Cage of Eden (Rank 2)

Publisher: Kodansha

Volumes: 21/21 (Complete), In Print

Shounen

Genre: Survival Horror, Ecchi, Scifi

Summary: Have you ever wished your life would change? Akira Sengoku feels overshadowed by his childhood friend, Rion Akagami, who is top at gymnastics and one of the hottest girls in his school. And his best friend Kohei Arita is an ace volleyball player, and tall and good looking. Meanwhile Akira is not particularly good at anything. All of them, plus his entire grade from school are returning from a school trip to Guam on an airplane, when suddenly disaster strikes and the plane crash-lands on a jungle island. Only they soon discover it’s no ordinary island, as they are attacked by creatures that should be extinct! What’s more, the island isn’t on any map! Akira was never good at anything before, but he’s brave, quick thinking and good at winning the trust of others. Is now finally his chance to shine? And what’s up with this crazy island?

Plot Overview: As the story starts, Akira wakes up in the jungle and finds himself separated from the others, but soon meets up with class nerd Mariya and flight attendant Ms. Ohmori. They search for the plane crash site only to find out that although the plane landed safely, the place is deserted and the captain of the plane was murdered. They meet with Rion, Akira’s childhood friend who tells them what happened and how everything descended into chaos and everyone left in groups.

They stay at the crash site for the night for shelter, but giant anteater-like creatures descend on the plane and try to get inside. Akira lights the plane on fire to scare the creatures away and rescue the others. With the plane ruined, they are forced to look for a new safe place for shelter, while they also look for other survivors and try and convince them to work together while fending  off attacks from various other creatures.

Volumes 2-10: Initially the story seems like it’s heading towards a bloodbath as a number of survivors from the crash have gone crazy and are out to show the others that the only rule of survival on the island is the survival of the fittest. And meanwhile, they fend off attacks with varying success from various deadly creatures. But Akira and his group believe that their best chances of survival lie in working together and combining their strengths and they try to convince the others they meet to join them. 

Volume 10-20, the story takes a notable shift as they meet another like minded group while checking out a mysterious man-made structure of some kind in the center of the island. From that point on they have gathered enough people to form a small village, and they organize themselves into making a safe settlement to live in. While they create further expeditions to investigate the other man-made structures on the island, things climax to a big showdown between their group and a stronger group led by a ruthless man who rules through fear and paranoia.

Volume 21: Ending

Review: Overall I thought Cage of Eden had some great strong points, but also a number of parts where the story fell short, too. On the plus side, I thought it was really cool to see a survival horror series where they are trying to survive pitted against various extinct animals other than dinosaurs. Don’t misunderstand me, Dinosaurs are cool and I’ll still watch/read those anytime. But while there are literally dozens of stories out there with man vs. dinosaurs, other extinct animals get curiously neglected in fiction. I always thought it was strange, because there are literally tons of other various bizarre creatures in our fossil records and many of them were just as fearsome and dangerous as Dinosaurs. Anyway some of the extinct animals featured in the manga were really fascinating and terrifying, especially that freaky long-armed bear is going to haunt my dreams. 

As an out of civilization survival horror story goes, it’s surprisingly wholesome. There are many times the series seems to be veering towards murder sprees, but thankfully most of them don’t come to pass. The majority of the deaths actually happen due to the attacks by the extinct animals and the harsh environment and not so much due to murder. As well, the series also has major themes about the virtues of good leadership, teamwork, friendship, and love and overall it isn’t as cynical as I expected from the beginning.

That being said, I was also disappointed how overall the characterization of all of the characters, even the main characters, are all fairly shallow. A lot of the characters can have their personalities summed up into something simple, like computer nerd, delinquent with a heart of gold, optimistic girl and etc. etc. And sorry to say that they all do not grow that much beyond their initial character specs either. Sometimes I felt like forgiving the author since there are about 10 main characters and dozens of minor characters, and it’s clear he wanted the focus to be on the setting and the situation. But other times when he tried to write deeper characters, a lot of times, it just didn’t work very well. Still, the setting and the overall plot was still interesting enough on it’s own to keep reading, so I didn’t mind that much.

The teen girls and the women fare even worse in characterization than the guys, to the point where the series reads fairly sexist. Many Shounen manga have significant female readership, so usually they will add a few girls as main characters who are equals to the guys, and have their own stories. But not so much here, where the guys are almost always solely in the spotlight, and nearly all the girls and women are just there as potential romantic interests. The women and the girls are there to get ogled, lose their clothes and get rescued over and over again. And yet strangely enough, somehow there is very little romance happening in this series. For the longest time Akira and Rion don’t get any closer in their relationship, despite many nudges from fate and helpful advice from the others. And it’s not a harem at all until towards the end, when suddenly all the girls decide they like Akira, which was dumb.

The first half of the manga is about survival and overall, this part was the best. The plots are pretty varied as they face threats, human and nonhuman. They learn a lot about the strange environment they’ve been forced to live in, struggle to adapt and there’s a sort of debate about who should be in charge and how they should be organized. Then the second half of the series is focused very strongly on solving the mystery behind the island by piecing together clues they find. Overall, I was happy with the second half of the journey, which had many fascinating clues. But when it came to the final ending, I felt like the ending fell a bit short. 

