Archive for the English Manga Category


Yuri Manga: Strawberry Panic, Volume 2 (English)

May 13th, 2008

Have you visited translator Anastasia Moreno’s fabulously wonderful blog, Manga Gunkan yet? Go. It’s not often you’re going to get such a unique mix of fun tidbits about translating, manga, military adventures and cute dachsund pictures – all written up in both Japanese and English, for your reading pleasure. Check it every day.

And speaking of Ana’s mad translation skills, today we’re talking about Strawberry Panic, Volume 2, translated skillfully by mad Ana. (For a summation of both my frustration with the SP fandom and the plot, please check my review of the Japanese edition from December 2006.)

Today, I’m just talking about the reproduction into English. I’ll never get tired of telling you that Seven Seas does a very, very good job. Ana’s translation captures the soap opera-like, over the top-ness, and the adaptation, by Lorelei Laird, allows the dialogue to speak for itself. Considering how absurdly melodramatic everything is, I think it would make a pretty great J-drama. In fact, I’m already giggling at the idea. (And, OMG, since Marimite spawned a parody porn movie, why hasn’t anyone made a SP parody porn? It’s just *begging* for one. ^_^ And with that thought, there goes the last shred of soul I had….)

The technical reproduction seems very clean, with some moire in the backgrounds that, to be honest, I had to go looking for, because it never seems like a problem to me. Some sound effects have been translated and replaced, others have had a English equivalent placed nearby and in at least one case, it was left untranslated. As I always say, it’s not an issue for me. But, surely you can figure out that the crowd is saying “Waaahhh” at the apearrance of the newly crowned Hikari and Amane.

I only have one complaint. It’s not totally Sevens Seas’ fault, but I object strongly. On the back, someone at the now-defunct Newtype, apparently decided that he was clever by describing this series as “Girl-Crushes Gone Wild!” which is not only insulting, but inaccurate. The characters – repteadedly – express feelings of love and devotion towards one another. These are not crushes. (Duh) The implication that this is a manga equivalent to straight girls with no pride who do lesbian-looking things for straight guys to get off on is actually pretty correct, but I found it annoying anyway.

On the last page of the story, as Nagisa and Shizuma kiss, there is a puzzling allusion to a third volume of the manga. Let me assure that there is no third volume to the manga in Japanese. The puzzling allusion to the third volume is there in the Japanese edition too. It never happened for a number of reasons.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 6
Characters – 6, +1 for Kaname
Yuri – 9
Service – 6

Overall – 7

You may notice that my scores are different this time than when I read it originally. That happens. ^_^

And, my deepest, sincerest (and somewhat belated) thanks to Daniel P. for being the sponsor of today’s review!





Battle Club Manga, Volume 2 (English)

May 12th, 2008

I feel as if I’ve been flattened by a truck, so I’m going with a “brain need not apply” type manga today, courtesy of Dan P. Battle Club, by Shiozaki Yuji, has all the service of Shiozaki’s other, more well-known series Ikkitousen, without any of the complicating factors, like a plot, character development or sanity.

In Volume 1, we met the cast of characters whose crotches we would be looking at. Welcome to Volume 2, in which several of the untranslated things in the story suddenly and quite unneccesarily, become translated. Why do I say it was unneccesary? Because NOTHING is going to make this story better – not translation, not touch up, nothing. It’s Grade Q crap and I dare you to tell me that you’re reading it for the plot. I know I’m not. I’m reading it for the absurdity, and the occasional flash of Yuri.

Let me just get this out of the way. Dear moron who wrote the front page copy; Lesbian is not the same as bi-curious, and Higuchi is not a lipstick lesbian, no matter how much you think your clever copy is alliteratively alluring.

I’m done. Thank you for your patience.

For the rest of the story, we’re basically watching Tamako get molested as she trains and Mokichi being a loser. With service. In fact there’s so much service here, I’m surprised the book doesn’t get a 4-star AAA rating. (Probably that joke just fell really flat for most of you, but I don’t care. It wasn’t for you.)

Tamako gets her ass kicked by a rival school’s Mukouda, and by Taki in a panda suit and then there’s some service as the women (and Taki) take a bath, then some bits about Mokcihi, but no one cares. Whole hunks of the book are related while coach takes a piss, sometimes accompanied by Mokichi or Taki, because apparently that’s funny.

Yuri is…well, not much. Higuchi remains gay in theory, but we’re not seeing much practice. When she gets defeated by Mukouda, her lesbian cool points take a hit, too and the guys begin to harrass her – because lesbians are only cool when they are invincible. Thank heavens *I’m* still invincible! Shiba shows up primarily to be turned on by Taki and Tamako wrestling naked in the onsen. Well, duh.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 1
Characters – 3
Yuri – 2
Service – Infinity

Overall – 5

How low can you make your expectations go? If you approach Battle Club with expectations like “the word balloons will have words” and “I will see ass shots” you ought to be okay.





Pretty Face Manga, Volume 1 (English)

May 8th, 2008

After wallowing in the tragedies of Confidential Confessions I felt the need to read COMEDY! Unfortunately, all I had was Pretty Face, Volume 1. ^_^;

No, it really is a comedy and if I had any humor in me at all, I would surely be doubled up in laughter at the endlessly amusing plight of a bad-ass punk guy who was severely injured in an accident and awakes to find that a helpful plastic surgeon reconstructed his face and upper body to resemble that of the girl whose picture he carried in his pocket. (The wife says, “Because I always carry a picture of myself, just like Paris Hilton.”)

