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May 29, 2024
In an attempt to broker peace, two feuding families of assassins arrange a marriage between the daughter of one family and the son of the other. The bride-to-be, Lilithia, throws both families into turmoil when she rejects the marriage in favor of pursuing her fiancé’s sister, Lu Die. Lilithia is willing to throw away everything for love, while Lu Die is torn between her feelings and her loyalty to her family.
This is a one-volume manga, which means that there’s not a lot of room to expand on the story. The central story of Lilithia and Lu Die is handled well, but the supporting characters are
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underdeveloped, and the background context is largely unknown, for example why the families are enemies, or what the culture of the world is like. All we know about that is that same-gender marriages don’t appear to be recognized, or else that would provide a simple solution to the drama. There’s certainly a potential for tragedy in this setup. Lu Die and Lilithia don’t expect to get a happy ending, and another character compares their relationship to Romeo and Juliet, but our two leads find a solution that works for them. Some readers may find the ending too ambiguous for comfort, but i believe our heroines were happy.
Overall, i don’t think Marriage Black had much of an impact on me. It wasn’t a bad story, but i’m not sure it will prove to be particularly memorable. The art was the same way, neither especially beautiful or spectacularly bad. If you’re looking for a way to spend the time, or a yuri manga that doesn’t take place at a school, this is worth a shot.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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May 20, 2024
This is one of those rare BL manga with a worthwhile story attached. It revolves around Fran, a former outlaw who found that life unfulfilling and became the sheriff of a small town in the middle of nowhere, his chance encounter with a Native American man, and his difficulty in escaping his past. Secondary protagonist Toto saves Fran from a slow death in the desert, despite not particularly wanting anything to do with him. (One element that i particularly appreciated was Toto’s fear that associating too much with Fran would cause him to lose his own culture, something that Native people struggled with in this
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time period.) Unable to get Toto out of his mind, Fran goes looking for him again, and the two develop a bond.
As far as romance goes, the romantic element is low-key – we don’t really see any of the common romance tropes – but the connection between Fran and Toto isn’t. Fran is able to open up to Toto about his past, something he could never do with the people he works for as sheriff. And while it’s never addressed why Toto is on his own, he too keeps coming back to meet Fran, rather than spending time with his own people. The question of why he’s alone is one i really wish had been addressed – are they gone? Is he an outcast? What happened in his past? But the question of his background and circumstances is the only problem i had with this story. There’s a poignance to these two lonely people coming together that is going to stay with me for a long time, and when they do have sex, it’s more about the emotional charge than the fanservice appeal.
This is hands down one of my favorite gay manga i’ve read, and one of my favorite Westerns (in any medium) that i’ve ever encountered. I would love to see this story adapted into a movie – it certainly has a happier ending than Brokeback! The art is fantastic, and i would definitely recommend this series.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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May 13, 2024
Macaroni is the story of an orphan on a journey, who is being hunted by persons unknown. He doesn’t know why they’re after him, and in fact at first doesn’t even seem to realize the danger he’s in. When the priest who raised him is unable to continue the journey, he hires a bounty hunter to act as main character Robin’s bodyguard. A gunslinger who happens to be around and looking for some action joins up, and the three of them travel together, dodging pursuit all the while. It’s a fun story, though the mystery has the potential to be a bit frustrating for a
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while. At first, i was dubious about the storyline – i didn’t understand why Robin was being hunted, and wasn’t sure it could be suitably resolved in a 2-volume manga. Without any spoilers, i will say that the last two chapters wrapped up the plot to my complete satisfaction. The reveal makes complete sense in the context of a western, and the pacing was perfect for the length of the series. It all ties together.
I hate to say it, but the art is not good, very early-2000s yaoi, with the blocky faces and awful lips. It gets the job done, but it’s not a selling point. The female characters are pretty, though, and the clothes are better than in some manga westerns that i’ve seen. There are plenty of female characters, unusual for both a western and a BL, and they’re all quite likeable. I was particularly fond of Ted’s sisters. As for the main characters, Robin doesn’t seem to quite fit into the world – his personality and thought processes feel very Japanese. Which is fair, the writer is Japanese after all, but the other leads Sydney and Ted, along with the supporting cast, blend much better into the world of a western, with the exception of Ted’s katana. A U.S. cavalry sword would make more sense, though still a bit unusual. The villains are believable and the cast all play off each other well.
