Narumi’s father has goaded him into entering the Scissors Project into the All-Japan Beauty Tournament in order to prove he’s serious about forming his own salon with his schoolmates rather than inherit the family salon. In this final volume, the outcome of both the tournament and the love triangle between Narumi, his friend Ochiai, and protagonist Kiri, is revealed.

I was pretty disappointed in this conclusion. Kiri is sidelined for most of the first half for an incredibly contrived reason—she catches a cold by going out in the rain to forgive the rival hairstylist (I lost count, but I believe he’s the fifth or sixth to appear in the ten-volume series) who stole her special scissors but who we are supposed to care about because he is a sad orphan—and a lot of the romantic momentum built up in the previous volume is squandered. The outcome of the tournament is treated as an afterthought and while we do, courtesy of a comedic bonus story set ten years in the future, ultimately learn which boy Kiri ends up with, we never see her admit any feeling for either of them or witness any reaction from the boy not chosen.

Ultimately, Beauty Pop is a silly and cute tale that shows occasional glimmers of a more satisfying story but fails to deliver in the end. In some ways, I am reminded of the conclusion to Hana-Kimi, which had similar issues involving the unsatisfying resolution to a romantic triangle. How one felt about the final volume of that series would be a good indicator of what to expect from this one.

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

From the back cover:
After kissing Kiri accidentally, Narumi struggles to keep his composure during the All-Japan Beauty Tournament. With everything on the line, can the Scissors Project even make it through the preliminaries?

Review:
Sometimes the overall feel of a volume is so cute that I can’t help but like it, even though it also contains myriad things at which I roll my eyes.

We start with the continuation of the All-Japan Beauty Tournament. At the end of volume eight, Narumi and Kiri accidentally bumped lips when they were tripped by a scheming competitor. We resume with both of them sitting, dazed, and realizing just in time that they should get a move on if they don’t want to be eliminated in the first round. Round two involves taming a brat of a kid, which Kiri awesomely does by giving him the haircut of his favorite TV hero, though why she waits 45 minutes into the 60-minute round to actually talk to the kid, I couldn’t say.

The competition adjourns for a week, leaving time for romance drama to ensue! I like that Kiri is pretty nonchalant about the accidental smooch, saying, “I didn’t hate it,” while Narumi is the one who flees and freaks out. When Kiri’s dad is conveniently whisked off to America, extracting a promise from Narumi to look after Kiri, the two spend some time alone wherein Kiri acts clingy because she’s afraid of cockroaches and Narumi valiantly vanquishes one on her behalf. By various means, Ochiai finds out about that, Narumi finds out about Ochiai’s feelings, Ochiai declares that he won’t hold back any longer, and it’s a whole big tangle of cute drama, pretty much.

Now that the focus is on Kiri and the two boys who like her, the annoying side characters are left far in the background and I don’t miss them at all. Arai’s art, delicate and perfect for drawing hair, also excels at more romantic scenes, and there are many panels in which Ochiai’s and Narumi’s softened expressions really catch the eye. Too, I like the gradual way Arai has built up the possibility that Narumi and Kiri could actually feel something for one another; it certainly didn’t seem possible earlier in the series.

From the back cover:
Just as the Scissors Project is getting stronger than ever, forces are at work to discredit Kiri and disband the club. What’s even more surprising is the person who is behind it all…

Review:
Most of what happens in this volume is pretty dumb. There’s a rival stylist, hired by a mysterious boss, whose tasks are to get the Scissors Project to disband and to retrieve a pair of special golden scissors that were given to Kiri a few volumes ago. The rival causes the rest of the students to suspect Kiri of trashing the S.P. club room, but is eventually unveiled in a highly unlikely fashion. His boss then tells Narumi that he can prove he’s serious about the S.P. by entering and winning a tournament.

It’s all incredibly contrived, but this silly plot does serve to provide some good moments. When Narumi catches some girls planning to pull a nasty prank on Kiri, he gives them an earful, not realizing she’s nearby and has overheard. In fact, ever since their talk about why they want to be beauticians, relations have thawed some between them. In this volume, they’re giving each other thank you gifts, we get to see Kiri laugh, and I feel, for the first time, a romantic vibe. Ochiai’s not to be outdone, of course, and tries in his way to protect Kiri, too.

