Case Closed

The anime dominates Japanese airwaves, while the manga has happily chugged along for 20 years.  For whatever reason the series has never caught on quite as strongly in English-speaking territories, and even though we’re still currently still over 30 volumes behind, any series that hits its 50^th volume over here has done a damn good job.

Detective Conan/Case Closed is a whodunnit series following Jimmy Kudo as he solves murder cases with style and finesse.  His fame gets the better of him one day as he falls foul to a crime syndicate who poisons him with an untested drug.  The result is a physical change where he reverts back to having the body of a child.  Taking on a false identity to protect his loved, he continues to solve crimes while protecting his true identity.

 

 Case Closed is far too long to have a singular story with a solid beginning, middle and end, and as such it is also not the kind of series you can read in large chunks over extended sittings.  The writing is densely packed onto the pages and the segmented procession of murder cases takes precedence over Jimmy getting his old body back.  There is no hurry in solving the bigger mysteries as we get to know the wide recurring cast.  This laid back approach may bother some readers, but if you’re happy watching something like Poirot which by and large exists as individual stories, there will be little to object to here.

Buy a couple volumes and take your time, Case Closed isn’t going anywhere.

Gantz

Kei Kurono is a bit of a brat who is accidentally killed by an underground train.  As his decapitated head rolls around the station platform, he suddenly finds himself transported into a game where he and other recently deceased people have to fight for their continued survival.  Gantz offers no further explanations, and so the next round begins.

It’s violent, sex-obsessed and batshit crazy - this is Gantz in a nutshell.  It really goes all out with a live-fast-die-young attitude with entire volumes flying as the plot is sacrificed in favour of pure action.  Some people may be familiar with the anime series which covered only the first few volumes before ending on an entirely different note to the manga, which instead continues into new areas.  The gore was certainly there in animated form, particularly in the second half, but for my money the pacing too was slow for a series so entrenched in action.  To be honest I also found the manga a little difficult to get on with, partly because I already knew what would happen, but also because Kei is such a scumbag I struggled to care about whether or not he got destroyed.  His sexist pervy ways are pretty repulsive along with his shitty attitude, but from the second stage (starting at volume 11 where the book covers turn blue) even worse characters are introduced which propels Kei into becoming more of a hero role and more appealing as a main character.

At this point in the story more layers are gradually added as Hunters are introduced as well as other Gantz teams.  Only now are the answers starting to show themselves (Dark Horse’s release has currently reach the late 20s).  I’ve got no idea where things will head further down the line, and Gantz offers no guarantees.  Frankly, I am hooked.

As a side note the artwork of Gantz is very detailed with CG used extensively for the backgrounds and other little fixes.  It makes you wonder just how much or little of this manga is actually drawn by hand, and while early volumes produce slightly wonky art, later volumes are pretty spectacular.  I do find Dark Horse’s sound effects a little distracting at times however.  The original Japanese ones are big and bold, yet translucent.  The English ones on the other hand are filled in with pure white so you lose a little of the impact, sometimes to the point where it’s more difficult to keep track of proceedings.  It’s still a great manga though.  It’s a nasty, sadistic thrill ride, but with enough of a sense of fun about itself to throw a random panda into the middle of the carnage.  Volumes are quite expensive and are read quickly due to the low word count, but is worth the expense.

English/Japanese sample comparison

Detriot Metal City

… or DMC depending on who you ask.

This is one for the all the metalheads who don’t take themselves too seriously. Like a cross between Alice Cooper and Tenacious D, DMC rips into itself in a knowing way and holds little back.

Moving into the city to try and achieve his dream as an indie-pop artist, Soichi is a good boy who loves his mother, gentle melodies and being a super-hip musician. He does find success with his music, but only as the lead guitarist and vocalist in DMC, the heaviest death metal band around that is taking the industry by storm. The lyrics are vile and most bodily fluids are readily shared on stage for his adoring fans. You’d think he’d be happy to be making his way in the world, but Soichi resents his role as Lord Krauser II and does whatever he can to avoid performing while hiding his dual identity from his friends and family.

