Manga Village

One of the things that surprised me (and continues to surprise me) about TokyoPop was their ability to survive off of B-list titles. The subject matter of this review is a prime example. Butterfly is the definition of B-list. The series is a five-volume supernatural/horror/gender bender from Gentosha, which looks to have a really smart collection of josei and seinen manga. Why this series was picked from all of the other content Gentosha could provide is really not the subject of this review, but it is worth considering. Perhaps Tokyopop was getting smarter with their releases, and knew that Butterfly would appeal to their fan base. By: Yu Aikawa Publisher: TokyoPop (March 1, 2011) Age Rating: T for Teen (13+) Genre: Supernatural Price: $10.99 If that is the case, this series proves that I was not a part of the TokyoPop fan base. The story centers on Ginji, a high-school guy with a severe hatred for the occult, but who is haunted by the image of his dead brother. This dead brother appears to have hung himself, for reasons unknown. Ginji meets up with a girl who his friend has introduced him to and ends up in a rough spot…

A surprisingly fun title with great characters and good stories and just the right touch of that magic feeling.

At the age of twenty-five, newlyweds Makoto and Yura experience intercourse for the first time.  Now, with their first anniversary right around the corner, Makoto and Yura are just as determined to be sexually fulfilled as the day they said their vows!  But fears Makoto might be cheating test Yura’s trust and inhibit her libido, while their niece Jun looks for love in all the wrong places.  Follow the hot young couple as they step up into love and continue getting it on… and on… and on! By Katsu Aki Publisher: Tokyopop Age Rating: M (18+) Genre: Romance? Price: $19.99 This volume continues the one-shot chapter formula, with the bulk of the focus on Makoto and Yura learning the best ways to satisfy one another amid a variety of everyday situations (ski trips, separations due to work, various anniversaries, et cetera).  Alternate perspective and advice is offered, however, in chapters about Makoto’s over-sexed 20-something sister and Yura’s confused and newly available teenage sister.  There’s even some advice offered for singles, couples in sexless marriages, and others as well.  It’s light on plot, but extremely thorough and very informative in a non-creepy way when it comes to the how-tos. A likable…

When two mysterious young men walk into the café to declare war, Uru’s passion gets the best of everyone, and they accept the challenge—with one condition: the loser will have to quit the industry for good. However, just before the contest, Shindo sprains his wrist! And when Uru’s mother shows up at Bonheur, will she convince Uru to go back home? Café Bonheur will have to survive through some turbulent times if it’s to stay happy—and in business! By Kou Matsuzuki Publisher: Tokyopop Age Rating: Teen 13+ Genre: Comedy/Shojo Price: $9.99 In Kou Matsuzuki’s second volume of Happy Cafe the story picks up right where it left us in the first volume with Uru cheerfully serving customers delicious sweets made by the hands of a seeming-not-so-sweet Shindo. In Café Bonheur things heat up when the Abekawa brothers present a challenge that puts their business on the line. Within this second volume of Happy Cafe the setting of the story began to evolve outside of Café Bonheur as it brought in new characters from a rival cafe. As a reader I felt that it expanded the cafe from being the main focal point and fleshed out the personalities of the main…

I’ll start by throwing this out there: I was a compulsive World of Warcraft player for a solid six months of my life in college.  Eventually, despite having a blast playing with my friends, I quit the game, permanently deleted my character, and haven’t looked back since. Written by Richard A. Knapp; Illustrated by Jae-Hwan Kim Publisher: Tokyopop Age Rating: 13+ Genre: Fantasy Price: $12.99 I have a fairly good grasp of the WoW mythology up until the first expansion pack, which allowed players to travel through a portal to reach the realm of Outland.  That’s where Shadow Wing picks up and instantly crushes the reader with page after page of narration explaining why the portal is significant and why the inhabitants of Azeroth are crossing over. This could have been a great hook, if not for two setbacks.  First and foremost is the hideous, eye-straining font that the narration is printed in.  It made me cringe every time it popped up in the story and it appears in nearly every panel for the entire first chapter.  The second issue is that it spends a ton of time building the back-stories of the characters, which are both clearly established on…

Yayoi – the 78th Head of Household of the Suzuka Clan – is a mystic with a tremendous power over the spirits.  Of course, along with great power comes those with the desire to steal it!  Enter Ura, who wants to become the King of the Demons.  He comes to the human world to challenge Yayoi, but ends up stripped of his powers – and is sealed away as a black cat instead!  Although Ura is still hell-bent on “eating” Yayoi’s power, the unlikely pair find themselves caught up in an adventure they never imagined! By Mizuho Kusanagi Publisher: Tokyopop Genre: Fantasy/Romance Age Rating: T (13+) Price: $14.99 A fantasy series for teen girls, Mugen Spiral is composed mostly of one-shot stories that involve Yayoi defeating demons with the help of Ura, a demon she seals away in cat and/or human form until he needs to bail her out.  It’s better than it sounds, since the stoic and very powerful Yayoi isn’t the type of heroine that needs to be rescued often, and Ura is a very unlikely white knight.  It’s also mercifully light on both zany gags and dark melodrama, two extremes that fantasy series tend to get caught…

