Ouran High School Host Club 11 by Bisco Hatori: B+

February 17, 2009 by Leave a Comment

Eleven volumes in, things are still pretty much where they started with this series. Haruhi is still concealing her gender and participating in the Host Club, Tamaki is still ignorant of his feelings for her, and characters like Mori and Hunny haven’t changed a bit. This volume finds the gang competing in a sports festival that Tamaki has orchestrated in an attempt to spur Kyoya to compete passionately over something that yields him no personal benefit.

Ouran High School Host Club walks a fine line between comedy and plot progression and, honestly, dwells on the humorous side of the divide most of the time. When it does visit the other side, however, the results can be surprisingly gratifying. While many of the characters have been stuck in the same places for a while, the same cannot be said of the Hitachin brothers. Originally a pair of practically interchangeable pranksters, they have matured significantly and are now distinct individuals. Kaoru has been aware for some time that both he and his brother have feelings for Haruhi, and when Hikaru finally catches on, it makes for some great scenes between them.

The comedy is sometimes funny and sometimes not, but the more serious elements are always a hit with me. It’s for moments like that that I continue to read this series.

Review originally published at Manga Recon.

Filed Under: Gender Hijinks, Manga, Shoujo Tagged With: , ,

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors 4 by Nari Kusakawa: B+

February 16, 2009 by Leave a Comment

This is the story of Cello, an aspiring Palette or “color magician,” who has had to repeat her first year of training school because her abilities are a bit different than those of her fellow students. The Palette of 12 Secret Colors is a very episodic series, and this volume is no exception. On the agenda are a separation from her avian partner that prompts Cello to strive to be her best, a rampaging drunken ostrich, and a swimming competition.

I’m not a fan of episodic tales in general, but Kusakawa manages to incorporate modest development for her lead characters and their relationship even while hijinks are ensuing. Over the course of the previous volumes, Dr. Guell (the school doctor) has helped Cello out on numerous occasions and now secretly harbors romantic feelings for her. The episodic nature of the story contrives to put the two of them together, occasionally in ridiculous situations, but also provides the opportunity for many warm and fuzzy moments. The final scene between them in volume four is anything but ridiculous or fuzzy, however, and may be just what Cello needs to finally begin to see the stoic doctor in a new light.

That said, this story is certainly progressing at a leisurely pace for one with only two volumes left. I can’t help but wish for a more dramatic storyline or more tangible evidence of Cello’s progressing skills. Aww-inspiring it may be, but it’s currently too mellow to generate anything akin to awe.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at Manga Recon.

Filed Under: Fantasy, Manga, Shoujo Tagged With: ,

Two Will Come 4 by Kyungok Kang: B+

February 16, 2009 by Leave a Comment

Jina Han was just a normal girl until she learned that she was destined to be the victim of a curse placed on her family generations ago by a magical serpent that was killed by her ancestors. Since the revelation, various people close to Jina have attempted to kill her, but she is staying strong. Determined not to let the curse defeat her, Jina tries to put together the clues and figure out whom among her friends and family could really be the one destined to murder her.

Two Will Come is an enjoyable supernatural tale, reminiscent in some ways of a horror movie, but one that emphasizes psychological suspense rather than gory visuals. I never anticipate any of the attempts on Jina’s life, and even here in the final volume they manage to surprise me. Unfortunately, I didn’t experience the same reaction to the climactic reveal, since I found it rather predictable. I do like that the origins of the curse are fully explained and all subplots neatly resolved. A chapter of side stories also fills in some backstory for a few of the characters.

While Kyungok Kang’s art certainly has a retro style—it’s supposed to be 1999 but the fashions remind me more of late ’80s shojo—it’s also quite appealing. Kang uses the contrast of black and white spaces effectively in the context of the story while maintaining a smooth sense of flow that contributes to the overall atmosphere. This, combined with skillful storytelling, results in a very satisfying reading experience.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at Manga Recon.

Filed Under: Manhwa, Supernatural Tagged With:

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors 3 by Nari Kusakawa: B

February 15, 2009 by Leave a Comment

From the back cover:
Cello meets Fenne, a fellow Palette-in-training who’s been having problems with his abilities ever since his bird-partner died. Despite his sarcastic attitude, Cello is determined to both help him find a suitable new bird and to become his friend. Then Olga—Dr. Guell’s jealous bird—decides that Cello is taking up way too much of Dr. Guell’s time. So now she’s determined to make sure that Cello quickly completes her Palette training.