While the ending was overall fine and definitive enough to answer the question of the truth behind the island, there were still some major plot holes of things that were never explained. For example, the reason why the plane crashed in the first place is never explained. There are also a number of clues which we were told were important, but are also never resolved either. And a couple of these clues seemed tantalizing and potentially important too. For example, one of the clues they find is a naked mummy sealed in a barrel with a key in it’s mouth. They do find out where the key goes, but the rest is never explained. And I’m still wondering about it. 

Recommended: Overall this popular survival horror manga has an interesting scenario and a mystery driven plot, but also suffers from shallow characters and sexist writing. The abundance of ecchi fanservice may also be a potential turnoff to some as well. But at least the extinct creatures are awesome. And the ending while overall it was fine, suffers from a few major plot holes.

Age Rating: Older Teen: mostly for violence and some gore. Most of the series isn’t that graphic, but then again, sometimes you’ll have characters bleeding from their eyeballs. There is also an abundance of cleavage, underwear shots and female nudity. There is also some attempted rape but not that graphic. There is also one cross dressing boy who manipulates some pedophiles into helping rescue some friends late in the story by leading them on, but at least it’s for a good cause... 

Other Works in English by this Mangaka: DEATHTOPIA (Seinen)

Other Notes: The first 10 volumes of this series are currently free to read with a Comixology Unlimited/Kindle Unlimited Trial.

DEATHTOPIA (Rank 3)

Publisher: Kodansha

Volumes: 8/8 (Complete), (Digital only)

Seinen

Genre: Horror, Ecchi, Fighting, Police, Scifi, Conspiracy

Summary: Koh Fujimura (19) thought he was an ordinary guy until one day he was involved in a mugging that turned into a hit and run accident. His eyes were injured, and he was sent to the hospital. But while he was there, he was attacked by a serial killer woman posing as a nurse, who tells him he needs to die, because he is a threat to “them.” He is saved by 3 beautiful cops, but bizarrely enough the serial killer woman, who was shot and fell from the fourth floor, got up and walked away!

After he recovers and leaves the hospital he discovers he can see something no one else can see- bizarre looking people who look like their heads are dark clouds of scribbles. He is soon forcefully recruited by the group of women who saved him before and discovers he has the ability to see what they call “Cheaters,” who are mutants. While not all Cheaters are violent criminals, those who are, are exceptionally dangerous because they possess superhuman abilities. The 3 women, Maya, Yui and Saki are part of an elite squad that investigate and take them down. As he joins the special squad to discover more about his own special ability, he discovers that someone is targeting him and his family specifically, under a mysterious plot from a man named “UD.”

Review: As the group of Maya, Yui, Saki and new rookie Koh take on new missions and aim to keep notorious serial killers from striking again, it becomes increasingly clear that the Cheaters are organized and in communication with each other. They are taking orders from a mysterious man code named UD who has a particular interest in Koh’s abilities, for some unknown reason. Meanwhile, Maya, Yui and Saki who were recruited with their own special skills, all have their own reasons for joining.

That being said, while the central plot was alright and kept my interest in finding out the truth behind Koh’s ability, I found the level of Ecchi to be way overboard. It starts off normally enough with your usual underwear shots, cleavage, skimpy skin tight outfits, and Koh accidentally walking in and finding the women naked after a shower more than once. But it ramps up to 11 as basically every single serial killer they fight are all rapists, even the women. One of the women cops gets raped as well, (although by another woman, which apparently doesn’t count, gross). They also practically continuously get their clothes cut off them until they’re fighting naked quite often. It ramps up around volume 3-4 and then thankfully drops off to a more typical level. If you have a strong stomach for this stuff, then I would only rate it moderately worse than average, but honestly I found a lot of it to be pandering and in poor taste. 

Overall, I had mixed feelings about this series. There were parts of it that I liked, including parts of Koh’s and the other main character’s story arcs. Some of the villains that they take down also had some interesting powers. On the other hand, a lot of the series felt like it was trying to make up for the lack of writing ability by giving the readers extra naked women, instead of trying to create more compelling reasons to convince the readers to keep reading the story. Also, the main plot line I found somewhat frustrating as the main characters know they're being manipulated for the longest time, but aren't able to finally turn the tables on those behind the scenes until the last volume. But at least the ending was fairly solid.

Recommended: TLDR; Overall this series about the good guys trying to take down psychopathic serial killers with superpowers before they kill again, while uncovering the truth of a dastardly plot behind everything, is not bad. But you need to be able to tolerate a lot of rapey behavior from the villains and quite a lot of gratuitous fanservice to be able to enjoy this series.

Age Rating: R for both violence, gore and sexual stuff. The gore is kind of inconsistent, some parts are fairly tame, and some parts are literally tearing people’s faces off or cutting them in half and so on. The sexual stuff is like that as well. Sometimes it’s tame underwear shots and cleavage, and other times it goes full on rape. But thankfully there’s only one actual rape scene, but it has also some other weird rapey scenes that are dreams and otherwise not real.

