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December 26, 2004
Raiku Makoto: Konjiki no Gash!! ch. 178-188
Ahhhhh, I fi-nal-ly caught up with Gash in Shonen Sunday. These chapters continue the introduction to the next big battle. Obviously, spoilers to follow.
In 178, Gash received a letter from someone called Lein, claiming to be his friend. Hahaha, who would have thought Gash had friends? I really liked Lein, but his arc didn't sit right with me ... I understand the dilemma of Lein wanting to burn his own book to protect Kyle, but dammit was Kyle an annoying little whiner. I understand being afraid of monsters and fighting and of speaking your mind against adults, but I think having him only say "miiii miiiii miiii" until the very end was pushing that characterization. I didn't feel that his sudden outburst in 183 was very convincing; seriously, I didn't even think he knew that many words. A bit sudden. Lein was a great character, though.
So the new big enemy, I guess, is called Liou and is gathering strong monsters from all over the world to break the seal on that big castle thing which they're calling ... ファウード. I have no idea how that's supposed to be spelled (yes, even less an idea that with the rest of the cast). Fawood? What draws my curiousity is that we don't see Liou's human partner. As far as I recall, there have been monsters who were physically strong and could fight without their books, but there haven't been any before who could use any sort of magic without a book, was there? Hmmm.
As for the Momon v. Tio battle ... Tio scares the hell out of me. I'm curious as to why Megumi can't read that new spell, though I guess it's something like Bao Zakelga which won't work unless under a special condition, perhaps.
187 was sort of ... weird. There have been many Suzume-centric episodes between battles, but this one is directly Kiyomaro/Suzume, and even has a shojo-manga feel to it. Not that it's bad, but ... it threw me off. I think it signifies that the big battle coming up really will be the last. Not that it wasn't obvious from 188, where Elly, Ted, and Zeon also head to the Fawood (wait, what about Brago?). Awwwwwww. Does this mean Gash will end before reaching volume 30? I think it might.
188 was a big important revelations chapter, but I forgot all about that when Folgore appeared. It's been so looooong without Fol-sama! I'll cherish these two panels forever! Or, you know, until he appears again. Com'on Kiyomaro, run to Folgore's place! Come quick, next issue!
Category: Shonen/seinen | Comments (0)
December 25, 2004
Tanabe Ierou: Kekkaishi vol. 01
The story of a teenage boy Yoshimori who is the heir of a house of "kekkaishi", people who can make metaphysical "barriers" to fight "ayakashi" (something mysterious and suspect, like monsters and ghosts). It's his job to patrol the school ground at night where a lot of ayakashi appear, attracted by the body of a nobleman who is burried under the school and gives the ayakashi strong powers. Yoshimori doesn't actually want to be the heir, though, and only patrols because he wants to protect Tokine, an older girl who lives next to his house and is also the heir of a kekkaishi.
And, um, that's it. I can't think of more to say about this, because although the premise is interesting, nothing much happens in this manga. Yoshimori and Tokino goes around defeating monsters and (at times) helping ghosts. It's not bad, and the characters and comic relief is all nice, but ... um. The art of the ayakashi is pretty Takahashi Rumiko inspired, but the general style is rather Ghibli-esque (actually, closer to Urushihara Yuki) and cute in a highly simple way. The fight scenes work. The touching sequences are adequate. But it's like ... it doesn't have much substance. When I had finished the volume, I thought it must have been something like 120 pages long though it's actually the standard length of a tankobon (about 190).
Nice for a laid-back read because you don't have to think much about what you're reading. A very typical Shonen Sunday manga, I suppose, and it wouldn't surprise me if it continued for 40 volumes in the same vein. Not that that would be a bad thing per se, but if it doesn't get more exciting soon I won't keep reading.
I love the cover design, though. It's very simple and cool.
Category: Shonen/seinen | Comments (1)
Togashi Yoshihiro: Ôkami nante kowakunai!
