bokurano ours, vol. 6

bokurano ours, vol. 6
mohiro kitoh
graphics/manga/scifi
viz media
published 2012

Now the children know the truth: their opponents are human beings, just like them. Despite going into his battle with mixed feelings, Kirie finds one more chance to surprise his fellow pilots. Komo follows after him to what seems like an easy victory...until the enemy's tentacles threaten to overwhelm her.

I've got to admit....I was bored.  This one was soooooo boring to me.  The only interesting things Kirie did was go after Hatagai, but then even that amounted to nothing.  And then there were millions of pages of Tanaka going on and on and on and on about karma, talking in circles, saying the same thing. She even mentions how she's rambling!

Then his battle wasn't even shown.

We move on to Komo and then something happens that hasn't happened before so it gets exciting.  But then Koyemshi goes on in detail about particles and cells and elements and I thought I was going to die.  Now, don't get me wrong.  I know this is a scifi book and I know there's people out there who really enjoy those details, but I'm not one of those people so I almost died.

But thankfully, that's over with now.

bokurano ours, vol. 5

bokurano ours, vol. 5
mohiro kitoh
graphics/manga/scifi
viz media
published 2012

Zearth's surviving pilots make a promise to each other: they'll never break down, they'll never cry, and no one's to blame. Yet after Maki's battle breaks open the core of her opponent a frightening discovery may test their new resolve. Inside, the children come upon a terrible shock - the truth about who they're driven to destroy.

So yeah, I was completely wrong about the enemy robots.  I think it was just wishful thinking on my part, but after Moji's battle and the choice he makes with his body I knew that was it.  The kids are really dead after their battles.  The one thing I don't get is why some of them live a bit after their victories and some drop dead right away.

Maki's story is just so sad.  These kids are just in a shitty place all because of some wacko that we don't really know anything about.  Why these kids?  Just because they stumbled upon that cave?  Or were they meant to find the cave?

And now that they know what's inside the core does that change anything for them?  Either choice they make is hopeless for them.  At the end of volume 5 there are still 7 kids remaining.  It's getting pretty bleak.

bokurano ours, vol. 4

bokurano ours, vol. 4
mohiro kitoh
graphics/manga/scifi
viz media
published 2011

Having no interest in boys her own age, young Chizu develops a crush on her schoolteacher. After after a few tentative secret dates, her relationship with the older man takes an unexpected and violent twist. When Chizu finally takes control of Zearth, she's got two things on her mind: save the planet and exact revenge on her ex-lover.

These kids are way more mature than they should be at their age.  As it stands none of them have really had an easy life save for maybe Kodama but he was a strange bird so who knows.  We don't really get to see much into his life except for his love for his father.

And now there are two adults who have entered into the contract after the kids realized they were short two pilots.  Koyemshi is speaking to someone we can't see when the kids aren't in the cockpit.  He's an evil little fucker it seems.  So far my theories about the robot don't seem to be holding true so it shows how much I know about stuff!

bokurano ours, vol. 3

bokurano ours, vol. 3
mihiro kitoh
graphics/manga/scifi
viz media 
published 2011

Saving the world is hard.  Saving yourself is even harder.  The underage pilots of Zearth are starting to crack under the pressure.  In the beginning all they wanted to do was play a fun game.  Now they're fighting for their lives and the fate of the planet.  Say goodbye to childhood.  It's time to grow up and be a hero.

This shit is fucked up.

There's no other way to express that.  It is really just fucked up.  First of all, you have to think about the psychological stress these kids are under.  They know they are going to die.  There's no way out, at least as far as they know at this point.  They either know they are next to die or they just know they are going to die shortly, but they don't know exactly when.  So every day they wake up knowing this could be the day they are called to pilot and then they will die.  

And they're around 12 years old.  Which makes the circumstances involving some of these backstories even worse.  *****spoilers*****  An affair with a teacher, gang rape, attempted rape, murder....it's a lot to take in.  And then along come these adults who are half blaming the kids for the death toll the robots have caused.  They tell them they'll take care of everything so the kids think this is it, they're saved.  But the adults are just arrogant jerks.  