DMC is a situational comedy mixed with heavy metal. To be perfectly honest, I don’t really like Soichi as himself. He is a pathetic and limp do-gooder who will swallow all of his pride to keep up appearances. He does have a breaking point though, at which he seeks revenge as Krauser. Spitting down someone’s throat or dry humping people in public (affectionately referred to as ‘rape’) is the kind of low-brow thing to expect. It’s as offensive as it is ridiculous. I love it, but would understand if the constant torrents of swearing and filth put the majority of readers off.

It starts out as somewhat of a satire, but gradually turns into a familiar pattern of Soichi tries to be nice, gets burned, and then kicks ass as Krauser. It’s very funny, especially in the first few volumes, but would advise reading in shorter bursts as opposed to reading the whole thing in one sitting. It’s difficult to laugh at the same joke more than once, so it’s impressive that DMC is able to retell its joke so many times. The final few volumes develop a longer narrative, so the series is able to round itself out properly rather than outstaying its welcome.

This is a stupid and likably earnest manga that beats death metal into the otherwise gentle and inhibited societies such as ours. Satsugai!

Spiral: The Bonds of Reasoning

After the disappearance of his older brother, Ayumu continues to lives with his sister-in-law as normal despite that lack of resolution to the mystery of it all. However when strange incidents start to occur at his school it’s not long before he finds himself in the middle of a dangerous conspiracy. Only his self-faith and powers of deduction can overcome the puzzles that await him.

Spiral is perhaps one of the most anti-shonen series out there. Confrontations appear regularly, but are always presented as tests of logic as opposed to an exchange of blows. Mindlessly shooting up your enemy presents no satisfaction to the intellectual cast, despite many of them being quite capable assassins, and so it is victories of the mind that are valued above all else where betting your life on your reasoning is the only real way to win a true victory. As such entire chapters of talking heads can go by, but the detailed scripting makes for engrossing reading.

‘Who are the Blade Children’

Anyone familiar with the Spiral anime will be familiar with this tagline. As the series debuted viewers were constantly teased with information about the Blade Children, who they were, and what the mystery about them was in relation to Ayumu’s life and the mystery surrounding his brother. Expectations were high for the final episode when all would be revealed… except nothing happened. True, the show ended with a Hollywood-style showdown, but the conspiracies weren’t explained and audiences were left feeling a little cheated.

It turns out the series only covered half of the manga which continues to plot to a full and proper resolution. With divulging any spoilers, I can say the ending is full and complete with pretty much everything explained thoroughly. So thorough in fact that the explanation if what/who the Blade Children are takes up an entire volume in itself!

It may base itself on reasoning, but the second half of Spiral sends itself into some pretty unreal scenarios as increasingly outlandish concepts come into play surrounding the final mysteries. Spiral might have its own logic, not necessarily one that relates to the real world. A very worthwhile dialogue-based manga then, just a bit far out there for some readers.

Tenjo Tenge

Soichiro Nagi and Bob Makihara are a couple of street punks looking to conquer their high school – a plan which promptly fails as they get the crap beaten out of them. It turns out Todo High is a mess of inhumanly strong fighters and martial aritsts who don’t take kindly to having some newbies start causing a ruckus. Seeking refuge at the Juken Club, a dissident martial arts group populated with two female hotties and one male loser, they begin their training to fight back.

In short: Tenjo Tenge is so awesome it doesn’t really need a plot.

Tenjo Tenge is not to be confused with Tenjho Tenge though, oh no. The difference in removing that ‘h’ is indicative of this book being an entirely different beast to CMX’s previous ill-advised release of the same manga. Tenjo Tenge is all about the boobs and the blood and makes no apologies for it. So CMX choosing to edit out the worst parts (i.e. the selling points) seems like a pretty bizarre decision. Needless to say the hardcore fans went apeshit at the idea of a manga being censored, boycotting the entire company and demanding an uncut version.

With the event of CMX being unceremoniously (and somewhat unfairly) shut down, Viz jumped at the chance to give the series a proper go leaving in all the action in larg format double volumes editions and even inserting colour pages. Basically it’s everything that was asked for –I just hope the fans who moaned at CMX choose to back up their words with their wallets. As for the manga itself, it’s refreshingly OTT and thoroughly disgracefully stupid. If seeing muscle-bound freaks and scantily clad girls beating seven shades of shit out of each other I’d struggle to think of anything more earnest and relevant than this one.