My Manga Reviews

Origami

by May | May 16, 2019

I think that it's a nice manga ranked really low (#13369 on MAL with a 6.64 score) and axed really quickly.

Story: Since Yuna was little she had unbeatable luck, is always happy, has a lot of friends but is an orphan. She still has an older brother and together they fight poverty. One day, Yuna meets a boy who demands that she gives the only memento she has of her mother to him. She refuses but a little later she expose the true identity of the boy and about the memento of her mother.

When I think of origami I think about paper folding... but... Wikipedia also says that ori means "folding", and kami means "paper" (kami changes to gami due to rendaku) so that's why in this manga we have a lot of gods (kami) but I still think that maybe another name would fit this manga better.
The story is well made and had potential to become a really good manga (sadly it was rushed/axed): the characters have a good background and a clear goal (return to their normal human life). The few characters are interesting and develop well, maybe because there aren't a lot of them and the side characters are really few. The story is quite simple and enjoyable.
The drawings are well made and cute. Every page is well made, good to look and with a lot of details.

My rating: 7/10

Spoiler

It had potential... a lot of potential but sadly the ending was axed and the ending was left open... it's still enjoyable but an open ending after we discover that "only one will be left" is a little unsatisfying. We can see only one death and the main enemy is still there doing who knows what because we won't see him again. And we won't know who was left in the end because all of the main character left together for a journey to find all the Mitama.

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Sensei Lock On!

by May | May 9, 2019

Categories: (Completed) Manga Review

**Name:** Sensei Lock On! (先生ロックオン！)
**Alt name:** Lock-on the Teacher!
**Author:** Shindou Arashi (Story & Art)
**Volumes:** 2 | **Chapters:** 35
**Genres:** Comedy, Romance, School

"Read a 4-koma manga".. this was one of the entries in the 2019 MRC... I don't know many 4-koma so I searched on reddit for something and I found a really cute one!

Story: Kadokura Kyouko, grade school teacher, 33 years old. Yamato Kazuki, university student, 20 years old with only one goal: marrying his former teacher (and to be an astronaut... or maybe a teacher XD).
Yamato has been in love with Kyouko since she was his teacher in 4th grade and he promised to marry her. Now he is an adult and one of his goals is accomplished: he is dating Kyouko!
Now that the two are dating, their relationship (teacher-student) don't seem to have changed that much... or not?

This 4-koma was really cute! With a simple plot but... cute! The two main characters are really interesting and well developed. It's an interesting 4-koma because is a little slice of life but is always funny to read without getting tiresome (I have read it in 2 days!)
There's a lot of interesting characters (other teachers, students and friends) but all of them are used to help our couple or simply to improve their relationships. It's rare but all the characters are nice and you get attached to them and can't find someone that you dislike.
The releationship of the Kyouko and Yamato slowly develops (or maybe not? XD) but at the climax the manga ends (there's a sequel so one day I'll read it!)
The drawings are really cute. There aren't many landscapes (well, it's a 4-koma so who cares about them? XD) but all the characters are drawn with a lot of details.

My rating: 8/10

Yakitate!! Japan

by May | May 3, 2019

Categories: (Completed) Manga Review

**Name:** Yakitate!! Japan (焼きたて!! ジャぱん)
**Alt name:** Fresh-Baked Japan, Freshly-Baked Japan
**Author:** Hashiguchi Takashi (Story & Art)
**Volumes:** 26 - **Chapters:** 242
**Genres:** Comedy, Drama, Fantasy, Parody, Shounen

I really love manga about food... I really love to read good manga about food... but Yakitate!! Japan amaze me in a... strange way.

Story: the plot is really simple. Azuma Kazuma is a genius at baking and creating bread. His dream? To create the perfect bread to represent Japan internationally. With this goal he enter the famous bakery Pantasia and a lot of cooking battles begin.

This is the plot. Really. It's that simple. Until the end of the World competition in Monaco (the first part of the manga) this manga is really good: the ideas for the different kind of bread are interesting, the characters are nice and the reactions to the bread are fun.
Sadly the second part of the manga aren't that interesting: Azuma don't have any kind of development (he is a genius so he don't need improvement....), other characters don't do anything anymore (or some are simply used for the reactions), the reactions become too long and boring and the bread? It's become magic since the reactions to it can change people forever (for example a human that trys Azuma's bread can become a fish..).
I think that near the ending, the manga was axed since it was rushed and started to make no sense at all.
Like I wrote before, the main character is a genius so he don't improve that much. The other characters have a lot of potential but some of them simply aren't used anymore and others stop to baking bread to simply become side characters for the gag reactions.
The art is good and nice to look... nothing special but they are nice. (Sorry, I'm used to wonderful pages where the food is that realistic that you can't stop thinking about wanting to eat whatever they cooked!)
Overall, I think this is a good manga... maybe it should have been much shorter but it's a nice read.

My rating: 7/10

Story Spoiler

That last battle was... horrible. The amount of magic was too much when the reactions to the bread startet to change people forever... but fighting against a bread-monster was too much. Why the author didn't wrote a normal human vs human battle? I wanted Kirisaki to fight Azuma... I wanted to read something more normal instead of that battle. I was fine with everything until that point but that last battle ruined everything.

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