Clover is the tale of a psychic girl and a former black ops soldier who embark on a journey together through a Steampunk setting. They both carry heavy burdens of love and loss that bisect in an unexpected way as they outrun armed forces that want them stopped by any means necessary.

Sue and Kazuhiko

Characters
Kazuhiko Fay Ryu – a former black ops agent who was dragged back into the force to complete one final mission.
Sue – the world’s only four-leaf clover, making her the most powerful psychic. Grew up solitary in a room with mechanical animals as friends until she made contact with Ora.
Ora – a singer and Kazuhiko’s girlfriend, now deceased. Has strange ties with Sue.
Gingetsu – a black ops soldier and former two-leaf clover.
Ran – one of two remaining three-leaf clovers. Lives with Gingetsu (take that as you will).

Ran (left) and Gingetsu (right) are separated by a wall with ornate windows

Setting
Like with any CLAMP story, the setting deserves some exploration. This is a world where teleportation is equivalent to a taxi service and a strange shadow government works to control and contain psychics.

The Steampunk setting is bleak and fantastical: full of dark contrasts and fascinating machinery. Even the armed robots that guard Sue look like cute, fluffy animals in clown suits. The world works in its own manner and is unforgiving of readers who have trouble keeping up.

Ora doing what she loves most: singing

Strongest Character
Taken as I was with Ran, Ora is undeniably the strongest character. She has the most powerful effect on the other characters and acts as silent motivation for Sue’s journey. She evokes the most sympathy as the story unfolds: the story works backwards, first showing her as dead and terribly missed and then working back to a compassionate mentorship towards Sue and absolutely in love with Kazuhiko.

Twin three-leaf clovers: Ran (C) and A

Strongest Scene
This one is a toss-up between Ora’s death and Ran’s final meeting with his creepy twin brother. From the beginning of the story, we know Ora is dead. So when the tale works backwards, we are prepared for the fact that she is not long for this world. She even reveals to the reader that she is a one-leaf clover: a psychic whose only ability is to know the exact day she will die.

That day approaches and she is tense. Her love for Sue and Kazuhiko gets expressed so strongly that the recipients begin to worry for her. Despite all this, she still gets on stage to perform and accept her fate.

Meanwhile, in his own story, Ran is revealed as a three-leaf clover: one of two in this world. The other remaining is his twin brother as the death of the third three-leaf hangs over their heads. It’s no secret that A, Ran’s twin brother, killed off the third clover and Ran escapes his glass prison to avoid a similar fate.

Walls don’t keep a powerful psychic back for long as A ventures into the world to capture Ran. And in typical CLAMP fashion, A is the creepy-maybe-in-love with-his-brother type who wants to keep Ran forever. Their confrontation is a bloody one sprinkled with plenty of psycho as Ran tries to talk his brother down from a fit of titanic proportions.

CLAMP’s art style remains the same with Sue, but changes with Ora

Art
It’s CLAMP: the girls are skinny and wispy and the men have tiny heads and huge shoulders, and yet it all still looks so beautiful. Although, Ora is definitely all lady: she has a curvy figure, powerful facial expressions and huge lips.

The pretty art is made even more beautiful by the full-color, glossy, gallery pictures sprinkled throughout the book. The artist obviously loves her own work and is aware that fans want to see more.

The cover of the omnibus, as published by Dark Horse

Cover Art
Everything on the cover is fitting: a full-color picture of Sue surrounded by clovers of different leaf-varieties. Sue looks rather sweet and mild as she sits there without boots on. However, the picture isn’t as stunning or evocative as the full-color gallery pictures inside the book.

I’d like to just make a mention here about paper quality: the gallery pictures are printed on glossy paper, which in the publishing industry is a very expensive commodity. The paper for the actual comic is the highest quality I’ve ever seen: it’s thick, smooth photo paper that will maintain its bright white color indefinitely. A lot of love went into this omnibus, and no expense was spared for the materials.

If more manga publishers went this route, these books would last forever, but publishers would quickly run themselves bankrupt with the unnecessary expenses. So thank you, Dark Horse, for publishing this at top-quality and proving that you really care about the quality of your manga.

Back Cover Summary
The summary tries its best to make sense of the puzzle that is Clover. Guys, I’ve read this story three times over and I’m still not sure I get it. The summary explains things in plainer terms while using brilliant, descriptive words. They call this world “baroque” and “retro-tech,” which are always nice terms to see being used.

Dark Horse goes so far as to explain that this story was republished as an omnibus in celebration of CLAMP’s 20th anniversary and that they included lots of never-before-seen extras. It gives the impression that Dark Horse really admires the stories it publishes.

An example of the bizarre architecture

Who Will Enjoy This?
Fans of obscure and confusing Sci-fi should adore this story. It’s like a giant riddle that only ever reveals little pieces at a time. The story expects you to keep up and if you get left behind, well, that’s your own fault.

Limited character attachment is built and though many characters are explored they’re never explored quite deeply enough on an emotional level for me.

Also, this story is adult. Ora sits on Kazuhiko’s lap often and sexual references are batted around with ease. This isn’t naughty like Chobits: it’s just like hearing adults speak.

I think this story is meant to appeal more to men because of the strong action aspects and slightly raunchy dialog. However, CLAMP remains purely CLAMP in its themes and characterization. Also, “Kazuhiko Fay Ryu”? Fay? Did you run out of names, CLAMP?

Regrets
CLAMP, although I commend your effort with these roses, I can no longer imagine a working relationship between us. I’m grateful you still find it in your heart to care by presenting me with something so lovingly packaged.

However, this story shows me that you still think you’re too good for me. We have different interests, different loves, and no amount of pleading will change that.

It was wonderful to see this side of yourself once again. It has opened me to consider that maybe we can be friends. But it will be many years before I can bring myself to trust you again.

It’s the beginning of a new year, which in TV Land means it’s off-season! The first show to catch my eye this off-season was the mystery/horror anime based on Ayatsuji Yukito’s novel. Let’s dig in to the darker side of the new year with Another!

Long story short, ninth grade’s class three had a Mary Sue named Misaki who had a supposed accident and died. But the students of this class acted as if she never left, going so far as to have her included ultimately in their graduation ceremony. Cue equally creepy theme song.

Sakakibara Koichi starts off his new life in the town of Yomiyama in the hospital after becoming ill. His dad is working as a researcher in India, his mother is dead, so he’s living with his older sister and grandmother in their hometown. He’s also soon to start his eighth grade year at Yomiyama North Junior High School (Yomi North). Five minutes in and we know the entire backstory. For those of you going into writing, take note: that’s how it’s done.

The class representatives from eighth grade’s class three have come to (rather awkwardly) visit Koichi in the hospital to wish him well. These mostly expressionless but kindhearted kids head out after an (also awkward) questioning if Koichi has ever lived in Yomiyama, especially so after shaking his hand.

