Negima! Magister Negi Magi Volume 28

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By Ken Akamatsu. Released in Japan as “Mahou Sensei Negima!” by Kodansha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Magazine. Released in North America by Del Rey.

Despite a minor battle in the middle of the volume, which is more of a reminder to Negi and his allies that they aren’t quite invincible yet, this is very much a catch up with the plot volume. Not much happens except little bits of revelation that slowly move the story forward, and setups for the next volume, which begins another huge arc.

That said, even if this volume isn’t the best, there’s still several moments that make me grin. The biggest has to be Setsuna and Konoka finally getting a Pactio. Setsuna’s feelings for Konoka started off as being crippling to her, but after the Kyoto arc in Volume 6 mostly turned into a running gag for several books. After getting her ass kicked by Tsukuyomi, however, Setsuna is once again starting to doubt herself and her abilities, and thinking it would be best if she gave up on being happy and worked on getting better at the sword.

Konoka, of course, sees Setsuna angsting and immediately knows what’s going on. She’s a terrific contrast to the swordsman, being fairly simple and light-hearted, and simply deciding after seeing what’s going on in the magical world to get as good as she possibly can. And she wants Setsuna by her side as her knight and protector. How can Setsuna possibly say no? So they decide to pactio… which Konoka gives a bit more ‘oomph’ to than we’re used to. This is the volume where I went from describing their relationship as “well, it’s mostly yuri tease and one-sided crush’ to ‘OK, no, they’re as close as this type of manga will get to being a couple’. It’s great to see.

As for the rest of the volume, there’s another of the ‘stupid perverse fanservice’ chapters that Akamatsu throws in every 12 chapters or so to pacify the audience that doesn’t care about shonen fighting mangas. What’s more, we now finally reunite Yue with the rest of the gang, though she still doesn’t have her memories, and her fellow Knights regard Negi and company with suspicion. We also can see Negi’s fallibility here – earlier, he notes 2 badges in one place that are meant to be Yue and Anya. But when Yue then shows up where he is, it doesn’t occur to him to wonder why there’s an extra badge. Negi, you’ve been infiltrated!

Said infiltrator drops the disguise briefly here, and we see how the ability not only makes the person disguised act and think like the person they’re replacing, but can also influence the original’s thoughts. Shiori, Fate’s mole, is starting to be affected by Negi’s basic shonen hero purity and niceness, and worries what might happen if she falls for him while disguised.

And then there’s Kurt Godel. He’s an absolute jerk, but so over-the-top about it that you know there must be more to him than that. He kicks Negi and Asuna’s ass, and is clearly trying to bait Negi – in fact, it almost reads like he’s trying to get Negi to kill him, which would be very odd indeed. And then he invites them all to a grand ball to discuss things, where everyone will be perfectly safe, of course. At least it allows the girls to dress up.

And then we get the last big revelation, which is from Natsumi of all people, who sees that the Magical World is actually laid over an alternate Mars from a different dimension. Most of the cast think that this is cool to hear about but utterly irrelevant, but Negi and Setsuna both realize what it also means – Chao’s descriptions of where she came from take on a whole new meaning. Akamatsu hasn’t quite hit One Piece levels of ‘you should have been paying attention’ back references, but he does very well for himself.

I could go on at length, but you get the idea. For a breather volume, this is just packed with plot and characterization. Good thing, too, as this is the last breather volume to date. Starting with 29, we go into the Magic World finale, and it’s still running in Japan. Sadly, due to the Del Rey/Kodansha/Random House shuffle, it may be a long time before we see Volume 29 here in the States. In fact, Negima may be finished in Japan before we do. Which is a shame, as it’s a bestseller, and better than it sounds.

Manga the week of 11/3

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First week of the month, so must be Viz! Well, mostly.

Certainly the title that caught my eye the most is the manga biography of Che Guevara, which Penguin Books is putting out. Unlike most faux-manga bios, this seems to have actual Japanese artists. If you like Che Guevara, check this out! (How often do I get to type that?)