I bet no one would believe this story if I told them. A ninja fell from the sky in a sudden downpour of rain and saved me, a girl who wanted to die to spite her arrogant father. Pretty much anyone would say I’m crazy, huh? By Shoko Conami Publisher: Tokyopop Genre: shoujo/action/fantasy/romance Age rating: T/Teen/13+ Price: $9.99 In the grand internet battle between ninjas and pirates, I’ve always favoured ninjas. But although I prefer Naruto to One Piece, I don’t always find the frantic action and profound angst of the world’s most popular ninja manga to be suited to my mood. Sometimes I want something a bit less high-powered, a bit less epic, a bit softer, a bit more… well… girly. Still with the shurikens and ass-kicking, of course, but played in a different key. Enter Shinobi Life, in which teenage romance and ninja action intersect to delightful effect. Kagetora is a ninja charged with protecting the princess Beni; while escorting her from a battle, he falls through a vortex in time and finds himself in the 21st century. By chance or by fate, he happens to have fallen on the roof of a building where a girl who…

Welcome to the Happy Café, where romance and happiness are the specials of the day! Meet Uru: She’s a little short, a bit disorganized, often is mistaken for an elementary school kid, and lives by herself after her mother gets remarried. When she decides to pay the bills by working part-time at the Happy Café, she meets Ichiro and Shindo, two of the most unsociable guys she’s ever met! And to make matters worse, it turns out that Uru is not exactly meant for the waitress world, as she’s a HUGE klutz. But as this hilarious shojo tale unfolds, 1 happiness–and even true love–might be lurking just around the corner… By Kou Matsuzuki Publisher: Tokyopop Age Rating: Teen Genre: Romance Price: $9.99 Kou Matsuzuki’s Happy Cafe takes place in Café Bonheur where little, height wise, sixteen year old Uru decides to seek employment after witnessing customers the day before leaving the cafe in such lifted spirits. Little does she realize the two men that work there, Ichiro and Shindo, are not the rays of sunshine she thought the customers sought after. Given the premise I was half expecting it to be loaded with slap stick humor of a ditzy girl…

Karin continues to come to terms with her feelings for Kenta, but her flirting will have to be put on hold for now. Karin’s grandmother is in town, and that’s enough to put her entire family into a panic. Elda Marker is no silver-haired, cookie-backing matriarch. She’s a hot and heavy vampire vixen with a taste for blood, but a distaste for everything else having to do with the human race. So how can Karin possibly tell her about her new human almost-sorta-not-quite boyfriend? It’s going to be one freaky family reunion! By Yuna Kagesaki Publisher: Tokyopop Rating: Older Teen Genre: Comedy/Horror Price: $9.99 After 4 volumes of almost all comedy, Chibi Vampire is starting to get some real drama going.  The awakening of Elda Marker works as an introduction into the more vampiric side of this series.  Up until now, it has mainly been about Karin living the human world.  With this volume, we start to see more of the issues vampires have to deal with. Elda’s awakening of course brings lots of troubles for Karin.  Elda has a taste for young blood, and hates humans in general.  So no one wants to tell her about Karin’s “condition”.  And…

The old cliche is that pictures are worth a thousand words; The cover of DearS volume 1, is the epitome of the cliche. One look at the tight rubber suit-like clothing, gratuitous bosoms, and the giant dog collar around the girl’s neck, and you get a pretty good idea about what this manga is about. By: Peach-Pit Publisher: Tokyopop Age Rating: Teen (13+) Genre: Comedy Price: $9.99 We start of with this loner, kind of losery guy named Takeya, and he lives by himself in an apartment. Everyone is obsessed with DearS, these  aliens that crash landed on Earth one year ago. They’re beautiful, strange, and, well, actually, they’re slaves. Great plot, right? It doesn’t get any better, I assure you. Takeya, in his own way, comes across one of these DearS and in saving her life, she becomes his slave forever. Of course, you don’t get that at the beginning of the book, but later on, it becomes readily apparent.. What isn’t apparent is why anyone would read this drivel. There is not a speck of plot to it; just a girl in a skin-tight plastic suit walking around and buying groceries in an apron. It’s like 7 different…