On the elevator, Koichi bumps into a mysterious girl going to floor B2 named Misaki Mei. The next morning Koichi’s dad calls and they talk about his recent collapsed lung, which is apparently hereditary. Playing it off like it’s nothing, Koichi’s dad wishes him luck on his first day of school. Oh, and Koichi owns a parrot named Mei, go figure.

Koichi introduces himself to the class, and from his seat notices Misaki in the class room. His lunch is taken up by his classmates bombarding him with questions about his sickness, life in Tokyo, so on and so forth. With an strange glare from the class rep, a student offers Koichi a tour of the campus. During gym, Koichi sits out with a boy who has a heart disease preventing him from being physical. Later, a girl with a sprained ankle (this school is riddled with injuries apparently) comes to him to talk, and when he asks about Misaki stiffens up and plays dumb to it.

Seeing Misaki on the roof, Koichi runs up to meet her and starts asking questions. Coldly she tells him to stop questioning her and not talk to her again. Oh and the rest of the school associates Koichi’s name with death B.T.Dubs. She then takes her leave.

A terrible rainstorm starts after school. During the car ride home Koichi sees Misaki alone and unprotected walking in the rain. Lost in thought, we jump to credits.

2011 is coming to a close this week, so this is the last Sampler of the year. No I’m not going to talk about a New Year’s anime (and not just because I couldn’t find one.) I’d like to round off the year with a show that, sadly, not too many people have heard of. This is probably my personal favorite older anime. Today we take a trip back to 1988 with Gunbuster.

A little background information may help explain some of the shows…quirks. In today’s terms, the animation isn’t exactly par. But as far as late 80′s anime goes, it’s actually pretty decent. The director of the show, Hideaki Anno, was also the director of Neon Genesis Evangelion (which oddly enough was also set in 2015.) The name of the show comes from two sources: The tennis anime “Aim for the Ace!” and “Top Gun,” and its plot is based of Aim for the Ace! (although many parallels to Top Gun are in it.) Anime in the 80s was also very different from modern, so take every quirk with that in mind.

So we get a cute little monologue from a young girl who tells about how her father is a defender of Earth who fights aliens in space on the ship Luxion, which he is the captain of. Fade to the future. Noriko’s dad died when his ship was overrun by the aliens, but she still wants to be a pilot just like her dad.

I may be exaggerating, but this opening has to be one of the most stereotypical ever made. It’s not only incredibly 80′s, but fits almost to a tee the cliches found in anime openings. Of course you only have to sit through a minute and a half of that, then back to the show where Takaya Noriko is enviously watching the mech pilots training. When I first saw this one thing kept running through my head: Push ups? Sit ups? Jump rope? They’re giant robots, what do they need to exercise for? But apparently these sisyphean work outs are impressive to Noriko.

But Noriko is at least a master jump roper outside of a mech, of course she still gets made fun of by the people who can actually use them. The senior student, Amano Kazumi, steps in to save her from the ridiculing. This prompts an overly-dramatic, trance-like romance moment where violins play and everything is overly bright and floral/bubble patterns fill the background. Seriously, out of nowhere this happens too. You’d think that all of a sudden it was a love story between the two. Anyway she gives Noriko a pep talk and a hair ribbon then leaves.

So now we find out that this is a special school made to train youth in using mechs so they can help fight the aliens, and two students are going to get picked to go up and be representatives of the school. They also have a new coach, Ohta Koichiro. Instead of an introduction, Coach has their auto-balance disabled and makes them run fifty laps, except Noriko has to do it out of her mech because she couldn’t use it properly. So he’s every gym coach ever.

The next day starts off with a surprise phone call for Noriko telling her she has been picked to represent the school. No student, including her or Kazumi, can believe that the most incompetent person probably on Earth was picked for such a high honor. When she goes to complain, Kazumi gets yelled at by the Coach for doubting him, and also reveals he is a survivor of Noriko’s dad’s ship (which comes with an awesome eye-scar apparently.)

Sick of all the vandalizing of her mech, mocking, and pranks by her fellow students, Noriko goes to Coach to ask him to pick someone else. He takes her on a walk to show Kazumi running up a giant staircase wearing iron clogs, and lectures her on hard work. Thus beginning the amazing training montage. For full effect I recommend muting the actual show and playing Joe Esposito’s “You’re the Best” for the entirety of the montage.

Noriko’s being good at stuff prompts another student who doesn’t even have a name to go into a jealous rage and challenge her to a mech battle after class. She then spends the next two minutes or so beating the living daylight out of Noriko. To stop her sensory overload, Noriko turns off her mech’s monitor and fights in blackout. Gone in a completely over the top psychotic rampage, nameless girl takes out her blade and tries to stab Noriko. Instead Noriko dodges by jumping up in the air and performing the Inazuma Kick (Lightning Kick), which may be one of the greatest mech series attacks ever (as the series progresses anyway.)

Girl finally calms down and accepts defeat. Now that Noriko has near-killed a fellow student in an illegal on campus fight, everyone is happy and trusts her completely. Her and Kazumi fly off in a private rocket ship into space to join their fellow pilots.

Mech shows may not be your cup of tea, but I do highly recommend watching the rest of this series and its sequel, Diebuster (also known as Gunbuster 2,) both of which combined is only twelve episodes. Firstly because the ending of Diebuster is just absolutely amazing, and secondly to expand your anime reaches and explore new genres. There’s more to anime than any Top 10 of the 21st Century list you may have read. Go watch some older shows like this, you may just end up loving them as much as modern stuff.

It’s Christmas time here at the Fan. As if you couldn’t tell by all the ear-murdering Christmas music covers blasting in every single store. In light of the season, I picked an anime that when I started I could’ve sworn couldn’t exist. That’s right, an anime [loosely] about Santa.

When I decided I wanted to review an anime about Christmas, I figured I was licked to begin with. I mean, I’m trying to find a show about Christmas from the country that made a picture of Santa on the cross! But after about a minute of Googling I managed to come across Itsudatte My Santa!, and I can’t say I was disappointed; it was almost exactly how I imagined it would be.

I don’t know if it’s just me, but the first thing I noticed within ten seconds of watching is the opening exposition being disturbingly similar to that of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. If anything go and watch the first ten seconds, it’s uncanny. So Mr. Depressing Narrator Man talks for a bit about children’s fantasies of Santa being crushed at a young age, and how he never had a Christmas because his parents were always away on important business. Instead his grandma made him a giant cake each year, and that cake for one made him even more depressed. To top off this beautiful speech, he denounces Santa’s existence. This guy’s kind of a downer.

