Yearly Archives: 2018

Val x Love, Vol. 1

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By Ryosuke Asakura. Released in Japan as “Ikusa x Koi” by Square Enix, serialization ongoing in their magazine Shonen Gangan. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Ko Ransom.

In a way, I almost wish this had been worse. If it was completely bottom-feeling fanservice and nothing else, I could have smiled, nodded, said “Yeah, thought so”, and moved on. But there is the occasional flash, throughout this first volume, that it is going to gain greater depth and try to do something with the psychologies of its main characters, who have a lot of messed up things going on with them. You’d see it poking its head out… and then we’d paper over it with a monster fight which out of necessity seems to involve making out, or feeling up, or some other variety of fanservice that is literally dictated by whatever robotic-voiced rule machine seems to be in charge of the girls. It ends up feeling like you merely have to make the right level ups and the problems will be magically solved. And all the level ups involve stronger levels of “getting closer”. In other words, it’s not all that far from a mediocre ero game.

Our hero is Takuma, a young high schooler with a scary face. Nothing we haven’t seen before in Toradora!, or Haganai, or even Bleach. Except Val x Love takes it up to eleven, giving Takuma immense shark teeth and a huge body, making everyone absolutely terrified whenever he does something. Even worse, he’s somewhat socially inept – all he wants to do is study, so that he can make his dead mother proud. Unfortunately, he freezes up during tests so actually has horrible grades. The guy’s a wreck. And, not helping things, he is now living with eight other women (the ninth is absenting herself as she thinks he’s a loser), all of whom are valkyries sent by Odin to help save the world from demonic invasion. As I indicated abovel, they level up by completing various types of “love” tasks with Takuma – ‘so shopping while holding hands’, ‘be flirty’, and of course ‘feel bare breast for thirty seconds’. When this is achieved, they gain power and can take out the monsters.

There’s a lot that’s still unexplained about the sisters and their background, and most of them are barely sketched in here – I assume future volumes will take care of that. Natsuki is the lead heroine and obvious love interest, who’s a tsundere but competent, sort of in the Rin Tohsaka mode. The otehr featured girl is Itsuyo, who’s a bit more complex – her past as a cowardly girl and a lot of issues with her father have led her to have an outward “teasing oneesama” personality, but when it comes time to put up or shut up she’s freezing up just as badly as Takuma does. I was hoping this would lead to a nice sweet scene where they walk about their similarities and resolve to help each other become more confident. Instead, it leads to a kiss on the cheek and a quick monster elimination.

If you’re a young teen who wants monster fighting, cute girls, and the occasional bare breast (the series is rated M, likely more for that than any violent monster attacks), you’ll likely enjoy this. But it proved immensely frustrating for me in not going down more interesting roads. And given that the preview for the next volume featured the “oh no, I seem to have whipped cream all over my face and breasts” trope which is #1 on my Anti-Hit Parade, I think I will leave Val x Love for other valiant lovers to read.

Baccano!, Vol. 1

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By Ryohgo Narita, Shinta Fujimoto and Katsumi Enami. Released in Japan by Square Enix, serialized in their magazine Young Gangan. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Taylor Engel.

For the most part, when you are reading the first volume in a series, you do not need to worry too much about spoilers. I can see a casual reader picking this up and thinking “Oh, this is an adaptation of the first light novel, I can read this instead.” And they’re… sort of correct – the 2nd and third volumes of this series will in fact be a pretty straightforward adaptation of the first light novel. However, this first volume serves as a prequel to the series, taking place 3 years prior. And it spoils the absolute heck out of some things. I’d recommend reading the first four books and watching the anime, really. If you’re already familiar with the series, though, this first book is a treat, especially for Firo fans, showing us a younger Firo more desperate to prove himself as his own man, but beset by his baby face and the fact that circumstances mean he has to try a bit harder. Luckily, he has his family. Well, families.