Review:
Just as I was wishing to know more about Cello’s progress, she makes a remark in one chapter about how she has cleared “about half” of the first twelve colors. That’s a step in the right direction, I suppose.

Unfortunately, none of the stories in this volume really do much for me, though none is bad or anything. A new character, Fenne, is introduced and ropes Cello into helping him adapt one of the migratory birds that visit the island to be his new partner. At first he mocks her for having to repeat her first year, but comes to like her, which bothers Dr. Guell, who is coming to realize that Cello occupies his thoughts rather a lot.

The story with Olga serving as Cello’s tutor misses the mark for amusing and instead ventures into the territory of “too silly for me.” The same can be said for the chapter in which Cello’s father pursues an outrageously ridiculous plan of making up with his wife, with whom he’s had a fight. About the only one I really like is the one about Cello’s birthday, and how Dr. Guell sweetly buys her a present. Not only that, he’s clearly paid enough attention to her to know exactly what kind of present she would like best.

The relationship between Dr. Guell and Cello is the most interesting thing about the series at the moment, but I do rather wish for a more serialized story line. This is the halfway point of the series and though it’s very pleasant and guaranteed to foster some warm fuzzies, it feels like something more should be happening by now.

Filed Under: Fantasy, Manga, Shoujo Tagged With: ,

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors 2 by Nari Kusakawa: B+

February 15, 2009 by 1 Comment

From the back cover:
It’s Christmas time on the island of Opal, and a visiting young Prince introduces holiday traditions to its residents. What could be more festive than the powers of the color wizards unleashed upon the season? But Dr. Guell is jealous of the relationship between the Prince and Cello and adds a sour note to the happy celebration. Then, find out more about Cello’s family and learn how she first bonded with Yoyo, her very special bird.

Review:
The episodic adventures continue in this volume, including a story about a visiting prince with a predictable secret, the tale of how Cello first met Yoyo, and a chapter about Cello’s family and her dad’s attempts to get some kind of facial expression out of terminally cool Dr. Gruell. Each of the episodes has something amusing about it, or some particular insight on character, but some are also a bit dull; I’m already kind of tired of seeing the triplet little girls turn up again and again.

The second story is my favorite, and not just because of Yoyo’s cuteness, though I suppose that is a factor. Mostly, though, I like it for the continuity. In an offhand remark in volume one, Cello mentions that she used to like climbing trees until she fell from one, and now she’s afraid of heights. This chapter includes that incident. It’s a minor thing, but I’m happy to see the seeds for it planted in advance.

While the current story structure is not short on charm, I still keep wanting this to be like a shounen manga somehow, with Cello acquiring mastery of new colors and her progression in skill clearly mapped. So far, she has improved enough to do well on a mid-term exam, but that’s sort of nebulous; the idea of knowing exactly how many of the twelve colors she can control and how many she has left has definite appeal.

Filed Under: Fantasy, Manga, Shoujo Tagged With: ,

Two Will Come 3 by Kyungok Kang: B+

February 14, 2009 by 1 Comment

Book description:
Jina is through sitting around in terror and accepts an invitation for a night out with her friends. En route, however, she has a vision that indicates one of them will be responsible in some way for her death. She begins to try to puzzle things out, working to figure out which one of her friends could have a motive for wanting her dead.

Review:
Last time, I talked about the continuity in this series as one of the things I like best. Well, another of those things is the ability to surprise the reader with shocking images without resorting to violence and gore to accomplish it. Kang does a good job of building a suspenseful atmosphere then bursting out with a panel of psychological creepiness. Any time someone tries to attack Jina, it’s out of the blue and surprising, and there’s also a very cool moment where she’s thinking about one of the murdered victims—sort of imagining the victim in her mind’s eye—and then suddenly that victim turns around and seems to start talking to her. It’s very nifty.

Also in this volume, the two parts of Jina’s life—school romantic drama and family curse drama—begin to come together and one can see what Kang has been planning all along. You see, it’s true that there will be one person who tries to kill the intended victim, but there will also be a second person, an “enabler.” Someone around Jina will incite someone else to kill her, in other words. And as the relationship drama escalates, two girls obsessed with Jaesuk and angry at Jina because he likes her begin to look like serious suspects. It’s quite well done. I had never really questioned the presence of the school drama, so I hadn’t expected it to all tie in together like this.