Before the credits can even finish fading away, a conversation between two teenagers, a guy and girl, with the girl inviting the guy to spend the night with her, which is apparently a huge scandal judging by the surrounding crowd’s reactions. To not look like some sort of pervert, she then smacks him to the floor. Reputation Saved. Then she claims to be Santa and a pinnacle of purity that would never do something so terrible. She even got a free police escort.

The more she speaks, the more she seems like Christmas’s version of Himeko from Pani Poni Dash; can’t decide if that’s good or bad. After Kyon guy attempting to run away from Himeko girl, he blurts out he hates Christmas because he was born on December 24th and named Santa because of it, which is a pretty good reason. Her reaction has to be my quote of the week though:

Well fine. If he doesn’t think he needs me to make him happy, I’ll just stick to him like glue until he finally decides to cheer up some.

The logic is painfully infallible there. Que stalking montage! (Oh by the way, she can conjure any item beginning in “san” because of Santa magic.) Naturally though, running blindly around the city is a bad idea. Not long after he starts running, Santa bumps into a gang leader and forces him to drop his three month pre-ordered cake, cus that’s what gangs do right? Eat fancy cake? So naturally he beats up Santa, then gets beat up by Mai (girl.) After all that hooplah Santa gives in to spending the night with Mai.

Within an hour or two, Santa goes from total recluse to sitting outside the [see-through] shower talking to Mai as she bathes. This cycle of manic depressiveness occurs frequently. After a long conversation of explaining his lack of Christmas spirit, Mai makes them a feast, which, as expected, goes over terribly. Long story short they end up on the balcony and she kisses him to transfer “happiness.” Almost immediately he gets a call from his crush inviting him to a party.

So after a day of saying how she’ll make him happy, Mai succeeds with making that phone call happen. But then she yells at him for having the audacity to going to that party instead of being with her; Mai > Happiness. And this is where it gets almost just too much: Santa goes to his crushes house and she claims to never remember calling him, and we find out that Santa apparently never took any of their invitations to other parties, and they have a birthday party for him every Christmas.

Now that he finally has his chance to being happy, spending Christmas with friends, and dating his crush, he runs away back to Mai. He “returns her happiness” by kissing her, conveniently at midnight. If I said it almost got too much earlier, I was wrong. This is where it really gets bad. With a magical girl-style transformation she turns into her “true form” a.k.a. a pin up girl in a near-lingerie Santa outfit (but not without an up-skirt panty shot of course. And that’s not even mentioning the actual transformation itself.)

The newly transformed Santa Mai takes Santa around the world to deliver presents with her. Along the way we see the giant army of other Santa men and pinup Santa girls also delivering presents. She also makes a stop at Santa’s parents’ work so he can finally see them get a phone call from them literally 100 feet away. Now that they’ve made up in their own weird way, Santa is finally happy and goes flying off into the night with Mai on her sleigh.

It’s Thanksgiving Eve! Although most of you probably had a traditional mini-feast with friends and/or family, I’d like to dedicate this Sampler to anyone who said “Forget it, I’m eating out tonight.” Let’s dig in to an anime about one of the strangest restaurants in anime: Working!!, also known as Wagnaria!! to those watching it in America.

Unfortunately the show starts off in a very play-it-safe manner, with a little demo of the average waiting process at the Wagnaria restaurant. A snippet explanation of the current staff situation of the restaurant is awkwardly placed into a rather unnecessary conversation, and behind the scenes the assistant manager assigns ironically-named Poplar Taneshima, an elementary school looking high schooler, to find part-timers. Now I don’t know much about running a restaurant, but by the end of the show I counted somewhere between nine and eleven employees, which is a large staff compared to the restaurants like Wagnaria that I’ve been too.

Though the opening song doesn’t sit well with me, I have to give them kudos for going with a montage of Poplar trying to find recruits. Fortunately for Poplar the opening can only go on a minute and a half and her search is over with the finding of Takanashi Sota, even if he only accepted the offer because of some loli complex. The lethargic manager, Shirafuji Kyoko, gets her thirty seconds of screen time and promptly leaves.

Poplar shows Takanashi the basics of being an employee. During this we get short thirty second introductions for Sato Jun, the quite-but-kind chef; Soma Hiroomi, the more talkative chef; and Todoroki Yachiyo, a katana-wielding waitress. A rather nice system of getting the main cast introduced in the least painful way, I’d say.

Poplar comes to Takanashi for solace after someone calls her a middle schooler, which he responds to with a short joke. This prompts a practical staff meeting around him about him being a lolicon, and ends with him indirectly comparing Poplar to a daphnia. But because he hasn’t dug himself a deep enough hole, he manages to call the twenty-eight year old manager “pretty old.” That’s how everyone likes to spend their first day on the job, right? Being called a lolicon, insulting everyone’s favorite employee, and calling their boss old. Not to be take that comment sitting down, Shirafuji schedules him to seven day shifts for what seems to be two or three weeks.

This is a Daphnia, by the way

Apparently Shirafuji is just insane in general though, as we see from her bluntly insulting a customer and kicking then emptying the bank account of a punk who picked on Poplar and called her a “rotting [explicit].” But it’s okay, because her bank robbers will “do it so it won’t make the news,” a very reassuring fact. In order to get on her good side again, Takanashi takes back calling her old and calls her childish, which gets him only six days of work the next week.

While checking the scheduling list, Takanashi notices that in his almost month-straight of work he hasn’t met a certain Inami Mahiru. Before Poplar can explain the elusive employee, she’s called back to work. I’m not sure if time lapses are common in anime (leave a comment [hehe, people don't comment...] if you know if they are or not,) so the “A few days later” stamp seems pretty lazy and clever at the same time. This new day seems like any other, save for the strange girl lurking around the back rooms. A cutaway to the schedule shows that today the mysterious Inami is on duty.

Everyone loves a good parallel action sequence. We get multiple cuts from Inami changing to Takanashi’s events leading up to their encounter. On his way he notices the scheduling of Inami for that day and is excited to get to meet her. She walks in and his excitement and greeting are cut short by a mach-speed punch to the face. Did they forget to mention Inami is an androphobe (afraid of men)? Of course everyone else expected this and carries on with their tasks while the sound of banging and screaming goes on, except Poplar and Yachiyo because they remembers that they forgot to tell the two employees about each other. Shirafuji also realizes she scheduled the two together on accident. Whoops.

Roll the credits But not before an internal recap monologue by Takanashi. Fortunately or unfortunately, I’m not sure, the ending matches the opening with a slideshow of screen caps retelling the episode’s plot over some catchy music.]]> http://918thefan.com/2011/manorexics-anime-sampler-working/feed/ 2 http://918thefan.com/2011/manorexics-anime-sampler-hunter-x-hunter/ http://918thefan.com/2011/manorexics-anime-sampler-hunter-x-hunter/#comments Wed, 09 Nov 2011 18:31:18 +0000 TheManorexic http://918thefan.com/?p=25419

You gotta love when they take an old anime and revamp it to make it cleaner and more canon. I know I do. My favorite example of this has to be Hellsing Ultimate, even if it takes a year to make a single OVA. But this article isn’t about that, it’s about another ongoing revamp: Hunter x Hunter.