Other Works in English from this Mangaka: Cage of Eden (Shounen)

I’m in Love and It’s the End of the World (Rank 3)

Publisher: Kodansha

Volumes: 5/5 (Complete), (Digital only, so far)

Shoujo

Genre: Romance, Twins, (Relationship) Sisters

Summary: Mahiru Yanase and Mayo Yanase were supposed to be identical as twins, but Mayo became an outgoing popular girl, while Mahiru became “the other Yanase.” After an incident in middle school where the only boy who ever liked Mahiru instead fell for Mayo at first sight, Mahiru has lived in her sister’s shadow ever since. She became a superstitious girl who avoids talking to people who are too friendly, for fear that her luck will balance itself and something terrible will happen soon after.

On the first day of high school, Mahiru bumps into a friendly classmate, Aoi Satomi. And he’s way too friendly! But even though he’s way out of her league, he only has eyes for Mahiru. Can she let go of her superstitions long enough to give Aoi a chance? Can she find her confidence in herself? And what’s up with him? 

Review: The beginning of the story starts out sort of average. At first Aoi pursues Mahiru, and while she is interested, she is scared of getting involved with him at first, citing her bad luck will eventually bring about the end of the world. But in truth, it becomes clear that it’s her lack of confidence in herself that prevents her from wanting to date anyone, and she doesn’t believe any boy could ever find her attractive over her sister. But after he reveals at the end of volume 1 that they’ve met before, and he fell for her back then, the story really starts to blossom. As volume 2 starts, Mahiru finds herself wishing she could change, and then she finally decides to give Aoi a chance even if it means the end of the world.

I won’t spoil anything past that point, but I was really glad I gave this slightly obscure title a chance. It becomes a very endearing story about two people who save each other through their love, at a very dark time in their lives. While the majority of the story is about Mahiru getting over her inferiority complex about her sister, there is also a good bit of the story about Aoi and his difficult life as well. It’s not a title that will amaze you, at least not at first, but it slowly and steadily gets better, and it’s a story that is told very well. And I was impressed with the ending, it was great.

Recommended: TLDR; All in all while this romance title starts off a bit plain, it gradually becomes a story about two people who saved each other through their love during a dark time in their lives. The story starts off with a focus on Mahiru and her obsession with luck, but soon shifts to being about her and Aoi’s relationship, as well as their friends and Mahiru’s sister. It’s an underappreciated manga and is highly recommended.

Rating: PG: Thanks to Mahiru’s lack of confidence, they only kiss. 

Other Notes: This title is only available digitally only so far, but Kodansha has been printing the bestselling ebooks into physical books. If it gets more popular, they will print it. The first two volumes are currently available free on Kindle Unlimited/Comixology Unlimited.

Other Works in English from this Mangaka (from Most to Least popular):

• House of the Sun (Shoujo)

• Atsumori-kun’s Bride to Be (Shoujo)

Yokai Rental Shop (Rank 3.5)

Publisher: Seven Seas

Volumes: 4/4 (Complete), In Print

Shoujo (reads like), Yaoi Interest

Genre: Yokai, Supernatural, Fighting

Summary: Hiiragi thought he had no family left in the world, but on her deathbed, his mother told him that he had an older half-brother, Karasu. He goes to the Pet Shop that Karasu owns to meet him, only to discover the Pet Shop that seems to sell exotic animals is actually just a front for an even rarer service- a Yokai Rental Shop! For an exorbitant sum of money, a customer can rent a yokai to grant any wish. At first Hiiragi is determined to shut down this dangerous scam, but soon is swept up in Karasu’s plan to get revenge on their father- who is still alive!

Review: This is such a strange manga that mixes and matches several genres, I barely know where to start. I expected this manga to be more like the mangaka’s other most popular work, Nightmare Inspector, which is a series of mostly short stories around the theme of helping customers with their nightmares. The beginning of Yokai Rental Shop series was very similar at first, starting off with 4 short stories around the theme of “being careful of what you wish for.” These stories were enjoyable cautionary tales and I loved the Yokai, which are drawn differently in a Japanese brush painting inspired style. Yokai inspired stories can be so fun, they’re fascinating, often intelligent monsters/spirits that can be good, evil or anywhere in between and they have bizarre special abilities. 

But partway through the second volume, the story takes a sharp turn and changes its focus to the two half brothers as they try to rescue a young girl who was kidnapped by their father to be his bride. While there are a few more Yokai that are featured in the later volumes, the plot gets hijacked into being about the father of the two brothers. It becomes a story about two half-human, half-yokai brothers rebelling against their powerful and cruel father, who seeks to breed the ultimate half-human, half-yokai hybrid to survive climate change, funnily enough.

While I thought the rebellion plot itself was sort of interesting, I was disappointed that from that point on the Yokai become helpless pawns in the struggle between the brothers and their father, and are no longer the focus of the story.

But the thing that bothered me the most is how this manga mashes up Shoujo, Shounen and Yaoi and somehow creates a manga that won’t please many readers at all. The artstyle is very Shoujo, the main characters are all very feminine pretty boys, including even their Father. But it lacks the introspection, character development and the focus on the feelings and the relationships of the characters like Shoujo has. And while there’s plenty of fighting like a Shounen manga, yet it lacks the strategy and determination like Shounen manga has. And finally while there’s a lot of Boy’s Love subtext enough to make those who like to ship characters together happy, it’s not actually a Yaoi romance. Even if it’s got two pretty boys who would die for each other and sometimes tearfully hug, and swear to be there for each other, it’s all technically non-romantic, which is honestly weird.

