By Kenjiro Hata. Released in Japan as “Hayate no Gotoku!” by Shogakukan, serialization ongoing in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz.

This is very much a book of two halves, or rather a book of 1/3 and 2/3. The first third of this volume has our usual wacky butler antics. Nagi tries to secretly rent a porn video, but gets things mixed up and ends up with a horror video instead, which gives her nightmares. We get a flashback showing us exactly how Sakuya hired Chiharu to be her maid. Hina has been tricked into dressing up for a kids’ sentai show, and has to hide her identity from Hayate and Nagi. And Nagi makes an attempt to buy a camera, in order to capture some memories of the time she and Hayate first met.

Each of these chapters has some great Hayate bits in them, the sort of humor that works because we know these characters, and have spent 17 volumes seeing their growth. Hayate and Maria discussing Nagi’s attempt to buy adult videos while Nagi pretends to be asleep. Sakuya’s butlers reacting to her walking out in just a bra, and realizing their ojousama is all grown up. Hina’s embarrassment, which has gotten to be the sole reason for seeing anything with her in it. And of course the heartwarming moment when Hayate, Nagi and Maria finally get a good picture taken. Nagi smiles, and notes she and Hayate will be together forever.

Ghlk. We immediately see Hayate’s twitchy reaction, and though he covers it up well enough after that, we see him that evening (in a very rare shot of Hayate actually attempting to sleep) thinking about his past, and we finally move into what’s been implied for some time: an extended flashback showing him with the princess-curled young girl who he said was his first girlfriend, Athena. This is the rest of the volume (and will be wrapped up in 18), and if a totally different mood to the start. There is still the odd bit of humor (mostly revolving around Athena’s jealousy of Hayate, even as a little boy, being a chick magnet – the sequence with Izumi as a little girl is both touching and adorable), but for the most part this is a gauzy, fairy tale romance, albeit with a grim spectre of drama hanging over it.

The flashback starts with Hayate in elementary school being accused of stealing the other children’s lunch money. He didn’t, of course, but his parents did. It has to be said here, and I can’t emphasize it enough – Hayate’s absent parents are some of the worst in all of anime and manga. We never see their faces, only shadows and silhouettes, which is deliberate on Hata’s part – they aren’t meant to be real people, who you might remotely sympathize with, but offscreen monsters. Everything they do, every time we see them in flashbacks, they are gambling, they are stealing, and they are ignoring their child. It’s heartbreaking. And so when Hayate runs away, and finds himself in a strange garden with a castle in it, it reads as it’s meant to – like a fairy tale. There’s even a princess.

Athena herself is meant to juxtapose with Nagi. There are a few similarities – they both get jealous very easily, and tend to have a bit of the ‘brat’ quality to them when they do so – but for the most part Athena is a contrast, being far more mature and driven than your average 6-year-old has any right to be. She is alone in the castle, and Hayate staying to be her butler is beneficial for both of them. We also see that Hayate’s strength is not merely the result of years and years of incredible training and ludicrous jobs – although that helped. No, Athena did some magic, which gave him some of his incredible strength and stamina. What’s more, she then teaches him swordsmanship, proving to be a most adept fencer even at her young age.

There is notably no fanservice here, even though we see Athena kiss Hayate, and they share a bed. Athena may be mature for her age, but the two are still six, and this is meant to show an innocent friendship – in fact, Hayate’s first friendship. Unfortunately, Hayate still has a six-year-old’s issues. He already knows what a monster his father is, but hasn’t seen what his mother can do yet – and wonders if she misses him. He doesn’t want to live in fairy tale castle land, he wants to live in the real world. And when he suggests Athena come with him, things turn even more serious. Athena gives him a ring, noting it’s part of a set, and asks that they wear them “once they grow up”. Hayate, delighted that this means she’ll leave with him, exits the castle to tell his parents. And we cut back to Athena, staring at Hayate with the most heartbreaking expression you’ve ever seen, and one of the rings lying on the floor. As if we didn’t get it, Hayate’s narration notes she looked like she knew the future with them together would never come to pass.

This is where the volume ends, on a nasty cliffhanger. We *know* that something horrible is going to happen, most likely with Hayate’s parents. Still, the purpose of this volume was twofold. First, to introduce Athena, another of the series’ main characters. And to show that Hata can write a serious, even tragic storyline via extended multi-chapter flashback and not lose his readership. I think he succeeded on both counts, though your mileage may vary. The series is not going to turn into an angst-fest completely, and the humor will return with a vengeance. But from this point on, we do get more and more serious arcs. We have to wait 6 months now between volumes (curse you, poor sales!), but it will definitely be worth it.

And for the curious, I ship Hayate/Hinagiku, Hayate/Ayumu and Hayate/Athena about equally. :)

By Kenjiro Hata. Released in Japan as “Hayate no Gotoku!” by Shogakukan, serialization ongoing in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz.

This is another fun volume of Hayate. For those who like the series’ goofy otaku humor, there’s jokes galore! If only they were explained by some endnotes. Sigh… My favorite was mocking the ‘Four Heavenly Kings’, which takes swipes at both Pokemon and Megaman. I also love Hibino Fumi to death, even if she’s barely in this volume. Her ability to speak before thinking serves her well.

