Sakura Hime 9

Arina Tanemura – Viz – 2012 – 12 volumes

I haven’t read this in awhile, but it’s still addictively good, though I’m not sure how many fans it will win outside the shoujo audience. Arina Tanemura is always good for it, and this series is particularly good. I’m not sure that it’s my favorite, but it’s probably the most solid and enjoyable all the way through.

Less drama in this volume, most of which is dedicated to the odd friendship between Hayate, the young ninja who was accidentally turned into a frog, and Rurijo, a kind of Nataku/Golem-type creature that looks like Sakura and was brought to life by her brother. Rurijo is a particularly nasty villain. While all the others have a reason for following Sakura’s bitter brother, Rurijo does so because he created her, and she loves him.

This volume shows a wonderful side of her, though. While it can be a bit tiresome to see villains made to be “good” over and over again, I thought it was nice to see the bright, cheery side of her personality. And that’s pretty much all it is, her personality, as we learn later. I liked that part of it, too. We also get to see a new side to Hayate, who feels neglected by Kohaku. While he thinks of nothing but Kohaku, he’s not sure that she shares his feelings since she tends to be completely devoted to whoever she’s serving (in this case, Sakura). The friendship between Rurijo and Hayate is quite lovely, and was an unexpected bright spot in a story that has been tending towards darkness lately.

Speaking of which, we get some of that in the beginning when we learn about Aoba’s curse (which is pretty awesome) and settle the matter of cheating, alternate wives/spouses in general, et cetera. That part was never very interesting since there was no chance Sakura and Aoba were going to spit up. I wish there was, especially since Aoba was so terrible in the early volumes, but that’s not the case.

Tanemura expresses some dismay at having to draw Rurijo in the nude so much, which I thought was funny. As a golem-type creature, she needs to soak up a lot of water, so Hayate actually runs across her (and keeps meeting up with her) while she’s bathing. Being naked doesn’t really bother Rurijo, and that adds a lot to the personality thing I mentioned earlier, too. It’s nice to see that she can be naked without it being a super-sexual thing, too. Tanemura is right, it seems to suit her.

Tanemura talks a bit about the volume Fudanjuku Story that she was working on around the same time this was released. I mentioned before that this was totally coming out in English as an inevitability, but as she was talking about it here, I realized that it was apparently about some sort of idol group? In which case, it’s totally not coming out here. I was bummed, but an online summary I read just now made it sound like a very typical shoujo manga, so maybe she takes the band members and puts them in a school club, or something? In which case, there’s a chance, depending on if the manga’s only a small part of the book or the whole thing? I’m a little curious now. Then again, it’s also possible that Arina Tanemura’s manga aren’t selling that well in English anymore, which would also explain why it hasn’t been licensed. That would be most heartbreaking, though.

Basically, I’m still enjoying this immensely, and I am curious to see how it ends. I’ve expressed doubt over the end of a Tanemura series before and been surprised by Time Stranger Kyoko, but then again, Full Moon. She mentioned Sakura Hime was going to be long, but then ended it at volume 12. I’m curious to see how cleanly this happens. We’re mostly caught up with Japan, which means the next few volumes will come out slowly. That’s fine, because I do enjoy this series a lot and will be sad to see it end, something that doesn’t really occur to me much anymore. And I do hope to see more of her work in English. If not Fudanjuku Story, maybe her new series.

This was a review copy provided by Viz.