If you've read this far, and you're not put off from reading it and want to know how the ending was, it was fine. For Shoujo I would say it's a normal happy ending. I enjoyed it but wished there was more to it.

Recommended: TLDR; All in all fans of Nightmare Inspector are probably going to be disappointed that this is totally different. Shoujo and/or Yaoi readers might find something of interest in this beautifully illustrated manga about two half-brothers rebelling against their cruel, powerful father, but it’s lack of romance may be a turn off.

Age Rating: PG13: lots of blood, some violence but very little gore.

Other Works by this Mangaka: Nightmare Inspector (Shoujo, reads like)

Mermaid Saga (Rank 2.5)

Publisher: Viz 

Volumes: 2/2 (Omnibus Collector’s Edition), In Print (See Edition notes)

Shounen

Genre: Horror, Supernatural, Romance

Editions: 

• Originally published in flipped (left to right format) in single comic book issues (1992-1995)

• Collected into 3 flipped 1st Editions: Mermaid’s Forest (1994), Mermaid’s Scar (1996) and Mermaid’s Gaze (1997)

• Collected into unflipped 2nd Editions: Mermaid Saga Volumes 1-4 (2004)

• Collected into 2 unflipped Mermaid Saga Collector’s Editions (2020/2021)

Summary: It is said that anyone who eats the flesh of a mermaid is granted eternal youth and immortality. However few know the real truth, which is that many have died, been transformed into senseless monsters, or have been otherwise cursed while they attempted to cheat death. Yuta, who ate the mermaid flesh hundreds of years ago but still looks like a young man, seeks out the legend of the mermaid in hope of returning to normal. Or failing that, at least to warn others of the truth. Meanwhile, he meets Mana, a sheltered young woman who was also a “lucky” one who was able to obtain true immortality. As the two of them travel together, following the legends of the mermaid as they attempt to hide their immortality, they meet many others who weren’t nearly as fortunate. 

Review: Rumiko Takahashi is most famous for her hit action romance comedies, Ranma ½ and Inuyasha. Personally, while I loved Ranma ½ and enjoyed Inuyasha, my favorites of her works are her more serious works, including this one. The Mermaid Saga series is a collection of short stories that take place in a mixture of the past and the present. These stories mostly follow Yuta, but also cover many stories in the present with Yuta and Mana together. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that tragedy follows those who seek the legend of the mermaid. And as the story continues, it becomes clear that immortality itself is a sort of a curse as well.

Short Stories Summaries:

• A Mermaid Never Smiles, Parts 1+2: Yuta, in the present, goes to investigate a village not on any map and discovers a horrifying secret and meets Mana.

• The Village of the Fighting Fish, Parts 1+2: Yuta, in the past, visits an island of friendly pirates that has a rivalry with a neighboring island of ruthless pirates. The ruthless pirates are looking for a mermaid and they force their rivals to hunt one for them.

• Mermaid Forest, Parts 1-4: Yuta and Mana are traveling together. Mana gets hit by a truck, is presumed dead, and is stolen away by a doctor who steals corpses. Yuta chases after her only to discover a wealthy house in the middle of Mermaid Forest, where a mermaid is said to be buried. And they have a dark secret…

• Mermaid’s Dream: Mana is taken away by what looks like a monster, but discovers it can talk and has its own tragic tale.

• Mermaid’s Promise, Parts 1-4: Yuta and Mana go to visit the grave of a woman Yuta once loved, named Nae. Nae is said to have died 60 years ago, but knew a secret about the ashes of a Mermaid. But not only is she still alive, she acts strangely. What is going on?

• Mermaid’s Scar, Parts 1-4: Yuta and Mana investigate a woman who is said to have survived a terrible boating accident miraculously without a scratch. Meanwhile, the woman attempts to kill her child who seems to know something about where some mermaid flesh is buried.

• The Ash Princess, Part 1+2: In the Past, Yuta finds a con man selling fake mermaid flesh and using his daughter’s ability to heal from any wound to pass the fake flesh off as the real thing. But something isn’t right with his daughter, who kills animals and eats their livers raw…

• Mermaid’s Gaze, Parts 1-4: The Kiryu Mansion is said to be haunted, and Yuta and Mana go to investigate. A lifelike doll sits in the window, said to be the ghost of a girl who once lived there. Meanwhile, an old woman there calls the police constantly claiming to have killed a young man, but they never find a body. The young man returns and dies again and again, demanding the doll that sits in the window. But why? 

• Mermaid’s Mask, Parts 1-3: Yuta and Mana investigate a young boy named Nanao who takes a mysterious medicine that heals minor wounds instantly. Nanao loves his mother, but his grandmother insists that Nanao isn’t supposed to be with her, and seems to know something is terribly wrong.

Recommended: TLDR; This collection of horror themed short stories with a dash of romance around the theme of the curse of the mermaid are quite good. They’re tragic and memorable and overall highly recommended.

Age Rating: Older Teen: lots of blood but not that gory. But it does have some scenes that are pretty disturbing.