Many were expecting this show to take place after the OVA, but this is a complete do over to try and make the show more manga-accurate. Now I’m not one to do my homework, so I didn’t go read the manga and fact-check to see if they accomplished this, but I have heard from consultants that they did a good job with the canon. Really the only problem I have with the show on a technical scale is the opening is so ridiculously cliché that it seems like it got the storyboard from an “every anime opening ever” type video.

Like many good shows, Hunter x Hunter has something people like to call “backstory.” This is given to us here in the form of narration. We now know that hunters are incredible people who hunt for the mysterious and mythic. Next we jump to a boy wearing leaves sitting in a tree fishing, as boys tend to do. In town two men talk to Mito (it isn’t said, but this is Gon’s aunt) about how she promised Gon he could take the Hunter Exam if he could catch the Lord of the Lake. Who says Asian parents have high expectations?

So Gon catches the fish in what I would think is the single most intense reeling in ever, combining fishing, acrobatics, and some form of martial arts. But the thing that impresses me most is the assumed hundred pound fish being dragged on a line wrapped around a tree that never snaps the pole. Seriously, he must me using an adamantium fishing pole or something there. After he returns to town we find out that catching the Lord of the Lake is a pretty big deal, especially since a twelve year old did it when five men couldn’t. So Mito lets Gon leave for the exam, and they make a pretty intense pinky swear that goes something like this:

Pinky swear made. Whoever breaks their promise has to swallow a thousand needes. Sealed with a kiss.

Sending off your nephew whose parents either died or abandoned him onto a boat full of vicious strangers to take the most intense test on the planet. Seems legit. This boat has a few dozen very colorful characters, but only four really stick out. Now here’s a basic anime rule: If the show cuts away to two insignificant to the current scene characters, they’re gonna be important later. Here we see just that, with two cut aways to Kurapika and Leorio. We also meet the picked-on clumsy deckhand, Katsuo, and the drunkard captain.

I don’t know when you learn that cracking your nose increases your smelling sense to that of a blood hound, but Gon did at some point. He is able to tell a massive storm is coming with his super sense. During this storm, the boat gets tossed every which way, and like anyone, the captain rides up the hundred foot wave and over it. Gotta love anime physics. After all this the only people not unconscious or sick are our five notable cast members mentioned before, surprise surprise.

The captain calls Gon, Kurapika, and Leorio into the helm for a little interview. He asks why they want to become hunters, a question to which Leorio and Kurapika refuse to answer. After revealing his boat ride is the first part of the Hunter Exam, Kurapika reveals he is the remaining member of his clan and wants to kill the gang who killed his clan and Leorio answers that he’s in it for the money. Leorio is angered by not being spoken to with an honorific by Kurapika and threatens to kill the last of his “filthy clan,” to which Kurapika follows him on deck to fight.

The ship is headed towards a giant waterspout and the crew members try to lower the sails to avoid it while the other two fight. Because they’re awesome, the notable five are completely impervious to the effects of giant waves and sideways boat. But before the fight begins, a huge gust knocks the deckhands off the sail’s rope and Katsuo is left to dangle in the wind until he is thrown overboard. But it was a deus ex machina wind so he was blown between the two fighters who reach overboard to try and catch him but miss. So Gon jumps over as well, grabs Katsuo, and the other two grab Gon. Being awesome has its perks.

Nothing brings friends together like saving their lives. Kurapika and Leorio forgive each other, and the captain is so impressed with their teamwork that he instantly passes them and agrees to drop them off at the port nearest the next part of the exam. Thus ending the episode in a bright and optimistic mood. That is, until the narrator talks again and says

And so begins Gon’s journey to follow in his father’s footsteps and become a Hunter.

rant Really? Now this is gonna sound very ignorant, but why do we say this is the beginning of Gon’s journey? Did we totally forget about Kurapika and Leorio? Why not say “And so begins Kurapika’s journey to avenge his murdered clan” or “And so begins Leorio’s journey to get the money needed to live the life he always wanted,” or maybe they’re all starting one collective journey. Just saying, it makes it seem like every character in this episode is never going to be heard from again and it’ll just revolve around Gon’s random encounters. /rant

Characters
Yuri Shibuya – a 15-year-old Japanese student who is typical in every way until he one day gets sucked into a toilet and comes out in another world. He has a strong sense of justice.
Conrad Weller – Yuri’s godfather who lives in this other world. He is half-human, half-demon and he acts as mentor to Yuri. He’s the middle son of Cecile, the former Maoh.
Wolfram von Bielefeld – Yuri’s rival who, under bizarre circumstances, winds up engaged to Yuri. He has a beautiful face, but a short temper. He’s the youngest son of Cecile.
Gwendal von Voltaire – The strong, silent eldest son of Cecile. His cold exterior belies his kindness. He enjoys sewing and puts up with his insane friend who likes to use him as a guinea pig for her inventions.
Gunter von Kleist – This guy is supposed to be the royal aid, but he seems more like Yuri’s personal screaming fangirl. Every scene he’s in is immediately reduced to something over-dramatic and intentionally funny – though for me, it always falls very short of humor. He’s like that annoying yaoi fangirl at a con who you can’t shake off.

There are more background characters that help add to the story, but there are too many to keep track of.

Clockwise from center: Yuri, Wolfram, Gwendal, Gunter, some guy named Josak, Conrad.

Synopsis
Yuri is your typical, baseball-loving Japanese high school student. One day, when fending off bullies attacking an acquaintance, he gets flushed down a toilet. He emerges Alice-in-Wonderland-style in a world with a Medieval-European themed world where demons and humans live side-by-side, but rarely amicably. Yuri is crowned the king (Maoh) of the demons and I guess that means king of the whole country or something – it wasn’t really clear.

He’s met with opposition, not only from himself as he tries to explain that he’s just a typical human boy, but also from two of the former Maoh’s sons: Wolfram and Gwendal. Ala Yu Yu Hakusho, Yuri goes into a demon form, kicks everyone into submission, and then passes out, forgetting the whole ordeal ever happened.

The rest of the series covers Yuri’s misadventures as his underdeveloped common sense and overdeveloped sense of justice land him in the most bizarre circumstances. Interestingly, he tries to correct any unfairness he finds, but that doesn’t usually fix the deeper problem. For example, a town’s economy has fallen apart because it has no water. He brings water to this town, but a volume later he finds out that the town’s economy still doesn’t exist even with water, and the townspeople are becoming prostitutes far from home to send money to their starving families.