The following is an overview of Togashi Yoshihiro's first tankobon, Ôkami nante kowakunai!!. It was first published in October 1989, and the five short manga included were drawn between 1986 (his debut) and that year. The edition I own is from October 1994 and the 20th press, so considering all things, I guess it has sold all right. All pictures have been linked to bigger versions so you can study the progress of Togashi's hideous young art closely.
Buttobi Straight
Togashi's debut in the Tezuka Award at Shukan Shonen Jump. It's a baseball manga set in a school baseball team (a standard genre in shonen manga) about the rivalry between Todoroki, a power pitcher, and Segawa, a technique pitcher. They hate each other's guts and get into fisticuffs every day about what they believe baseball really is -- a sophisticated team sports, or a war of life and death.
The teachers decide to throw Todoroki out of the team, as they gather he is pretty stupid and probably won't be any use in the national championships, and they propose a fixed match in the club: two teams, one pitched by Todoroki and another by Segawa, will fight for the spot as the pitcher; just, the team will sabotage Todoroki!
It should be noted that the teacher who comes up with this conspiracy resembles the ass that is Iwamoto of YYH rather closely, both in appearance and manner. I suspect Togashi holds a grudge against one or more of his teachers in school. Not that I blame him, if he had teachers like that. It's amusing to me to see that one of the very few purely evil and unsympathetic characters in Togashi manga is a school teacher ... I don't know about you, but I want to smack Iwamoto around a few times.
Tonda Birthday Present
Hachimonji Tetsu is Yusuke a delinquent who loves to fight and to play video games. His grandpa is a notorious mad scientist (none of his inventions have ever worked, and he blows up his house regularly), and for Tetsu's birthday he invents a virtual reality machine so Tetsu can play fighting games as if it were in real life. Tetsu decides to play the new action RPG Dragon Chest II, and grandpa turns the machine on -- and lo and behold, their town transforms into the universe of the game, and Tetsu into the hero! Now he must save the princess (actually Keiko his childhood girlfriend) from the evil Dragon King (actually the yakuza boss).
Although it wasn't my original intention to compare these early stories to later Togashi works, this particular manga reminds me of Level E, in which a group of school children are sucked into a real RPG taking up an entire planet. I loved that story line to death, and this short manga isn't all too unamusing, either.
Horror Angel
Kyosuke is Japan's biggest horror movie fan. He can say he is for certain, because the failry of horror movies (yes) showed up and told him so. The fairy says she will grant him three wishes that has to do with horrow movies. First wish, she thinks Kyosuke wants to experience a horror movie in real life, and has his mother feed him his father, which Kyosuke hates (obviously). What Kyosuke really want help with is to ask out his beloved Moka, which the fairy can't do, but she does encourage him to ask her out ... and surprisingly, she agrees. But ...?
Togashi writes in the author's notes that he drew this piece purely because he wanted to, which is evident in the horror-y drawings (Togashi loves horror). Oh god, the gross! The contrast to his usual cutesy art is striking, and I almost think this is the kind of thing he really wants to draw.
... Ew.
Over-all, I think the "horror fairy" theme and the love story fitted together rather badly in this story. I guess that's what you get for both wanting to draw something mainstream and something personal at the same time, and not being experienced enough to join the two properly.
Occult Tanteidan
A two-part detective/horror manga. In part one, the Occult Detectives solve a case about a ghost haunting their school because it was murdered before it could enter a singing contest. In part two, they help the living spirit of a dying boy enter a marathon contest.
I don't really have much to say about these -- they have nice ideas that are well-told, and have the heartwarning quality that YYH had in the first two volumes. The characters are amusing and cute (the male protagonist is another prototype of Yusuke), and it's a joy to read. I understand why Togashi writes in the author's notes that this was the piece that enabled him to go on drawing more manga.
Ôkami nante kowakunai!!
Takuro is a warewolf. He's pretty bad at keeping this a secret, and has already lost count of how many times he has moved and changed schools because he changed form in front of people. At his new school he falls in love with Sayaka, the cutest girl in class, and enters the baskett club to be near her. Can he get her to love him although he's a warewolf?