Other Works from this Mangaka in English: (from most to least popular)

• InuYasha (Shounen)

• Ranma 1/2 (Shounen)

• Maison Ikkoku (Seinen)

• Urusei Yatsura (Shounen)

• RIN-NE (Shounen)

• One Pound Gospel (Seinen)

• Rumic Theater (Shounen)

Don't Cry, Girl! (Rank 2.5)

Publisher: JManga

Volumes: 1/1 (Complete), (Digital Only) (see notes)

Shoujo

Genre: Comedy, Romance, Age-Gap Romance

Summary: Taeko’s parents were incompetent, and so she was sent to live with a friend of her father’s named Matsuda. She knocks on the door only to discover that her new roommate and guardian is a shameless Nudist! As Taeko struggles to adapt to her bizarre twist of fate and hide the truth about her living situation, she is determined to be strong. Can they reach some understanding? 

Includes an unrelated short story: 3322: Kanako told her father she wants to drop out of high school. He suggested she spend her summer break at an acquaintance’s place, a motherly older woman’s place deep in the boonies. Will she change her mind while she’s there?

Review: I debated whether to review this title, because JManga is now a dead publisher and their releases were only digital in the first place, so there aren’t even any used books available to buy. That being said, I did want to do a sort of post-mortem on dead manga publishers as well as highlight the more unique titles in their catalog. And although these titles are no longer available legally, they are still available in some form or another, if you search for it.

The beginning starts off with quite a lot of crude humor, mostly in the form of dick jokes. Honestly I was shocked to see a Shoujo manga written by a woman having this many dick jokes, but it was actually surprisingly funny. Then after about halfway through it turns into a weird romance. The most obvious weirdness is that he’s her guardian, and almost double her age (16 vs 30 something). But the weirdest part is that it’s left somewhat ambiguous whether they both actually like each other or whether it’s some weird joke that got taken too far. And then it ends fairly abruptly. All in all not bad for a short one volume story, but it could have easily been a short series, and I would have liked a more concrete ending.

As for the short story 3322, it was surprisingly good for a short serious story, but it reads like a failed pilot for a new series. I would have liked it to have had a more concrete ending as well.

Recommended: TLDR; It’s a short and funny read for the first half of the story, at least if you don’t mind some crude humor, mostly in the form of dick jokes. But honestly the romance part was kind of weird and I wished it had stayed a comedy for the whole thing. 

Age Rating: Older Teen, a lot of male nudity but all tastefully censored with convenient angles. But the humor is probably more on the adult side.

Other Works from this Mangaka in English (from most to least popular):

• Dining Bar Akira (Yaoi)
• Yes, It's Me (Yaoi) (digital only)
• I Want a Love Story (Yaoi) (digital only)
• Black-Winged Love (Yaoi)
• The Night Beyond the Tricornered Window (Yaoi)
• Mo-some Sting (Yaoi) (digital only)

As the Gods Will - the Second Series (Rank 2.5)

Publisher: Kodansha

Volumes: 21/21 (Complete) (Digital Only)

Shounen

Genre: Life and Death Games, Survival Horror, Supernatural, Ecchi, Harem

Summary: Life seemed ordinary for high school seniors Akashi and his best friend and soccer teammate Aoyama. They had an argument about whether to pursue their dreams of playing soccer professionally together in college, or just Aoyama alone. Akashi felt like they lost their chance to play pro forever, ever since Aoyama lost that fateful game that would have taken them to the national tournament. Akashi runs out in a huff and skips school, while Aoyama stubbornly stays behind. But the two of them never get a chance to apologize to each other, as the school is soon attacked by deadly Daruma dolls!

The both of them, plus somehow every single high schooler on the planet, gets swept into a series of deadly children’s games for some unknown purpose. Can Akashi and Aoyama survive to apologize to each other? And what are the games even for?

Review: The overall main plot is based on a series of mostly Japanese children’s games combined with wordplay that have been reinterpreted into games of life and death. Thankfully there are many translator's notes in the margins explaining the games and the puns. And some of the games are more familiar and don't need much explanation.

The overall theme of the manga is high stakes of the games acting as a sort of pressure cooker that can bring out the best and worst in people, as well as a sort of ongoing debate whether it is better to be selfish and ruthless or be more of a team player. But it’s a bit more of a guilty pleasure of a manga for the life and death games, as the death toll is ridiculously high, and basically almost none of the characters deserve their gory deaths. They were all drafted into the games and refusing to play results in instant death.

First thing to get out of the way is how annoying it is that Kodansha has licensed only this series, which is subtitled the Second Series because it's a sequel to the First Series. There are two prequels starting with 0- Zero which is 4 chapters long and contains spoilers for the entire series and explains why the games are happening. Then, the First Series is 5 volumes long and covers Shun Takahata and Amaya's journey before meeting up with the characters of the Second Series. Luckily both series have been scanlated fully and can be found by searching Kami-sama no Iu toori and 0- Zero. It is not necessary to read either of them before the Second Series, but I would recommend at least 0- Zero because it keeps the answer of why the games are happening until volume 17, and I felt like the answer was kind of a let down and not worth waiting so long for.

Plot Overview:

• Volumes 1-3 was a strong start to the story, as they try to figure out the games, the rules and how to win based on the clues they are given.

