My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, As I Expected, Vol. 2

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By Wataru Watari and Ponkan 8. Released in Japan as “Yahari Ore no Seishun Rabukome wa Machigatte Iru” by Shogakukan. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jennifer Ward.

In many ways, this second volume of OreGairu does not have a heck of a lot going on. There are school ativities and discussion of career plans, as befits high schoolers. There is the Service Club and their attempts to help people, which features two cases this time around, both of which are solved relatively quickly. But that’s appropriate, as the problems are very much those of typical high-schoolers – feeling like the odd man out in a group of friends, and trying to find a way to pay for higher education. They’re also solved relatively quickly because both Hachiman and Yukino are both amazingly intelligent and observant, and normally they’d be praiseworthy. But they aren’t, mostly because of the reason anyone would read OreGairu in the first place: to read about these horrible, broken people lacerating each other with words.

I read this book right after reading Death March to the Parallel World Rhapsody, and the contrast between narrative style is mindblowing. Hachiman’s cynical bitterness overflows every page, and his defensive asides only serve to make him more pathetic and yet strangely endearing. His insight into human nature, particularly the way that high school students interact around each other, is high-level stuff, and if he was looking for a career at all I’d suggest he move in a direction where he could use those talents for the better good. But his crushing apathy and disaffection ensures that this isn’t going to happen. Yukino is similar to him, though without the outward self-hatred. I say outward because this second volume shows us that there is a topic that really upsets Yukino and cracks her jerkass facade, and that’s showing family issues in her face. Clearly Yukino’s issues are family-related just as Hichiman’s are peer-related, and I have no doubt that future books will explore this in agonizing detail.

Thank goodness for Yui. I feel a little bad for her, as much of the time she feels like a character from a far more cliched light novel trapped inside this series. But she’s desperately needed to offset the bile coming from her two clubmates, and her relatively normal reactions to everything show off both how intelligent and broken Hachiman and Yukino are. She’s also tied to the accident at the start of his high school life, something he is now aware of, and this culminates in a stunning final scene where she gives him a perfect opening to get closer to her and possibly lead up to something more, and he just shuts her down as callously as possible. This series would never work if Hachiman’s attitude was fixed as quickly as this, so the pushback was expected. But it’s beautifully, heartbreakingly written, and you feel bad for Hachiman while wanting to kick him in the head. And Yui needs a hug.

That said, the actual plot is mostly irrelevant for this series, which runs on snappy dialogue and clever characterization. It’s not a happy, feel-good series at all, but it’s absolutely worth a read for light novel fans.

Cage of Eden, Vol. 21

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By Yoshinobu Yamada. Released in Japan as “Eden no Ori” by Kodansha, serialized in the magazine Weekly Shonen Magazine. Released in North America by Kodansha Comics. Translated by Mari Morimoto

It’s been six and a half years since I last did a full review of Cage of Eden on this site. The series pretty much was the definition of “this is worthy of a Bookshelf Brief”, featuring a lot of fun action, thrilling adventures, and copious nudity. It’s been over in Japan for a while now, and for a while I wondered if it would ever end here – this final volume comes out a full year after the last one did. But now it’s here, giving us more of what I just said above. There’s huge beasts killing off a few villainous guys whose names I can’t even remember. There’s deadly slime mold that almost, but not quite, manages to kill off our heroes who we do care about. There is an explanation of everything that has been going on, though it is quite rushed. And as for romantic resolution… the hand-holding on the cover is the best you’ll get.

While I did enjoy this last volume, the whole thing screams “your popularity is waning, wrap it up in 4 chapters even though you won’t have time to fit anything in”. As such, much of the back end of this volume is devoted to Akira’s mother, and her POV as her son’s flight is lost with everyone on board presumed dead. The grief and loss she shows is actually some of the best writing in the volume, and helps to make up for the “and therefore I became the heir to a huge scientific conspiracy” that follows. As for the solution to how the class is on the island and why, it’s a reasonable one given the vaguely science-fictional stuff we’ve already seen, and probably a bit more satisfying than Lost, a series that Cage of Eden hes reminded many people of. The ending is wide open, as we never do find out what happens to everyone once they return to Japan… it’s intentionally left as a blank slate.