Too, the subplots are not forgotten, and it looks like all of them will be successfully resolved in the final volume. Just one more to go!

Review copy provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Manhwa, Supernatural Tagged With:

Two Will Come 2 by Kyungok Kang: A-

February 13, 2009 by 1 Comment

From the back cover:
A mysterious “auntie” has just told Jina her family’s chilling secret. Jina is marked for violent death—and her killer is going to be one of two people very close to her. Meanwhile, her schoolmate Jaesuk is determined to make his feelings for Jina known, even if it means exposing his own shady past. But then a nighttime rendezvous with Jaesuk leads to a shocking scene right in the family kitchen… and Jina learns that her two worlds are about to become irrevocably intertwined.

Review:
One of the things I like best about Two Will Come is its continuity. A couple of things happen in this volume that reference or build upon small moments from the first volume, and one must pay attention to be able to catch the subtlety because Kang doesn’t point out, “Hey! Remember that time Lloyd talked about a girl from his past? Well, do ya?” She just lets you put things together on your own. Similarly, I’m quite sure now that the figure I saw skulking in a car in volume one was indeed Jina’s aunt.

This volume is a lot more action-packed than the first. Jina has the worst day ever, as she learns about the family curse and then, in quick succession, survives one attempt on her life, learns all about her boyfriend’s duplicity, and then survives a second murderous attack. Her reaction to learning about the curse is well done, prompting many lovely two-page spreads and thoughtful soliloquies like this one:

Layer after layer… If you keep peeling away the shells, all sorts of hypocrisy and truth you never imagined lay themselves bare before you.

After the second attempt upon Jina’s life, her cousin and his friend, Lloyd, take her on a road trip for a bit, where they meet with a fellow who had, thirty years ago, been compelled by the curse to murder his wife and who has since devoted his life to researching its origins. The encounter ends up heartening Jina and she ends the volume determined not to let the curse defeat her. It’s all very interesting, but I do have to wonder why this fellow is not in jail. It looks like there were witnesses to his act and everything. With everything else fitting together so well, this unanswered question is quite jarring.

In addition to all of the main plot advancement going on, there’s also some development on a couple of subplots. All in all, the story feels very balanced and purposeful, two qualities I greatly appreciate.

Review copy provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Manhwa, Supernatural Tagged With:

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors 1 by Nari Kusakawa: A-

February 12, 2009 by 2 Comments

From the back cover:
On the island of Opal live the world’s most colorful birds. The birds have attracted a school for aspiring “Palettes”—wizards who have the ability to borrow color from one object and paint its qualities on to another. Young Cello has the potential to be a great Palette, but she just can’t seem to control her power. As the end of freshman year approaches she’s on the verge of failing, so she’s going to need all the help her bird Yoyo can provide.

Review:
This is the story of Cello, a sixteen-year-old studying to be a Palette, or artisan with the power to control colors. It seems like a silly skill to have, but the volume shows different ways in which it can be useful. Cello is smart and aces the written assignments, but her practical abilities need work: she has the unique ability to manipulate color from a distance, but not the fine control required to craft the fine goods that fetch high prices from outsiders. Her problems with control result in her being splattered with color pretty frequently, requiring multiple visits to the infirmary to see the young school doctor, Dr. Guell.

In the chapters that follow, she and Guell foil two separate attempts to steal the village’s precious birds and also supply some fun for some little girls’ birthday. It’s true that these adventures are episodic, but they really don’t feel that way because they’re not pointless. In the wrong hands, I’d dislike the chapter with the random little girls, but Kusakawa uses it to reveal details about Guell’s background as well as to illustrate what a kind person Cello is.

I also like that romance is not the focus of the story. Cello has definite goals that she’s working towards and acquiring a boyfriend is not among them. That said, there are a few subtle moments that hint that she and Guell are starting to at least admire and appreciate one another.

What I love most, however, is Yoyo, Cello’s bird. I love Koh from Silver Diamond because he talks and is amusing, but a lot of Yoyo’s cuteness is because he is silent. He’s clearly intelligent, but must get his point across mutely. One of the most endearing things he does is kick Cello (cutely, I swear) every time she thinks or says something self-pitying or overly self-critical. I heart him.