There is a strong emphasis on cultural differences: for example, Yuri, Wolfram and Conrad are on a ship that gets boarded by pirates. Yuri and Wolfram hide in the closet (I see what you did there) and make a sudden noise that catches the attention of the pirates. Yuri tries meowing, but the pirates misinterpret the noise as a foul dragon-like beast that will surely eat them. Other fun cultural differences are that everyone eats with sporks and slapping someone is this world’s way of proposing to them.

Each character reacts to Yuri differently, but they all wind up feeling strongly for him. Gunter is, as I said, an insane fangirl. Gwendal at first despises Yuri for being a weak leader who does not believe in battle, but eventually sees the goal Yuri is aiming for. Gwendal eventually sees Yuri as something cute, if a bit strange. Conrad harbors mentor-like feelings for Yuri and always offers an explanation for cultural differences. Meanwhile, Wolfram transforms from rival to jealous and insecure fiancé around Yuri, who does not return his feelings.

From right to left: Yuri, Conrad and Wolfram clad in the style of this other world.

Strongest Character
Yuri, being the protagonist, is supposed to come across as a strong character what with his power as king and his strong sense of justice. However, the supporting characters nearly outshine him. It’s hard to ignore Gunter’s constant screaming, but the character who comes across most strongly is, in my opinion, Conrad.

Conrad acts as mentor and support to Yuri. He tries to teach Yuri the way of this world and he backs up the young king’s endeavors whenever possible. He’s always patient and explains things to Yuri in a subtle manner that is never demeaning. I didn’t catch this when I watched the anime, but it seems like Yuri’s connection to Conrad is stronger and is more positive than with any other character in the series.

Even though Wolfram’s jealousy and Gwendal’s softer side are amusing to see, Conrad is the strongest character in this series.

Conrad, the strongest character.

Strongest Scene
Due to a series of bizarre events, Yuri winds up imprisoned at a women’s camp for female elopers. The women are sentenced to lift and move heavy rocks in a mine to gather some kind of mineral. Yuri starts to carry out his sentence, but then sees what the prison guards do to the babies the female prisoners have given birth to.

These guards carry a bundle to the middle of the plain and begin to dig a grave for it, claiming that the child is dead. But then it starts wriggling and wheezing. They go about trying to bury it anyway. Yuri freaks out and goes into demon form, desperate to punish everyone involved in this prison camp.

Our heroes unwrap the baby and see that it’s been beaten nearly to death. The artist rendered bruises all over its body, and it was truly a startling sight to see in such a (somewhat) lighthearted series. Kyo Kara Maoh! definitely has its dark points, and so far this was the darkest.

SHOCKING IMAGE HAS BEEN REPLACED BY THIS PICTURE OF A CUTE CAT.

Art
“Classic” is the best word to describe this style. Every bit of it looks the typical anime style and it remains strong throughout the series. However, the characters in this other world have intricately detailed garments and wavy (rather than spiky) hair styles that make the main character seem average by comparison. (Of course, to them, Yuri is gorgeous and the rest of them are average, but whatever).

The style doesn’t change much throughout the series, for which I am grateful. Clothing gets the most attention and buildings/surroundings typically get glossed over, although architecture can be gorgeously detailed when the illustrator puts her mind to it.

Yuri and Wolfram in incredibly detailed clothing.

Cover Art
The covers are all full-color with illustrations that look just like the artwork in the rest of the manga. Each cover shows Yuri and his crew in some action-poses as he holds an item important to the storyline. For example, in volume 4 the cover shows Yuri and Gwendal handcuffed together and in volume 5 they get arrested. It’s a bit preemptive, I think, to show something on one cover that doesn’t even happen until the next volume, but it’s the thought that counts.

Let me just add that the material used for the cover is some kind of textured paper rather than the typical glossy cover. It’s not terribly durable, but it’s pleasant against the fingers and for some inexplicable reason, I love it.

The English-language publication of volume 1.

Back Cover Summary
It wouldn’t be a Tokyopop manga if the back cover summary weren’t completely befuddling, offensive and/or full of gratuitous exclamation marks! For some reason, Tokyopop believed that this series was a gender-bender. I would attempt to explain to Tokyopop why it is incorrect on every level, except that dear, sweet, misguided Tokyopop is no longer with us. Let us have a moment of silence for our departed friend…

… Silence is over. The summary sucks. It’s not the worst I’ve seen – I think that one goes to Shinobi Life. And eventually Tokyopop starts to describe some of the things that actually happen in the volumes, though with the sort of dry, clinical edge of a doctor writing his prescriptions.

Author’s Notes
Kyo Kara Maoh! is based off a novel by the same name. The author of the original novel, Tomo Takabayashi, leaves notes at the end of each volume for the manga artist. The manga author, Temari Matsumoto, responds to these memos and that’s about the extent of the author’s notes. Ironically, the two spend more time talking about the anime adaptation than anything else, and the interactions aren’t very interesting.

Though met with resistance, Yuri eventually becomes the new Maoh.

Who Will Enjoy This?
This series seems to have been catered for yaoi fans of all varieties. Most of the humor is found in the reactions other characters have to Yuri and his behavior: Wolfram and Gunter seem to serve as the main comic relief with their antics and jealousy.

However, this is a generally lighthearted series with a few dark moments and it reminds me strangely of Yu Yu Hakusho with the whole demon-transformation-thing and the traveling-to-other-worlds-thing. I wouldn’t write this off as useless yaoi trash in any way and the series has the potential to please anyone who enjoys simple stories with large doses of good-nature thrown into the mix.

Altogether, this series is like a lemon sorbet: surprisingly tangy with a nice flavor, but not terribly filling. It’s a pleasant reading experience, but it’s no full-course meal.

How Yuri “proposed” to Wolfram. Note: this is probably what the fangirls will do to me after reading my review.

Regrets
I regret reading this series immediately after reading Rasetsu. Kyo Kara Maoh! has a meandering plot that doesn’t seem to be headed in any sort of strong direction. It’s a pleasant read, though insubstantial.

My other regret is that this was a Tokyopop title, so when Tokyopop went under they weren’t able to finish publishing this series. Volume 7 out of 9 was the last one released and it saddens me to think I have no legitimate way to pursue the next two volumes (yet).

Halloween, the time of year where everyone gets to dress up and go around asking for candy while completely oblivious to the Coal Tar surrounding them. Now I’m not a demon myself, but I have a feeling that October 31 is one of their favorite days of the year. So in order to get in the Halloween spirit, today we’ll take a look at Blue Exorcist, the story of the son of none other than the Demon King himself.