This is standard Jump comedy/action/romance fare with a few "naughty" shots, and quite clearly leads up to Togashi's first long series, Tende Showaru Cupid. The girl is cute and the guy ordinary, and it really isn't my kind of thing ... Sadly (for me), Togashi holds this course and goes on to become the "oiroke tantô" of Jump (the place Katsura Masakazu held for a long time, and Ichigo 100% is holding now), until he returns to the quirky fantasy/fighting manga we know and love with YYH.
Category: Shonen/seinen | Comments (1)
December 24, 2004
Yu Yu Hakusho drama CD vol. 01
Bearing witness to my Yu Yu Hakusho obsession, this will be long.
When I heard they were going to release a drama CD of YYH, with the original anime cast, and feature the (in)famous Kurama and Hiei flashback episode Two Shots in it, I was ... "thrilled" is too mild a word. "Out of my fucking mind with joy" probably fits better. It's not that I didn't have my share of skepticism about the obvious cash-in nature of it, or that I didn't worry about how the now ten years older seiyu would deal with these characters, but my love for YYH transcends all skepticism and doubt and I always end up loving everything associated with the title however bad it may be (and often is), so I soon forgot all needless worries and just waited to get my hands on it.
You should all know the storyline of YYH by this point, and if you don't you suck (yes, you do), so I'll skip that. Basically this CD features a 45 minute drama about the Yusuke v. the Hiei, Kurama, and Gôki gang battles, and a 19 minute dramatization of the Kurama and Hiei side story, Two Shots. There are some exposition about what happened to Yusuke before this drama CD begins and he is appointed Reikai Tantei, but it probably won't be a good idea to listen to this without knowing his backstory beforehand.
The seiyu. Sasaki Nozomu (Yusuke) doesn't sound at all like he used to, and it's really really weird to hear Yusuke being so deep and serious all the time. Actually his voice here fits my personal image of Yusuke better, but the comical side of Yusuke is almost completely lost, which is a bit of a shame. Hiyama Nobuyuki (Hiei), I think, acts better now than he did in the anime, and doesn't seem to be forcing his voice to be as deep as it was in the anime, which I love. I was a bit disappointed that he doesn't have a high-pitched evil laugh like the good-ol' crazy villain that he is here, but oh well! Chiba Shigeru (Kuwabara) only appears briefly, but sounds exactly like he did in the anime, and I love him and his voice so very much. I hope he'll have lots of lines in the second volume. I'll probably be flamed by Ogata Megumi fans and Kurama fans alike for saying this, but ... Ogata sounds exactly like she did in the anime, as far as I recall, and she reminded me that I never liked Kurama's voice in the first place, haha.
As for the supporting cast. Fukayuki Sanae (Botan) sounds exactly like she used to, which is great. Amano Yuri (Keiko) sounds more laid-back and grown-up here which I personally find refreshing, since I disliked Keiko's high-pitched squealing in the anime. She doesn't sound like a 14-year-old anymore, though, which might annoy some people. I loved Wakamoto Norio (Gôki) here, and he reminded me of the voice of some other character I also loved but couldn't quite place, so I looked it up and it turns out he also voiced Chû in the anime! I love Chû and his voice, especially the way Wakamoto kinda rolls the words on his tongue. Honestly, I liked Gôki's voice the best on this CD (your mileage will most probably vary). Tanizawa Kumiko (Shiori) left no big impression with me. Matsuoka Yuki (Kitajima Maya) was surprisingly cute and I loved how the sentenses just spurted exitedly out of her mouth; very Maya-ish. Nishikawa Ikuo (Hedoki) had a voice you would expect from a vomit-formed low-life scum of a yôkai, but I really didn't like Katô Osamu (Yatsude): I had imagined Yatsude to have a deep and more matter-of-fact voice, since I didn't think he seemed very stupid in the manga.
