Short Takes: Flower in a Storm and Rin-ne

This week’s Short Takes column looks at two recent VIZ releases. The first, Flower in a Storm, is a rom-com about a high school student with superpowers and the billionaire playboy who loves her; the second, Rin-ne, is Rumiko Takahashi’s follow-up to the award-winning, best-selling InuYasha. I admit that I didn’t have high expectations for either manga, but both turned out to be pleasant surprises, the first for its goofy, over-the-top premise, and the second for its playful skewering of the “I see demons!” genre. Read on for the scoop.

FLOWER IN A STORM, VOL. 1

BY SHIGEYOSHI TAKAGI • VIZ • 200 pp. • RATING: OLDER TEEN (16+)

Flower in a Storm begins with a bang: seventeen-year-old Ran Tachibana storms a classroom where self-proclaimed “everyday, ordinary high school student” Riko Kunimi is making plans with friends. Brandishing a gun, Ran declares that Riko is his bride-to-be, a pronouncement that doesn’t sit well with Riko, who tells him off, then jumps out a third-floor window, landing gracefully on the pavement below. That death-defying leap is our first clue that Riko is anything but an ordinary teen; as we soon learn, Riko possesses a variety of superpowers — strength, speed, agility — that would make her a solid addition to the Justice League. Riko, however, just wants to fit in with her peers, a desire fueled by the memory of a boy rejecting her because she “wasn’t normal.” What she doesn’t grasp — at least in the early going — is that Ran likes her precisely because she isn’t ordinary; he finds her strength and grit irresistible, even if he doesn’t express his feelings in the most constructive, socially responsible fashion.

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The Shipping News, 2/10/10

InuYasha was the first comic that I actively collected, the manga that introduced me to the Wednesday comic-buying ritual and the very notion of self-identifying as a fan. Though I followed it religiously for years, trading in my older editions for new ones, watching the anime, and speculating about the finale, my interest in the series gradually waned as I was exposed to new artists and new genres. Still, InuYasha held a special place in my heart; reading it was one of my seminal experiences as a comic fan, making me reluctant to re-visit InuYasha for fear of sullying those precious first-manga memories. VIZ’s recent decision to re-issue InuYasha in an omnibus edition, however, inspired me to pick it up again. I made a shocking discovery in the process of re-reading the first chapters: InuYasha is good. Really good, in fact, and deserving of more respect than it gets from many critics.

The second VIZBIG volume, which arrives in stores this week, gives ample proof of Takahashi’s skill. The story arcs are long enough to be complex and engaging, but not so long as to test the patience. Like her sister-in-shonen Yellow Tanabe, Takahashi knows how to stage a fight scene that’s dramatic, tense, and mercifully short (not to mention coherent). Takahashi’s villains are powerful and strange, not strawmen; though we know our heroes will prevail — it’s shonen, for Pete’s sake — Takahashi throws creative obstacles in their way that makes their eventual triumph more satisfying. Then there are Takahashi’s characters — they’re familiar types, to be sure, but with enough gumption and warts to make them interesting. Kagome is a great example: I remembered her as a whiny tag-along, but was surprised to discover that she was feistier, smarter, and more like a real teenager than I remembered.

If you haven’t looked at InuYasha in a while, or missed it during the height of its popularity, now is a great time to give it a try. Each volume of the VIZBIG edition collects three issues, allowing readers to more fully immerse themselves in the story. And if you’re a purist about packaging, you’ll be happy to know that VIZ is finally issuing InuYasha in an unflipped format — a first in the series’ US history. Still need persuading? Then check out Connie’s Slightly Biased review of the first VIZBIG volume, in which she enthusiastically compares it with Mermaid Saga and Ranma 1/2.

What else is arriving in your local comic book store? Here’s a run-down of new releases, courtesy of Midtown Comics. For a more complete list of Wednesday’s new arrivals, consult the ComiXology website.

NEW SERIES/ONE-SHOTS

• 9th Sleep (DMP)
• How to Capture a Martini (DMP)
• Rampage, Vol. 1 (CMX)
• Taimashin: Red Spider Exorcist, Vol. 1 (DMP)

CONTINUING SERIES

• Ikigami: The Ultimate Limit, Vol. 4 (VIZ)
• InuYasha, Vol. 45 (VIZ)
• InuYasha VIZBIG Edition, Vol. 2 (VIZ)
• Jormungand, Vol. 2 (VIZ)
• Kekkaishi, Vol. 20 (VIZ)

Short Takes: Haunted House, Mermaid Saga, and School Zone

Boo! This week, I’m taking the highly imaginative step of writing about spooky manga. The twist? All three titles are penned by trailblazing female artists. First up is Mitsukazu Mihara’s Haunted House (Tokyopop), a comedy about a normal teen whose parents have clearly embraced Addams Family Values. Next on the agenda is Rumiko Takahashi’s Mermaid Saga (VIZ), an older series that mixes horror and folklore to good effect. (You can read the first chapter for free at the Shonen Sunday website.) And last but not least is Kanako Inuki’s School Zone (Dark Horse), a three-volume series about a school built atop a cemetery — always a bad idea, kids, even when the land is being offered at bargain-basement prices.

