Mayo Chiki!, Vol. 1

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By Hajime Asano and NEET. Released in Japan as “Mayoeru Shitsuji to Chikin na Ore to!” by Media Factory, serialization ongoing in the magazine Comic Alive. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

Possibly the most frustrating thing about Mayo Chiki! is that there is a manga with some interest in it struggling to get out here. The story is not remotely going to be original, but it could at least be interesting, with some likeable characters and a healthy dose of humor. The humor, at least, is present, and one of the manga’s saving graces. But none of that really seems to matter, as the manga’s art and general mood seems to revolve around presenting young girls (in the classic moe ‘they’re 17 but look about 9’ style) looking humiliated in half-naked (and sometimes 3/4 naked) poses. And it kills any chance the story may have had of doing something with its cliches.

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The basic premise of Mayo Chiki! reads like any number of the moe light novels that have come out in Japan recently, and been made into anime/manga/games/etc. Indeed, some of you may have read my reviews of I Don’t Like You At All, Big Brother!! and Haganai, both of which run in the same magazine and are cut from the same cloth. The premise is that Jiro, who is terrified of women (but extremely tough) due to his mother (a wrestler) and sister (just a sadist) beating the shit out of him every day, such that he gets a nosebleed whenever he sees a woman as a defense mechanism (his family stopped when they saw blood). School is his only refuge, but one day, in the bathroom, he accidentally walks in on the handsome yet cold Subaru, and notes he is wearing panties. In fact, it’s worse than that – Subaru is a girl. And no one is supposed to find this out on pain of death. Luckily, Subaru is more than just a handsome bishie trap – she’s also butler for the school’s rich princess, who turns out to be sympathetic – and sadistic. She blackmails Jiro into keeping their secret, and gradually Jiro and Subaru grow closer, despite everyone else now thinking the two of them are gay.

Yes, there was no way this would be fantastic or original given that premise. But it didn’t have to be all that bad. And as I said, the manga has some very funny moments in it, my favorite being the ‘secret memory manipulation technique’ which consists of hitting someone till they lose their memory. And there are some possible plot points of interest, especially given the hero and heroine have both lost a parent. But then you get the little sister turning out to have incestual feelings for her brother, I think simply because you can’t write a moe light novel without incest subtext anymore. And Subaru being tied up in bed with a ball gag in her mouth, supposedly to stop her from killing Jiro but more accurately to show the reader she is tied up and with a ball gag in her mouth. And the extras, which have a ‘I am holding a microphone with my mouth open’ shot, a ‘I am licking ice cream’ shot, and a 2-page spread of the cover, only with Subaru wearing only an unbuttoned men’s shirt.

I like some moe stuff – Haruhi Suzumiya, K-On!, Toradora. But I think my general feeling about moe manga with so many suggestive poses like Mayo Chiki! is that it makes me feel like a criminal when I read it. Certainly I don’t recommend taking this book anywhere near Canadian Customs. That said, I am me, and I’m sure that if readers can get past the art style and sleazy sexual poses, there’s a more interesting story in here crying to get out. And of course there’s the anime adaptation, which Sentai has released, so it has a built-in fanbase. I think I’m just tired of anything from Comic Alive, maybe.

Neon Genesis Evangelion Omnibus, Vol. 1-3

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By Yoshiyuki Sadamoto and GAINAX. Released in Japan by Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in the magazine Shonen Ace. Released in North America by Viz Media.

In a not-entirely-coincidental move, Viz has released the first of their omnibus releases for Evangelion at the same time as Vol. 13, giving the reader a chance to catch up and remind themselves of what they may have forgotten. And it’s definitely possible that they forgot, as the manga began in 1995, and Viz started releasing it in 1998 or so, in 32-page comic book format (remember when they did that?) and flipped (remember when they did that?). But now it’s decades later, and it’s time to get the band back together again with this new oversize omnibus with color pages and snazzy packaging. (Which is well worth it, by the way, it looks great.) But what about the content?

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Given I only reviewed Vol. 13 of Evangelion last week, there may be some repetition involved. But the main reason I tend to prefer the manga adaptation of Evangelion to the anime is that it takes the basic plot and makes everything just slightly more tolerable. And indeed, in these early volumes, it is pretty slight – there are no major changes from what we watched in the first 6 episodes or so of the anime. For those living in a cave, Evangelion starts off as a post-apocalyptic giant robot sort of story where a young teenager estranged from his father is called to a super secret base to find out that he’s one of the few people who can pilot said giant robot and defeat the enemy creatures that keep attacking the Earth. Only the creatures are Angels, and that’s not merely Japan’s love for using religion where it’s not appropriate – Evangelion is drenched in religion, with each enemy angel having an appropriate name – Sachiel, Shamshel, Ramiel, etc.