As for over-all quality of the acting, I liked it. But that probably has much to do with how I think this media (drama CD) complements YYH much better than anime. What I enjoy most about Togashi Yoshihiro is his pace and tempo, like the quick bantering between the characters and the swift and effective panel-work in the battle scenes. I feel the anime dragged on too much, and while that's a general problem with anime based on shonen/battling manga, I felt it ruined the style of Togashi's works even more than it ruined other works. (Or I could just be hugely biased.) 45 minutes to cover the whole storyline with the Gôki v. Yusuke battle, the Kurama storyline, and the Hiei v. Yusuke battle is a wee bit too short, yes, but still better than dragging it on for three and a half 25 min episodes, if you ask me.
I do have a lot of complaints as well, though. The overtly explanatory lines, like Botan's "Yusuke, look! Keiko-chan is hanging from the ceiling!" (what, like he wouldn't have seen her dangling there?) makes the production seem a bit ... cheap. I realize that the Gôki battle isn't very important to the over-all storyline, but I was disappointed when Yusuke defeated him too easily. I hate that they changed some of the lines and grabbed lines from other places in the manga and pasted them in randomly: Kurama's lines from a flashback of Hiei's much later in the manga were pasted into the end of Two Shots instead of the poetic way the manga ended, and since I loved how the manga version of TS ended, I haaaaated the end of the drama version. I also disliked that they made Kurama fight with his rosewhip here. The image I had of young-Shûichi!Kurama clashes majorly with Ogata's acting, too ... in TS it was very interesting how Kurama's expression changed drastically from when he's speaking to Hedoki (cruel) to when he turns around and talks to Maya (gentle), but Ogata's acting doesn't convey this at all. I rather like how she's gentle and teasing yet so very seme towards Hiei, though. Hahaha, yay for seme!Kurama.
Most of all, though, I missed Koenma-sama and Atsuko-san. They had lines in the manga, you know! Meep.
Lastly (yes, this piece of ramble will have an end), a few complaints about the booklet.
Ouch!
OUCH!!!
Reportedly they also wrote Keiko's name wrong in one place, but I couldn't spot it. But ouch.
Category: Miscellaneous | Comments (0)
December 22, 2004
Ragawa Marimo: Shanimuni GO vol. 17
I am forever one volume or two behind in this series (18 came out just a few days ago, I think). That combined with Ragawa taking periodical breaks in Hana to Yume with this series and the tankobon publishing thus being rather slow, I have a hard time remembering what happened in the previous volumes.
But still! The Ide Nobuhisa v. Takatsu Heita match is included in this volume, and I luff Heita oh so much. Leading directly from the end of the last volume where Heita sat in the boy's room and angsted about the pain in his back (... I guess I do remember what happened), this volume begins with Heita and Asano Takumi arguing loudly (more angsty Heita!) and Heita wondering about whether Ide heard them argue about his back pain or not (even more angsty Heita!), and continues onto Heita grimacing from pain with every swing at the ball (Heita angst!), flashes back to Heita being picked on because of his attitude (Heita angst!), and then ends with Heita collapsing with pain into the arms of his team mates and groaning loudly (Heita angst!).
So yes. It's all about the Heita angst. (Like, duh.) And that one shot of Heita being all cute and teary-eyed looking up at his balding coach (whom I also love). OMG so much cuteness!!!
Okay, in all seriousness, I admire Ragawa's ability to draw a whole three-set tennis match, intervene it with adequate amounts of shojo-manga-esque flashbacks and angst, and have such a relieving and refreshing and hopeful resolution for the rival character (in this case, Heita). If she can manage the same in the destined match against the evil overlord looming menacingly in the distance (i.e. Saseko Shun), whether this will be Ide v. Saseko or Louis v. Saseko, I will love this manga forever. (Because quite frankly the Ide/Hinako/Saseko love triangle plotline was rather depressing in the last couple of volumes, and if the resolution is depressing, too, I'll die. On a side-note, I'm a Shun/Hinako supporter.)
