After Hours, Vol. 1

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By Yuhta Nishio. Released in Japan by Shogakukan, serialization ongoing in the magazine Hibana. Released in North America by Viz. Translated by Abby Lehrke.

There is something of a history in yuri manga of the protagonists realizing their feelings for each other while still in school. Sometimes it’s just them, sometimes we get another couple, and sometimes everyone in the school seems to be gay, but the theme is “students”. After Hours, therefore, with its relationship between a shy 24-year-old college graduate and the 30-year-old DJ she meets at a club, is a breath of fresh air for no reason other than the fact that it’s about two adults. Fortunately, there’s a lot more to it than just that, and in fact the ‘yuri’ part of the volume is touched on a lot less than it is in those school stories. These two meet, hook up that evening, and any angst or worry they have has nothing to do with the fact that they’re both girls. It’s great to see.

Emi is the blonde on the cover, and she and her friend are going out clubbing, something Emi is not really wild about. She’s even less wild when her friend hooks up immediately and leaves her to fend for herself. Luckily she’s saved by Kei, who works at said club. The first chapter may have been a one-shot that got turned into a series, as it’s really simple: they get on, Kei invites her to come over and look at her etchings… erm, collection of old records, and things end up progressing from there. Even the morning after, aside from a brief “OMG what did I just do!” look from Emi, is really sweet. Most of the rest of the first volume stays at that simmer, though it’s apparent that when Vol. 2 comes out there may be a bit more angst and drama. Emi is unemployed at the start, and dialogue hints that she’s living in an apartment with a guy… who she’s in the process of breaking up with. Much of this happens on the edges of the story, as Emi is understandably reluctant to bring this up with Kei, though she tries once or twice.

The other reason to read this manga is the excellent look it gives into Japanese club culture. Kei is a DJ, and shows Emi how to be a VJ and provide images for her songs about halfway through the book. It shows the fun and rush of doing these things, while a flashback of Kei’s shows how difficult it can be as well, particularly when you’re just starting out. (Kei is very laid-back and knowing for most of the present day stuff, and it’s nice to see that she used to be a ball of pent-up frustration and anger.) There’s a large group of clubbers here, almost all men, but they seem nice (accidental Jagermeister shots aside), and also seem to understand that Emi and Kei are in a relationship without it ever being brought up. After Hours is a yuri title, but the yuri in the first volume seeks, for once, to make things LESS awkward – Emi and Kei bond very fast, much faster than I think they would have if Kei had been a man. I really enjoyed the first volume, and hope Vol. 2 comes out soon (it’s not out in Japan yet, I believe.)

In Another World With My Smartphone, Vol. 3

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By Patora Fuyuhara and Eiji Usatsuka. Released in Japan as “Isekai wa Smartphone to Tomo ni” by Hobby Japan. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Andrew Hodgson.

The author and reader are clearly settling in for the long haul here in this third volume of Smartphone. ON the author’s end, he’s become aware that he wants to tell a long, convoluted (if ridiculous) story, so is starting to add more key backstory and introduce characters who may not obviously influence the plot right away. Indeed, he goes a bit too far in the other direction – the new possible villain or possible ally, Kaworu… um, sorry, Ende… is casually introduced, implied to be important to both the past and present of this world, and then just goes away for the rest of the book. I’m all for foreshadowing, but again, Smartphone guy is keeping it real and making it as thuddingly obvious as possible. Fortunately, the rest of Smartphone is also the same as always, which means totally ridiculous and compulsively readable.

On the cover, as you can see, we have Sakura from Sakura Taisen… erm, Yae, whose country we visit at the start of the book. This allows Touya to singlehandedly put down a war with nothing but a few swipes from his phone – even finding out some of his foes are undead and can’t be killed by his normal go-to means is only a prelude to him trying something even more ludicrous and over the top, which works a charm, of course. He also manages to take out another “Monarch”, this one being a twofer combo of Gamera and a giant snake. Naturally, they soon become adorable plushie versions of themselves, as Touya owns them so hard the entire harem thinks he’s being too cruel. He gains access to a floating Garden of Babylon, complete with a gynoid servant who is easily the nest addition in the book. Touya’s main harem are all just as pure as he is, so a deadpan robot girl who constantly makes sexual innuendo and comes on to him was desperately needed. Unlike the stupid extra story from the last book, I don’t mind Cesca at all because both her dialogue and Touya’s reactions to same are entirely in character.

