple of problematic things about Bakuman, however. Moritaka and Azuki’s pledge to get married when they achieve their dreams—without dating in the meantime—is pretty silly, but not out-of-character for a couple of fourteen-year-olds. The fact that they’ll be encouraging each other via e-mail, just like Moritaka’s uncle was encouraged by letters from his classmate, who just so happens to be Azuki’s mother, is a coincidence I could’ve done without. In general, this whole subplot failed to interest me; I was much more interested in the boys’ efforts to get their manga off the ground, but I suppose listless Moritaka needed to find motivation somewhere.

More significantly, many reviewers have taken issue with the displays of sexism in Bakuman. Having now read it for myself, I get the impression that certain characters are sexist but I’d stop short of applying that label to the series as a whole. This makes me wonder, though… why, when characters in Bakuman say things like “She knows by instinct that the best thing for a girl is to get married and become somebody’s wife” or “Men have dreams that women will never be able to understand” does it not piss me off as righteously as when characters make very similar comments in The Color Trilogy by Kim Dong Hwa?

I think it depends, for me, on who’s saying it. If, as in the case of The Color Trilogy, a male author puts such words into the mouths of female characters, I can’t seem to help getting peeved about it. In Bakuman, the speaker of the first line above is Akito—in other words, just an overconfident teen who thinks he knows everything. He goes on to say he doesn’t like a particular girl in class because she’s proud of how well she does in school, but when Azuki’s mother later tells him she doesn’t like smart guys, he flails about and says, “But that’s just your taste.” Perhaps what he earlier presented as deep insight about Azuki was really his own taste coming through. The second line above, about men’s dreams, though technically spoken by Moritaka’s mother, is actually a quote from his off-camera father and was easy for me to dismiss as, “Oh, he’s just an older man with outdated opinions.”

I’m not trying to argue that these characters aren’t sexist, but they don’t succeed in getting my dander up and certainly will not deter me from reading more of the series.

Bakuman is published in English by VIZ. One volume’s been released here so far, while the ninth volume of this still-running series came out in Japan last month.

This review was originally published at Comics Should Be Good.

Review copy provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Manga, Shounen Tagged With: , ,

Yotsuba&! 2-8 by Kiyohiko Azuma: A

August 30, 2010 by Leave a Comment

The theme of this month’s Manga Moveable Feast is a Kids’ Table featuring discussion of Yotsuba&! and other kid-friendly manga. Here is my take on the former; be sure to check out this week’s Off the Shelf where MJ and I will talk about the latter!

My opinions on these seven delightful volumes of Yotsuba&! can be summed up as: “Yep, still awesome!” I really don’t have much to add to what I said in my review of volume one. Yotsuba is still wide-eyed and exuberant, there are still many laugh-out-loud scenes and lines of dialogue, and I still teeter on the edge between wanting Yotsuba to stay as she is forever and wanting to see her grow up. Instead of a straightforward review, then, I thought I’d share my favorite moments in each of these volumes.

Volume two:
Yotsuba encounters frogs, pools, and cake in this volume, but my favorite chapter is entitled “Yotsuba & Vengeance.” Inspired by a movie her dad and Jumbo are watching, Yotsuba whips out a water gun and “kills” them both, then changes characters and swears to avenge them. She promptly goes next door and squirts her neighbor, Mrs. Ayase.

Mrs. Ayase: Aaaah, I’ve been murdered!
Yotsuba: Yep.
Yotsuba: Ah, where’s Ena?
Mrs. Ayase: Huh? Aren’t I supposed to be dead?
Yotsuba: …
Yotsuba: You’re half alive.

Hee! After providing the requested information, Mrs. Ayase is squirted again and told, “Now you’re full dead.”

Volume three:
One thing you really begin to notice with volume three is continuity between chapters that renders them not entirely episodic. At the end of volume two, Yotsuba’s neighbor, Asagi Ayase, returns from her a trip to Okinawa with souvenirs for her family and some goodies to share with Yotsuba. This makes Yotsuba want to give Asagi a souvenir, too, but you have to go somewhere first to do that. So she goes to the park and looks around and finally finds a four-leaf clover, which she proudly presents to Asagi. When Asagi and her friend proceed to drive off, Yotsuba waits impatiently for their return, certain she will be brought another souvenir at that time. My favorite moment of this volume occurs when Asagi returns, seemingly empty-handed. It’s a really great example of nonverbal storytelling and I especially love what Yotsuba does with her hands.

