WIBR: Detroit Metal City vol. 5

While this series has accomplished many things over the course of its English-language run so far (such as being consistently hilarious, and successfully satirizing some of heavy metal’s more outrageous aspects), I think that its greatest achievement in the end will be making me look like a complete ass.  Since the beginning of its run, I’ve felt that the series was a one-joke concept that, while very funny, would eventually run out of steam well before its final volume.  That didn’t happen with the first three volumes, and I put it on my “top ten” for last year because of that.  Vol. 4 looked like it might be the tipping point after things got back to normal with the end of the “Satanic Emperor” arc, but vol. 5 is hilarious right out of the gate.  Negishi makes an ass of himself (and is made an ass as well) in so many new and inventive ways that show Wakasugi’s stash of comic situations and conflicts is far deeper than anyone could have realized at first.  Things get even better at the end when Wakasugi starts the buildup for the series’ next major arc which is going to touch on an item that’s been part of the series since its beginning, but never been touched on.  I mean, if Negishi is “Krauser II” then there had to have been a “Krauser I” previously…