On a smaller scale than the Heita angst (which rules all), this volume is also a treat for all lovers of Japanese dialects and accents. Asano's Osaka dialect is more believable than most others I encounter in manga (most manga uses "soyana" for "sôdana", while I muchly prefer "seyana" which Asano uses here -- such a small thing, but so lovely). Raiden Shizuka's brother's Kagoshima dialect is great, too. Like "are homechottoyo". Homechottoyo! I'll totally have to incorporate that to my daily vocabulary. I might like Shizuka more if he spoke the Kagoshima dialect like his brother, but alas he doesn't and besides he looks too much like a girl.
This was like the most rambly comment I've made about a manga in a while. Let me conclude with what I always tell people when the opportunity arises -- stop reading Prince of Tennis, read Shanimuni GO. For realz.
Category: Shojo/ladies | Comments (6335)
Fujisaki Ryu: Sakuratetsu Taiwahen vol. 1-2
I don't really like Fujisaki Ryu. I formed this opinion after reading the first half of Hôshin Engi (which went nowhere) and a few chapters of Waqwaq (which art was difficult to follow), but a few people kept recommending Sakuratetsu, so I succumbed. Actually I just wanted to know what the meta deal with the God of Manga was all about.
The hero Sakura Tetsu is a high school student obsessed with money who works so many jobs that he only sleeps three hours a day. He became that way because his family owns and lives in a house in the middle of downtown random megalopolis, and he has to make money to keep this house. One day, while Tetsu is at school, a huge tree appears in the air above his house and begins to attack it. It turns out the tree is Sekaiju (Yggdrasil), the palace of Future Queen Aris who has escaped to the past because in the age she comes from, the universe is just about to die of old age (it got wrinkles). She claims she owns the future rights to the property on which Tetsu's house is built, but of course Tetsu's grandfather has the right to the property at present. They're just about to settle this dispute peacefully (with a lot of money exchanging hands) when Space Pirate Feyerabend comes flying in on his spaceship Principia Mathematica and says he will be taking over the Sakura estate and building his castle there, seeing as he has been meaning to invade Earth for three years (it took him three years to decide where to build the castle because he couldn't get the darts he threw at a globe to actually stick). Just as Aris and Feyerabend are about to engage in a huge battle, Emperor Sigmund of the Land Beneith the Earth comes up from the ground under Tetsu's house and says he can't let the others have a war over the property directly under which his land resides. So they have a huge three-way battle that is about to ruin the entire city.
Have I lost you yet?
Basically, Sakuratetsu Taiwahen features a series of fairly unrelated events in which some new weird entity tries to invade Tetsu's house and property and Tetsu fights back more or less sucessfully, while his "friend" Idea Furato (lover of all things weird and unusual who only worsens every bad situation) records everything. It is quite hilarious. I loved how the evil scheme of Prince Nietzsche of the Demon World was so easily ruined and how he's reduced to a sorry hobo for the rest of the series. Hahaha.
However, it doesn't seem like the readers of Weekly Jump liked this series very much, and it only had two volumes and the last half of the second volume is a self-parody of how it's being cancelled. This is where the meta comes in, with the God of Manga sending a reader of WJ into the world of this manga, but sadly, I didn't like this part as much as I had expected. I'm generally not very fond of this self-torturing kind of humour, so when the reader commented about how he remembered this manga being "all the way back in the magazine" and how he "remembered reading the first chapter sometime" ... eugh. Not funny.
But why was this manga not popular? If it had continued for some more volumes and not ended so masochistically, I'd really have liked it. The format (new "enemies" appearing at the hero's doorstep every week) is pretty standard shonen manga, and the wacky comedy and cute art reminded me of Magical Taruruuto-kun* which was a fairly big hit in WJ ... Well, okay, I know why it wasn't a hit: not enough porny shots of pretty girls. Idea is cute, and there were a few risky shots of her at the end, but I guess that was too late. Tsk.
Also, I'll accept "Sakura Tetsu" as the name of a Japanese person, but "Idea Furato" is pushing it.
* Second Egawa Tatsuya reference in one day! I don't even like the man.