If you want romantic comedy, that’s in here as well, though of course don’t expect anything approaching resolution. The volume begins by finishing up Hayate and Hina’s date, with both of them suffering from the fact that they can’t read the other’s feelings well. Hayate eventually does manage to win her over, and all is well… oh wait, Hayate also has a habit of being hideously honest, even when the situation calls for subterfuge. Hina is not amused. Oh well, at least she got to see an amusement park.

Perhaps the most startling part of the volume was seeing Yukiji Katsura, everyone’s favorite desperate lush teacher, as a hot young high school student. We’d heard before that Katsura-sensei used to be slightly less… bitter and over the top, but seeing her in flashback as the girl everyone admires in class is still stunning. I also agree with Kaoru-sensei, the idea of Hina turning out like that is very scary indeed.

The best reason to get this volume, though, is the second half, which has a longer story focusing on Izumi Segawa, the goofy airhead of Hinagiku’s three friends. She’s placed surprisingly high in the first popularity poll (even Hata said he was surprised), so this was no doubt created to give her more face time. It works pretty well. We meet her insane father, who is naturally incredibly overprotective (He apparently owns So*y… gosh, I wonder what company that cam be? The asterisk makes it impossible to tell!). And the family ‘butler’ shows up, with his crush on Hayate still very much intact. Throw in Miki and Risa stirring things up for fun, and the realization that Hayate has another (if less obsessed) suitor, and you have the basis for much fun.

Well… mostly much fun. We’ve noticed, starting about Volume 9, that it’s a bad idea to let Hayate have flashbacks to his childhood. We see that again here, as Izumi tries to find a way to change the subject so that she doesn’t have to admit to having a crush on him. She asks about what his ex-girlfriend he’d mentioned was like. We see him think of her, the same princess-curled blonde we’d seen in earlier flashbacks (though we still can’t see her face)… and he starts to cry. He’s not even sure why he’s doing it. Luckily, Izumi giving him a hug to calm him down gets things back into comedy range, but… when is Hata going to show us who that girl is, and why Hayate’s past is so traumatic?

We get the answer in the preview for Volume 17, which shows us it will be there. Hata also apologizes in the author’s notes, noting the next volume will be ‘a major turning point’. And he ain’t kidding. The next volume of Hayate the Combat Butler, continuing into 18, will be far more serious than this series has ever been to date. Meanwhile, this is another light, fun read. It won’t bring in new readers, but its antics are just what fans of the series want to see.

By Kenjiro Hata. Released in Japan as “Hayate no Gotoku!” by Shogakukan, serialization ongoing in the magazine Shonen Sunday. Released in North America by Viz.

Generally speaking, when you have a comedic manga that runs for as long as Hayate the Combat Butler has (24 volumes and counting in Japan), you need something that lives and dies on the personality of its characters. Goofy situations are all very well and good, but if you’re not invested in the people involved, it’s not going to work. Thank goodness that Hata does not have this problem. Almost all the humor in this volume of Hayate comes from our love of the people in the manga, their quirks and foibles, and how they interact.

There is one new character introduced here, Fumi Hibino, who slides into the cast seamlessly, mostly by going through the same ‘welcome to school’ intro that Hayate did – she arrives for her first day to find Hinagiku up a tree after saving a cat. Of course, Hayate is a majestic Butler Hero, while Fumi is a complete airhead, so things don’t go quite the same way. It’s actually impressive that, in a series filled with girls who could technically be described as ‘airheads’ (Izumi, Isumi…), that Hibino manages to immediately make an impression.

In re-reading that last paragraph, I note once more how annoying romanization can be, in that it gets very confusing having an Izumi and an Isumi as major characters in the same manga.

In any case, there’s tons of fun to be had here. Yukiji’s surprising modesty when attacking the bear, Hayate and Maria’s sauna adventure, the Nishizawa siblings’ hilariously useless love advice, Hayate’s response to Nagi asking him to praise her “talent” (shades of Sailor Moon in that very weird gag…), young Maria’s crusade against lolicon porn (especially of herself), and a great final chapter featuring Hinagiku terrifying the entire cast with her attempts to be sweet and nice.

There’s also a few character moments that are quieter, but no less powerful, and also tie into the overall plot. Isumi’s fight against the bear, where you are reminded how hellaciously powerful she is. Her earlier discussion with Aika, and their discussion of the cursed stone that Nagi’s grandfather gave her. Nagi and Hayate with the old model car, one of the few moments where the author gives Nagi a really sweet, touching scene with Hayate (she tends to act the brat a lot, let’s be honest).

Best of all, we get a chapter with Hayate walking Ayumu home, then detouring to get her notes she left behind at school, which reminds you again how they really would make a terrific couple if this wasn’t the sort of manga it is. In any other manga Ayumu would have kicked everyone else’s ass, harem-wise. It’s a tribute to how awesome she is that she’s still in the running. More to the point, like Maria, Ayumu is one of the few people in the manga that Hayate actually regards as a possible girlfriend, as opposed to dealing with ‘children’ like Nagi and Isumi, or ‘girls who hate him’ like Hinagiku (lampshaded by the author in the last chapter).

For Hayate fans, this volume will not disappoint. Lots of comedy, a bit of romance, and lots of fake not-action. Plus you get to see Maria smile evilly while threatening people again. Who doesn’t love that?