This volume’s first story involves Nene getting to know a young girl who is about to experience life with a completely different kind of cyberbody.  Now, I expect this story to have a humanist sci-fi bent that takes the unusual nature of this cyberbody and spins a surprisingly touching tale that’s another showcase for our […]

This series has been treading the waters of “Not as Good as it Once Was” for a good long while now.  I keep waiting for it to either step up its storytelling game or to give us some signs of its old, nasty self that thrived on shock value.  What I was not expecting was […]

In the previous volume, Denji and most of the main cast went to Hell.  Nobody goes to Hell in this volume.  They just go through it.  Starting with Power, who has been traumatized by her encounter with the Darkness Devil and can’t calm down as a result of it.  Denji does his best to deal […]

You know, if this volume represents the last we see of Tanigaki in this series… I’m cool with that. Meanwhile, Sugimoto, Asirpa, and Shiraishi are on the trail of another tattooed convict, Botaro the Pirate.  When they get word that a man with strange tattoos is working as a candy seller in a nearby town, […]

There are a lot of great things about this series.  One of the best is how it never forgets about its sense of humor.  There may be points in the story where things take a turn for the dramatic, but there’s always been some kind of fun ridiculousness lurking underneath the drama to remind you […]

The first half of this volume carries in much the same way as the first one did.  That is to say it makes for decent fantasy comfort food reading as Frieren and her apprentice Fern continue their way North back to the Demon King’s castle.  Her former comrade Eisen is here for the first chapter […]

Have you ever played a “Yakuza” game and thought to yourself, “You know, this Goro Majima guy is pretty crazy, but he’d be even more crazy if he wore high heels?”  If you have, then the arc that kicks off in this volume has you covered.  Zenpachi Kurogane is a member of the Yakuza family […]

Vol. 6 was as compelling as it was uncomfortable to read.  Vol. is more on the “uncomfortable” side of that equation as it turns out that completely submitting to his mother’s wishes hasn’t made Seiichi’s life any better.  Especially in that he can’t even follow them correctly when it comes to his (former) female friend […]

I said last time that I’d stick around for this series no matter how long it takes.  That, uh… turned out to be quite a while, but I’d say the wait was still worth it.  This is mainly due to how vol. 15 is one of the better volumes of “Real” in advancing the stories […]