Volume four:
For some reason, volume four feels especially slice-of-lifey to me. Yotsuba has a plethora of amusing reactions to the things she encounters, as per usual, but my favorite chapter involves a simple trip to the grocery store to buy ingredients to make a “regular delicious” meal. I love, too, how Yotsuba takes the lesson that the smaller cart is “for kids” and applies the same reasoning to things like quail eggs and (presumably) cherry tomatoes. Plus, that hamburg steak that they’re having for dinner sounds super tasty! (I’m much more dubious about the konnyaku.)

Volume five:
Although volume five is home to the classic chapter “Yotsuba & Danbo,” in which Yotsuba interacts with a cardboard robot without knowing her neighbor’s classmate is inside, my favorite chapter is actually “Yotsuba & Rain.” Maybe I’m just partial to episodes in which Yotsuba and her dad run errands together, but this has the two of them venturing out into the rain to return a DVD. After Yotsuba fails at the art of umbrella, assures the clerk that the dolphins jumping “like boing” were awesome, and sings a little song to the amusement of another patron (“We are all living! And living is pain!”), she wraps up her afternoon by accosting random strangers and asking if they’ve tried taiyaki. The whole chapter sums up her character, and her relationship with her father, very well. The one sour note in this volume is the introduction of Yanda, a coworker of Yotsuba’s father, who essentially gets his kicks out of antagonizing a five-year-old child.

Volume six:
The most significant thing to happen to Yotsuba in volume six is that she gets a bike. This leads to a variety of cute scenes, but the best chapter is “Yotsuba & Delivering,” in which Yotsuba attempts to catch up with a school-bound Fuuka on her bike—which she is not supposed to be riding without an adult present—in order to share some delicious milk with her. I love the duo of panels in which we see first a corner with simply the “gara gara” (rattle) sound effect of the bike, and then the same corner after Yotsuba has finally made it around. In general, Yotsuba seems a little more restive and mischievous in this volume, disrupting Ena when she’s doing homework, eating her father’s eclair when she knows she shouldn’t and then going next door in search of a replacement, et cetera. Azuma really captures kid behavior so well. Even a child as charming as Yotsuba has impulse control issues and then resorts to sneaky means to cover up afterwards!

Volume seven:
One of the things I enjoy most about Yotsuba&! is seeing how she thinks, especially when she’s trying to solve problems. In the chapter “Yotsuba & Errands,” rather than ask another customer at a convenience store to help her get down a Cup Noodle she can’t reach, she asks for something long. The customer finds a fluorescent bulb that suffices and watches, stunned, as Yotsuba uses it to bat the noodles down from the shelf. There’s also a lot of great nonverbal storytelling in this volume, particularly in a chapter in which Yotsuba, Fuuka, and Fuuka’s school friend attempt to make a cake, whimsically taking periodic breaks to express their cake-making feelings through interpretive dance.

Volume eight:
Although I adore Yotsuba’s reactions to the various things she encounters at the cultural festival being held at Fuuka’s school as well as her stint riding atop Jumbo’s shoulders, my favorite chapter is “Yotsuba & the Typhoon.” From its opening page, on which an awestruck Yotsuba is seen through a rain-splashed window, you know this one is something special. The goodness continues when Yotsuba insists on going next door and dashes out to frolic jubilantly in the downpour. Her father is aghast at first and then surrenders to the moment himself. I’m happy that he’s the one who tries to see things the way Yotsuba does, especially since the neighbors don’t want to join on the fun. The chapter is capped off by a perfect page of nonverbal storytelling as Yotsuba tests the hypothesis that if she were to go outside and open an umbrella, she’d fly away.

I thoroughly enjoyed my Yotsuba&! binge. What’s more, this series has tremendous reread potential—more, perhaps, than any other series I can think of—so I’m sure I’ll enjoy returning to it in future.

What are some of your favorite Yotsuba&! moments?

Review copies for volumes 2-6 provided by the publisher.

For more of the Kids’ Table MMF, check out the archive at Good Comics for Kids.