Shinji in particular benefits from the adaptation to manga. He still complains quite a bit, and still runs off halfway through the volume, but his general demeanor is more argumentative and sullen rather than weak and whiny, and it simply makes the reader identify with him better. Indeed, his reasoning for running off is given better depth in the manga – he’s desperately searching for a family/parental figure, and finding that the closest one he now has, Misato, has been writing a journal for NERV analyzing him is a crushing blow. His response to Touji is also excellent – some may object that it shows Shinji being too ‘cool’, but I like to think that it shows Shinji as being slightly less broken.

There’s also Shinji’s relationship with Gendo, and his observation of Rei’s relationship with Gendo. I’ll admit I’m not all that fond of Gendo, and the manga doesn’t help – he’s the one character who’s actually less appealing than in the anime. But seeing his interactions with Rei must deal Shinji’s fragile psyche a crushing blow, wondering what in God’s name is wrong with him if he can’t get any sort of affection from his father but she can. Of course, this isn’t Rei’s fault, and it’s to his credit that he’s able to bond with her as well. The three volumes are roughly divided into Shinji’s relationship with another person – Gendo in Vol. 1, Misato in 2, and Rei in 3. The climax to 3, where Shinji manages to coax a genuine smile out of Rei,l is wonderfully heartwarming, and a great place to end this omnibus.

If you haven’t read the manga yet, this is absolutely a worthy release to get, showing why it’s become one of the most important stories from the last thirty years.

Also, Page 234 has to be read to be disbelieved. Sometimes an Angel is not just a cigar, I guess. And Misato’s dialogue is just icing on the cake.

Alice in the Country of Hearts: My Fanatic Rabbit, Vol. 1

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By Quin Rose, Owl Shinotsuki and Delico Psyche, based on the game by Quin Rose. Released in Japan as “Heart no Kuni no Alice ~My Fanatic Rabbit~” by Mag Garden, serialized in the magazine Comic Blade Avarus. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Well this has certainly turned into a franchise, hasn’t it? Given sales in North America seem to be relatively strong (for manga), we shouldn’t be surprised. Yet here is the third spinoff series from the original Alice manga, with promises of a fourth this spring and two more in the summer. Each focusing on a different pairing for our heroine, in the finest otome game tradition. And each managing to also deal with the main serious game plotline, where your secondary goal is to figure out that Alice actually regaining her memories is BAD BAD BAD. And with one exception (sorry, Bloody Twins, you still suck), the spinoff manga have done an impressive job of doing just that.

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Not that you would know it from the first half. And I try not to begrudge the series its romance – after all, that *is* the other half of the goal of the games, and its primary audience is women who like to see hot guys of various types (all psychotic, but in different ways!) fall for our stand-in-for-the-reader heroine. This time around, it’s Elliot March, aka the march Hare, who is Blood Dupre’s #2 at the Hatter Mansion. As with the rest of the cast, Elliot is drawn to Alice being different (her ‘outsider’ status) and both he and Alice starting to fall for each other while simultaneously not knowing what that is. You know the drill – “what is this strange pain in my chest”, etc.

Things start to change as we are reminded that the hatter clan is a mafia organization – and that Wonderland has a very casual, even callous view of death, given that it’s impermanent (well, relatively). Alice has been trying to distance herself from the fact that she’s living with a bunch of killers, so Blood (deliberately, I suspect) makes absolutely sure that she gets this shoved in her face, and knows that Elliot is a trained killer as well.

Then comes the part of the book that really knocks it out of the park. For all that Alice is the heroine in Wonderland to whom all the guys are attracted, she has amazingly low self-esteem, constantly living in the shadow of her perfect big sister (whose fate, again, is alluded to but never specified by the other men in the cast) and having to be around Blood, who physically resembles her old boyfriend/crush/whichever. Elliot notices that Alice gets depressed every time this comes up, and offers a solution. And once again, the manga (and no doubt the games) remind you that it’s not just a case of picking a hot guy and living sexily ever after – these people are SCREWED UP. Wonderland is a world of twisted values about death and what it means to be alive, and they’re not attracted to Alice’s personality or beauty – they’re attracted to Alice as she has a beating heart rather than a clock.

After this, the rest of the manga isn’t quite as interesting – it doesn’t help that Peter shows up, and is in ‘obsessive’ mode. It does end on a good cliffhanger, though, with Vivaldi calling for Alice’s head even as Elliot races to the Hatter Mansion to save her. There’s only two volumes in the series, so everything will wrap up nicely next time, I imagine. But this series continues to show how to make a really interesting romance series – having you constantly question everything about the heroes, heroine, world, and premise. Nice job.