It's heavy, heavy stuff.  While Volume 2 made me incredibly sad this one just kind of made me feel ill, creepy crawlies and all that.  There's a whole lot of drama packed into these volumes, no doubt.

bokurano ours, vol. 2

bokurano ours, vol. 2
mohiro kitoh
graphics/manga/scifi
viz media
published 2010

Saving the world is hard.  Saving yourself is even harder.  One summer, fifteen kids innocently wander into a nearby seaside cave.  There they meet a strange man who invites them to play an exciting new video game.  This game, he explains, pits a long giant robot against a horde of alien invaders.  To play the game all they have to do is sign a simple contract.  The game stops being fun when the kids find out the true purpose of their pact.

Wow.

I liked the first book okay.  It was crazy weird and seemed to have a lot of potential.  Then all of a sudden it got really dark and incredibly sad.  So far each book seems to be focusing on two characters at a time in order of being 'called'.

Little pieces of the mystery of the 'game' are being revealed and nothing is good news.  Each kid has a story and these stories are not of the happy ending variety.  I was planning on moving onto the next book in the Chew series, but I think I'm going to have to finish up this one first.  I have some theories about the monsters they're fighting and I want to see if I'm right!

ōoku: the inner chambers, vol. 2

ōoku: the inner chambers, vol. 2
fumi yoshinaga
graphics/historical/fantasy/manga
viz media
published 2009

Curious about why female lords must take on male names, the shogun Yoshimune seeks out the ancient scribe Murase and his archives of the last eighty years on the Inner Chambers - called the Chronicle of the Dying Day.  In its pages Yoshimune discovers the coming of the Redface Pox, the death of the last male shogun, and the birth of the new Japan....

This takes us back almost eighty years beginning around 6 years after the death of the last male shogun.  In the previous volume Yoshimune goes to Murase to ask about the Chronicle of the Dying Day and in this volume two the Chronicle plays out.

In the first volume there was some humor and attempts at lightheartedness.  Here is just a lot of bleakness, violence and tragedy.  Kasuga will not let anything stop her from saving the Tokugawa name.  Murder, kidnapping, whatever, she'll do it.  She is a terrifying character.

There was just a lot of sadness, but we got to see the transition from being a place that housed women for the shogun to a place that housed men who thought that their male shogun was still alive and favored men.  The secrets that were kept and doled out to a select few who were then doomed never to leave the Inner Chambers.

I am anxious to get back to Yoshimune to see how she will have taken this account and what she will do, if anything, to change the state of affairs in Japan.  And also, how she will deal with the Inner Chambers.

7 billion needles

7 billion needles, volume 1

volume 2
volume 3
volume 4
nobuaki tadano
graphic/scifi/horror
vertical, inc.
published 2011

On a clear calm night, while on a class trip to the beach, Hikaru Takabe decides to go for a walk to escape the shackles of school and peer pressure.  While observing the stars above a calm dark sea in an instant she is disintegrated when struck by a meteor.

Flash forward one page, and Hikaru awakes, from what seems like a horrible daydream of sorts, sitting amongst classmates in school without a scratch on her.  The meteor dream seemed so real she cannot believe she's alive, but given her relative aloof nature, she soon shrugs off the events and moves on with life.  However, one thing she cannot shake off is the strange buzzing she hears coming from her new pair of headphones....

This was on the border of being really interesting and making absolutely no sense to me.  Everything was good until volume three when the subspecies and the Moderator were the focal point and things got very science-fictiony.  It was intense.

I think that ultimately the series was about friendship.  It seems so simple and almost cheesy after all that, but when it all came down to it there seemed to be the overriding theme of loneliness.  Once Hikaru was taken in by Nao and Saya she wasn't so lonely and was able to open up more.  Which then prompted her to help Chika who she saw as herself before Nao and Saya.  Hikaru became a spectator (who actually mostly just ignored everyone) to an active human.  She participated in life which ended up allowing her to save the world.

More sci-fi than I usually read, but I enjoyed it thoroughly!