Category: Shonen/seinen | Comments (3)
Takahashi Kazuki: Yu-Gi-Oh! vol. 01
It's been a while since I last bought a manga in Danish. Thinking back, it's probably the first time since volume two of One Piece in May 2003. Wow, I didn't realize it had been that long ... as I recall I was planning on collecting One Piece, but didn't when volume two failed to live up to the expectations I had set after volume one. I mean, volume one had Shanks.
There have been a lot of manga coming out in Danish lately, but quite frankly I don't really care about any of the titles they're putting out. I've read Detective Conan (who is keeping his name in the Danish version), Ranma 1/2, D.N.Angel, and Evangelion already, which leaves me with a choice between stuff like Ah! Megami-sama, Tokyo Mewmew, and Love Hina ... which is like the ultimate choice of evil vs. evil if you ask me.
So, Yu-Gi-Oh!. It's difficult for me to say anything about it, since it's just another fairly entertaining Jump series in my eyes. Not much stands out. The art is Egawa Tatsuya-inspired and cute (much cuter than the anime) but not really my thing, the "bets" that Yugi makes in each episode are childish but probably okay for the audience, and the translation is passable (better than Dragon Ball and One Piece, which had unnaturally excessive swearing). I'll probably give it to my little brother like I did with my DB and OP volumes, because quite frankly it doesn't seem better or worse than the majority of stuff on the Japanese market. Like, whatever.
Oh, Jônouchi is cute in all his idiocy.
Category: Shonen/seinen | Comments (0)
December 12, 2004
Ikeno Koi: Tokimeki Midnight vol. 1
Ikeno Koi's Tokimeki Tonight was one the first manga I ever read and also one of my first and biggest fannish obsessions. (That is, along with Patalliro. Because dude, Patalliro.) Tokimeki Midnight can be considered an alternative universe fanfiction of Tokimeki Tonight written by the original author. The premise is that of the two princes of Makai, what if Aron had been sent to the human world instead of Shun? Who would Ranze have fallen in love with then -- Aron?
In this alternative universe, our heroine Ranze is a human high school student and Aron is her class mate. Aron is in love with Ranze, and the two have recently begun to go out, but Ranze isn't entirely sure if she's in love with Aron or not. One day, Aron brags to the class about how he has recently attained super powers, and shows them how he can bend spoons (how retro, that). Inspired by this, the class decides to go to the ruins of an old haunted hospital. Unexpectedly, something does appear for Ranze and Aron, and this something mumbles something about killing Aron. They get home safe, but the next day, who transfers to Ranze and Aron's class but -- Shun! But Ranze notices that he is always staring at Aron coldly, and he also mentions that Ranze shouldn't fall for Aron because "it won't be any use". Who is Shun and what is he up to?!
That last part of the summary is entirely redundant if you know the original series, because then you'll know who Shun is and what he's in the human world to do. Just the curse of self-parodying, I guess. That doesn't mean this series doesn't have its own good points, though. Along the way we find out that Shun is still an angsty cool boy with an oedipus complex, and that Makai is still in deep trouble that I'm sure Ranze and Shun will save it from in the future volumes.
Obvious for anyone familiar with the original series, Ranze falls in love with Shun in this version, too. I mean, anything else would have defied her entire character and the theme and purpose of the series Tokimeki Tonight. But it's refreshing to see them call each other "Shun-kun" and "Ranze" (although I do miss "Makabe-kun" and "Etô" ...), and Shun is less stuck-up here so we get a few more kisses and hugs than in the original (although I do miss those few romantic scenes in the original that were just so spot-on and still some of my favorite shojo manga scenes ever ... okay, I'll shut up about the original now).
Aron is as cute and funny as ever, which I love, and Kamiya-san is a bit softer in this version and it's really neat to see her and Ranze be friends from the get-go. In future volumes I'm looking forward to seeing Aron's darker side, because that boy can be scarily obsessive when he puts his mind to it. I can't wait to see the whole brother complex thing unfold! Mwaha!
