WIBR: Twin Spica vol. 2

You know, I like this series but the events of this volume were a real bummer.  After being accepted into the Tokyo Space School, Asumi finds herself acclimating rather well to its curriculum and solidifying the friendships she began in the last volume.  The problems begin when she finds out that if she becomes an astronaut, she’ll have to have a specially made suite to accommodate her — a drain on the school’s strained budget.  Making matters worse is that the teacher who brings this up has a grudge against Asumi’s father and while the plan to dismiss her is decried by the school faculty, one of the higher-ups privately asks him to get rid of her “quietly.”  Then in the second “bonus story,” we see a young Asumi’s efforts to make friends with a girl who was injured in the rocket crash that her father was responsible for.  I’d like to say it ends on a high note, but the “magical realism” employed to make it work didn’t feel right.  Here’s hoping we get less depressing character drama in the next volume, and more focus on the cast’s training to become astronauts.