One of the hardest parts of making any story is finding out the best way to start it so that it manages to hook the audience immediately. Some shows like to start with the opening theme right off the bat, others may begin with a huge scene snippet that is elaborated on after the opening, while still others decide to start with a bunch of monks chanting in a candle-lit basement and get caught on blue fire one-by-one. Blue Exorcist went with the latter. The final words of the leader priest is a choked “Demons…”, which zooms out to show a church glowing bright blue and then we cut what appears to be the final blow of a fight between some teenagers. They losers run off and a dove flying toward the horizon transitions us to the logo. Not bad for a minute and forty seconds.

Personally I have mixed feelings about this next scene’s setup. Almost right away we are introduced to what we can assume to be our main three characters for the time being: The teenage hoodlum Okumura Rin, his paragon twin brother Okumura Yukio, and Father/Reverend Fujimoto Shiro, whom also happens to be their legal guardian. These three are introduced in such a clean way, as are the workers of the church, but then we get the awkward and out of character speech from a worker to directly characterize the brothers. Sometimes having background characters tell us what we should know about the characters works, but not when it makes them look like some loonies needlessly pointing out to themselves out loud how different the brothers are. Luckily this is redeemed with some quick foreshadowing when Rin’s yelling makes a heater explode in a burst of blue flames.

While talking to Yukio, Rin gives us a well-placed flashback to explain just why he beat up the stereotypical street rat named Shiratori. It would seem that the punk was shooting doves with a crossbow, because that’s just what all the cool kids are doing nowadays. Since the workers don’t have anything to do (like their jobs and whatnot,) they went out and scheduled a job interview for Rin behind his back. They even shirked their duties long enough to gather some formal-wear for him. After strangling himself trying to tie a tie, Rin sets off for his new job. But not before another bit of strategically placed foreshadowing with the priest and a mystery family which explains that Father Fujimoto is also an exorcist, and some father-son bonding via tying a tie.

Roll the first day on the job montage! Rin manages to start off every job doing great, but inevitably screws it all up by the end of the task. But he manages to catch a break cooking fried soba by tweaking the recipe a bit and impresses the boss so much that he got the job. All goes well for him until he sees a girl chasing a scarf blowing in the wind and catches it for her, recognizing her as the girl who stopped by the church earlier that day. Before he gives the girl her scarf, some sort of monkey-looking creature appears on it and runs off with it. He chases after it (because he really wants to return that scarf apparently) and ends up trashing the store he just got hired at during the pursuit. Yui, the owner of the scarf, somehow teleports to where the monkey-thing stops running and even though Rin saves her from being crushed, is ultimately fired from his job.

Yui and her father decide to pay a visit to the church to give thanks for Rin saving her life. Yui and Rin try to explain that she was being bullied, but not by humans, which is reasonably disregarded by the father. It’s not until Father Fujimoto asks him to believe them for his daughter’s sake that he plays along, and they depart. Before getting to go to bed, Rin is shown the bill sent by his previous boss for destroying the store, since getting fired and missing his favorite dinner just wasn’t enough of a punishment for getting a girl’s scarf back and saving her life. But we don’t have enough foreshadowing, so Father Fujimoto goes downstairs to look at the sword locked in the mysterious red box.

Suddenly, demons. Rin wakes up and is greeted outside by a swarm of what he thinks are bugs of some sort that no one else seems to pay attention to. He is then payed a friendly visit by Shiratori, who stereotypically takes him under a bridge to talk. The first thing we see is a cutaway to a fire in a barrel with multiple sticks in it, foreshadowing? I think so. Somehow Shiratori comes from a rich family whose name can’t afford to be tarnished by news that their son has the psychopathic tendency to kill innocent animals. Even though the silencing fee could cover his obligation to the store, Rin declines it. Shiratori then makes the mistake of insulting Yukio, which is followed by Rin bashing him in the face once more.

As it turns out, punching Shiratori was a terrible idea, who knew? At this point you would’ve noticed the black bugs have been especially plentiful around Shiratori, which may be a hint to their nature, for these are a breed of demons called Coal Tar. After being struck, he goes in a rage-induced transformation to a demon as the bugs start a frenzy around him. He has his three henchmen hold down Rin as he reaches for the foreshadowed metal rod in the bucket fire and contemplates how he should torture Rin.

I did mention that Rin was Satan’s son, right? Right before he is burnt by the glowing hot pole, Rin explodes into a mass of, yep you guessed it, blue flames. The henchmen run away, but Shiratori only seems pleased by the outburst. He says that blue flames are the calling card of Satan’s offspring and introduces himself as the demon Astaroth (a reference to biblical Astaroth, one of the Crowned Princes of Hell.) But before he is able to take Rin to Hell, Father Fujimoto steps in and exorcises him with great ease from Shiratori. He then explains the concept of the parallel worlds of human Assiah and demon Gehenna, and that Rin is Satan’s half-human son and many more will come to hunt him down because he revealed this. The episode is wisely ended with Father Fujimoto grabbing Rin by the arm and them starting off back home “To Be Continued” style.]]> http://918thefan.com/2011/manorexics-anime-sampler-blue-exorcist/feed/ 2 http://918thefan.com/2011/13-days-of-halloween-with-the-owl-in-the-rafters-day-6/ http://918thefan.com/2011/13-days-of-halloween-with-the-owl-in-the-rafters-day-6/#comments Mon, 24 Oct 2011 21:47:58 +0000 Tyto http://918thefan.com/?p=24279

Day 6 and we’re finally into the heat of it! In the past decade the zombie trend has really spread like a plague itself, but what many film goers and videogame fans don’t realize is that the zombies themselves aren’t the element of the trend that makes it so sensational. Quite the opposite, most of the adaptations of the trend tend toward goofy specialized mutant zombies, fast zombies, and more intelligent zombies, or even more animal-like zombies, or zombie lookalikes that aren’t actually undead, and they is all a product of people’s dissatisfaction with the boring limitations of the traditional zombie. What really makes the zombie fad so enticing as a gameplay and/or plot device has nothing to do with the zombies themselves, or even the element of the undead, but simply the combination of the swarm and viral elements that made the iconic zombie classics so terrifying, and the idea of a horde overtaking humanity so possible. On this principle, I’m going to go over the manga Bio-Meat: Nectar by Fujisawa Yuki as a “zombie story” done properly, and without any zombies at all.

At the end of the twenty-first century, Japan’s steadily escalating overpopulation, lack of resources, and threatened to collapse the entire nation. To prevent the social apocalypse of their nation a team of scientists developed the revolutionary salvation to Japan, a bio chemically engineered life-form called Bio-Meat, or B-M for short. This miracle invention quickly propelled the company behind the development of B-M into an international power house of both food and waste industries, and elevated them to the status of national icon, as the biggest industrial achievement of Japan in the new century.