HAUNTED HOUSE

BY MITSUKAZU MIHARA • TOKYOPOP • 192 pp. • RATING: OLDER TEEN (16+)

Remember that brief but excruciating period in your adolescence in which everything your parents said, did, or wore proved horribly embarrassing? Sabato Obiga, the hero of Haunted House, is living through that very stage. The crucial difference between his experience and yours, however, is that his family is genuinely odd: they look and act like something out of a Charles Addams cartoon, from their dramatic attire — Mom dresses like Morticia Addams, Dad like an undertaker — to their penchant for ghoulish pranks. Though Sabato desperately wants to date, his family members do their best to sabotage each new relationship by staging ridiculous scenes in front of his girlfriend du jour. In the first chapter, for example, Mom blithely picks up the family cat and announces that she’ll be “cooking something special on account of our guest,” while in a later chapter, his parents don hockey masks for a visit to the video store where he works. (Note to fellow animal saps: no cats were harmed in the making of this comic.)

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Rin-Ne, Vol. 1

I read a Rumiko Takahashi manga for the same reason I watch an Alfred Hitchcock thriller: I know exactly what I’m going to get. Certain plot elements and motifs recur throughout each artist’s work — Hitchcock loves pairing a brittle blond with a rakish cad on the run from authorities, for example, while Takahashi loves pairing a female “seer” with a demonically-tinged boy — yet the craft with which Hitchcock and Takahashi develop such tropes prevents either artist’s work from feeling stale or repetitive. Takahashi’s latest series gives ample proof that while she may have a limited repertory, she’s the undisputed master of the supernatural mystery.

Sakura Mamiya and Rinne Rokudo, Rin-ne‘s oil-and-water leads, are a classic Takahashi pair: Sakura is a seemingly ordinary teenager with the ability to see ghosts, while Rinne is a hot-headed boy who’s part human and part shinigami. The two meet cute in Sakura’s tenth-grade classroom when Rinne arrives to claim his long-empty seat. “Looks like he made it,” Sakura whispers to a friend before realizing that she’s the only person who can see the tall, flame-haired boy in a fancy ceremonial robe. Sakura then watches Rinne  attempt to banish an enormous Chihuahua demon to the afterlife — an exorcism that goes horribly (and comically) awry when the dog’s spirit merges with the spirit of a love-starved teen. Now forced to contend with an even more powerful, angry ghost, Rinne uses Sakura to lure it to the Wheel of Reincarnation, an enormous portal that separates the material and spirit worlds.

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Liveblogging the Shonen Sunday Site

As an experiment, I sat down this morning and read all five series posted on Viz’s new Shonen Sunday website, recording my thoughts as I went along. Before I share my impressions, I wanted to say a few word about the site itself. I’m pleased to report that it’s colorful and easy to navigate; each series is accompanied by helpful plot summaries, character guides, and fun blog entries by Viz staff members. I’m a little dubious about the “reviews” that appear on each series’ home page, as they all seem to be written by the same three enthusiastic teenagers; I noticed few, if any, genuinely critical reviews, nor did I find any that proved helpful in deciding whether or not I’d be interested in the storylines. Perhaps that reflects a moderator’s vigilance (no flamerz allowed!), or perhaps it confirms what I discovered: some of these series are pretty damn good.

The Plot: “In a mythical world where humans and gods co-exist, a ceremony marking the new governing princess is about to occur for the first time in 60 years. Only a girl from the Hime Clan may take this position, but the lack of females born to this family means that a boy called Arata must pose for the role. Meanwhile in modern-day Japan, a boy named Arata Hinohara is starting his new life in high school. He wants to put memories of his difficult past behind him, but things aren’t going to be simple when he discovers a mysterious connection to the first Arata…”

The Low-Down: Yuu Watase is an old pro, and it really shows in the first chapter of this cross-dressing adventure. In just thirty pages, she establishes the main premise of the series, introduces us to our principal hero and villain, and throws readers a major curveball in the final scene. Like Rumiko Takahashi, Watase has great comedic chops; her characters find themselves in stock situations (e.g. Arata accidentally splashes down in a hot spring filled with beautiful young bathers, with predictable results), yet these scenes are surprisingly funny, thanks to Watase’s first-rate timing. Her artwork, too, is a big plus. She draws costumes and settings with the kind of loving detail that makes her fantasy realm seem like a real place, while her fight scenes are a model of clarity, efficiency, and grace.

Will I continue to follow it? Yes — if the first chapter is any indication of what’s to come, then Arata should be a very entertaining mix of action and comedy.

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PR: New Rumiko Takahashi Series Debuts 4/22

With InuYasha finally laid to rest (the series, I mean… that’s not a spoiler!), Rumiko Takahashi has begun work on a new series, Rin-Ne. The series will be released simultaneously in Japanese and English, with new chapters posted every week at Takahashi’s official website, The Rumic World (not to be confused with the excellent fan site Rumic World). Read on for details.

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