Kusakawa’s distinctive artistic style is the same here as in Two Flowers for the Dragon, and I find it quite appealing, though the evolution of Dr. Guell’s appearance between the beginning and end of the volume is pretty major. It’s interesting how different the settings are for the two stories—Two Flowers is set in an oasis in the middle of a desert, while Palette takes place on a semi-tropical island, complete with palm trees and lush vegetation. Also, I really, really love the covers to this series. So much, in fact, that I’m gonna have to link to them. There’s an online preview at that site as well, if your curiosity is at all piqued.

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors is published by CMX. Four volumes have been released so far, with the fifth due on February 18, 2009. The series recently ended serialization in Japan and is complete at six volumes.

Filed Under: Fantasy, Manga, Shoujo Tagged With: ,

Two Will Come 1 by Kyungok Kang: B+

February 12, 2009 by 1 Comment

Book description:
Ordinary high school girl Jina discovers that she is heir to a terrible legacy handed down from her family’s sinister history. Long ago, her ancestors killed a magical serpent known as an Imugi, believing that it would bring them good luck. Unfortunately, the creature cursed them as it died, decreeing that one family member of each generation for that day forth will be killed by two people closely acquainted with that person. In this day and age, no one wants to believe in such outmoded superstitions, but one of Jina’s relatives has been murdered without fail in every generation. Now, Jina has been informed that she will be next to die…

Review:
Two Will Come is a suspenseful manhwa series involving a family curse that dooms one member of each generation to be killed by two people they know whose identities are unknown. This first volume sets up the story and introduces Jina, her friends, and her family. Not a great deal actually happens, aside from Jina acquiring a boyfriend who is, unbeknownst to her, a liar and a jerk. Jina’s also in the dark about her supposed fate, and the volume ends just as her aunt is about to tell her what happened to the previous generation’s victim.

Despite the lack of action, the volume is still entertaining. There are quite a lot of characters to get to know and their personalities and relationships are clearly established throughout the volume. A few subplots are brewing, too, primarily the mystery of the motives of Jina’s new boyfriend. There are some other things that I think might later be important, but I’m not sure, like the shadowy figure sitting in a car outside Jina’s house. Was that supposed to be her cousin or aunt watching out for her or someone with nefarious intentions? I’m not even sure whether I should spend brain cells remembering it for future reference.

Kang’s art has a retro feel, with eyes reminiscent of ’70s shojo but fashions and postures that remind me more of something from the early ’90s like Please Save My Earth. Though I’d describe most of the panels as “light,” with plenty of white space, Kang does employ black backgrounds, too, usually in more suspenseful scenes or in the several between-chapter drawings that depict Jina with two unknown hands reaching out to grab or touch her. All of the characters are easy to tell apart, even obscure family members, which is important when introducing so many characters at once.

After a volume of getting to know everyone, it seems the story will really kick into motion next volume. I’m looking forward to it.

Two Will Come is a four-volume series published by NETCOMICS. Volumes one and two were produced in print editions, but the whole series can also be found online for only $0.20 per chapter.

Review copy provided by the publisher.

Filed Under: Manhwa, Supernatural Tagged With:

Three in Love 1-2 by Shioko Mizuki: C-

February 9, 2009 by Leave a Comment

The title and back cover descriptions for this series are misleading, making it seem like the “three-person relationship” is one in which any one person has romantic feelings for the other two. Sadly, this isn’t the case. Instead, two girls—Machiru, a chronic overachiever, and Hanakago, an earnest first year—are both in love with the same spacey boy. Also, each girl has an additional guy who’s in love with her, forming a kind of love phalanx.

Instead of being an intriguing story about an unconventional relationship, Three in Love is really just bland. Volume two in particular is full of stock scenarios like a group trip to the pool and the school cultural festival. Also, it’s hard to like Machiru when she brags about her “unmatched brains” then does inexplicably ridiculous things like agreeing to sleep with the boy who likes her if he scores higher than she does on exams.

As for the art, in Shioko Mizuki’s own words, it “sucks a lot!!” In one of her author talk sections she mentions that it was her first time drawing with a pen and she was using poor quality ink and rusty nibs, which might explain what Erin adeptly described as art that “looks as if it was drawn in ballpoint pen.” Asymmetrical faces also abound while backgrounds are practically nonexistent.

With so many better options to choose from, don’t waste your time on this one.

Three in Love is published by Go! Comi. Two out of a total of five volumes have been released so far.

Review copies provided by the publisher. Review originally published at Manga Recon.

Filed Under: Manga, Shoujo Tagged With:
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