( 6/09/2007 11:04:00 AM ) Bill S.
MANGA CATCH-UP – Been doing some catching up on some of the manga series I've started over the last few years, so let's check in on three and see how they've been holding up. - GTO – Volume Nine: Yeah, I'm still way way way behind on Tohru Fujisawa's raucous comedy about doltish-but-goodhearted teacher Eikichi Onizuka (it ended with Volume 25, which was first published in America two years ago!), but every time I pick up a volume, I find I enjoy the experience. This 'un opens on a typically broad note: our dopey hero, knocked out by a group of punky school girls in the previous book, is discovered unconscious on the floor of his classroom with his pants down and his pubic hair shaved off! The book itself follows the usual formula: goof-off teacher Onizuka amiably lusts after everything in skirts, plays hooky and otherwise does everything he can to avoid actually teaching; sundry members of his classroom behave with believable adolescent viciousness toward Onizuka and each other; various characters – hypocritical administrators, power-hungry students – scheme to get our hero canned, but our protagonist prevails thanx to pure dumb luck. Energetically low-brow, but determinedly good-hearted – the manga equivalent to a Farrelly Bros.' movie – it's easy to see why this series has been such a big seller, though as I noted when I first started on this book, the preponderance of tiny funny asides can be a strain on a geezer reader like yours truly. Yeah, I know, GTO's core Older Teen readership has stronger eyes than mine.
- Kaoki Urasawa's Monster – Volume Eight: Not quite halfway into this addictive serial killer conspiracy thriller – so we know that hero Tenma's attempt at shooting cagey psychopath Johan Liebert is doomed to fail, especially since we've been told that Johan is expecting him to attempt it. What makes Urasawa's tale so compelling isn't just his slick way with a good suspense scene (though check out his visual sureness in the death of the Red Hindenberg in this volume), it's his awareness of the half-truths and rationalizations that bind his large cast in this beautifully controlled twisty tale, his Hitchcockian capacity to make his hero feel complicit in his antagonist's dark deeds. When I first read that Monster was eighteen volumes long, I couldn't help wondering how Urasawa was gonna keep this European Fugitive going so long without diluting the story. Now, I have complete confidence in his ability to keep the screws on all the way. Just a great frigging manga series . . .
- Naruto – Volume Twelve: Talk about yer decompressed storytelling: we're still in the midst of the Ninja Selections which began in – Volume Five, was it? Unlike Monster, as this series' cast and story backgrounds have multiplied, there've been more than one occasion when Masashi Kishimoto has come close to losing me: I still tend to skim the scenes devoted to the Cold War-styled scheming between the various villages. But every time he brings the storyline back to his title hero – an inspired comic creation, who also provides the heart and soul of this series – I keep reading. Hey, the books are only $7.95 and provide zippier puzzle-based action (discover each antagonist's charka-driven super-power; figure out the best way to beat it) than a lotta American superhero comics do these days. Add some moments of serious emotion that actually arise from the characters instead of reading like they were tacked onto the story in answer to some editorial edict, and you got surprisingly heart-felt storytelling. Small wonder Naruto is still knocking 'em dead in the bookstores.
More Manga Catch-Up in the weeks to come . . .
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