Cat Paradise vol.2

There's totally a T-Rex in this volume!

In this volume, several demon animal things infiltrate the school by possessing the bodies of students, and most of this volume involves Yumi and two of the student council members trapped in the library without their cats (thus, unable to fight) with a girl possessed by a spider demon. Outside of the library, Kansuke encounters an enemy as well (a werewolf-ish fellow) before trying to go after Yumi.

It's about as enjoyable as the first volume. With introductions out of the way, it's right down to business, and the business with the spider girl ends up taking the whole volume. The one thing that bugged me about the first volume is that they dropped this whole team on us, the student council, but we didn't really get to know them that much. But judging from the last story in the first volume, which focused on Kotori, and this volume, which focused on Akifuji and Tsukasa, we'll learn more about them and their powers as they each get their turn at bat. But until then, they're kind of just background people. By the end of the second volume, there should have been decent screentime for the whole group, but there wasn't, really.

But, this volume is still a good time. Even without their powers (until later in the volume), the action is still pretty suspenseful. I could see Tsukasa's power coming from a mile away because of something that happens early on, but I wasn't quite expecting it to manifest in the way it did. I loved that the characters' reactions were exactly the same as mine when the T-Rex appeared; I said "What the hell?" and then saw the spider was saying it too...it made me laugh. So that was fun. The new characters, the group of possessed students, are an interesting addition as a sort of rival group to the heroes. Each one is a different animal (spider, wolf, snake, etc.).

The art is as solid as last time, with some cool action shots throughout. I want to see more of the cast in the next volume, and also hope they don't spend the entire next volume on one enemy. Not there's anything wrong with that, just that there's only three volumes left!

Cat Paradise vol.1

I've never read any of Yuji Iwahara's work before Cat Paradise, but I'd heard nothing but good things. While his past stories seemed to be a bit dark, this is straight up action/adventure fun.
Yumi is a new student at Matabi Academy, and like many other students, her main reason for going to this school is that they allow cats on campus. We soon find out that a demon cat is sealed somewhere on the school grounds, and that the student council and their cats watch over it. Yumi and her cat, Kansuke, soon encounter a demon and gain their own power similar to the student council members'.

There's well tread ground here, but Iwahara obviously knows it. In the author's comment section, he says he was aiming for creating something that felt like an anime, and I'd say he hit his mark. Ancient sealed demons, students fighting monsters, a mysterious student council, seven "chosen" kids, etc.; it's all fairly common for anime. The twist in this scenario is the fixation on cats. Each student/cat pair has a unique power based on some aspect of their personality (Yumi creates costumes for Kansuke which turn him into a humanoid cat person). Their powers also allow them to communicate with cats. There are plenty of pet owners who dress up their pets, and Yumi is no expection, so when Kansuke finally gets to talk with her, it's funny to finally see an animal get to complain about being forced to wear clothes. In addition to Yumi, we get to see one other student council member's power in this volume.

There's a kind of silliness to the story's underlying premise, but that's what makes it fun. The other thing that make this series worth reading is the art. His art actually reminds of Eiichiro Oda's (One Piece), not in his character designs (they're nothing alike), but in the thickness of the linework, and the way that he uses parallel lines for shading instead of screentoning. Except in Iwahara's case the shading sometimes stands out a bit too much, and can look a little weird. Here ,for instance, Yumi's tongue and neck just seem a bit odd (click to enlarge):


Otherwise, I really like his style. I'm no cat expert, but it seems Iwahara put in the effort to make the cat's breeds all look distinct and like real cats...or as real as is art style would allow. There's also a touch of Disney to the way he draws the cats, but maybe that's just me. I loved this small little gag where they're in a library and Kansuke has the sudden urge to scratch a book for no other reason than the fact that he's a cat. The way he looks at Yumi as he's about to do it is just cute. It's something a real cat would do:


This manga is fun in the way something like Digimon is. You know it's silly, but you can't help but get wrapped up in it. Your mileage may vary, but I'm looking forward to more. And if you want your shonen fix, at 5 volumes, this is a good alternative to other, more epically-sized series.

Japan makes Twilight cool!

I am neither condemning nor praising Twilight. (Never read the books, but saw the first movie and I didn't hate it entirely. I'm more of a Harry Potter man.) Moving on. I wanted to share something cool. I saw these a while ago, but I was reminded of them with the recent hubbub over New Moon.