Overall, it’s not a very good volume, but it leaves off just as the tournament’s getting underway, and I expect I shall enjoy that.

From the back cover:
Kiri is undecided about what career she wants to pursue after graduation, but for Narumi it’s plain and simple—he’s always wanted to become a professional hairstylist. Can Narumi’s passion help persuade Kiri to face her dreams?

Review:
The Beauty Pop series is actually split in two parts, and this volume sees the conclusion of the first part, a smattering of bonus stories, and then the resumption of the series as Beauty Pop, Stage 2.

The conclusion to the first part of the series hinges on Kiri finally admitting that she does want to be a beautician after graduation. It’s time for the second-year students to fill out their career choice forms and she dallies over it a bit until Narumi’s passion for cutting hair, and recollections of the happiness of her former makeover subjects, prompts Kiri to make her decision. After talking to Narumi, she actually smiles at him, which, of course, causes him to go “b-bmp,” just like happened to Ochiai after he caught a glimpse of the same rare sight. Even the imposter from the last chapter ties in with the whole “go for your dreams” theme, even if his motivation for impersonating Narumi is totally ridiculous.

The bonus stories are not very good—surprisingly, the one featuring Chisami is the best of the lot. In “Twisted Typhoon,” most of the cast is contrivedly visiting Los Angeles at the same time, and Kiri saves the schedule of a movie shoot her mother is working on by correctly interpreting the drawing made by the temperamental child star who insists on a particular hair style. In “I Want to Be a Prince,” we see Chisami through the eyes of her childhood friend, Takeda, and discover that she’s a lot more lonely than she lets on. There’s one panel of her just waving and smiling sadly to Takeda that single-handedly goes a long way toward making her more tolerable. “Extra-Curricular Daydreaming” is the worst of a lot, about a dog who has returned as the ghost of a human boy to repay Kiri’s kindness to him in his canine life, an aim that he accomplishes by stealing pencil cases and snacks for her. Hana-Kimi did this—randomly inserting a story about the supernatural into its school-based narrative—and I disliked it then, too.

Stage 2 starts with the rather subtle revelation that Kiri has finally joined the Scissors Project. She’s been resistant and apathetic all this time, but now we see her sporting a certain bracelet and then are introduced to the significance of that bracelet a little later on. It seems that Ochiai is getting more serious about marketing the group, and Kiri even seems to be seeking out people to practice on rather than simply stumbling upon folks in need. A Scissors Project performance, with Kiri as a willing participant, ensues, but is interrupted by yet another famous stylist who, for some reason, enjoys interfering with the efforts of amateurs. Yawn.

I’m happy to see the change in Kiri’s outlook and that she is both participating and having comparatively civil conversations with Narumi. But with only three volumes left in the series, I hope the story quits introducing these tedious rivals and starts devoting more of its time to her character arc.

From the back cover:
The entire gang travels to Karuizawa to hone their skills. There, they meet Chihiro Osawa, a famous but nasty hairstylist who breaks Kiri’s scissors on purpose! But even more distressing to Narumi is a dream he has about Kiri…

Review:
This series really is at its best when it focuses on makeover challenges. In this volume, Kiri encounters the unfriendly Osawa, who gets peeved when she fixes the extremely curly hair of a girl whose request for help he had sneeringly ignored. His destruction of her scissors is enough to spur Kiri into anger—a rarity—which leads her to accept his challenge for a public showdown. Not only are such challenges themselves fun, but I enjoy seeing the kind side of Kiri as she helps solve beauty problems for average girls.

After Kiri’s efforts in the contest attract notice from the media, Ochiai characteristically seizes the opportunity to announce that she’s the daughter of Seiji Koshiba, a legend in the business. And here’s another parallel to sports manga: Kiri’s father, Seiji, was the best in his day, but retired from the spotlight to live in relative obscurity and train his offspring for greatness. I am strongly reminded of the relationship between Nanjiro Echizen and his son, Ryoma, in The Prince of Tennis. I think I even spotted an “Ero Ero” magazine in one panel, though Seiji is less upfront about perusing nudie mags than Nanjiro is.