Now let’s get to the part i’m sure y’all are looking for: the gayness. Although MAL has this series tagged as erotica, there is no sexual content and even the romance is lowkey to the point where it can almost be ignored. In fact, i would argue that this is more a case of “homoerotic fanservice” than “gay romance.” I’m not sure i’d go so far as to call it queerbaiting (i’m honestly on the fence about that), but it definitely wasn’t what i was looking for as a queer who enjoys westerns. Not everything has to be Gemma Files’ Hexslinger trilogy, but putting a little effort into developing a plausible relationship would have been nice.
Overall, this was a pretty fun read. The characters were likeable, and the story enjoyable. Its only flaws were that the art was lacking with regard to men’s faces, and the “romantic” elements left me with a bad aftertaste. I think it would have come off better if the author had written it as a basic western with no romance whatsoever, rather than trying to shoehorn in some BL. Ted had the right idea, shutting down any attempts at romo that happened on his watch. Fantastic aro representation, right there. So i guess there is something for the queer community after all. Macaroni isn’t what i wanted it to be, but it wasn’t a bad way to pass an hour or so.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Dec 28, 2022
Mixim 11 is a hard manga to review, because it’s just so generic. The story revolves around three boys who are unpopular with girls, who learn that one of them is actually a prince of the star Polaris and all three were sent to grow up on Earth for safety reasons. Now it’s time to determine which one is the prince and marry him off to one of a select group of “zodiac maidens,” while fending off enemies from a rival star trying to overthrow Polaris’s government. The idea has potential, and could have been pretty good with some more thought put into it, but
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the manga just didn’t seem to be trying.
Structurally, the story is all over the place. The first two dozen chapters or so are a truly awful slice of life, without a single redeeming point, until suddenly, it turns into a passable battle manga. The plot is poorly developed, mostly progressing from fight to fight without a lot of thought put into the underlying threads that connect those fights together. In fact, by the end of the series, the original plotlines seem to have been completely forgotten.
The protagonists aren’t particularly likeable, and the first thirty chapters or so were a chore to read. The story picked up a lot after the main villains were introduced – they didn’t appear as much as i would have liked, but the main characters and the storyline improved after that. The main villain is a strong callback to Anzai’s best-known work, Flame of Recca (he wears the same clothes as Kurei, and has a similar personality to Joker). After having seen characters that seem to be based on Kurei in every post-FoR manga by this author i’ve read, i have to wonder if he’s decided he’ll never create a better character and he’s given up trying. In a similar vein, the main character’s abilities are reminiscent of another Anzai lead, Ginta from MÄR.
The female characters are completely wasted – the ladies in Flame of Recca and MÄR had a lot more to do. Momoko and sometimes Arachne are the only girls in Mixim who really get the opportunity to do anything significant, and even they’re overshadowed by the male characters. The other girls are just window dressing, and frankly the story wouldn’t change much if you took all the female characters out entirely.
As a space nut, i’m either the best or the worst person to write this review, because i can and will judge the scientific aspects of the worldbuilding. Polaris is not the brightest star in the sky as Anzai claims, although that is a common mistake among people who don’t do much stargazing. The brightest star known is Deneb, in the Cygnus constellation, with an absolute magnitude of -8.73. If you’re judging by how bright stars look from Earth (and discount the Sun), then the brightest star is Sirius, with an apparent magnitude of -1.44. Polaris has an apparent magnitude of 1.97 and an absolute magnitude of -3.64, putting it about in the middle of the rankings either way. The villains come from Kochab, which they call the darkest star in the sky. Actually, with an apparent magnitude of 2.08, it’s not much dimmer than Polaris. Its absolute magnitude, -0.83, has more of a difference, but still on the brighter side of the scale. The two of them are the brightest stars in the Little Dipper constellation. It’s impossible to live on the surface of a star, so i assumed that characters being from Polaris or Kochab actually meant that they were from planets orbiting those stars (there is at least one confirmed exoplanet orbiting Kochab), but even when the cast visit those “stars”, the manga sure does treat them as if they were planets. In addition, it doesn’t make much sense that the people of Polaris would have abilities based on and draw strength from the Greek-Babylonian zodiac, since from outside our solar system the stars would form completely different patterns. Personally, i find it hard to believe that the aliens would look indistinguishable from humans – it’s not like this is a live-action program where you need costumes actors can wear – but that’s so common in science fiction that there’s not much point arguing about it. On a more fun note, the first chapter refers to the three leads from Polaris as trinary stars (actually, the English translation says “twin stars”, but we know what they meant), and the star we know as Polaris is actually three stars orbiting each other – a literal trinary star system.
