I know the story / I know the score
Fushigi Yuugi: Genbu Kaiden volume 7. I bought it today.
I read these chapters online back during the summer. I re-read them today. (Instead of working on a paper, orz. >.<)
And the events in this volume got me just as close to crying the second time around as they did the first. (And it's not easy for [spoiler] to bring me that close these days!)
Seriously, people, if you're not reading this series, you should be. Now. Hated the original Fushigi Yuugi? No excuse. I've never gotten past volume 5 or so of FY, I have pretty much no patience for it.GK is nothing like the first FY. Watase's grown up so much~!
Fushigi Yuugi: About Miaka and her magical male harem which includes her **~~true love~~** whose name she spends a quarter of the series saying/screaming.
Genbu Kaiden: About Takiko and the family she makes out of people who are among the first friends she's really had, a group of damaged people who are going to try their best to save a country from self-destruction. Sure, it's got romance too. But largely with a hero who...actually spends a considerable amount of time as a heroine.
Watase's stated theme for GK is "life and death." And she's been handling and reflecting it excellently from the start. Now that all of the Celestial warriors have been located (note: located, not gathered~), she's been able to bring this into focus even more, and it's really displaying the best that she can do.
Anybody else around here remember the end of volume 6 of Alice 19th? You know the scene, the one with the man and the bells~? Oh yeah, this is that Watase.
Though speaking of Watase's statements...
"I don't have a normal female brain, so I don't feel the need for romance in manga, but I do want Takiko and Uruki to have a proper, bittersweet love story. Even so, I really wanted to draw the action in this volume, so I got all worked up about it. This is more like my kind of story. Romance always seems limited because the characters are so focused on each other. It's boring...I'm much rather write about ideals like steadfast conviction or devotion or..."
-from Watase's comments at the beginning of FY: GK vol. 7
NO WATASE, NEVER GIVE IN TO THE FOOLISH FANGIRLS. THIS FEMALE BRAIN LOVES THE STORY ABOUT DEVOTION YOU TOLD IN THIS VOLUME. Complete with some awesome fighting and wonderful sociopolitical side elements! IN THE LAST TEN YEARS YOU HAVE ONLY CHANGED FOR THE BETTER, NEVER GO BACK.
...Not that I don't adore the stuff that's coming. But that's really not romance, it's character and world exploration strongly featuring romance. There's a difference.
I will say this.
When I came up to the dorms this year, I decided that I had room for two manga series to accompany my books. I chose Mushishi (by Urushibara Yuki, volume 6 comes out the 25th~), and Watase's Alice 19th, which is the brilliant series that pulled me from being indifferent to Watase to someone who fiercely defends her and participates in watase_awards.
If she handles the ending of Genbu Kaiden as well as she handles things in this volume (and a few later things available through onemanga), I think it's going to beat Alice 19th out in my favorites standings.
I read these chapters online back during the summer. I re-read them today. (Instead of working on a paper, orz. >.<)
And the events in this volume got me just as close to crying the second time around as they did the first. (And it's not easy for [spoiler] to bring me that close these days!)
Seriously, people, if you're not reading this series, you should be. Now. Hated the original Fushigi Yuugi? No excuse. I've never gotten past volume 5 or so of FY, I have pretty much no patience for it.GK is nothing like the first FY. Watase's grown up so much~!
Fushigi Yuugi: About Miaka and her magical male harem which includes her **~~true love~~** whose name she spends a quarter of the series saying/screaming.
Genbu Kaiden: About Takiko and the family she makes out of people who are among the first friends she's really had, a group of damaged people who are going to try their best to save a country from self-destruction. Sure, it's got romance too. But largely with a hero who...actually spends a considerable amount of time as a heroine.
Watase's stated theme for GK is "life and death." And she's been handling and reflecting it excellently from the start. Now that all of the Celestial warriors have been located (note: located, not gathered~), she's been able to bring this into focus even more, and it's really displaying the best that she can do.
Anybody else around here remember the end of volume 6 of Alice 19th? You know the scene, the one with the man and the bells~? Oh yeah, this is that Watase.
Though speaking of Watase's statements...
"I don't have a normal female brain, so I don't feel the need for romance in manga, but I do want Takiko and Uruki to have a proper, bittersweet love story. Even so, I really wanted to draw the action in this volume, so I got all worked up about it. This is more like my kind of story. Romance always seems limited because the characters are so focused on each other. It's boring...I'm much rather write about ideals like steadfast conviction or devotion or..."
-from Watase's comments at the beginning of FY: GK vol. 7
NO WATASE, NEVER GIVE IN TO THE FOOLISH FANGIRLS. THIS FEMALE BRAIN LOVES THE STORY ABOUT DEVOTION YOU TOLD IN THIS VOLUME. Complete with some awesome fighting and wonderful sociopolitical side elements! IN THE LAST TEN YEARS YOU HAVE ONLY CHANGED FOR THE BETTER, NEVER GO BACK.
...Not that I don't adore the stuff that's coming. But that's really not romance, it's character and world exploration strongly featuring romance. There's a difference.
I will say this.
When I came up to the dorms this year, I decided that I had room for two manga series to accompany my books. I chose Mushishi (by Urushibara Yuki, volume 6 comes out the 25th~), and Watase's Alice 19th, which is the brilliant series that pulled me from being indifferent to Watase to someone who fiercely defends her and participates in watase_awards.
If she handles the ending of Genbu Kaiden as well as she handles things in this volume (and a few later things available through onemanga), I think it's going to beat Alice 19th out in my favorites standings.