Monthly Archives: January 2018

The Asterisk War: Battle for the Crown

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By Yuu Miyazaki and okiura. Released in Japan by Media Factory. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Melissa Tanaka.

I always enjoy each volume of Asterisk War I read, despite the fact that you can see every plot beat and character development coming from eight miles away. The good thing about it is, it’s the RIGHT kind of character development. This being a tournament arc, you would expect that the losers among our heroes get shuffled off to the side to watch from the stands, like… well, every other tournament arc in manga and anime. But no, Saya and Kirin (yes, it’s a spoiler that they lost, but not much of one if you have any idea about how narrative works) not only get to save the day in their B-plot, but Saya actually gets something of a resolution in the argument she had with Rimcy a couple books ago. And speaking of Ardy and Rimcy, their character arc is not winning the tournament, it’s showing that they are capable of growing and striving just as humans do, and it’s also carried off very well. The well-worn path this walks is comfortable, and has tea at the end.

The girl on the cover this time around is Sylvia, president of the all-girls institute that’s one of the six schools. She essentially shows up to give Ayato a hand in the kidnapping B-plot and to tease him – even the author admits he had planned to add her later. She’s cute, though, and I look forward to seeing how she differs from Claudia in the Ayato harem sweepstakes. As for the tournament part of it, there are two really good fights and one sort of mediocre one – we know that Ayato and Julis are going to reach the finals, and so the battle they face to get there feels perfunctory and short – which is better than perfunctory and long, I suppose. Saya and Kirin fare better – as I said above, they have to lose for plot reasons, but they do a damn good job, forcing Ardy and Rimcy to bring out their secret weapon earlier and generally showing that they are not just stoic/meek (delete where applicable) girls.

They also get to rescue the kidnapped girl, despite severe injuries from the tournament, injuries that are also handed to Ayato and Julis in the final. The final battle takes up the most space in the book, and is mostly worth it, though perhaps drags on a bit long – yes, even in books as short as The Asterisk War, scenes can go on too long. But Ardy is fun, and I liked the way that Ayato and Julis finally got together to take down the pair, which is clever, finds a way around Ayato’s big weakness, and is also quite shippy. That said, their pledge at the end of the book to keep allying in the other two competitions no matter what just seems to be inviting trouble, if you ask me.

So one tournament down, and apparently next time we get a slight break before jumping into Tournament Two. In the meantime, The Asterisk War continues to be, in my opinion, predictable cliches done right.

Yokai Girls, Vol. 1

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By Kazuki Funatsu. Released in Japan as “Youkai Shoujo -Monsuga-” by Shueisha, serialized in the magazine Weekly Young Jump. Released in North America by Ghost Ship. Translated by Jennifer Ward. Adapted by Bambi Eloriaga-Amago.

I have in the past been somewhat hard on manga that are fanservice for fanservice’s sake, particularly when it’s coming from Seven Seas, who for a while had the reputation of picking up that sort of series. (They’re growing out of it, and in fact the creation of Ghost Ship may have been partly to give said titles their own forum.) That said, like almost all genres, I’m not against a particular type of manga provided it’s written well. And, much to my surprise, Yokai Girl is written well. It shouldn’t be too much of a surprise, as this is by the author of the legendary (if unlicenseable) Addicted to Curry, which ran for almost 50 volumes in Young Jump between 2001 and 2012. It’s basically a foodie manga, only it has, well, an excessive amount of fanservice, enough to make it hard to put out over here even if it weren’t incredibly long. For a followup, the author tries the same thing – this is essentially a yokai manga, only with an excessive amount of fanservice.

Yatsuki is our hero, looking somewhat sheepish on the cover. He’s a recent graduate who seems a bit of an “ordinary normal harem protagonist” sort, though there’s more to his backstory than meets the eye. He works part-time, lunches at a maid cafe with a cute girl waitress he’s attracted to, and has a younger sister (we think) back at his apartment. One day he runs into a girl stuck up a tree, and after getting her down in the classic ecchi tradition (crotch to the face, then an accidental grope of the substantial chest), she ends up passing out and he takes her back to his place. Though nothing happens, they’re clearly both attracted to each other… which is why he’s very surprised to find that she’s a yokai, a rokurokubi, or the girl with the really long neck that you’ve seen in some titles. And of course this proves to be only the beginning of his troubles, as soon more girls arrive, and more girls we thought we knew turn out to be related to supernatural origins. Fortunately, Yatsuki seems to be hella tough and also good at dealing with yokai.

As you’d expect, if you don’t like fanservice, stay away. Not only do we have a ton of panty shots, nudity, and mildly sexual situations (i.e. don’t expect any sex), but even the yokai are racier than I’d seen it titles like Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan. The Kakiotoko is not a yokai who I want to describe in the confines of this review, except that he looks like a very buff Freddie Mercury and is hilarious. More importantly, there’s an actual serious plot behind all the not-quite-porn shenanigans, as Yatsuki has a very good reason to want to seek out and work with both yokai and yokai hunters, and the fight scenes can be bloody and vicious. So, while there are a fair share of groanworthy moments (the running gag of his offending the maid cafe waitress gets old fast), for the most part this is a very good example of what you get when an established author with a good sense of timing and character turns his hand to “let’s titillate the teenage reader”. Recommended for fanservice fans.