Objectively, this really is a terrible manga. The flaws are impossible to ignore, but i actually did enjoy it after i got past a certain point. Gods help me, i enjoyed it. Admittedly, that was mainly due to the villain Pandora, but the fact remains that as soon as i finished reading it i wanted to go back and read it again. It was a little better the second time around, probably because i knew what to expect. All the flaws – the terrible first thirty chapters, the plot holes, the scientific errors – were all still there. My original reaction to this manga was “Yep, that sure was another Nobuyuki Anzai manga.” It’s very much in his style, but doesn’t stand out even if you only compare it to his other works, so i would only recommend this to serious Anzai fans.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Nov 3, 2021
Normally, i don’t like to review an ongoing property, but there’s no information on this site about this series, so i’ll try to fill the gap. Arisugawa In The Beautiful World is about a girl named Arisugawa, who hates men mainly because of her father and older brother. She’s gained a reputation as a man-hater all around town. One day, Arisugawa is kidnapped by a ninja with a complex about his feminine appearance, who wants to use her as a sacrifice in a spell meant to give him a more masculine body. Unfortunately, the spell goes wrong, and Arisugawa is turned into a guy.
At only
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ten chapters translated into English, it’s hard to judge the story, which focuses on Arisugawa’s struggles in her new body and attempts to find a way back to normal. The comedy is mainly body-focused, as Arisugawa discovers the woes of her new body. If she hated the penis to begin with, imagine her frustration getting a hard-on every time the wind blows. I’m sure anyone with a penis can sympathize. I’ve only seen this aspect of puberty addressed two or three times in fiction, and never at all in manga, so i found it oddly refreshing here.
The characters are delightful. Arisugawa is a perfect fish out of water, and sadistic ninja Kuro takes a certain amount of glee in being the only one to know the truth about Arisugawa. He, too, has a vested interest in finding out just what went wrong with the spell that transformed Arisugawa, so the two of them are unwilling allies. As a trans reader, i can’t help reading this manga as a parallel to the trans experience. I doubt that was Anzai’s intention, but Arisugawa’s discomfort with her newly masculine body, and Kuro’s discomfort with his feminine appearance, feel all too familiar to me – they are incredibly relatable – and i’m enjoying seeing it play out metaphorically in a comedy/fantasy setting. The other ninjas in the group play off each other and the leads well, and i look forward to seeing more of them.
Parts of the story do seem recycled from the author’s best-known work, Flame Of Recca. Such aspects as ninja, time travel, and an organization called Uruha all featured in FoR, and some character designs are similar. That said, the way they’re used in Beautiful World is very different, so it doesn’t feel like a retread of the same material.
So far, Arisugawa In The Beautiful World is a fun series about a girl lost in time and in a body that just doesn’t fit her. If body humor isn’t your thing, you might want to give this one a miss, but i’ve enjoyed it immensely.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Apr 12, 2021
When Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle ended, many people were left confused. Some readers had a lot of questions. Tsubasa World Chronicle doesn’t answer any of them. When i read this manga for the first time, i wrote, “Rather than attempting to wrap up any loose ends or mysteries of TRC, it feels more like CLAMP weren’t ready to part with the travelers and wanted to write one more adventure with them.” That still holds true, but was written before CLAMP developed such a habit of only writing “sequels” that add nothing to their parent story. It was a happier time in the CLAMP fandom.
That’s not to
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say TWC isn’t a good manga, because it is. It’s set in a fantasy version of the Ryukyu Islands, with CLAMP’s typical attention to cultural details. The story is about the interplay between life and death, in a world where the two are uniquely connected. The crux of the story is Syaoran’s desire to meet someone who was important to him in TRC once again, and whether that would ever be possible. I don’t want to say too much, as this series does contain spoilers for TRC. If you haven’t read Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle, you should do that before reading this one. That said, Syaoran’s dilemma is poignant, and i wish i could discuss it in greater depth.
