Space Battleship Yamato: The Classic Collection

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By Leiji Matsumoto. Released in Japan as “Uchuu Senkan Yamato” by Akita Shoten, serialized in the magazine Bouken Ou. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Zack Davisson. Adapted by J.P. Sullivan.

There’s been a wonderful glut lately of both classic 70s manga and also Leiji Matsumoto’s works (frequently those are the same thing). We got Captain Harlock and Queen Emeraldas, and we’re getting the modern rewrite of Harlock. And now we’re getting the original Space Battleship Yamato, with the modern version of that coming out this summer. No sign of a rescue of Galaxy Express 999, but I suspect that’s more complicated. In the meantime, it’s time for more of the best of what Matsumoto has to offer as a manga artist… and also the worst, as Matsumoto is not perfect, nor is this collection. But it does give you exactly what the title promises: Space, and lots of it. Impressive battleships sailing through space. And, wonder of wonders, and ending that, although rushed, actually wraps up the series! Unfortunately, that ending is 1/3 through the book, and the actual ending is the open non-ending we’ve come to expect from Matsumoto.

For those who are unaware, Yamato was conceived as an anime, and Matsumoto was brought into it later on in development. He quickly made it his own, though, and the manga began about a month after the anime started. (The anime was also “adapted” into Star Blazers, for those with long memories…) The premise has aliens dropping radioactive bombs on Earth, and the only ones who can stop them is the Earth Fleet… which isn’t doing so hot. Fortunately, they have a secret battleship, Yamato, that can battle the Gamilans, as well as try to seek aid from mysterious blonde-haired, gorgeous, and mostly dead alien babes. (This isn’t Harlock, so the gorgeous aliens aren’t evil here.) Together with trusted old Captain Okita, young and impetuous yet destined for greatness Susumu Kodai, and only woman in the Earth Fleet Yuki Mori, they will defeat the Gamilans… and then have to escape Earth after it grows smug and proud in the aftermath.

The main reason to get this manga, in my opinion, are the many pages of the expanses of space. Each chapter features at least 5-6 pages of just space, planets, and stars, and it’s here to show off the wonder of it all. Characterization, on the other hand, fares less well, with everyone pretty much matching to a type. There’s a sense this is trying to adapt an anime rather than be its own thing (which may be true). In addition, I have to say it, I’m not a fan of the way Matsumoto uses humor. His leads tend to be the brooding, serious types, so he balances it out by having the dumbest Milton Berle-style comedy, complete with drunken vets butchering pigs, etc. An exception to this is the robot Analyzer, who would be an R2-D2 ripoff if this weren’t a good three years before Star Wars. His snarky comments did spark amusement from me, especially when they verged on verbal abuse.

This doesn’t really hit the heights that Harlock and Emeraldas do; it tries to be majestic, but can’t quite make it. But it’s entertaining as a space opera, and I do love those expanses of darkness with only stars. If you enjoy Matsumoto, give this a try.

The Saga of Tanya the Evil: Abyssus Abyssum Invocat

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By Carlo Zen and Shinobu Shinotsuki. Released in Japan by Enterbrain. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Emily Balistrieri.

The subtitle of this volume is translated as “Hell Follows Hell”, or more colloquially, one mistake leads to more. Tanya learns that here in a book that shows off how imperfect all the sides are. Tanya herself, due to her rabid anti-communist mindset (and the salaryman inside her, who I honestly tend to forget about most of the time) is slow to realize that the not-Russians fighting them are actually fighting for their homes and native land… not for communism. This is huge because it changes the entire way they have to fight the enemy. She also runs into Mary Sue for the first time, and while there’s clearly a much larger fight still to come, it’s a difficult battle that depletes her elite unit of a quarter of its entire force. (That said, rest assured all the characters whose names we can remember survive.) And of course Britain and Russia are having their own issues with lack of manpower, lack of supplies, lack of materials… we’ve reached the attrition stage of the war.