I will give props to the author because at this point, he comes up with one of the most utterly absurd plot devices *ever* to get the punk dude to be able to go back to school – the girl he likes had a twin sister who disappeared some time ago, and now everyone thinks *he* is the sister, returned at long last. Shades of The Return of Martin Guerre…not.

So in Pretty Face, Volume 1, everyone thinks Rando is really Yuna, including and especially Yuna’s sister Rina, who is so excited to have her sister back she wants to sleep with her and bathe with her and rub her naked body all over her, and other sisterly things. Yuri in this volume is by implication and incest-flavored, like Rando imagining himself with Yuna’s face and Rina kissing.

It’s been a long time since I read this series in Japanese, but I vaguely remember that another female character falls for “Yuna” in later volumes, and there’s more fake Yuri there.

Technically, this may be the best reproduction I’ve ever seen out of Viz. (Does that make you think, “Oh, what a shame”?” It does me, lol) The tones are clean, the art is clear and it’s very easy to follow the crazy action scenes.

Pretty Face is not intellectual comedy. It’s physical gags and face faults and the thrill of watching a cute girl kicking ass mightily, with a frisson of Yuri-ish sort of romance. And lots of penis jokes.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 7
Characters – 5 They are pretty much one-trick ponies in this volume
Yuri – 3
Service – 7

Overall – 7

My deepest thanks to Ziggr for sponsoring today’s review~!





Confidential Confessions Manga, Volume 4 (English)

May 6th, 2008

Back in the bad old days of Yuri, in between the frantic melodrama of the 70’s and this current decade, (and with the exception of Sailor Moon) it was fairly common in manga to find lesbian love paired with mental unbalance. Confidential Confessions, by Momochi Reiko is a series that allows us to wallow in the depravity of “true” stories and incidentally, see some crazy lesbians.

You know the television show that’s on WEtv (which as you know, I like to refer to as the “Violence Against Women Network,”) High School Confidential? This manga was written 10 years ago – and it’s the exact same stuff. Teenage pregnancy, abuse, drug use, etc. Freaky, huh? Guess good girls in bad trouble still appeals to some.

In Volume 4, we “deal” with a number of unpleasant issues; institutionalized abuse of female students; prostitution; bullying; and, in “Forbidden Kiss,” a lesbian love affair complete with insane jealousy, a knife and an ambiguously asexual ending.

The author’s notes dramatically explain that all these terrible things go on, and she feels that, by telling these stories, she’s bringing these issues to people’s attention, so the bullying and abuse and prostitution will stop. She doesn’t mention the lesbianism. If I was young and had read her story, I might have been tempted to stop being a lesbian. Those girls were *crazy*! ^_^; This is the same tone of slavering “concern” with which WEtv deals with the same issues in their show – oh, how awful, isn’t it just terrible what happened, did you hear, I know I was shocked too.

The art in Confidential is decidedly old-school, and in a way it made me nostalgic. If you like the dredging up of sleazy “true” stories, then you’ll be happy to note that the series is 6 volumes long and there’s a second series, Confidential Confessions: Deai, as well. So plenty of teenaged girl misery and abuse for you to bathe yourself in and either feel better about your own life, or get secretly turned on, or whatever floats your boat.

While I do love me my Evil Pycho Lesbians, I’m less moved by this kind of teenage pathos. But, if you love tabloid drama Confidential Confessions is certainly dramatic. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – N/A
Characters – N/A
Yuri – 6
Service – 5

Overall – 7

A tip of the hat today to Ted the Awesome for sponsoring today’s review! (You may have noticed that I haven’t added anything recently to the Yuri Wishlist. That’s because I’m positively *drowning* in things to review and want to make some of it all go away before encouraging you all to throw more on top of an already untenably large pile. When these piles are gravitationally stable again, I’ll add more stuff to the wishlist! Thanks, everyone, for your support!)





Ninin ga Shinobuden Manga, Volume 3 (English)

May 1st, 2008

Is there a word in the English language more perfectly suited to bringing forth titillated giggles from 12-year old boys than “boobies?

Don’t answer that – it was meant as a rhetorical question.

In Volume 3 of Ninin ga Shinobuden, Onsokomaru is a jerk, the various Sasukes are a freakish kind of “noble savage,” and Shinobu is still sweet with a little light lechery on the side. Kaede is, of course, still living in hell having all sorts of fun with the ninjas.

This volume is more of the same kind of thing as usual: Shinobu gets small, the ninjas all help Onsokomaru “clear” the levels of a game in his mind, Shinobu finds a baby elephant in her bed, the Ninjas get lost in a forest, a typhoon comes and other nonsense.

For Yuri fans there’s more Shinobu/Kaede time, and the usual sorts of hints that Shinobu’s feelings are what they are. In the chapter where female ninja instructor Izumi shows up looking for someone to pose as a finacee – and we learn what we already knew – that Shinobu’s the best man – and in a later chapter, the best ninja – of the bunch. :-) And we have to wonder…if Kaede doesn’t like Shinobu “that way,” you know, why on earth is she still coming to the ninja school at all? Because I don’t know too many “friends” who would make visits to Bedlam. Every day.

The reproduction is much more consistent than previous volumes, the tones all reproduce nice enough, and the translation seems tight. Because this book is drawn practically border to border, the translation notesget crammed in to the tight spaces between panels. But you know, it works okay. No complaint from me.

Best of all, there’s the riveting author’s notes about Koga chewing a lot of gum to lose weight.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 6 – this volume at least has a variety of set-ups for the usual chaos
Characters – 6
Yuri – 3
Service – 3

Overall – 6

Unfortunately, we probably won’t be seeing Volume 4 in print. I only care because it has the best Kaede x Shinobu chapter in the series. Oh well.

Super thanks to Michela W for sponsoring today’s review!