Filed Under: Manga, MMF, Seinen Tagged With:

Sugarholic 1-5 by Gong GooGoo: B

August 24, 2010 by 1 Comment

Jae-Gyu Sin is a lazy and listless twenty-year-old living with her mother and grandmother. When a mudslide destroys their house, her grandmother ships Jae-Gyu off to Seoul with very little money and instructions to stay with her brother, a university student, for a while. On her way there, she manages to tear the shirt being worn by a random hottie then spots her childhood bullying victim Hee-Do on TV, where he is performing as part of a popular boy band. (Incidentally, I wonder just how many manhwa feature a spunky girl who gets into a relationship with an impossibly beautiful boy due to the accidental destruction of his property. It happens in There’s Something About Sunyool, it happens (sort of) in the K-drama Coffee Prince…)

After some setup, in which Jae-Gyu reconnects with her former classmate Hyun-Ah, accidentally pantses the hottie (Whie-Hwan), runs into Hee-Do, and ends up accompanying some of Hyun-Ah’s coworkers to a sort of prostitution gig, Whie-Hwan makes a proposition. His grandfather, head of a crime family, keeps hassling him about his ex-girlfriend, so he wants Jae-Gyu to live with him and pose as his new love interest for a month. When she sees the amount of money he’s offering, Jae-Gyu agrees.

Whie-Hwan, not surprisingly, has the angst. He was weak as a kid growing up in Thailand, so his grandfather had him study Muay Thai, not realizing that Whie-Hwan would grow incredibly attached to his teacher, Athit. Grandpa eventually forced Whie-Hwan to quit, under threat of physical injury to Athit, and Whie-Hwan has been miserable ever since. This begins to change as he spends more time around Jae-Gyu. Though she’s kind of obnoxious and aggressively immature, she is quite lively, and her presence helps Whie-Hwan wake up to the world around him.

In time, and after a few timely rescues of Jae-Gyu from a sleazy rich guy who’s taken a liking to her, Whie-Hwan realizes that he’s begun to have genuine feelings for her. Jae-Gyu, too, is experiencing the same thing, and it’s here where we begin to understand that her off-putting behavior is really just a defense mechanism. When she was a child, her father abandoned his wife and children, and in order to avoid attracting anyone’s pity or sympathy, young Jae-Gyu acted as bratty and rambunctious as possible. This attitude persists even now, with Jae-Gyu denying her feelings expression because “I know well enough that if I show any weakness, I lose.” I found Jae-Gyu grating in the first two volumes, but after this insight in volume three, I began to like her (and the series as a whole) much more.

Here begins the truly charming phase of the series, in which Whie-Hwan and Jae-Gyu decide to become a real couple and attempt to do couple-ish things, although neither has been in a real relationship before. Whie-Hwan’s idea of an ideal first date is to whisk Jae-Gyu off to Thailand so that she can get to know him better by experiencing the Muay Thai he loves and so he can also show her off to Athit. Over-the-top Evil Grandpa doesn’t take well to this, however, preventing the long-awaited reunion with Athit and and shipping Whie-Hwan off to the US for a few months.

When he returns, free of his grandfather at last, Whie-Hwan is much more clear-eyed and open about what he wants: a future in which both Muay Thai and Jae-Gyu figure prominently. I really enjoyed seeing the two of them finally begin to lower some of their barriers and communicate in earnest, though it will take until near the end of volume five for Jae-Gyu to be able to plainly say, “I like you” without expecting Whie-Hwan to read her mind and discover what she really means versus what she’s actually saying. I also liked that Jae-Gyu has to deal with some jealous pangs arising from the knowledge that no matter how much Whie-Hwan cares about her, Muay Thai and Athit will be as important to him, if not more so. She eventually realizes that, if she really loves him, she will encourage him to pursue what makes him happy while seeking to find something similar for herself. In a way, this outcome reminds me of Paradise Kiss, though the ultimate conclusion is much more happy and conventional here.

I’ve been able to write this entire review so far without making more than passing references to Hee-Do, which is a good indication of how entirely unnecessary I found him to be. Petulant and self-pitying, the smitten Hee-Do continually attempts to get through to Jae-Gyu how he feels about her. He thinks it’s a failure to understand on her part, but in reality, she’s aware of his feelings but doesn’t know how to deal with them. Rather than hurt him, since she eventually comes to value his friendship, she feigns obliviousness. Hee-Do is really the clueless one here, unable to see that his advances are making Jae-Gyu uncomfortable. I found his vacillation between glomping and moping annoying.