Bandai has another 4-koma volume of Lucky Star coming out. And DMP has Bloody Kiss tonight, which seems to feature yaoi vampires, making it the most licenseable title in the history of the world.

And Viz. New Gintama is always welcome, this one wrapping up the long arc with the cursed otaku sword. New Bakuman will likely give me mixed feelings, but I’ll read it anyway. Special A and Crown of Love put out their final volumes, though I think everybody but me dropped SA a while back. There’s also new Otomen, hopefully with more Ryo after that last cliffhanger, and new Kimi ni Todoke, which continues the arc focused on Chizuru.

As for debuts, I’m very interested in Genkaku Picasso, a title from the author of Short Cuts, which sounds vaguely disturbing. Though possibly not as disturbing as the cover to Kurozakuro, a new Shonen Sunday title which will not eat you if you buy it, despite those teeth. And a new shoujo series, The Story of Saiunkoku, comes from Kadokawa’s Asuka magazine, and no doubt has an anime tie-in or two already.

What’s interesting you?

Dragon Girl Omnibus 1

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By Toru Fujieda. Released in Japan by Akita Shoten, serialized in the magazine Princess. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Toru Fujieda is one of those manga artists who’s been around for some time. In the 1990s she was working at Sony Magazines, putting out short shoujo under their imprint. Then in the 2000s she moved to Akita Shoten, and has been releasing fun, medium-length shoujo series in their magazine Princess. One of her previous works, Oyayubihime Infinity, was released over here by CMX, and now we have the Ouendan-loving manga Dragon Girl, which Yen is releasing in 2 giant omnibuses, each covering 2 1/2 volumes of manga.

Yen has a lot of helpful translation notes (which are at the end of each ‘volume’ in Japanese, slightly awkward for the reader, and make me wonder if the omnibus decision was last-minute), but doesn’t actually get into the concept of ouendan, which may be unfamiliar to readers here. ‘Male cheerleaders’ doesn’t really describe the culture and history of the thing, and they aren’t really much like female cheerleaders at all, something which is pointed out in this volume. However, they do have similar goals. You can read more here.

Into this school comes Rinna Aizen, a tall, athletic, overly enthusiastic girl whose father was king of all ouendan at this school. It’s just recently gone co-ed, so she can finally pursue her dream of following in her dad’s footsteps (and also meet the cute boy who encouraged her years ago). This despite the presence of numerous obstacles in the form of high school boys: the leader of the club today, who wants to stay traditional; the unemotional pretty boy who ignores her; the boy who inspired her years ago, who now seems to have become a delinquent; and above all, the evil Class President, who seems to enjoy torturing her because that’s what he’s like.

Yes, in case you hadn’t guessed, for all of its focus on cheering clubs and high school drama, what we have here is a reverse harem series. This is actually one of its strengths, as we’re halfway through the manga with this omnibus and I’m still not entirely certain who she’ll end up with. Most reverse harems (or regular male-lead harems, for that matter) give a large pile of love interests short shrift while concentrating on the boy you know the heroine will pick eventually. But honestly, we could go in one of three directions here with no real logical leaps. Impressive.

To be honest, a lot of this is shoujo paint-by-numbers. If you’re looking for shocking twists or new variations on a standard theme, you’re not going to find them here. That said, this is a fantastic manga for me, as it pushes a lot of MY buttons. Rinna is exactly my sort of manga heroine – tall, strong, loud, a bit dense, and cheerful as the day is long – and seeing her personality slowly win over others is another favorite plotline of mine. Also benefiting the series is the fact that Rinna’s immediately given two best female friends (who are almost polar opposites), who help make the reverse harem aspect of the plot slightly less obvious, and give a wall of common sense for Rinna to occasionally run into. Nice to see this in Volume 1, where usually it takes series like Ouran 9 or 10 volumes to do this.

Most of all, Dragon Girl passes my most important test: I really, REALLY want to find out what happens next. After reading it, I went to Yen’s site to see when the 2nd and final volume is due out. (Yen says ‘Spring’, Amazon says February.) It’s not the best shoujo in the world, but it’s fun, funny, and doesn’t offend my sensibilities. That’s a winner for me.