Takebe used to be the toughest girl in school, but all her old friends have moved on, are getting married, having babies. She can’t even keep a real job. She’s stuck in her delinquent lifestyle and doesn’t know how to get out, in Catch These Hands!, Volume 1, by murata. While shopping for an outfit for a school friend’s wedding, she meets the one person she could never beat, her old rival the ridiculously-named Soramori Kirara.

Soramori also recognizes Takebe and asks her for a strange favor. Will Takebe go out with her? Taking this as a some kind of back-handed challenge, Takebe does. It immediately becomes apparent that neither them have much in the way of humaning skills. Takebe choses dates as a form of hazing, Soramori chooses things that are supposed to be fun, but she doesn’t understand why. ^_^ The chapter of the two of them snapping photos for Onstegram had me giggling out loud.

They are awkward and charming as heck and immediately, you want it all to work out, somehow. As I said in my review of this volume in Japanese, “I don’t know that we’ll ever see the scowl leave Takebe’s face or the two of them get any less awkward with each other, nonetheless, this series tickled my funny bone.”

The art is simplistic, which works fine here, as the awkwardness and the resulting gags are the entirety of the plot. ^_^

Amanda Haley’s translation is wonderful, giving Takebe a rough edge, without making her vulgar, and allowing Soramori to be over-formal and extremely awkward at the same time. Bianca Pistillo does a good job on lettering, establishing tone where she can. Yen’s policy of not doing full lettering of s/fx is kind of noticeable here where there is a lot of free space. It would have been a nice touch that would have added just one more ounce of immersion. Nonetheless, an excellent job all around for the Yen team.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – 0 Although I agree with Soramori, and do think Takebe looks good in that leather jacket
Comedy – 10 Gags that work in translation are precious and rare and should be treasured
Yuri – Yes? I mean they are going out. So, yes.

Overall – 8

One of the too-many projects I’m working on right now is a video of girl gang anime and manga as an intro for this series. I hope to get that up on Yuri Studio soon!