The rest of the volume deals with the beginning of a new school year, the appearance of a troublemaking imposter, and Narumi’s confused feelings about Kiri after learning she was his first love and experiencing a dream in which she confesses her love to him. Due to looks and his position as Kiri’s rival, Narumi is definitely the guy one would assume would end up with feelings for her, but I don’t really buy it yet, given how antagonistic and jerky he’s been thus far. It’s not just that I don’t think he loves her, it’s that I think he’s too immature to love anyone, as exhibited by the whole “icky girls give me a rash” thing he’s got going on. I’d love it if this series subverted convention and had Kiri end up with Seki or Ochiai instead, but I doubt that it will.

From the back cover:
Narumi’s father, Yujiro, a world famous hairstylist with salons across the globe, has never been able to defeat Kiri’s father, Seiji, in a hairstyling competition. Will Narumi be able to surpass his father by winning against Kiri?

Review:
That’s a really strange blurb, considering that the challenge Narumi poses to Kiri, after hearing about their fathers’ rivalry, goes ignored by her. Instead, this volume offers a mixed bag of some good moments surrounded by some extremely annoying ones.

The bad:
* Chisami, Narumi’s middle schooler sister, is extremely irritating and spends the volume coming to the high school in search of her “prince.” There’s a very dumb chapter in which she gets kidnapped, too.
* The team makes over a wannabe model who is afraid of men, leading to a silly cross-dressing gag.
* Iori acts inexplicably stupidly regarding a doll in Kiri’s possession that ultimately leads to the revelation that it was she who bested Narumi in a competition back in elementary school, his sole defeat.

The good:
* There are some nice bits with Kiri and her father where she recalls watching a video of a competition he’d been in during the height of his popularity.
* I like how Kiri cares for the makeover recipients and how their utter happiness afterwards is one of the few things that can make her smile.
* I continue to love anything related to Ochiai’s feelings for Kiri and Aoyama’s (Kiri’s friend) feelings for Ochiai and her reaction to the knowledge that he likes Kiri.
* I still love Shampoo, and how he’s incorporated into the background of some scenes. There’s a really cute one where he’s sleeping on Ochiai’s coat.
* In one of her sidebar columns, Arai-sensei reveals that, to properly approximate the lack of Kiri’s drawing ability, she commissioned her five-year-old nephew to create the drawings that would appear in the manga as Kiri’s.

This series could be so much better, and it’s frustrating. At this point, I’m not even sure if I’m going to keep it after I finish it (I usually do). On the one hand, I can’t see myself wanting to read it again, but on the other, I’d be sad to lose all of Shampoo’s cuteness. I guess I could just hang on to it for the good bits.

From the back cover:
Kiri steps in to help the injured Narumi in a Scissors Project beauty battle. But before Kiri can complete her magic, reminders of an incident in her past make her too fearful to continue with the cut.

Review:
For a minute there, this series was on the verge of improvement. Here’s what it did that pleased me:

1. A new character is introduced who’s actually not annoying. Seki, called Ken-niisan by Kiri, is a masseur who, in addition to being mellow himself, has the ability to mellow out others around him, even the volatile Narumi. I also really like that Kiri seeks out his presence; he’s the only boy she’s ever done that with and, currently, the only boy of the cast I can actually see her becoming romantically involved with.

2. One of the Scissors Project boys begins to develop feelings for Kiri, and it’s not the one you’d expect.

3. Once Ochiai unveils his plan for the Scissors Project club to carry their talents into the professional realm, and urges everyone to begin practicing their skills, there’s actually a kind of sports manga vibe going on that’s quite fun. Also, Narumi’s challenger in the competition is fond of calling out the names of his haircuts, like “Condor cut!” which is totally a sports manga thing.

Alas, by the end of the volume I was irritated again, because Narumi’s very annoying young sister appears, and we are apparently about to sit through a tiresome story where she won’t go away while she searches for her prince (a guy who helped disentangle her hair from some shrubbery and who is actually, of course, Kiri). The thing about Narumi getting a rash whenever he touches a girl is also pretty dumb. Sigh.

Nana thought it was a dream come true when Yano, the boy she liked, told her that he returned her feelings and they became a couple. Some problems have become apparent in their relationship, however. Early on, Nana was willing to go along with Yano’s moods and demands since he had experienced so much tragedy in his past. Now, though, she realizes that simply accepting Yano’s odd behavior isn’t going to help him, so she begins to challenge some of his actions. Unfortunately for her, her attempts to get closer to Yano and draw out more information from him about his past and his feelings for his ex-girlfriend bring forth several revelations that seriously threaten their relationship.