Speaking of the harem, I admit to being rather surprised at how fast things are advancing on that front. Clearly the author has realized that a) there’s no point in dragging out the ‘will they confess?’ any longer given that they’re all too pure to go any further than kissing anyway, and b) given this is a world where it’s OK to take up to 20 wives provided you can in fact be rich enough to support 20 wives, ‘who is best girl?’ is mostly irrelevant anyway. I was impressed with Linze for taking the advantage on the kissing front, showing off that she may be shy most of the time but is secretly the bolder of the twins. I was a bit less thrilled with Yumina basically already admitting that Sue, her little girl cousin, will also be part of the harem once she grows up, but I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised. I was also amused that he asked advice from God (remember this all started with God?) on how to deal with this, and gets a pep talk not only from the main God but also the God of Love, who judging by the illustration and behavior, is Marielle from Log Horizon.

One of the themes of this book is that Touya completely does not realize how ridiculously OP and amazing he is, because he tends to think of it as “I did very little to achieve this, therefore it wasn’t all that great”. Combine that with him not realizing why the girls all like him, and he’s very much harem protagonist material. That said, it’s the rare harem novel that actually takes the hero aside and literally has two gods telling him he’s being foolish and to try being a bit more selfish once in a while. That brings me to my last shuddering realization about this series: I can’t in good conscience call it bad anymore. Yes, it is terminally ridiculous (the scene where our hero builds an entire hot spring for the hotel he used to stay in in approximately five minutes may set a new record for laughable), and the lead is such a ridiculously overpowered twink that anyone who takes isekai seriously will be grinding their teeth, but by god, it’s fun.

Yona of the Dawn, Vol. 6

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By Mizuho Kusanagi. Released in Japan as “Akatsuki no Yona” by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Hana to Yume. Released in North America by Viz. Translated by JN Productions, Adapted by Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane.

One of the hallmarks of many a shoujo series is the idea of the man falling for a woman, among other reasons, because of her sheer stubbornness – the idea being that he no longer sees her as merely a weak girl who can’t do anything because of the fire in her eyes. And given that Jaeha is proving to be a tough nut to crack, it makes sense that we’d get one of these scenes with him and Yona as well. Of course, Yona of the Dawn is not your standard high school romance, and therefore the stubborn streak that Yona has involves truly death-defying walks along a sheer cliff face to acquire a much-needed herb. Jaeha can see how terrified Yona is of the whole thing, but also sees her reasoning behind why she still does it (mostly as she narrates it aloud to him, admittedly). It’s the best scene of the book.

The rest of the book is pretty nifty as well. We meet the pirate crew that Jaeha is working with, and they’re the ‘good’ kind of pirates, of course, led by a badass old woman who I hope we see more of but I suspect will be gone after this arc. The pirates are here to stop the evil slave traders kidnapping young girls, which makes Yona an obvious choice to be bait. (The other choice, equally obvious if you know this series, is Yun, who fills the tsundere role admirably and looks fantastic in women’s clothing (as he says himself). This does lead us to one of the series’ running themes, which is that it’s very difficult to conduct a secret mission to save the kingdom if you have fiery red hair that everyone knows is like the Princess. Yona’s solution here is very clever, and another sign of how she’s growing by leaps and bounds.

As for the romance side of the manga, well, Jaeha is falling for Yona, though he’s not quite ready to admit it. The second best scene in the book is when he talks to Hak and tries to get the measure of what the relationship between him and Yona is. Hak is very tightly wound, with most of his affection for Yona coming out as teasing and the occasional serious “dedication to duty” conversation, but it becomes clearer the longer he watches her that there is an intense pent-up desire there. This is normally the sort of thing that can’t stay pent up forever, but given this is a Hana to Yume romance, I expect it will likely stay pent up for quite some time. Still, it’s beautifully conveyed.

Ending with a truly loopy alternate universe omake (I love the idea of Yona as a ditz with a flower growing out of her head), this is another strong volume in an already strong series. Still one of the best Shojo Beat titles being released right now. I can’t wait to see what happens next.