The art in Sugarholic also has its problems. It’s appropriate for Jae-Gyu to look plain and coltish, and I’m used to the pouty male leads in manhwa looking like they’re wearing mascara, but practically everyone has this random little scribble on their lower lip that makes them look like they either got punched or are in desperate need of some healing lip balm action. It’s very distracting. Some of the dark-haired female characters look similar, too. I did like that the panels are large and not laden with dialogue, though; I’m sometimes a slow reader, but devouring this series was a breeze.

If you’re considering picking up Sugarholic, be prepared to endure two volumes that aren’t so great before things pick up in volume three. I liked it a good bit in the end, so I’m glad I continued with it, but I might not have done so if I hadn’t had all five volumes at hand already.

Sugarholic is published in English by Yen Press. All five volumes have now been released.

Review copies provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Manhwa Tagged With:

One Piece 25-27 by Eiichiro Oda: B

August 21, 2010 by Leave a Comment

I’ve heard a lot about the Skypiea arc of One Piece, though I actually knew zero specifics about what Luffy and his crew would encounter once they reached the legendary island in the sky. More, I seemed to absorb the general idea that this arc is really awesome and everyone loves it. Alas, I don’t love it yet, but there are some things I do really like about how the story is shaping up.

Volume 25 begins with the Straw Hats meeting Mont Blanc Cricket, the descendant of a notorious liar named Mont Blanc Noland who swore ’til his death that he saw a city of gold on an island called Jaya. Noland’s so notiorious, in fact, that there’s a children’s book written about him, and Mont Blanc Cricket’s life was essentially ruined by being related to this fellow. He now spends his days diving into the seas around Jaya in search of the sunken city, aided by a couple of monkey pirates who believe that Noland was telling the truth.

All Mont Blanc Cricket has to show for his ten years of effort is a small collection of gold artifacts, and when those are stolen by a gang of pirates, Luffy goes to get them back. I like how this local pirate, Bellamy, is given some attention beforehand, as if he’s someone to really be feared, but Luffy ends up taking him out with one punch. In gratitude, Mont Blanc Cricket and his monkey minions customize the Merry Go to survive the Knock-Up Stream, a vertical blast of water that’ll convey them to Skypiea and which is conveniently scheduled to go off the very next day.

Once on Skypiea, Luffy and Usopp proceed to act like greater idiots than usual and everyone is branded as trespassers because they enter without paying the required exorbitant fee. Duly, they’re hunted down, and the citizens of Skypiea are required to turn them in because their actions are monitored by a vengeful “kami” who rules the island. The Straw Hats are conveyed to a sacrificial altar to await Kami’s judgment or something, but can also save themselves by triumphing over various challenges set by his vassals.

Up to this point, the Skypiea arc is actually kind of boring. I think the main issue is that, though we’re learning about the somewhat crummy way of life on Skypiea, including a never-ending war between the kami and some Native American-esque people called the Shandians, Luffy and his crew are not involved. It sort of seems like it’s their job to go around, righting miserable conditions on the Grand Line, but actually, they really only get involved with civil strife when they’ve been asked to do so. Here, nobody’s asking, so the conflict goes on without them. This does make for some great moments, though, like when a Shandian attack distracts the kami’s vassals, allowing our heroes to have a leisurely journey through a dangerous jungle on a boat that goes “putt putt putt.”

I also really like seeing the Straw Hats actually acting like pirates and looking for gold. The end of volume 27 features the crew split into two teams and heading for the spot where they believe Mont Blanc Noland’s city has ended up after being struck by the Knock-Up Stream, and it seems poised to be pretty fun. I like what Nico Robin brings to the crew—she’s reserved and far more mature, but seems to be benevolently tolerant of their zany enthusiasm. I hope she sticks around.

Lastly, I enjoyed the glimpse of the wider world Oda reveals in this volume. For the first time, Luffy’s reputation has begun to precede him, and we see locals respecting him because of the high bounty that’s been placed on his head. We also glimpse the members of the world government and a few more of the warlords of the sea. It’ll probably be quite some time before we come back to these people, but I’ll always appreciate how Oda plants the seeds for future plotlines so seamlessly.