As for the romance I mentioned earlier, it’s even lampshaded by the author. Despite the occasional overture towards romantic triangles and the obvious attraction and love Akira and Rion feel for each other, the closest we get to a payoff is one last bathing scene, with the peepers helpfully telling us that no one has gotten any, not even Yarai ad his teacher. Honestly, we shouldn’t be surprised. Cage of Eden has always, despite the occasional attempt at depth, been more about surface impressions than anything else. And also, a lot of romance manga these days ends with no resolution to avoid annoying readers. That said, I think even the most hardcore of those fans might have forgiven at least Alira/Rion. Still, we’ll always have that hand-holding.

Cage of Eden was exciting, sometimes horrifying, frequently blatantly sexist, and tried to aim a bit higher than it could really reach, but overall I’m happy I read it. It’s a good example of a typical Shonen Magazine title from about 10 years ago, and I’m glad we got to see it finish up here.

Death March to the Parallel World Rhapsody, Vol. 2

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By Hiro Ainana and shri. Released in Japan by Fujimi Shobo. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jenny McKeon.

There is a bit of a cliche about the typical isekai hero. The abbreviation used, I believe is ‘OP’, as in ‘overpowered’. In fact, it gets applied to light novels heroes whether it’s an isekai or not, but generally tends to mean that the hero wins most of his fights with ease, has very little difficulty amassing a group of girls who like him, and wanders through the story being a cool wish-fulfillment character. Of course, when you examine the works more closely, no one here is ever QUITE that bad. Taking the two most obvious examples, Kirito has various issues in both his real and gaming life (which admittedly the author does not emphasize as much as he should), and Tatsuya has genuine issues communicating properly with people much of the time due to literally being engineered to not have strong emotions. Hell, even Arifureta’s hero spends almost half the book suffering as a bullied loser before he goes through hell and becomes Grimdark Araragi. And then there’s Death March’s Satou.

Even Satou’s very name, one of the most common last names in Japan, screams generic. The author seems to have this misguided opinion that being above the age of 25 somehow manages to let you control all your emotions perfectly, and so Satou strides through situations with barely a raised eyebrow. His briefly getting mildly annoyed at the villain at the end of this volume is a major breakthrough, something he even lampshades. Hell, you know the scene in KonoSuba where Kazuma goes through hell in order to get laid with a brothel employee only for everything to conspire against him? Here, Satou can simply go to a brothel, level up in many erotic ways (which he refuses to tell us), and suffer no punishment other than being briefly yelled at by his loli slave, who he spends most of the book chastising in any case. You could argue that Touya from Mixed Bathing and Touya from Isekai Smartphone are generic nice guys too, but at least they have normal reactions and are somewhat fresh-faced and shiny. Satou is “been there, done that”.

Oh yes, speaking of that loli, Arisa is the major new cast addition this time around, and is also from Japan, though we don’t know the details yet. Given her behavior, I suspect that she’s much older than her fantasy appearance here. But on that note, can we dial down Satou reminding us he’s not a lolicon just a bit? I realize he’s surrounded by young girls (most of whom he owns – the slavery aspect to this work is still very uncomfortable, especially as his reaction is along the lines of “well, that’s the way it is”) but it’s annoying given that the author clearly IS a lolicon and is happy to give us lots of service whether asked for or not. Other new characters include Arisa’s companion, who is painfully shy except when discussing Arisa, and also cursed to look ugly to everyone (except Satou), a generic mook villainess who is #7 of a group of eight, so is naturally named Nana by Satou because he is awful, and a cute realtor who seems to want to be ravished by her boss. Oh, and an elf princess, also very young.

Is there anything in this book that isn’t painful? The last third or so, where he’s battling his way up a huge tower full of monsters, shows the author can be decent when he’s writing fight scenes. At one point, Satou has to literally breakdance his way past the villains, the only time in the entire volume I laughed out loud. But for the most part, if you’re interested in an isekai published in North America, literally any other novel is better than this. Congrats, Death March, you’re the first light novel I’m dropping for simply being bad, rather than dark (Black Bullet, Goblin Slayer, Grimgar) or offensive (Siskan).