• Volumes 4-7 the school mysteries arc, was kind of so-so. On the plus side the strategy of the two teams trying to work together to save as many players as possible was kind of neat, but the actual ghost hunting was boring.

• Volumes 8-10 have a sort of side story where the characters are given special powers, but this plot goes mostly nowhere because they lose their powers at the end of the arc.

• Volumes 10-12 After a short interlude, the story goes to a game of sky high Hopscotch with a twist.

• Volume 13: A volume of Hell Labyrinth, and the reunion with Aoyama.

• Volumes 14.5-17.5-ish Then a 3 volume long arc of Cops and Robbers (a tag-based game), but this arc was awful as Akashi turns into a total idiot, other players are introduced who can break the rules and not die, and then somehow a lot of the winners die anyway.

• Volumes 17.5-ish-20 Then finally the story heads into its final arc, as the finalists play a game of Old Maid with a twist.

• Volume 21 The ending.

This series is an Ecchi Harem manga, which is a genre of manga with a lot of fanservice (most often cleavage and girl underwear shots) and where multiple characters confess their love to the main character. I had mixed feelings about this. On one hand the ecchi is worse than usual and I really disliked how the blatant fanservice would interrupt tense and dramatic scenes. Like in the very first chapter when the Daruma doll kills a teacher, a random girl falls over with her skirt flipped up and her butt straight in the camera. There’s a lot of that kind of stuff, and it’s kind of dumb. But the Harem part was surprisingly not terrible as Akashi sometimes does show admirable qualities of trying to save others or trying to get everyone to work together to survive, so it worked out somewhat better when his girl teammates who are trusting him with their lives inside a crazy and dangerous situation also fall in love with him.

That being said, this manga made an odd decision to include a number of LGBT characters, including a bisexual main character who is gay for Akashi. That in itself wasn’t terrible, but I disliked the fact that this character is really over the top and basically insane but also somewhat redeemed by his loyalty and friendship. And adding another minor character who is a lesbian, who is also stalker crazy, felt meh. To be fair, a lot of the regular characters are crazy too. The only thing that redeemed this manga somewhat here was the addition of a transgender girl, who is thankfully normal.

Overall the games are interesting and dramatic, and a few of the games have interesting twists that are figured out in a clever way. But while I was reasonably content with the resolution of Akashi and Aoyama’s central friendship plot, like half of the other minor character plots go nowhere and are never resolved. So basically, read it for the games and not for the characters. And finally the ending, was a terrible disappointment. At first glance I thought the author left it open for a sequel, but after much thought I think he was trying to go for a bittersweet victory but ended up much too bitter. Personally I would skip the ending completely (volume 21) and make up your own imaginary ending, and you’ll probably be happier.

Recommended: TLDR; This manga about a series of Life and Death games based on Children’s games and puns is very entertaining overall. Although it is a somewhat of a guilty pleasure, since all the characters are forced to play these horrifying and deadly games. On the plus side, the games and the way the characters manage to survive is very overall very interesting, but the manga is lackluster in other respects like character development and romantic subplots, and so on. And also note there is also potentially objectionable content with the inappropriate fanservice and a couple crazy LGBT characters.

Age Rating: R: plenty of deaths, blood and gore. Also lots of fanservice, underwear shots, some nudity, some implied offscreen sex, also some random groping and etc.

Other Notes: The first 15 volumes are currently free to read with a trial Kindle Unlimited or Comixology Subscription.

Mushroom Girls in Love (Rank 3.5)

Publisher: Seven Seas

Volumes: 1/1 (Complete), In Print

Yuri

Genre: Fantasy, Scifi, Romance

Summary: The Mushroom Folk are an all female tribe of Mushroom/Human hybrids who live simply and mostly peacefully in the forests of giant mushrooms. They herd docile fungi they call Cattle, and are ruled in small kingdoms where only the elites know how to read and write. In this fantastical setting, a simple herder mushroom girl Arriala falls in love and marries an elite scribe mushroom girl Erriela, the first marriage in the village in 10 years. Most ordinary mushroom folk reproduce by budding, but the two of them want to try the other way of making children. Unfortunately, they discover their mushroom genes are not compatible leaving Erriela unable to walk. Meanwhile the 3rd Princess has fallen for Erriela and orders her kidnapping. Can Arriala rescue her wife?

Review: This is kind of an unusual series, a curious one volume work from the mangaka of A Centaur’s Life. On the plus side, the artwork is amazingly imaginative and impressively detailed, in a look that kind of reminds me of Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind with its detailed, nature inspired fantasy look. The mushroom folk are kind of fairy-like creatures, looking like miniature people living in a primitive society in the middle of a giant mushroom forest.

The setting is rich and interestingly based on a combination of mushroom biology and in a fungi based ecosystem and a primitive caste-based society and a monarchy. The mangaka put in a lot of thought and research into this comic about mushroom folk society, and there is a wealth of interesting details, mostly in optional paragraphs of text between the comic chapters. If you are the kind of person who is interested in imaginative fictional worlds, then honestly I thought these were interesting, but I know a lot of readers are just here for the Yuri.