The cover art has Tanya standing at the gravesite of the soldiers who fell in that battle, and it reminds us that just because the title is “Tanya the Evil”, and Tanya frequently does morally reprehensible things, does not means she is 100% black of heart. She cares about her subordinates, mourns them, and has long passed the Tanya of the first book who was merely looking for “meat shields”. Likewise, General Zettour, at the end of the book, as he attempts to coerce/cajole the separatist parts of the Federation to join them, thinks that as a good person, he’s appalled, but as a soldier fighting for the Empire, he’s willing to be evil. A person who commits mass murders but feels really bad about the whole thing is still a mass murderer. And, on the other side of the coin, we have Mary, who is bright and shiny and filled with thoughts of revenge and I suspect is so naive that she will be led by the nose whenever she runs into someone manipulative.

Other things to note: as I feared, Loriya is still around, and still a pedophile. It’s not played for laughs as much, but still disturbing. Speaking of which, the soldiers joke at one point about Tanya marrying Visha for her coffee-making skills, and Tanya briefly ponders whether, as a male mind inside the body of a young girl, he would qualify as gay or not, but then promptly decides to not think about it. Which is fine, I won’t either. Tanya is twelve. In fact, the fact that Tanya is twelve comes up an awful lot here: after four volumes of mostly having everyone ignore the fact that she’s so young, we get a bunch of scenes to reinforce it: she can’t interrogate the Federation prisoners as they won’t take her seriously, she can’t get into the celebratory party at the Officer’s Mess as she can’t drink, etc. It’s a nice reminder that the basic premise of this entire series is meant to be, deliberately, very screwed up. War makes people send a child to battle.

I’ve heard that Tanya light novel fans and Tanya anime fans disagree quite a bit, and I suspect this book definitely falls on the reader side, being interesting more for the discussion of warfare than for the short, yet well-written battles. There’s also a lot of great wartime sarcastic banter between the soldiers here, which I enjoyed. For those who don’t mind long, lecturing tomes, this is still very good.

The Promised Neverland, Vol. 9

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By Kaiu Shirai and Posuka Demizu. Released in Japan as “Yakusoku no Neverland” by Shueisha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by Satsuki Yamashita.

At long last, we get to meet the famous William Minerva… or at least his echo. I liked the self-awareness that both Emma and Lucas had when they got to the elevator and went “…really? An elevator to freedom/ Is it THIS easy?” No, of course it isn’t that easy. In fact, it turns out that William Minerva may no longer be with us, though that doesn’t stop him from leaving a recording that helps our heroes to buckle down and not give up. It also reveals that this WAS meant to be a safe harbor, and it’s the demons who corrupted Goldy Pond and turned it into a hunting ground. There’s lots of odd otherworldly touches in the early part of this book, like the literal pond of gold whose water doesn’t get you wet, that reminds the reader that The Promised Neverland is as much science fiction as it is horror or mystery.

Meanwhile, I’ve been saying ever since he was removed ffrom the plot that Norman would prove to not be dead, and that is the case. That said, the chapter featuring him is one big “what the hell?” after another, and is meant to plant seeds, especially given that one of the kids in Emma’s group at Goldy Pond (who seems to have a learning disability) keeps repeating Norman’s number. How long has it been since the start of the series? Norman’s in much the same place he was at the first volume – solving tests, amazing folks with his intelligence, and trying to escape even though it’s even more impossible than it was at Grace Field. What’s more, the guy who’s his minder is the same guy who betrayed “William Minerva”. And, lest you forget that Promised Neverland is also a horror title, there’s that two-page spread of the room of experimental humans Norman walks past. In just one chapter you get about thirty things to think about.

Back at Goldy Pond, the next hunt has been scheduled early because the demons want to eat Emma SO BADLY. Fortunately, our heroes are prepared for it, and so we get a few chapters of the kids showing they’ve been holding back and taking out the mook demons. This includes one who leers at the reader and says “How Cute”, which makes me wonder if this homage to Kaguya-sama was in the original Japanese or if this is just a Viz invention. There’s lots of scenes of the kids seemingly cornered only to win out in the end, which I will happily read over and over again, and not every battle runs along the same lines, which is important in a long-running shonen title like this. That said, I doubt this series will be going to 90+ volumes like One Piece. But it is going to double digits, as the cliffhanger shows Emma confronting the strongest and cleverest of the hunting demons.

I hope I don’t need to repeat myself: Promised Neverland is consistently excellent, and I like how it’s really showing off that just because it left Grace Field (the cliffhanger to the first anime season) does not mean it’s all over. Essential.