The books probably aren't my kinda thing, but if I saw these, even I would take a second look:

More appealing than apples and chess pieces? The Japanese release of the novels were given a manga makeover, at least on the outside (the inside is just Twilight in Japanese). To be clear, these aren't manga, just the covers given to the novels in Japan. You'll notice that one of the books is listed as number "13". I'm almost certain there aren't that many novels in the series. It's common for novels in Japan to be released in parts, so for example, the first Twilight book might be divided into 2 or 3 individual volumes. I don't know why that is. Maybe Japanese text takes more page space? Also, I'm not sure how common it is for foreign novels to be given manga-like covers. Maybe they're marketing this to the light novel crowd? I dunno.



I really like the style. It makes it look like a hip shojo manga. I prefer this to mopey K. Stew and R. Pats (let's just ignore the fact that I called them that). The artwork is done by mangaka Ryuuji Gotsubo, whose soccer manga, Sasameke, will be released by Yen Press in just a few months. So if you like what you see here...check out Sasameke! And while we're on the subject of Yen Press, they're releasing a Twilight manhwa.

If you wanna see the rest of the covers just search "トワイライト" on amazon.co.jp Rest assured, they all feature Edward-san and Bella-chan dressed stylishly while practicing abstinence. In conclusion: manga makes everything slightly better.

Oh god, I just made a Twilight post.

Monster!!

Monster premieres tonight on Syfy(not SciFi) at 11!

Okay, I'm just posting this because I haven't posted anything all month...that will change. But yea, watch Monster!

One Piece 3-in-one collections?

We all know Viz is speeding up the release of One Piece in 2010 in a big way, but I just came across another One Piece release they're doing. On the Simon & Schuster website, where Viz's upcoming licenses and releases are often listed even before they're announced, there are listings for several One Piece volumes entitled "One Piece: East Blue 1-2-3", "4-5-6", "7-8-9", and "10-11-12", at a price of $14.99 (3 for the price of 2), which covers the East Blue saga (hence the title). I'm not sure if they'll be VizBig releases, but I doubt it, considering the price. It's probably meant more for new readers to play catch-up, and omnibuses are great for a series as long as this one.

From what I've read of NYAF reports, they didn't mention anything there, but the Simon & Schuster listings are usually true.

Bleach vol.27

I've been looking forward to this volume for quite a while, as it marks the beginning of a new arc in Bleach.
The first few chapters pick up where the last one left off with the gang fighting some Vizards, and most notably, Urahara jumping in...oh and Orihime running into Ulquiorra. But Urahara fights! He's one of the coolest characters in the series, so any time he gets to fight is a treat. His fight is kind of silly, involving some of his gadgets and whatnot. And speaking of the coolest Bleach characters, Shinji also steps in for a bit!

As for the main part of this volume, like last time, Orhime is once again the true star of the volume. Ulquiorra has come to take her to Hueco Mundo, and threatens to kill her friends if she resists, but he allows her to see one person to say goodbye to (in an invisible form). She chooses to go see Ichigo, of course. After finding out that she is missing, Ichigo and Renji's group want to go rescue her, but the leaders of the Soul Society decide she is a traitor and not worth the trouble of rescuing when they have bigger things to worry about. Obviously, this won't stop Ichigo.

There were several scenes that I really loved in this volume, the biggest one being Orihime's goodbye to Ichigo. Her speech is touching and fittingly (for her character) somewhat childlike. The other great scene is Tatsuki confronting Ichigo about Orihime's disappearance, in addition to the secret's he's been hiding. Tatsuki is a character I really like and who hasn't had much screen time, so I was happy to see her get down right pissed off about being left in the dark, especially when it involves Orihime.

Things were pretty tense this volume, and the stage is set for another epic arc. Yes, this looks to be yet another mission to save a damsel in distress, but this time it feels like there's more at stake, partly because Orihime seems like a much more innocent and vulnerable character than Rukia (and also much more of a mystery because of her powers), and partly because she's being sent to evil central. Either way, I'm sure there will be some great battles along the way.
Once again, I wish Viz would speed up its release a bit.

Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle coming to an end

Tsubasa: Reservior Chronicle's final chapter is set to run in the September 30th issue of Shonen Magazine. The series will end up having 29 volumes, I believe. Don't know what's going on in the storyline at all, but here's hoping CLAMP finishes it in a satisfying manner. I guess xxxholic's end can't be too far off either. But then again, I've never read it, so I don't know how strongly it's main story is connected to Tsubasa's. I want to start reading it soon (CLAMP's little crossover ploy works). Maybe they'll finish X now?

It seems like Del Rey might be fast-tracking Tsubasa's release a tiny bit, as they're releasing the next two volumes, 23 and 24(and an artbook), simultaneously in October.

(info from Ritual Scan Forge)