Unfortunately, I’m sorry to say the central Yuri story is not really particularly good. The characters are not very fleshed out and the story is really lacking in romance, even though it is supposed to be one. The early beginning of the domestic life between the two main characters is sweet, but we don’t get much of it before Erriela is attacked and then kidnapped. The rest of the story is about her rescue.

Recommended: TLDR; All in all, this short one volume work may be of interest to those looking for unusual nature inspired artwork and the interesting fungi based primitive society of fairy-like mushroom girls. But as a story it lacks interesting characters and is not very romantic.

Age Rating: PG13: lots of boobs and cleavage but they look like they’re wearing bikini tops and skirts most of the time. Some very mild violence. Arachnophobia warning: this manga features a huge hairy tarantula-like spider in it.

LGBT Friendly: 3/10: A bunch of readers disliked the whole division of Mushroom Girls into "Mommies and Daddies" although this is based on mushroom sexual reproduction and isn't intended to be societal commentary. Also, their society encourages divorce for couples unable to have children.

Other Works from this Mangaka in English: A Centaur's Life (Seinen/Yuri)

Chronowar (Rank 3.5)

Publisher: Dark Horse

Issues: 9/9 (1 Volume total, Complete), OOP but not hard to find

Seinen

Genre: Hard Scifi, Scifi, Romance

Summary: A satellite has malfunctioned and will crash soon into a residential area of Japan. The police are evacuating the city, but three people are still inside the crash zone: a wanted fugitive, Machida, the cop chasing after him, Watanabe, and Chiaki, a young housewife. The fugitive Machida tries to half-heartedly take the young woman hostage to escape but she runs away, deep into the evacuation zone. Machida and Watanabe run after her, and then the satellite crashes right on top of them! It soon becomes clear the satellite crashed due to a hitchhiker of alien origin as the technology detaches itself from the burning satellite and attaches itself to the three of them!

The story then jumps to 10 months in the future as all three of them seemingly vanished without a trace. The fugitive gives himself up to the police, tells them where to find the missing woman who is safe but remembers nothing, and tells an incredible, unbelievable story of what happened to the missing cop. 

Review: It’s an unusual and obscure little Hard Scifi and Cyberpunk gem of a story that’s very Akira-inspired in art style. Unfortunately it was so unpopular back when it was released in the 1990’s that it was never collected into a printed volume, only 9 chapters that were published in single comic issues.

As the story starts, the three of them soon discover themselves to be traveling at super fast speeds as the super fast alien technology binds to them and speeds them up in time pockets in order to communicate and observe them at it’s own natural speed. Everything in the explosion from the crashed satellite appears to be frozen in time. Things take on a bit of a role reversal as the Alien AI that initially attempted first contact with the Cop, Watanabe, messed up and burnt out his brain, turning him into a crazy killer. Machida and Chiaki find themselves in a dilemma as they try to stop Watanabe from killing them and trying to be the sole representative of Earth. A further twist reveals a romantic subplot as Machida and Chiaki actually used to know each other some years ago.

Even though this story overall was much better than I expected for an obscure one volume story, I felt kind of unhappy about how the mangaka decided to leave a couple of major plot points ambiguous including the conclusion of the romantic subplot. While some stories can pull off an ambiguous ending, I felt like this story was basically a straightforward story that just has a couple major pieces missing.

Recommended: Overall this Scifi story might be of interest to those who might enjoy a hard scifi/cyberpunk short story with a side of romance. But it’s also nothing particularly special even though it has its moments.

Age Rating: Older Teen, for violence

Scumbag Loser (Rank 3)

Publisher: Yen Press Volumes: 1/1 Omnibus (3 in 1), In Print Seinen (reads like) Genre: Horror, Scifi

Summary: Masahiko Murai is overweight, bullied and an obsessive stalker of a girl named Haruka. Life is terrible, but he’s convinced that it’s alright as long as he’s not the “Biggest Loser” in his class. Between himself and Yamada, who smells extremely ripe, he’s only the second worst. But one day Yamada claims to have a hot girlfriend, which would make him the biggest loser! Desperate not to fall to the bottom, Murai claims to have a girlfriend too, and he shows everyone photos of Haruka on his phone. Much to his surprise, a girl who looks just like the photo shows up to class the next day, introduces herself as Haruka and claims to be his girlfriend! But the slight problem with that is that the photo is one he made himself on the computer… and the real Haruka it was based on died 5 years ago... He confronts “Haruka” with this information and she admits she might not be human… but he doesn’t care. He begs her to go out with him and make his lie real. And she agrees… on the condition that he helps her by introducing her to the biggest losers out there. Meanwhile Yamada, who called him bragging about how he was going to sleep with his hot girlfriend, suddenly screams over the phone. And the next day Yamada smells and acts like a different person, but no one else notices. Can Masahiko survive whatever the hell is going on, or is he next? And what are the Replacements up to? Review: Masahiko at first seems like a crazy delusional stalker who has trouble telling apart his delusions from reality. He is extremely judgmental and believes losers should just die, even though by his own criteria he is a loser as well. His only unique quality is his fetish for bad smells that others would consider disgusting, but it becomes important because he can even pick out someone from a crowd and identify them based on their natural smell. At first he goes along with Haruka’s requests even though he suspects that something is wrong. But after he finally connects with someone, a girl classmate named Satou who shares his weird interest in smelling people, and then finds she’s been marked as the next victim, he feels conflicted for the first time. He changes and becomes a person who wants to try and do the right thing. From this point on the story takes a lot of twists and turns and I don’t want to spoil it. The majority of the plot is driven by the mystery of the Replacements, and this story was very interesting as well. Overall this is such a strange but fascinating story that slowly and completely transforms itself. It starts off as something like “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” and through dramatic reveals, changes to something completely different and surprisingly wholesome for horror by the end. It starts off kind of gross, both because Masahiko and others who believe they can decide that some people have no value to their lives and are better off dead. And also literally gross between the bullied demands for feet licking and also as the people eaters are slowly devouring people in secret and replacing them with impostors. As more and more is revealed about Masahiko’s past though, he changes into a more sympathetic character who is revealed to be warped and traumatized, but not actually a bad person. But the biggest twist is right towards the end, where the whole truth is revealed which puts the entire story into a new context. By the end, the manga argues that all lives should have value, even so called losers. And humans are the true monsters because they are capable of such cruelty. Humans bully those based on who they perceive to be below themselves, they lie, and they cannot love their children unconditionally. But they are redeemed somewhat by loving others and being someone who is needed by someone else. And then finally the ending turns into a sort of fucked up romance, but still again, surprisingly wholesome for horror. IMO, it was well done, just can’t say more without spoiling the big twists.