So, in the end, the Skypiea arc isn’t my favorite just yet, but this is still One Piece, so it’s not as if it’s in the least bit bad.

Filed Under: Manga, Shounen Tagged With: ,

Scarlet by Hiro Madarame: B+

August 18, 2010 by Leave a Comment

When I reviewed Madarame’s Cute Devil, I mentioned that I wanted to see what she’d achieve with more likable characters. Well, Scarlet provides the answer. The title story is somewhat disturbing, but that makes it interesting, and I really liked the tale of a one night stand between two coworkers.

You can find my full review in the latest BL Bookrack column at Manga Bookshelf.

Review copy provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Boys' Love, Manga, Short Stories Tagged With:

Midnight Bloom by Rico Fukiyama: C-

August 18, 2010 by Leave a Comment

What a disappointment! I usually like books in DMP’s DokiDoki imprint, but aside from a blandly cute title story, this one’s full of shallow stories and off-putting relationships, including a particularly ick-inducing student-teacher romance.

You can find that review here.

Review copy provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Boys' Love, Manga, Short Stories Tagged With: ,

There’s Something About Sunyool 2-3 by Youngran Lee: B+

August 13, 2010 by 3 Comments

Sunyool Lee’s life is full of disreputable accomplishments. If only she had something to show for them!

Volume two picks up four years after the dissolution of Sunyool’s six-month marriage to Sihyun Park, a wonderful guy with whom she was perfectly compatible. After a two-year stay in Paris, where she attempted to forget her pain and honed her pastry chef skills, she returned to Korea. A one-year stint running her own bakery ended in failure and now she works as an assistant at a bakery owned by a foul-tempered but gorgeous (aren’t they all?) novelist named Kangjae Lee.

When Kangjae first meets Sunyool, he’s willing to overlook the fact that she has just destroyed his laptop because she’s totally his type. Once he puts his contacts in, however, his illusions are shattered and they begin an adversarial relationship. Kangjae has the dubious talent of being able to enrage anyone within five seconds of meeting them, but Sunyool is able to hold her own against him, even while she’s working off her debt by working as his housekeeper. Most of the second volume consists of Kangjae acting like a spoiled child—“He’s a toddler who has no regard for anyone else’s feelings,” Sunyool decrees at one point—and Sunyool learning about his crappy childhood from his assistant/cousin, Byungman.

Things pick up a great deal in volume three with the return of Sihyun. In a nutshell: he still loves Sunyool and wants to be with her. Sunyool’s pride is stung because he didn’t stand up for their marriage four years ago and she knows that nothing has changed as far as his disapproving family is concerned. Various family members/wannabe fiancées show up to accuse Sunyool of ruining Sihyun’s life, and this is where she really shines as a character.

Although she, and members of the supporting cast, comment often on the storyline’s resemblance to a violent soap opera, Sunyool counters the over-the-top bitchiness of her accusers with a profound level-headedness that’s extremely satisfying. She has no expectations of a happy reunion with Sihyun, and makes that clear time and time again. Seeing a woman depicted as both in love and sensible is truly a lovely thing to behold, and though some of these twists are silly (though I did love the scene where she snaps and assaults someone) they also serve to show what makes her such a unique and interesting character.

Complicating matters is Kangjae. He begins hanging around the bakery more and more, getting antsy when Sunyool is not there and feeling jealous of Sihyun when he shows up. According to his cousin, Kangjae (whose real name also happens to be Sunyool Lee) was neglected by his parents in favor of his talented brother, so to see Sunyool all hung up on Sihyun when she could be basking in his hotness instead really bothers him. Initially, I was sort of annoyed that I was supposed to take the horrible Kangjae seriously as a love interest, but maybe this will shape up to be a Boys Over Flowers kind of scenario where the tough-as-nails commoner girl is able to help the immature rich guy become a better person.

In the end, There’s Something About Sunyool offers a lot of crackalicious drama that is extremely fun to read. Volume two is a bit slow, as all of the bickering grows tiresome, but don’t let that dissuade you from continuing on to volume three, which is much better and ends on quite a cliffhanger. That’s a little worrisome, since there haven’t been any new updates on the NETCOMICS site lately, but I choose to believe we’ll get more of this story in the future.