I say both food and waste, because the B-M were designed as a source of food that feed off of nearly any kind of solid waste save for glass, fiberglass, concrete, and metals. Like piranhas, in a swarm they can devour a food source several times their own small size in matter of seconds. For reference, a single B-M is around the size of a small turkey or large chicken. All of this has put the B-M company at the wheel behind a solution to food shortages, opening up land for new housing development by eliminating trash dumps, and providing people with jobs building and maintaining the massive B-M containment and processing facilities, and generally fixing/saving the Japanese economy all in a staggeringly short amount of time.

The story, as I’m sure you could have guessed, hinges around the B-M escaping their containment facility during a routine transfer meant to ship a group of B-M from waste disposal to food manufacturing. Suddenly sightings of strange “pig-like” animals are reported across Tokyo and it isn’t long before the escaped Bio-Meat are identified, but all too late. The Japanese government is on the move to cover up any kind of scandals that might ruin the B-M name and lose credibility with the public. As the B-M begin to spread through the sewer systems and procreate in the wild, the uncontrolled outbreak very quickly begins to stack up casualties, as curious and ignorant civilians are unwittingly dragged to their gruesome deaths. All throughout this infestation, the story follows a group of middle school kids as they struggle to survive against all odds, while the city collapses all around them.

The main character is Maaya Kan, an Osaka native who recently moved to Tokyo with his single mother. He has an obtuse sense of humor and is quick to get into a fight, but has a big heart deep down. Second addition to the party is Kanomiya Marino, a young girl, abandoned by her parents, living with her grandmother and grandfather. She is the target of a lot of bullying at school and a notoriously compulsive liar, so when she is the first to see the B-M drag a woman’s corpse into a sewer, no one but Maaya believes her until the B-M show up at the school, and by then escape is virtually impossible. Maaya’s reliable, if brutally and critically honest wing man -and also arguably the rival for position of protagonist in the whole story- is the calm, collected, poker-faced, and at first seemingly cold-hearted Toujou Shingo, a boy notorious at school as a know it all, and as an exceptional athlete despite his modest size. Even in the face of the bizarre B-M outbreak, Shingo keeps his cool, and leads the team of ragtag pipsqueak survivors. Finally is Banba Yuu, something of a school bully, who originally hated Maaya, but warms up to the group after they all learn to rely on one another for the sake of survival. He may not have the grace or finesse of Shingo, or the heroic passion and determination of Maaya, but Banba has the brute strength and pride to lend to the team when the situation calls for some good old fashioned muscle.

The whole series takes place over the course of a decade, with one three year time skip after the first major outbreak, and then a seven year time skip after the second, dividing the story neatly into three major arcs covering three different B-M outbreaks. The third arc does take a good deal of time to build up some political drama and tension before actually setting the B-M loose again, so it could be argued that there are in fact 4 arcs, or 3.5. I don’t want to spoil any major twists, but I think it’s still pretty safe to give a breakdown of how each major story arc starts without ruining things; after all, the real appeal isn’t figuring out that the heroes survive in the end, it’s seeing just how they manage to do it.

The very first outbreak, as I mentioned already, starts when an earthquake disrupts a transport truck loading live Bio-Meat to be moved for processing into food. We cut away to see all the kids and Maaya’s mother living their normal lives and running into a number of truly detestable individuals. While their lives carry on as usual throughout the morning, the live B-M escape into Tokyo via the sewers and begin surfacing all around nearby suburbs by noon. At first we get some amusing horror standards, like seeing all the people the kids hate get killed off thanks to their own stupidity, but along with them go a small handful of decent characters. The invasion peaks by noon and the kids find themselves apparently trapped in the school with the B-M prowling the school yard and soon enough flooding the halls. Objective? Escape the school, find their parents, and escape the city.

After the first outbreak is dealt with the heroes are the only survivors left and the government and B-M company agree to compensate them if they will agree to keep quiet about the events that wiped out an entire town. Three years pass and the team reunites for a public event at Shingo’s request. Shingo has begun working for the B-M company at the astonishingly young age of thirteen, Banba and Kanomiya have gone about a normal highschool life together, and Maaya has left Tokyo to return to his home town in Osaka and like Shingo hasn’t seen the rest of the team since. The event is the unveiling of the U.S.B-M, an American made Bio-Meat product said to provide better taste and more efficient production compared to its Japanese predecessor. Naturally, the new product demonstration goes awry and the U.S.B-M begins to multiply and rampage on its own.

Along with one of Banba and Kanomiya’s underclassmen, Tsuyoshi Shinora whom Maaya dubs the Green Ranger of the group, the team is thrust back into the nightmare from three years ago when the U.S.B-M inevitably gets loose. Learning from their past mistakes, the B-M company manages to jump on top of the situation pretty quickly this time around, but to little benefit for the heroes. Along with all of the guests at the U.S.B-M unveiling, as well as a number of innocent passerby in the same wing of the mall, the heroes and B-M representatives are all trapped in the quarantined wing of the building while they await for the B-M company to come up with a solution to the new U.S.B-M invasion.

The second outbreak ends with a few more survivors than the first and heroes even gain two new members to their team. Skip ahead by seven years and the original kids are now all adults, but it turns out that four years prior to the new current age (that is three years following the last outbreak) an unprecedented third Bio-Meat outbreak swept the central island of Japan. Forces developed to counteract the swarms erected electrically charged fences around key towns and cities to hold off the invasion. The defenses were soon found to be riddled with holes and survivors began to desperately seek refuge in neighboring strong holds. Two years into the outbreak all public media ceased broadcast: no television, no internet, and no cellphone service.

The B-M corporation was quick to flee and set up their final wall of defense on the southern island of Kyushu. Unfortunately for the rest of Japan they also established a strong military power to uphold their quarantine of the North, allowing no refugees into the last uncontaminated region of Japan. We catch up with Maaya, Kanokiya, and Banba, as well as the additional party members gained during the second outbreak as they reunite the bulk of the old team while trying to rescue a bus full of survivors from a dead settlement. We see that the one missing member of the team, Shingo, has established himself in the political/corporate hierarchy of the B-M empire in the south and watch as he tries to handle a terrorist group that threatens to unleash thousands of B-Ms on the island of Kyushu. While the terrorists’ plans don’t go exactly as planned, the B-M are of course released anyway, leading to the fourth outbreak and the real meat of the third major story arc.

By the end of it all there are plenty of twists, plenty of heroic rescues, and plenty of botched plans that end in disaster, and almost all generally unpredictable. It is a tad bit disappointing that there wasn’t better use of foreshadowing, but admittedly the spontaneous feel of some of the twists did have a nice kind of natural feel to it, and the over all trend of having different survivor groups crossing paths in the process of each enacting their own escape/survival plans was always a good source of entertainment, and there is a genuine sense of your stomach dropping when you realize that within the next couple of pages someone’s going to botch up the plan and send everyone’s chances of survival up in flames. To put it more simply the suspense and drama are definitely there where it counts.

