Black Cat is the story of Train Heartnet, who used to work as an assassin for a powerful organization called Chronos. After an encounter with a female bounty hunter (a.k.a. sweeper) named Saya (whom we only glimpse near the end of volume two), his outlook changed and he gave up that life. Now it’s two years later and Train has become a sweeper himself, collecting bounties on criminals with his partner, Sven. Train’s motto is “more money, more danger… more fun!” and his pursuit of the latter two usually means the duo doesn’t get much of the former.
Though the idea of the “protagonist who used to be a killer but has now become more kind” is not new to shounen manga, it’s employed a little differently in Black Cat. While many such heroes have made it their pledge never to kill again, Train has no problem with offing the criminal element, though he’s scrupulous about not harming innocents. This allows for the potential of a deadly showdown with his former partner, Creed, who was responsible for Saya’s death and upon whom Train has sworn to exact revenge.
After going after a few minor targets, Train and Sven are approached with a proposition by Rinslet, a notorious female thief. She’s been hired to steal some research data from a criminal bigwig, and wants Train and Sven to help make her job easier by capturing the bigwig first. They get the reward; she gets the loot; everybody’s happy. Of course, things don’t exactly go as planned, since the bigwig invokes Creed’s name and makes Train go rather nuts. Ultimately, Train and Creed confront each other, inflicting enough wounds to prove they are well matched as opponents but living to fight another day.
These first two volumes skillfully introduce Train’s past, his current circumstances, and the lingering threat of Creed and his band of revolutionaries (who seek to overthrow Chronos and want Train to join them) without inundating the reader with information. One of the best things about this series is the nebulous notion of “pacing,” which to me means that when I read it, it feels like I am watching a television show, with a variety of perspectives and camera angles and a natural flow to scenes and conversations. The story is also structured similarly, with the introduction of a villain who then retreats into the background for a bit while the protagonists get on with the daily grind of their occupation, calling, and/or duty.
My favorite aspect of the series, however, is the strength of the partnership between Train and Sven. It’s clear that these two trust each other professionally, but it goes deeper than that, as exemplified by Train’s reaction when Sven gets wounded during an attempt to apprehend a target. Their relationship actually reminds me some of Ban and Ginji in GetBackers, with the energetic but extremely powerful guy using the nickname –chan to refer to his more cerebral partner who possesses some sort of eye-related power (though this is only a hint so far in Sven’s case). That’s a pretty superficial comparison, but the overall affectionate feel is pretty similar.
Thankfully, the similarities between Black Cat and GetBackers do not extend to the art. Yabuki’s illustrations are clean and easy on the eyes, with a minimum of screentone and quite a lot of speed lines. Even without looking at the cover, one could probably tell that this series ran in Shonen Jump. Speaking of the cover, that’s the one area where Yabuki’s art becomes unattractive. Rinslet in particular looks much, much better in the interior art. One artistic element that does puzzle me is Train’s coat. What exactly are those brown things?! They look like miniature life boats but I have a sneaking suspicion they’re meant to be cat nipples.
Bizarre sartorial choices aside, what it all boils down to is that Black Cat is a lot of fun. The well structured story and the camaraderie between the leads elevates it beyond typical shounen fare and I’m definitely looking forward to seeing how the rest of it plays out.
This review was originally published at Comics Should Be Good.
Volume six of Monkey High! builds on issues between reserved Haruna and her cheerful boyfriend, Macharu, that began to develop in the previous volume. Macharu, in his optimism, keeps trying to help bring about reconciliation between Haruna and her distant politician father while the mere thought of her family woes is sufficient to ruin any fun Haruna might be having. Macharu’s friend Atsu, who also has feelings for Haruna, tries to take advantage of the situation to convince her that he’s a better choice, but in the end Haruna decides that it’s time to stop running from her family problems and face them head-on.
Choco and Mimi are in the eighth grade and they are best friends, despite the fact that Choco is serious, mature, and tolerable and Mimi is spoiled, ridiculous, and irksome. The cast also includes their stern teacher, Mr. Take; Ando and Mumu, a couple of boys in their class; and several pets, who are easily the best thing about ChocoMimi.
Kurohime is a witch-gunslinger, which essentially means that she can shoot magic out of a gun to heal injuries, beef up her own physical defenses, or conjure “witch-beasts” to fight opponents. As the volume begins, she is fighting the Kurohime Punishment Squad, a band of scantily-clad women with a grudge against her. A common enemy forces the women to work together and the previously-stoic Kurohime exhibits compassion for her reluctant allies and even helps to rescue the lover of one of them.
Shouzo Mita had no intention of going home to the rural town where he grew up, but when his father is hospitalized with a back injury, he returns to temporarily helm the family construction business and “fix things” with his family. Shouzo’s stay is extended when his father manages to reinjure himself, and he gradually relinquishes ties to his life in Tokyo while renewing some of his childhood acquaintances. Chief among these is Nanami Ushijima, sub-contracted as an electrician for the Mitas’ projects, who has blossomed from a dim-witted and chubby kid to a slightly less dim-witted but more conventionally attractive adult. As he gets to know Nanami, Shouzo grows to understand him better than anyone else, realizing that Nanami is smarter that he seems, with a genuine talent for numbers and deciphering electric schematics, but yet so malleable that he is unable to extricate himself from an unwanted sexual relationship.
From the back cover:
From the back cover:
The story of Ehwa, as begun in The Color of Earth, continues in this second volume of a trilogy. Like the first book in the series, The Color of Water is mostly about sex. Ever-curious Ehwa discovers some new things in this volume, often spurred along by crude scenes involving fields of phallic peppers or copulating animals. She also begins a romance with Duksam, a sweet-talking farmhand, and starts to understand her mother’s wistful feelings towards her own itinerant lover.
After losing her parents in a fire, Nanase Takamine resolved to become a firefighter. Now 21, she has achieved her goal and works as a fire investigator, not actually battling fires directly but determining where and how they started. Three years ago, while she was still a student at the academy, she came upon the scene of a hospital in flames. Rushing inside, she saved the life of a burning man, ignorant at the time that he was actually responsible for setting the fire. After he escaped from the ambulance, taking the lives of a pair of paramedics in the process, his identity as the wanted arsonist Firebug became known. Now, as Nanase is facing some puzzling cases, Firebug has contacted her and, in an effort to repay her for saving his life, provides clues and insights that help in her investigations.
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