Recommended: TLDR; All in all, I was really pleasantly surprised by this horror series. It starts off trying to convince you that there are losers that the world is better off without, but then takes a sharp turn and argues that all lives have value. It ends up being a story about love and redemption. Age Rating: R for violence and gore, and also some amount of nudity and underwear sniffing. But it’s not as dirty as it sounds, Masahiko remembers people from their smell and the Imposters bait men with sex to eat them.

Not Love But Delicious Foods Make Me So Happy! (Rank 4)

Publisher: Yen Press

Volumes: 1/1 (Complete), OOP but not hard to find

Josei, Yaoi Interest

Genre: Food, Memoirs

Summary: When Fumi Yoshinaga isn’t working her intense life of constant manga deadlines or catching up on sleep, the one thing she lives for is food. Particularly luxurious fine dining. She gets a side job drawing this series of short manga introducing restaurants around the Tokyo area, including ones she knows and loves. The main focus of the restaurant recommendations are Asian cuisine like Sushi, Korean food, Chinese Dim Sum and Vietnamese food, but there’s also some French and Italian cuisine and French pastries as well. The other half of the story is about the life of Fumi Yoshinaga, and her conversations with her manga assistants, friends and other acquaintances while they talk about the food, and their lives.

Review: This manga isn’t at all what I had thought it would be, I was hoping for more of an Antique Bakery-like story that centers around food but also has its own story too. Instead this manga is predominantly a series of rave reviews of Ms. Yoshinaga’s favorite fine dining restaurants with a few more casual eateries mixed in, such as a bagel shop and a bakery. While the various foods are drawn with lavish detail and the descriptions of the foods sound really delicious, the obvious downside is that all the places she recommends are in Tokyo. And the original manga was published in Japan in 2005, so by now many of those places will have closed or changed menu or dropped in quality and etc. etc. And that aside many of the places she recommends are very expensive menu courses as well. Which is kind of unfortunately not going to be interesting to a lot of readers.

The other side of the story is an interesting glimpse into the life of a manga artist and Ms. Yoshinaga’s life in particular. I think the most interesting short chapter is where she apologizes to a friend of hers who she just found out is a real gay man. She apologizes for making a living drawing manga with gay themes but not actual real gay themes that have nothing to do with real gay culture. But he doesn’t mind. And a lot of the rest of the manga has a sort of unintentional theme of marriage as she is in her early 30’s and a lot of her friends are getting married or talking about wanting to get married. She draws herself and depicts herself in a very self-deprecating way, and with a sense of humor, but sometimes I found it too self-deprecating. Especially when she draws herself looking like a troll without makeup or compares herself to a middle aged man and so on.

The closest thing to a story this manga has is probably the focus on one of her assistants, S-hara. They live together, but are just friends and roommates. There’s a sort of a minor side plot about him moving out and trying to find another job, but things don’t go the way they planned.

Recommended: All in all, this one volume collection of restaurant reviews by famous Yaoi mangaka Fumi Yoshinaga will probably not be of interest to most readers, unless they are interested in a glimpse of her life. Also like one review I read said, these stories are more enjoyable if you read one short chapter once in a while. If you binge them all they’re all kind of very alike.

Age Rating: PG

Other Works from this Mangaka (from Most to Least Popular): 

• Gerard and Jacques (Yaoi)
• Antique Bakery (Shoujo/Josei)
• Ichigenme - The First Class is Civil Law (Yaoi)
• Ooku (Josei)
• What Did You Eat Yesterday? (Yaoi)
• Lovers in the Night (Yaoi)
• Moon and Sandals (Yaoi)
• Don't Say Anything More, Darling (Yaoi)
• Truly, Kindly (Yaoi)
• Solfege (Yaoi)
• Flower of Life (Shoujo/Josei)
• All My Darling Daughters (Josei)
• Garden Dreams (Josei)