The character conflicts and personal development were sturdy, if a bit simplistic, and kept pretty darn clear from the realms of melodrama, save dying moments. It is worth saying that for all the deaths in the story there was surprisingly little variation. I don’t mean to spoil things but every person either died too quickly and too confused to know what had happened, crying for their mother, crying out for help, or just screaming unintelligible “aarg”s, “blarg”s, and “gahh”s. The few exceptions being a tiny handful of character who went out like heroes, usually during the ends of each major outbreak.

Really it’s a very fun series from start to finish and I’d like to have ranked it higher on this list, but it does have one tiny short coming as a horror series: it forgets to be scary. Indeed, the only real problem with Bio-Meat is that while it properly utilizes suspense and drama to create a fast paced and thrilling tale of survival it does lack a certain kind of scariness to it. Even in regards to unsettling imagery and ideas, it leaves the impression of a good action story more than it does a good horror story. The Bio-Meat are plenty grotesque but really the effect diminishes as the story goes on, and you become so wrapped up in the exciting race for survival that you’ll forget to be bothered by the monsters all together. The B-M themselves become more akin to a gun or some other kind of weapon in terms of functionality: you still wouldn’t want one pointed at your face in real life, but so long as you’re sitting comfortably on the other side of the 4th wall there’s really very little sense of fear from them, and by the end it just turns out to be entertaining to watch them swarm all over a person and eat them alive.

Challenger Approaching! Manorexic’s Anime Sampler has joined The Fan! A bi-monthly feast on tasty reviews of anime pilots, and who throws a better feast than anorexics? Today our main dish is Ben-To, and with that last annoying food reference, let us begin!

Ben-To is definitely a nominee for the “Most Absurd Premise” award (that I may or may not have just made up.) As you may have should have noticed about the title is the familiar word bento (Japanese boxed meals.) That is because bento is exactly what this show is about. While casually reaching for a half-priced bento, Satou Yo ends up caught in the middle of an all-out brawl in the grocery store over the discounted meal.

In their defense, it is a pretty good looking bento.

After a short scene about Satou practically coming back from the dead because he was too hungry to die and a rather out-of-place fanservice-filled opening, we get down to business…slowly. Satou narrates a short recap of his rather uneventful life then sees a mysterious girl and passes out from fantasizing a little too hard. Which, if I do say so myself, is a much more entertaining way of getting past the dreaded “first day” period than a twelve-hour time skip or awkward “go home and contemplate” scene.

The next morning we find what is assumed to be our protagonist walking to school, when he encounters mystery girl two, Oshiroi Hana. Oshiroi is an energetic girl who gets excited from seeing others in bento brawl related pain, whom apparently Satou previously met before having the previous twenty-four hours wiped from his mind. Next we get introduced to the previously mysterious girl from the grocery store, Yarizui Sen, sharp-witted recycler extraordinaire. After a short back and forth and a quick American insult, Yarizui takes her leave. As if almost following some sort of cosmic checklist, Satou has his next run in with our third and final mystery girl for the episode, Shiraume Ume. Ume is the student council president who has a very impressive slap as her sort of go-to catchphrase. With this school day finished, we are now introduced to our tentative main cast. The squirrely schadenfreude, the cold and sarcastic intrapersonal, and the take-no-crap tsundere.

It’s night two and Satou and his tag-along have found themselves back at the scene of the crime. The tension slowly rises as the two walk towards the bento section with cutaways to various store-goers, one of which being none other than Composite Krillin. Because horrible judgement skills are now a part of amnesia, Satou dreamily skips towards the bento only to be surrounded by the shoppers, all of which end up unconsious in a matter of seconds from some powerful force called the Witch of Ice a.k.a. Yarizui Sen.

In his unconscious state, Satou remembers all of the events of day one. But before he can quite remember being able to look up Yarizui’s skirt, he is woken up by a store employee who took them in the storage until they woke up. The weird thing about this is the fact that we only see Satou and Oshiroi in the back, which means he left the other dozen or so unconscious bodies littered around the store. But being a conditionally gracious shop keep, he not only answers most questions anyone may have about the bento brawlers, he also gives them food. Satou goes home and here we see that horrible decision making wasn’t a side effect of the amnesia, because Satou puts his entire dorm in a power outage microwaving the food he brought home while it was still in its foil.

At school the next day the class is talking about “some moron” who blew a fuse microwaving a SoyJoy. While totally nonchalantly whistling this off, Satou is approached by Shiraume and thoroughly questioned about the previous night as he intensely stares at her skirt. Even after continuously getting smacked for not giving Shiraume answers, Satou still has his gaze fixated on that skirt, and eventually she storms off. Even as she’s walking away he finds himself staring at her skirt, and we are shown that he’s actually imagining staring at Yarizui’s skirt, something he’s somewhat of an old pro at.

We’ve finally got to the part everyone’s been waiting for, the bento brawl. Satou and Oshiroi stand confidently in front of the store, and after a quick exchange head in. In a déjà vu sequence we pass the store goers from before, Oshiroi freaks out about touching his hand, and Yarizui sees them in the aisle. Satou displays his spidey senses in being able to tell that the Ice Witch was just behind him. The two decide their target bentos and pretend to be checking out other foods as the employee marks the discounted bento, raising the tension to levels no super market should ever have, and after he leaves everyone attacks the bento like a starving lion release from its cage.

Now if something like this were to happen in real life, we’d probably just see that one trained fighter or a super-built guy dominate everyone. But this is anime, everyone is an expert in hand-to-hand combat. A brunette charges the bento and takes out at least three guys, everyone and their fighting partner deal and take nasty blows to the gut and face, Composite Krillin gets knocked out of the mob, and anyone who dares so much as touch the bento gets a kick or two to the ribs. Satou spends some time wondering why on Earth people would do this over half price bento, but his stomach growling answers it for him, and he runs in as well. He does manage to take out one guy, but is then headbutted in the back by another into the path of someone’s kick. Right before impact, Yarizui steps in and takes over. What follows really cannot be described unless I wanted to write a two page essay on how the Ice Witch almost single-handedly taking out nearly every brawler with an array of moves that both tenth-degree black belts and Olympic gymnasts would envy. Satou rushes towards the bento one last time, but is stopped by a punch to the side by Composite Krillin into an uppercut by the brunette that sends him into one final mid-air crane kick by the Ice Queen. Before he manages to pass out though, Yarizui tells Satou that the weak perish in her territory, and offers to show him how to survive if he comes to the club room at school. And then the credits roll.

But we can’t let it end just yet. Satou accepts Yarizui’s invitation to room 501, the club room for the Lovers of Half-Priced Food Club, whose only member and president is none other than the Ice Witch herself, and of course Oshiroi came there as well. Thus officially starting Satou’s adventures in bento brawling.