As usual with CLAMP manga, TWC interconnects with several of their other works. World Chronicle takes place after Reservoir Chronicle, obviously, and after the first three volumes of xxxHOLiC Rei. It features Gate 7 characters making their first crossover appearance, as well as Kujaku from RG Veda, who i’d been waiting for /years/ to see in Tsubasa. It’s not necessary to have read Gate 7 or RG Veda to understand TWC, but xxxHOLiC Rei is probably a good idea.
If you were frustrated with the ending of Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle, this sequel might not satisfy you. But if you enjoyed exploring the different worlds of the CLAMP multiverse, and seeing the way our heroes interact with each other, this’ll be a fun read. Just don’t expect it to resolve anything from TRC.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Jun 8, 2016
I was a bit hesitant going into this OVA, as i've been a fan of the RG Veda manga for a long time and i've heard the OVAs were terrible. Once i finally watched them, the first was a pleasant surprise. The second was a letdown. I was prepared for some changes, such as how the staff didn't want to be bothered with the whole "Ashura was born without a gender" thing, so they turned Ashura into a girl. It does simplify matters, and with so little time to work with, simplifying whatever you can can only help. On the other hand, some other changes
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didn't make much sense to me.
There's nothing especially wrong with the first OVA. It's a straightforward adaption of the "demon of the frozen castle" arc. There were some plot details i was disappointed were cut, but they weren't necessary to the story and i fully understand why they were left out. The story works just as well as it did in volume 4 of the manga.
The second OVA is where it falls apart. It combines original material with events from all over the manga, especially the last two volumes. With a lack of proper setup for the ending, it simply couldn't happen the same way it did in the manga. This is where the OVA's simplification started to work against it. Characters' motivations, never what they appear in a CLAMP title, were changed to the surface explanation. Because they were motivated by different things, they behaved differently for the major confrontation, with the result that the ending felt incomplete and, to me, illogical.
The animation, on the other hand, was excellent. I feel like this would have been best handled with ten OVAs of this length, one for each volume of the manga. That would have enabled them to show the full story, which i believe was the cause of the problems. If they had time to set up and foreshadow later events, the story told would have been more interesting as well as more complete. It would also make more sense – always a plus in my book.
As a companion piece to the manga, it's perfectly alright, although not what manga fans would want. But to watch it on its own, without the manga as a reference point, i doubt it would make much sense. It certainly doesn't tell a full story. I fully admit that i'm biased in favor of RG Veda, which is why on my own list i give it a 6, but really it's more of a 5.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Jan 6, 2014
I first started Walkure Romanze because of a longtime love of knights and horses. The hope of an anime accurately portraying girls learning to joust crashed to the ground the instant i saw the opening theme, which shows them all riding in miniskirts. While that could have been excused as an artistic choice to make the opening look nice, it’s the same in the episode itself. A few girls, such as the student council president, wear what look like tights but are hopefully sturdy leggings to protect their legs. Most don’t, however, which means it’s a miracle any of these girls can walk upright, given
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the horrible saddle sores they must have – especially the girl who jousts in lingerie.
I kept watching because of a sick fascination of everything they get horribly wrong. For example, the main character, Mio, who’s never even touched a horse before in her life, is challenged to a joust by a more experienced girl. Mio’s friend spends the next episode teaching her how to manage a lance, but she almost never gets on a horse until the day of the match. There’s a slight problem with that. Even inanimate modes of transportation, such as bicycles, motorcycles, or cars, require a lot of practice before you can comfortably use them. Horses have a mind of their own, in addition to the rider having to learn how to signal to them where to go. The type of horses that would be used for jousting are much more strong-willed than beginner’s horses. The best case scenario, given the situation, is that the horse Mio borrows stands still and doesn’t listen to a thing she says, while everyone else in the school laughs at her. There are other scenarios equally likely. One: Mio makes the common beginner’s mistake of squeezing with her calves to stay on when the horse starts moving, which tells the horse to go faster. Sakura will run away with her, right past their opponent, and Mio won’t be able to get her to stop because everything she does tells her to go faster. She becomes the school laughingstock. Two: the weight of the lance pulls Mio off balance until she falls off and becomes the school laughingstock. Three: Mio leans too far back and to the left while trying to balance the weight of the lance, so she falls off and becomes the school laughingstock. In the worst-case scenario, she breaks her neck when she falls. Or she gets a concussion. Jousting is very dangerous even when you wear a helmet, which a good many people here don’t usually bother with. However, since these are wonderful magic~ horses who defrock anything in a skirt, things go just peachy for Mio. They only wear helmets in matches, and apparently then just for show, as evidenced when one girl is unsaddled. Her helmet goes flying, and she falls in a different direction, thus hitting her head rather badly and getting a concussion. Except she doesn’t get a concussion, because this is anime. There’s a reason riding helmets come with chin straps, people.
