Re: ZERO -Starting Life in Another World-, Vol. 1

Leave a reply

By Tappei Nagatsuki and Shinichirou Otsuka. Released in Japan by Media Factory. Released in North America by Yen On.

Given the sheer number of ‘person goes to a world based on a game’ light novel plots out in Japan, a genre so oversaturated that some competitions have banned the premise, it’s not a surprise that we’re starting to see the genre poked fun at a bit. Re: Zero begins with our hero, who went out to get snacks, suddenly in a busy intersection of a fantasy world, complete with anthropomorphic creatures, noble princesses, and sneaky thieves. The joke is that this is exactly the sort of thing that he’s read about constantly, and (given that he’s sort of become an ungraduating loser NEET in our world, albeit a buff one who keeps in shape) he is absolutely ready to gain cool new powers and save the world through the power of being awesome. Thankfully, this is not that series.

rezero1

In fact, Subaru himself may be the weak point in the book – deliberately, to be fair. He’s meant to be the sort of character you want to give a swift kicking to for being so stupid, but that’s always a high wire act, particularly if it’s your protagonist. Subaru is a smartass, and not really in a good way – he’s there with a snarky response most of the time, but it almost feels overscripted, as if it’s a default he drops into when he’s not really sure how to act in a situation. When things get more dire and serious, as they inevitably do, he gets more interesting, though not necessarily more competent. Because his powers are the main title of the series: when he dies, he resets to zero, which is to say he returns back to the start of the day to try to avoid dying. He’s not particularly good at avoiding this.

The rest of the cast fares better than Subaru, as they merely have to be fairly standard fantasy types that will get development later. There’s the overearnest princess, who can’t help but worry about Subaru even though there’s no good reason to do so; the aforementioned sneak thief Felt, who the epilogue shows us is more than she seems (my money’s on missing royalty); and Reinhard, who is perfect in every way, and basically is the character that WOULD normally be our hero in most works – the best part of the book is when we figure out that the way Subaru saved the day and avoided getting himself killed is to call for help rather than fight, which indirectly lets Reinhard come in and save the day, something Subaru is simply ill-equipped to do.

I’m not sure where this will go in the future – I assume if he dies in Book 2 he’s not going to go back to that intersection, as that would quickly grow tedious. I do hope that he matures and acts a bit less of a doofus, though I have zero hopes of that coming true. That said, this is a fun series with a premise that can go in many different directions, and I want to see where it takes me.

Log Horizon: A Sunday in Akiba

Leave a reply

By Mamare Touno and Kazuhiro Hara. Released in Japan by Enterbrain. Released in North America by Yen On.

Unlike Sword Art Online, which in many ways was less about the game itself and more about the romance between Kirito and Asuna, Log Horizon tries not to focus too hard on romantic pairings. This is not to say they aren’t there, of course, but they’re never going to take over the plot. The closest we get may be this book, in which Akatsuki and Minori both independently realize that they’re in love with Shiroe. This initially starts off being fairly mediocre – the cake eating scene is not as funny as it thinks it is, and reads as quite cliched – but it begins to get good when each of the two girls spies on the other bonding with Shiroe and is forced to deal with ugly feelings of jealousy and self-hatred. Minori, being a middle schooler, has never felt like this before. Akatsuki’s older, but she has a different issue – Minori sees the bigger picture better than she does. In fact, Akatsuki has trouble with the big picture in general.

loghorizon5

As you might imagine from the romantic sideplot, this is a bit of a ‘break’ volume for Log Horizon, with the crisis being less epic and more annoying. We get to see more of what we’ve enjoyed from prior volumes – Marielle being genki, Raynesia and Krusty snarking at each other, etc. The adventurers are holding a festival in their town, and people are coming from all over the area to join – both other adventurers and People of the Earth, many of whom have ulterior motives. The idea that these are just NPCs has long left town, and indeed the loathsome Lord Malves could hold his own with some of the other Adventurer villains we’ve seen before. But we save the true villain for the epilogue – we’d seen Shiroe worrying about another large town’s issues at the start o the book, and now we see why: it’s a dark mirror imagine of Akiba.

Nureha is clearly being set up as a major villain, though I’m not sure if she’s really the one manipulating everything here. She’s quite content to turn on her seductive wiles to lure Shiroe to their side, and they really, really want him – rewriting reality last volume to make Rundelhaus an adventurer was something that got noticed, and suddenly Shiroe, who was always the introverted social nerd – is dealing with unwanted attention. This is likely why he’s so comfortable making himself the ‘scary villain’ in Akiba, despite Minori’s protests. Being the center of attention, being wanted, is something that he desires, but makes him too uncomfortable. Not even Nureha’s manipulative sob story about her background (I do think it’s true, but it was still manipulative) or revelation that they may have a way back to the real world can sway him.

For a volume that seemed to be marking time, there was a lot going on here, and some good setup for future volumes. Log Horizon continues to be one of the best of the ‘people trapped in a game world’ books, and deserves attention.

Kagerou Daze IV: The Missing Children

Leave a reply

By Jin (Shinzen no Teki-P) and Sidu. Released in Japan by Enterbrain. Released in North America by Yen On.

As we reach the end of this book, our heroes are getting a lot closer to figuring out why they have these strange eye powers and what the powers actually are. In fact, they get a lot closer than the reader, as we’re shown parts of a diary that Marie’s grandmother kept, but they get to read the whole thing. Admittedly, we can connect some dots, but I am reminded once more that this is a light novel series based off of a series of songs, and that the intended audience is meant to be familiar with those songs. In particular, Shinigami (Reaper) Record, which introduces us to Azami’s story that is fleshed out here.

kagerou4

Azami is a mysterious supernatural creature – called a Reaper, she seems to also have many traits of a medusa, something which she’s apparently passed along to her granddaughter. Speaking of Marie, the bigger revelation in this book may be just how old she actually is – it’s somewhat startling, particularly given her fairly childlike personality. But of course, when you live alone in a cabin in the woods, there’s not as much chance to evolve or learn. And there’s also Konoha, whose real identity we’ve been able to guess with information from the previous two books, but who looks to be just as different from his other self as Ene is from Takane. Actually, the biggest disappointment here may be Shintaro, who still has a tendency to get dragged along and whine much of the time – indeed, the trip to and from the cabin is an endless stream of irritation from him.

If there’s a larger issue with these books, it’s the length – they’re much, much shorter than the average Japanese light novel, and you barely get into the book before it’s already finished, padding out its page count with lots of character design art and advertisements for the manga. Each of the last three volumes has featured a segment of the main plot and a more serious side story that gives us backstory and hints, but the backstory really is not connecting fast enough for my taste, and some of the things I was most interested in last time (Kano confronting Shintaro in Ayano’s body) is glossed over here, as Kido reassures Shintaro in a way that makes it seem like just a bad nightmare.

This volume was delayed two months, so the next one will come sooner than expected, and I’m hoping that less lag time will allow me to get into it a bit more. It would seem to involve Kano in a big way, so maybe I’ll finally get the answers to my questions. Kagerou Daze is enjoyable, particularly to fans of the multimedia franchise, but I still wish it wasn’t so fragmented. And short – even this review is underlength when I try to discuss it.