Manga the Week of 2/1

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Remember, kids, when the month starts on Wednesday, Viz ignores it. (Mostly). So even though this is the first week of February, don’t expect a Viz blitz just yet. What we do have is a lot of stuff that has been out elsewhere for a while, but is finally hitting Midtown now…

Digital Manga Publishing has a couple of titles left that didn’t come out last week. Vol. 4 of school comedy Great Place High School Student Council (still a very awkward title), and Vol. 2 of Mr. Tiger and Mr. Bunny… sorry, Mr. Wolf. Still not a Tiger & Bunny crossover, sad to say.

Kodansha has the 2nd volume of @ Full Moon, which has gay subtext, vampires *and* werewolves, yet still somehow has not been licensed for a major motion picture starring Justin Timberlake. I wonder why? There’s also Vol. 17 of Fairy Tail, which is about due for the return of Fairy Tail fandom’s least favorite character.

There is a large pile of Vertical releases, almost all of which everyone else has had for months, but which Midtown is getting now. So if you haven’t gotten Chi’s Sweet Home 7, No Longer Human 2, Princess Knight 1 *and* 2, or Twin Spica 9 *and* 10 (but not 11, oddly enough), now would be the time. They’re all recommended.

Lastly, arriving two weeks late for no discernible reason whatsoever, we have Vol. 6 of Cross Game, containing the Japanese Vol. 12 and 13. Akane arrived last volume, and was a somewhat polarizing character among the blogger reviews that I read. Will she get a chance to win people’s hearts? Or will it be 2 more volumes of all baseball again?

Any ideas?

One Piece, Vol. 60

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By Eiichiro Oda. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz.

I am still a little mindboggled that I get to review a sixtieth volume of a manga that’s been released in North America. Yes, it’s true that without Naruto’s success, I likely wouldn’t be reading this, but honestly without Naruto’s success I wouldn’t be reading ANY Viz manga. This volume wraps up Luffy’s flashback sequence, and then takes us back to dealing with the aftermath of the Marineford debacle.

As with most volumes of One Piece, there’s so much going on that you simply have to stop and focus on a few things that jump out at you. Sabo is an interesting character to add here, especially gives he has an explicit connection to Luffy’s past – *and* he’s the son of noblemen, who once again are shown to be thoroughly corrupt and evil. Sabo is the exception, of course, and his “death” halfway through the volume, unlike Ace’s, feels more like the deaths of One Piece past – i.e., you get the sense we’ll be seeing Sabo again at some point. This does not diminish any of the heartbreak, of course, especially following the disastrous fire which destroys the city.

The flashback now finished, we move back to the fates of those affected by the previous 7-8 volumes. It’s great to see Makino again, who seems to be the closest thing we’re ever going to get to a mother figure for Luffy, and she points out that just because someone is not sobbing on the ground in despair does not mean that they are suffering. And Luffy, who has been feeling that he has lost everything, is reminded of the one thing he still has and that he can still take heart in – the other Straw Hat Pirates. Who we finally *see*, after so many volumes missing. They aren’t reunited yet, no, but we get some nice ‘epilogues’ to their cover page stories, showing them getting Luffy’s mysterious ‘message’ and understanding it.

There is then what amounts to a montage of characters we have known, as Luffy, Jimbei and Rayleigh decide to GO BACK TO THE BATTLEFIELD (a sequence, I note, we are told about but don’t see – very smart, considering how long this arc has gone on) and everyone reacts to this. Highlights include Coby discovering that his screaming at everyone to stop fighting wasn’t just being really loud – he has haki now! Well, he has to keep up with Luffy somehow. Various pirates are off to the New World, including some of the Supernovas and Crocodile. Even Buggy is reunited with his crew. And it’s always wonderful seeing Vivi again.

The back half of this manga is filled with nostalgia, but it’s also pointing the way forward. The next volume will finally wrap things up and get our crew back on their way to adventure – OK, maybe the volume AFTER that – but Oda has built a world so strong that we are content to follow his plots wherever they may meander. Especially if it means we see Ace and Luffy as kids fighting giant bears.

Skip Beat!, Vol. 26

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By Yoshiki Nakamura. Released in Japan by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Hana to Yume. Released in North America by Viz.

It’s been a while since I reviewed Skip Beat! in depth – the last two volumes were Briefs for the Manga bookshelf team. Since then, the Natsu arc has basically wrapped up, although Kyoko is still doing that show. In the meantime, Chaiki has now joined the Love Me team. And, as with Kyoko and Kanae, her cynicism and inability to “love” is her undoing, at least as far as Lory is concerned.

Lory may be an eccentric (the python is quite typical of him, complete with the pun), but you can’t say that he’s not trying his best for these girls. Not only is his “punishment” acting assignments most young people would kill for, but they’re tailored perfectly for each of the victims. Chiaki in particular is trying hard to rediscover her love of acting, and swallows her pride a little here as she is well aware of what she needs to do in order to open up. Sadly, we only hear a bit of what Kanae is going to be doing. But Kyoko is the star, and as always the focus is on her.

Kyoko is ordered to go meet a “scary person”, and I was amused at the reminder of how out of place she is in normal society, especially in the Love Me uniforms (which are given a nice cover image here). Kyoko just stands out, and given that the crowd are already creeped out by Cain Heel, it makes sense that the combination of his aura with that of Kyoko’s leads to fireworks. Speaking of Cain Heel, Cain is, of course, Ren, something that we and Kyoko recognize right away, though Kyoko immediately doubts herself. I do sometimes wonder if Ren is an ex-Love Me member, and if Lory still gives him assignments in the same manner that he does for Kyoko. Certainly Cain Heel is designed to hit several of Ren’s buttons.

Naturally, Kyoko is now paired with Ren again, and we get to see her take on another role – this one outside of the TV camera, as she’s playing Cain Heel’s spoiled sister, Setsu. Seeing Kyoko get into the role is probably the high point of this volume. Each time she’s had to play someone “different” from herself it’s caused problems, and this time is no different. Yet she seems to get a hold of Setsu’s basic nature much faster, and has become adept at looking into the character’s motivations. Of course, this can be very problematic when they’re forced to live together in the same motel room…

Though obviously not explicit, there’s an incestual subtext here. The Heel siblings are close to the point of obsession, and Kyoko accurately notes that Setsu’s love of her brother is a bit disturbing. And it goes the other way as well, of course, showing us Cain’s love of his sister intermingling with Ren’s feelings for Kyoko. Ren has always been about repression and masks, so seeing him losing it and cracking is a treat. He really desires Kyoko here, and we start to see the real reason that Lory paired Ren and Kyoko together. Of course, he regards his desires as deeply wrong, so we’re still not actually going anywhere, but…

This new arc promises to be a lot of fun, and is already mixing together humor, romance and drama in equal measures. It’s still running in Japan, so we’ll be seeing a lot of the Heel siblings in future volumes. For now, though, we’ll enjoy the comedy, be amused at the pseudo-romance, pretend not to notice Ren’s obsession merging with “Cain Heel”, and try to forget that terrifying panel of Ren’s huge hand reaching out to grab Kyoko and drag her into an alleyway, which would be genuinely horrible if we didn’t know it was him.