We Were There is not unlike NANA in that it can be simultaneously very good and very painful to read. There’s a lot of raw emotion in this series, from Nana’s reaction to Yano’s devastating secrets to her realization that no matter how much she loves him, it isn’t enough to mend the wounds he suffered because of his ex-girlfriend’s betrayal. Yano comes off as the villain in a lot of what transpires, but it’s evident that he’s in a lot of pain, too, and probably somewhat mentally unstable.

With Nana and Yano seemingly so inevitably doomed by volume four, I honestly have no idea where the story could go from here. This is definitely not your average shojo high school romance.

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

From the back cover:
Every day, all day, I think about him. I wonder if there’s a limit to love? I’m no longer able to imagine a world without him.

Review:
Now that Nana and Yano have been dating for a little while, some problems are beginning to arise. Their relationship has been growing more physical and while Yano’s not exactly insistent for more, it’s clear that he’s expectant, while Nana doesn’t see the urgency to “do it.” They’ve got other problems, too. When, at Christmas, Nana tells Yano a small lie about her afternoon plans so that she can shop for his gift, he gets all paranoid and stalks her. In an ordinary shoujo story, such a scene would be played for drama, but with this series, I was actually very worried that Yano was going to snap and do something violent. Even his friend seemed to have the same idea, since he declined to actually go shopping with Nana as she had asked.

After the holiday is over, Yano asks her about the lie and she confesses. He makes her swear that there will be no secrets between them. It’s right around here that I seriously began to dislike Yano, because he, of course, is keeping some pretty mighty secrets from Nana. When she grows suspicious about one of them, the exact nature of his relationship with Yamamoto-san, the sister of his ex-girlfriend, he lies.

Yes, the truth would’ve hurt her tremendously, but it makes one wonder… what exactly is Yano giving to this relationship? He expects Nana to behave as he wishes and to be completely open and honest with him without having to give her the same in kind. I found it very disturbing that Nana was convincing herself not to ask about his past with Yamamoto san because she wants him to keep on smiling, like even she knows on some instinctual level that the alternative is a very scary thing.

When, at the end of the volume, Nana tells Yano that she’s ready to sleep with him, I mentally cried, “No no no no!” Seldom have I been so worried about one half of a lead couple. We Were There is an example of a series that’s very, very good but also somewhat torturous to read.

From the back cover:
Tsuyoshi Niida, having taken second place to Harumi’s hairstyling once again, is determined to come out on top against the Scissors Project. He issues a challenge, but the Scissors Project needs five people to compete in this beauty battle or they’ll lose by default. Narumi needs Kiri’s help—but is his desire to win stronger than his pride?

Review:
I was beginning to lose hope for this series when I started this volume. The cast is peopled with annoying characters and I am so tired of Iori’s way of speaking. Here’s an example:

And since me is really happy right now, me wants to share some of that happiness with you.

I’m not sure what’s going on in the original Japanese. Perhaps he’s using the English “me” where he should be saying “ore” or something? Anyway, it’s irksome.

Matters aren’t helped by the introduction of Niida, another spaz-prone guy who sees himself as Narumi’s rival. He issues a challenge to Narumi that conveniently requires five people, specifying an aromatherapist and two hairdressers, which means that much of the volume is Ochiai trying to convince and/or manipulate Iori and Kiri to participate while Narumi has many tedious violent outbursts about how he doesn’t need their help, et cetera.

Finally, though, finally, we start to see some of Narumi’s good qualities. We see, for example, that he’s really hardworking and is so fixated on his goals that things like girls and love don’t even register with him. He also incurs personal injury to prevent Kiri’s cat from being hurt by a bicyclist. I realize that this last is a silly turn of events, but I was so desperate for any glimmer of redeeming qualities in Narumi that I was grateful to get it. Too, this selfless act is what finally serves to convince Kiri to participate, leading to another fun challenge and a cliffhanger ending with the fate of the competition hanging in the balance.

These characters really are at their best when they are using their skills. I hope Narumi can get over his latent insecurity/megalomania soon because, this being shouo and all, I think I’m supposed to be rooting for him and Kiri to get together. At present, however, they’ve got no chemistry together at all.