2 screenshot limit

I sold a batch of manga to Book-off over the weekend, and this title was among the books in the ‘maybe’ batch. I remember liking the first chapter of this series, and had bought both volumes in Japanese to see what happened, but somehow, I must’ve forgotten to actually look at the books since one was still shrink-wrapped when I looked it over.

Star Blacks comes from Yoko MAKI, the creator of Aishiteruze Baby. It ran for 2 volumes in Ribon magazine. As much as I appreciate short-running manga, the fact that something only ran for 8 chapters should’ve been a sign about its quality.

The story actually starts out quite nicely: Kisaki is a seventeen-year old girl who finds herself becoming the unlikely master of the sword that can cut down demons. Her father, who owns a sword shop, realizes that Kisaki is the only one who can wield the Katana of Oni, which proves that she is the reincarnation of their ancestor who also fought the demons in the past.

So, yes, the premise sounds great: girl with sword, fighting demons, reincarnation… Trouble is, the mangaka didn’t seem to know where she was going with the story. Many times, it felt like an odd mash-up between a monster-of-the-week shonen series with a dash of boring school romance. Though the concept of a Ribon series dipping its toes in shonen-like fights, if the story isn’t up to par to the art, then readers aren’t going to stick around. And additionally, Japan’s fascination with Catholicism cracks me up. The first chapter features a nun whom Kisaki has considered as a second mother, but then, of course, the first demon that Kisaki fights emerges from the nun’s despair and weakness. Kisaki dons the nun’s rosary as a necklace, but it ends up getting wrecked in a subsequent fight anyway. Huh? Okaaay.

I really hope Yoko MAKI has better luck with her later series. Obviously, these books are going to be sold to Book-off. No sense having them take up valuable shelf space in my apartment.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 13th, 2009 at 11:23 am and is filed under manga & manhwa. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.