The main reason I gave that spoiler warning o\in the first paragraph is because the manga also features Claire, showing off his acrobatics and his solipsism, at a point before he’s left Firo and the Gandors to set off on his own. Given that a large part of the second book revolves around who Claire Stanfield is, this will give it away. As for Firo, he’s perfectly characterized here. We see that he’s exceedingly observant and clever, but also easy to anger and filled with a desire to take care of everything by himself – which makes things far more dangerous for him here, in that he isn’t an immortal. The first chapter is entirely about this (and shows off Maiza’s dangerous side – folks who think of him as just an “accountant” may wind up dead), the rest of the book has anotehr plot about a seemingly immortal priest who’s going around killing people.

Narita excels at writing unpleasant people doing bad things and making you like them, and that’s the case here, as despite being mafia (or camorra, yes) gangsters, beating people up, killing them, and torturing them, you’re left with the feeling that the 1930s were a rollicking good time. There are other shoutouts as to events in the series proper – the villain behind the villain turns out to be very unsurprising provided you’ve read the first book, and there’s a substantially large role for Keith Gandor, possibly more substantial than he’s ever gotten in the actual novels. By the end of the book you’re ready for the adaptation proper, which begins in Vol. 2 but really begins with Isaac and Miria making their grand entrance at the end. There’s even a cameo by Carol at the end, for anime watchers.

If you’re new to the series and want to check out Baccano!, I do recommend this order: anime, then light novels, then this manga adaptation. If you’re a long time fan, though, this is a must buy.

Invaders of the Rokujouma!?, Vol. 9

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By Takehaya and Poco. Released in Japan as “Rokujouma no Shinryakusha!?” by Hobby Japan. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Warnis.

There are many things that I greatly enjoy Rokujouma for, but it has to be said that surprises and plot twists are not one of them. This is not necessarily a bad thing, of course, but it does need to be said: if you’re reading Rokujouma and wondering what is going to happen next, “the most obvious thing” will be the correct answer. In this book we see Ruth getting an arranged marriage visit – given she’s the princess’s attendant and closest friend, she’s a bit of a hot commodity. We meet her theoretical fiancee, who is handsome, turned his father’s business around, donates to so many charities it’s ridiculous, and no doubt spends his spare time petting kittens. There is no reason to refuse this marriage except, of course for two things: 1) she’s in love with Koutarou, something that she finally accepts by the end of this book, and 2) he turns out to be… well, let’s save the gripping suspense for the next paragraph.

If you guessed “turns out to be secretly EVIL!”, congratulations, you can now write an anime series. In fact, not only is he secretly evil, but he turns out to look exactly like the sneering evil guy that Koutarou fought in the past in the previous mini-arc, something Koutarou lampshades. Actually, that arc is becoming the kick off for a lot of new plots – Koutarou is teaching Ruth sword fighting now because he wants her to fight like her ancestor did. More importantly, Ruth figures out the truth of what happened, that Koutarou is in fact the Blue Knight. She almost kneels before him in worship, to be honest, which made me a little uncomfortable, but given who Ruth is and the appearance of their biggest legend before her as the man she loves, it’s very much in character. Actually, given this book is almost all Ruth’s book, it’s pretty well characterized. Which isn’t surprising, as likeable characterization and development is the strongest point of this author.

As for the rest of the cast, it’s Valentine’s Day, and we are briefly reminded that Koutarou was supposed to, at the start of the series, be one of the “unpopular” guys that never got valentines. The very idea is laughable now, of course, so instead we’re treated to a comedic series of his love interests handing out chocolate one by one to an increasingly baffled Koutarou. Harumi is satisfied just saying it’s “obligation chocolate” when she knows it’s not. Theia gets the prize, however, as she says it’s definitely love chocolate, leaving Koutarou poleaxed. (She also implies that she’d be perfectly happy sharing Koutarou with Ruth, making me wonder if this is another series that’s going to have a harem ending of some sort.) The other girls also do well for themselves, apart from poor Yurika, who’s stuck in comedy relief mode this book, so is totally useless.

So now we have a new enemy, and I’m pretty sure he’ll be back, but probably not next book. Shizuka’s on the cover of this one, and of the main heroines she’s the least developed – in fact, is she a heroine? Perhaps she’s the best developed of the supporting roles. I wonder if she’ll get more focus next time. That said, the cliffhanger for this book implies Kiriha will get the bulk of the next one. Rokujouma remains a delight, even if it’s a very predictable delight.