Volumes two and three of There’s Something About Sunyool are currently available only at NETCOMICS.com, though a print version for volume two is scheduled for a September release. No cover image is currently available.

Review copies provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Manhwa Tagged With: ,

Black Lagoon 1-3 by Rei Hiroe: A-

August 8, 2010 by 7 Comments

If asked for a one-word description of Rei Hiroe’s seinen action series, Black Lagoon, my response would be “kick-ass.” I’d quickly follow that up, however, with “and a lot more intelligent than one might assume.”

Black Lagoon is the story of the Lagoon Traders, a group of seafaring couriers based out of the fictional city of Roanapur, Thailand. African-American Dutch, an ex-military man who keeps cool in any situation, is their leader and, as the series begins, his crew consists of a trigger-happy Chinese-American girl named Revy and a Jewish Floridian on the run from the FBI named Benny. (Benny is totally the Wash.) The Lagoon Traders acquire a fourth member, Japanese salaryman Okajima Rokuro (immediately dubbed “Rock” by Dutch) after a job during which they’ve taken him hostage to use as leverage with his employer. When the latter opts to leave him to die, Rock decides to forsake his old life and joins up with his captors.

From there, the crew takes on a variety of jobs. Sometimes they’re the “good guys”—as in volume three, when they’re helping bring documents detailing Hezbollah plans into the hands of the CIA—and sometimes they’re the “bad guys,” like when they’re hired to arrange a getaway for a murderous child assassin. They don’t trouble themselves with value judgments like that, though; to them, business is business. Dutch will take a job if it pays well, even if it puts him into conflict with the powerful Balalaika, leader of a Russian gang known as Hotel Moscow, with whom he has worked closely in the past. “We both have jobs we gotta do. That’s all there is to it,” he tells her at one point. (Yes, “her.” There are tons of badass women in Black Lagoon.)

Aside from the (very violent, very riveting) action spawned by these dangerous jobs—including many gunfights, explosions, and high-speed chases—the story also focuses on Rock’s integration into this seedy world. His origins may be more ordinary than his crewmates’, but he has a backbone and proves useful on a number of occasions. His main source of conflict early on is with the dynamically damaged Revy, and the two have some fascinating conversations. Her early life was extremely bleak (“I stole. I killed. I did all sorts of vile crap. My story ain’t worth shit.”) and she seems to feel that Rock, with his more idealistic outlook on things, is passing judgment on her. He isn’t, at least not in the way she thinks, and when he is able to explain his perspective on things (and is probably the first person in her life to believe in her ability to be a better person) she becomes more accepting of his presence.

There’s something about the label “action” that makes me worry that the art is going to feature incomprehensible panels full of speedlines, so I was happy to discover that Hiroe’s art is actually much cleaner than I’d anticipated. He seems to have a fondness for cross-page panels, which is kind of neat, and varies up scenes of dialogue so that they’re more than just talking heads. Vessels and guns are all extremely detailed, and if Revy does have a predilection for extraordinarily skimpy clothing, she’s so strong and interesting a character that this comes across as entirely her personal choice and not merely an attempt to provide some fanservice.

The very best thing about Black Lagoon, though, is that it really is a mature manga. Many manga receive the “mature” rating because of boobs and violence, but really, maturity is not required to understand and enjoy those things. To fully understand this series, one needs a basic knowledge of geography—the Southeast Asia setting is wonderfully unique—as well as history and current events. There’s an international cast of organized criminals, as well as terrorists and other groups, and having some idea of their ideologies beforehand is essential. I think the story is supposed to be set in the mid-’90s, but was written after 9/11, so when a member of Hezbollah speaks of planned attacks against New York City, it’s pretty chilling.

I’m excited to continue with this series. It’s not for the faint of heart, and sometimes the violence does get a little much for me, but it’s so damned good that I just have to see what happens next.

Black Lagoon is published in English by VIZ. The ninth volume has just been released, which is also the most recent volume available in Japan, where the series is ongoing.

Filed Under: Manga, Seinen Tagged With: ,
« Previous Page
Next Page »