Itazura Na Kiss Volume 4

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By Kaoru Tada. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialized in the magazine Bessatsu Margaret (“Betsuma”). Released in North America by Digital Manga Publishing.

Thank you. After begging for three volumes to have Naoki be slightly more open and approachable, we finally get some progress here. Oh, he’s still mostly a stone-faced jerk, but the ‘soft’ moments are starting to happen more and more often, and we can now be sure that his complete lack of open affection for Kotoko is more due to his personality than anything else. The black shoujo coffee still has no sugar, but at least we get a little milk added here.

My favorite of these was in a chapter introducing yet another rival, this one on Naoki’s end. Taketo is young, cute, pre-law, and decides that since Naoki and Kotoko still aren’t going out, he’s going to take Kotoko for himself. He then promptly gets into a fight about this with Kotoko’s obsessed stalker friend Kin-chan. Kotoko, who has little experience with guys liking her, much less fighting over her, is mostly ineffectual here, having no interest in Taketo but frustrated by her lack of anything with Naoki. Naoki then shows up, notes they’re all being stupid, and then leans in snarkily and notes that it’s all useless, as “the one Kotoko’s in love with is ME.”

This is important, as it’s really one of the first times we’ve seen he actually cares about that. Sure, he’s been shown being nice to Kotoko on occasion, and tolerating her far more than is sometimes warranted, but we’re at a point now where we have to find out what the lead couple see in each other. One of the main premises of the entire manga is that Kotoko isn’t ‘good enough’ for someone like Naoki, given her poor studies, flakiness, tendency to overcompensate wildly, etc. Here we find Kotoko’s simple devotion really does register with him… and he likes it.

The other major Naoki plot we get here is seeing him decide on a career. Because this is old-school shoujo, we don’t really see much of what leads Naoki, at the end of this volume, to consider a career in medicine. One can assume it started with Yuuki being hospitalized, and watching all the doctors and nurses there. But seeing his indifference at running his Dad’s company, even though he proves to be excellent at it, gives us a better look – Naoki likes to be challenged, and finds anything that doesn’t do this boring. Perhaps a career as a doctor will give him what he seeks.

Kotoko remains Kotoko throughout. Now that Naoki is finally developing into a nicer (well, relatively speaking) brand of shoujo hero, I feel the urge to see Kotoko do the same, but know it’s going to be a much harder road. It’s very difficult for these dippy shoujo heroines to stop being spunky, I am useless at everything but will try harder sorts. Heck, halfway through this volume we see Kotoko got fired from her part-time job as SHE FORGOT TO SHOW UP FOR A WHILE. She’s a flake. And now that I’m no longer frustrated by Naoki’s grumpy stoicness, I can allow my frustration at Kotoko’s incredibly slow rate of character development come to the fore. She needs to mature.

Still, we’re now only 1/3 through the series. And the leads are already 20 years old, which puts this a leg up on other shoujo. Hopefully further volumes will not only develop Naoki and Kotoko’s relationship, but also Kotoko’s own sense of self and independence.

The Story of Saiunkoku Volume 1

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By Sai Yukino and Kairi Yura. Released in Japan by Kadokawa Shoten, serialization ongoing in the magazine Asuka. Released in North America by Viz.

I will admit to being unfamiliar with the original light novels this is based off of, which now number 16 and are still being written. I do see that the manga artist for the series actually is the same artist who does the illustrations for the light novels, which is refreshing. Nor did I see the two anime series based off of it, some of which was licensed by Geneon before they went under. This is, after all, a Kadokawa title, and nothing says franchise quite like Kadokawa. That said, I never felt like I was missing anything, as this particular manga is very good at simply laying out the basic plot and just going along with it.

The basic plot is politics, with a dash of romance. We meet our hero Shurei, who is a noble but whose family has fallen on hard times. Therefore, she’s well versed in commoner things such as cooking, cleaning, etc. She is asked – okay, tricked – okay, bribed – into becoming consort to the Emperor of our fictional country, who has proven to be completely ambivalent and uncaring about ruling his country. Naturally, she takes this as a challenge. She’s determined to make him a good ruler… once she can find him.

One thing I liked about this title is how clever everyone is throughout the first volume. Perhaps it’s because this particular shoujo title is freed from the high school of modern times (it takes place in generic fantasy country at the time of generic Edo period), but people manage to not only be book-smart but also savvy. This includes our heroine, who first meets the Emperor when he’s pretending to be someone else, and sees through this almost immediately. Much to my surprise, it also includes said Emperor, who does have a bit of sheltered and spoiled to him (mostly in his personal dealings), but is also putting on an act, which he starts to drops under Shurei’s influence.

Having also seen many times the story of two girls who are in love during their teenage years and then go on to grow up and marry men, it was somewhat amusing to see the reverse here, as the Emperor has been taking young men to his bed for some time, but on meeting Shuhei his tastes start to change as he falls for her. (It goes without saying, this being shoujo, that the Emperor and his underlings are all quite pretty.) The underlings are mostly there to deliver exposition, though one does seem to have a Ryouga-like sense of direction. (Is that too dated? Should I start saying Zoro-like sense of direction? I do want to keep trendy…) And of course there’s Shuhei’s retainer Seiran, who it is hinted is far more than he first appears.

There is some romance here, notably with the rather forward Emperor and the shocked and flustered Shuhei, but I’m actually far more interested in the political plot developing. Hopefully I’ll get to see more as the series goes on. A good pickup for Viz, giving their Beat line some much-needed variety.

Fairy Navigator Runa Volume 2

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By Miyoko Ikeda and Michiyo Kikuta. Released in Japan as “Youkai Navi Runa” by Kodansha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Nakayoshi. Released in North America by Del Rey.

I had noted in my review of Volume 1 of this magical girl series that it had the potential to be darker than you normally see in that genre. Of course, I was merely fooling myself. Not as to Runa’s potentiality for darkness, but fooling myself to think that magical girl series were ever light and fluffy. The sheer number of magical girls dealing with death and horror boggles the mind, with Sailor Moon being only the tip of the iceberg.

Unfortunately, Runa’s morality at having almost killed a bad guy is quickly forgotten in this lighter and fluffier second volume, which proceeds, having introduced its cast of orphan friends in the previous chapters, to have our heroine abandon them all for their own safety and sets off to live elsewhere with her animal guardians. She now knows that she has to find the Jewel of Everlasting Time, which grants unimaginable powers.

And so we travel to nameless portside town, where there’s a magical signature but it’s indistinct, so Runa spends most of the time watching a cute young woman do magic tricks. Amusingly, she also becomes close with a young girl her own age, who bears a striking resemblance to her old friend Sae. I’m not certain how much of this is deliberate – it’s never actually brought up – but it is fairly ironic that Runa finds a new replacement for her best friend so rapidly, and that she share similar looks and personalities.

Not a lot really happens in this volume, to be honest. There’s a legend about mermaids being betrayed by humans that (surprise) turns out to be relevant later. The vaguely evil boy from Volume 1 turns up again, and his own animal guardian takes a large bite out of Runa’s shoulder (again, probably the only thing justifying the T Ages 13+ rating here – this is for kids). The only real suspect turns out to be the villain, although how much of a true villain they will be we won’t know until Volume 3.

So now we wait for Kodansha USA, though to be honest I won’t be suffering over this series going on hiatus they way I am with Negima or Zetsubou. It has flashes of potential, but Volume 2 felt a lot more generic than Volume 1, and it’s hard not to see this as just another generic Nakayoshi shoujo series, like much of Del Rey’s recent shoujo output.