Lastly let me note that I didn't expect to like this series at all. My love for Tokimeki Tonight is huge, so I thought I'd find this series to be blasphemous. But it's just so nice to see these characters again, including the minor ones like Sand (here, "Swan"), Kaede-chan, and Ranze's family. Oh, that reminds me! Ikeno-sensei, in the following volumes pleeeeease let Moori (Ranze's dad) have cool scenes? Please? He's like my favorite male character in this series ever. Lub.
Category: Shojo/ladies | Comments (0)
December 10, 2004
Kiwadoi kake (Narita Ken x Miyata Kôki, Miki Shin'ichirô, Kamiya Hiroshi)
I can't be bothered to re-read what I've written about the other BLCDs I've rambled about here. Did I write something about my wanting a good plot with my BL? I don't really think I did, but ... if I did, that was a lie. I don't. To hell with plots. Who the fuck cares.
This CD has a plot. It goes something like this. Futaba (Miyata Kôki) is one of those androgynous uke boys. He lives with his uncle and aunt who run an inn at a ski resort. Some important corporate dude is closing down the resort, so he follows this dude to town to protest. There Futaba meets Asahina (Narita Ken), the big strong seme guy, whom he mistakes for the corporate dude. It turns out Asahina is the corporate dude's bastard (literally) brother, and that he is a trained private eye for some organization called UNCLE JSIA and is investigating some mysterious crime or other related tot he corporate dude. When Futaba learn about this, he hires Asahina to figure out why the corporate dude is closing down the resort, and says he'll pay with his body (haha, typical). And thus, Futaba, Asahina, and Asahina's colleagues (Miki and Kamiya) investigate.
Make no mistake ... I only know those names and finer plot-points because I'm reading the booklet as I type. You don't seriously expect me to remember any of that? Because, dude, I don't. I'm not a very auditory inclined person -- there is a limit to junk I can understand and remember from hearing it, sadly. (Yes, this did make me a bad student in school. Shuttup.) That's one side of it. Another is that this CD just has too much going on. I understand the novel this was based on was the first title in a series, but still! Fuse (Miki Shin'ichirô) just sort of hangs around and talks about random things with Asahina, while Homura (Kamiya Hiroshi) is silent for the most part and has some cryptic dialogye with Futaba for a few minutes. I mean, what is the point?! Why are they there?! And why the unnecessarily good cast?!
So it was no wonder that when the drama reached its end and the big mystery was solved, I no longer cared about it. But hey, if you can follow and understand this stuff on tape, maybe it'll be a good CD for you.
And oh, I should probably mention that the smut is okay. There's a lot of seme!grunting, though, so beware. Miyata is an okay uke -- not as sweet and whiny as I had expected, but then I had expected the worst.
Category: BLCDs | Comments (1)
December 01, 2004
Nasu Yukie: Sorekara doshitano? Koneko-chan
For a brief while I considered writing something about Yoake mae, bokura wa ... which is another one of Nasu Yukie's recent BL tankobon, but then I thought, "Why? Why would I want to review it knowing full well that I will only bash it and compare it to Nasu in her heydays? What is the point? There is not point! I should rather write about all the good stuff she has done and why I love her so."
So I will.
As Nasu herself notes, this can be considered a female version of Koko wa Greenwood. She took some funny episodes which didn't work with boys and used them in in this series. There is no storyline as such, just a series of funny (often hilarious to me) anecdotes about three female students of a design school and the people that surround them. There are some love triangles, but they don't amount to anything in the end. That doesn't matter, though, because it's all about teh funny! There is hardly anything serious in this entire book, which I guess sets it apart from Greenwood which had fabulous serious episodes such as Amayadori. It's somewhat a shame, because Nasu can do good serious especially when she has already established her characters in humour. But aside that, I have no complaints about this series and it makes me all happy inside to read. Yay!
It's difficult for me to write anything intelligent on Nasu Yukie, it seems. I either love her and can't say much more, or I just dispise everything she does and can't be coherent.
The last story included here is the conclusion to Tenshi to diamond, another Nasu series, so I'll touch on that when I review the series.
Category: Shojo/ladies | Comments (2)