But enough about that. It’s not as though this show is actually about jousting or horses. It’s just a framing device for the same goofy harem ecchi that shows up in a lot of shows and gives anime a bad name. Walkure Romanze is full of huge-breasted girls and one guy, who accidentally gropes pretty much every girl in each episode, because isn’t accidental groping great? Because he’s the only guy of a reasonable age at the school, all the girls either want to get into his pants or each other’s. Noel is especially rapey towards Mio, which is shown with lots of random groping and sex disguised as stretching. Or the other way around. It’s hard to tell with this show. Of course, they couldn’t leave out the hot springs episode! Lots of nekkid groping, pillow fights, and people in the wrong bath at the wrong time hijinx for your enjoyment! (Or lack thereof.) Rather than individual characters, we have a bunch of typical anime stereotypes. There’s the offensively naïve and stupid main character, the nice guy, the elegant student council president, the kuudere albino, the crippled imouto, and so on, none of them with anything resembling personality. Everything feels very rote, like they’re following a formula for bland anime. Honestly, the only reason i rated it above a one was because the jousting idea was pretty original.
The predictability of the plot (as opposed to the characters) shouldn’t really be held against it. You can’t bring any interest to a sports story, anime or no, without a big tournament. Still, though, the progression of newbie falls in love with the sport –> defeats a few minor opponents –> becomes tournament underdog and does surprisingly well didn’t feel like they were trying to bring any originality or flavor to it. Again, very formulaic. It only managed to surprise me once, with the end of the very last match in the tournament. I won’t say what happened, but i will say that it followed common sense more than you’d expect from anime. The best part was the music. Not the opening and ending – those are just as dull and interchangeable as the characters. But the background music was very nice, classy instrumentals similar to medieval music. It helped build the mood that ‘these are knights in training’ much better than anything else the show tried to do.
So, all in all, i don’t think it was worth it. If you like ecchi and/or the discussion of a lance as if it were a penis, then this is the anime for you. But if you have even the slightest interest in jousting, horses, or girl knights, you’re better off reading old Tamora Pierce novels.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
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Jan 15, 2013
To be honest, when i first saw this on CLAMP's list of published manga, i didn't think it looked too interesting. Recently, though, i found myself wanting to read something new and short, and this fit the bill, so i tried it and was surprised how much i liked it.
-Story- To be honest, there isn't much to the story, but at 23 pages, that's to be expected. Two men meet by chance and fall in love. It's just a bit of pure fluff.
-Art- It's an early CLAMP manga. Of course the art is gorgeous. A lot of detail is put into the hair and eyes,
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and it turns out looking really good.
-Character- Here's where my main enjoyment of the work came from. As has been known to happen in CLAMP manga, the characters come form other series they've done: in this case, RG Veda and CLAMP School Detectives. The two leads are reincarnations of Ashura-ou and Taishakuten, and the three eponymous detectives make a guest appearance as high school students. Other RG Veda characters make small appearances as well. Interestingly, though, Shining Star was published 3 years before RG Veda and 5 years before CSD, making this possibly the first appearance for either group of characters. It was interesting to see these characters in a modern school setting.
-Enjoyment- Despite my preference for dark and angsty manga, i found myself grinning throughout the whole thing. I found Ashura and Taishakuten to be two of the most interesting characters in RG Veda, in that it was their choices that shaped the whole story more than anyone else's, and yet very little is shown of them. I was also extremely disappointed that Ashura didn't get a chance to live a happier life in Tsubasa, despite most characters from CLAMP's darker manga getting that opportunity. It was very nice to see the two in a sweet little piece for a change.
-Overall- Honestly, i think only RG Veda fans will appreciate this piece. The main reason i liked it so much was because RG Veda has been one of my favorite manga for over 4 years. There's not much going on except as a treat for RG Veda fans. I'd recommend it to everyone who enjoyed RG Veda, but if you haven't read that or didn't like it, you should probably give this one a miss.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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