Rosario Vampire Review

Just in time for Halloween, I finally got a hold of the final volume of the manga. I have thoroughly enjoyed this manga. Its a manga that I've been reading for nearly a decade. The manga is divided into two seasons.

Premise: Tsukune Anno is an utterly average student who couldn't get accepted into any high school...except for one he had never even heard of before, Yokai Academy. When he gets off the bus he finds himself in this strange, creepy world. Shortly afterwards, he runs into a fellow student named Moka, an upbeat cheerful girl who immediately bites his neck and gains a taste for his blood. Yeah this is no ordinary school, Tsukune has been accepted into a school for monsters. The school's purpose is to teach younger monster's how to operate in disguise in the human world so humans and monsters can coexist. What basically follows is Tsukune just trying to survive each day at the school while not letting anyone know he is human (outside of his friends) or he will be killed on the spot. That is the plot of season 1 of the manga.

Season 2 of the manga centers more around the introduction of an organization of monsters called Fairy Tale. They basically want monsters to take over the human world and slaughter humans. We also get a look at Mizore's hometown. However, the crux of season 2 centers around the importance of Moka's "rosario seal", her family, and the fate of her mother who Moka hadn't seen since she was a child. Its some fun stuff all around if a bit fast paced when the manga gets to it a couple volumes before the end.

Before talking about the characters, I want to talk about the manga's genre and how it handles a few of its tropes for a bit. Its bit of a weird mix for me. While its a shounen fighting manga that focuses on monsters slugging it out, it also has a harem aspect, and a bit of romance. The harem aspect feels a bit weird to me since well, the both manga and Tsukune pretty much admit that he only has eyes for Moka. The manga also doesn't take the harem aspect too seriously so it avoids some annoying tropes and they all come off as feeling like really good friends so it works well in that regard. I find it really interesting that despite being the protagonist of a shounen manga, Tsukune isn't actually able to do much himself for a chunk of the manga. Usually its Moka or a member of the female cast dealing the finishing blow. Tsukune gains a ghoul form thanks to Moka infusing him with a her blood to save his life after what would be mortal injuries a lot, then he becomes half-vampire, and only gains full on vampire powers in the final battle in season two of the manga. It feels like a nice natural, incremental power escalation which is weird for me to see in a shounen manga as he constantly has to adapt to things even when he gains enough power to stand on his own as he is usually out-classed even by his friends. The restrained power trope is actually applied to Moka for the most part. Her rosario basically sealed off her vampire powers allowing her to be raised in the human world.

Now for the characters, I like them. Tsukune is a neat protagonist. At first he freaks out a bit when he enrolls in the school but after meeting Moka and forming a group of friends, he starts wanting to create a world where humans and monsters can coexist. There are two Moka's thanks to her rosario seal: Inner Moka and Outer Moka. Outer Moka is the more bubbly and outgoing side of Moka's personality with occasional confidence issues. Inner Moka is her more powerful and confident side and she is the side of Moka that can access her vampiric strength. Kurumu is a succubus but she is rather naive about things and is focused purely on who she sees are her true love (Tsukune). Its a rather heartbreaking outcome for her as when she comes to the realize that Tsukune likely won't return her feelings, she has a breakdown and it actually affects her fighting ability for a bit. In the end, she sort of comes to peace with it but still vows not to give up trying to win his heart. Yukari is a young witch who I don't honestly view as being in love with Tsukune and I see it as a crush than anything. Mostly because a lot of times, she tries to help the others get closer to Tsukune (and attempts to help Tsukune get closer to Moka) as opposed to going after him herself. On top of that when Feng Feng gets introduced in season 2 of the manga, she has a lot more chemistry with him and the epilogue comic strip after the main epilogue sort of implies that they get together in the future. Mizore is a snow fairy and she is honestly my favorite character in the manga. Its mostly due to her motivation regarding how she feels about Tsukune. She loves Tsukune and wants to be with him as much as Kurumu does but she outright admits that even if he doesn't choose her, she just wants him to be happy and that will be enough for her. Something about her being willing to sacrifice her own happiness so he could be happy just stuck with me.

I'm splitting this section here because I consider these characters to be more secondary members of Tsukune's group of friends. These characters are Gin, Ruby, Koko, and Feng Feng. Gin is a werewolf with a rather pervy side to him. Pervy characters don't annoy me that much and Gin does have some redeeming qualities to him as he is rather loyal to his friends. Thats about all I can say for him as he gets one big moment in season 1 of the manga. After that, he kinda moves into the background and even disappears for a good chunk of the manga and I have no idea why, maybe Tsukune's group just got too big for the writer to know what to do with Gin. Ruby's introduction is fine. She was a witch taken in by another witch in the human world who hated humans for various reasons. After her introduction, she appears sporadically throughout the rest of season 1 of the manga. With that being said, the comedy around Ruby makes me cringe a bit. Its usually a joke about how she is a masochist and likes being hit. There is an entire chapter where she is training Tsukune where she keeps bringing that up and it kinda messes up the flow imo. With that being said, I do like how its used when she actually fights a member of Fairy Tale. It causes him to freak out because he is raining down lightning bolts on her and her only response is screams of ecstasy. Koko shows up in season 2 is Moka's younger sister with a chip on her shoulder as you'd expect since she views herself as being the weakest in her family. Mostly she is the weakest because after a certain age a vampire's powers and fighting ability increase exponentially and Koko hasn't hit that age yet. When she is introduced, she has a sort of obsession regards to wanting to beat Moka in a fight. That stops around the time Fairy Tale shows up and they have to focus on defeating them. Feng Feng shows up in season 2, shortly before the Fairy Tale stuff pops off. The dude is a yaksha but not a powerful one at the moment and he is the soon-to-be head of a chinese monster mafia family. The family's power has been waning lately so at first he tries to strong arm Tsukune into joining by telling the girls that the members of his family are allowed to have multiple wives. He has a few confidence issues regarding his abilities and I like the guy as a character. He also has some really good interactions with Yukari so I'm all for them ending up together in the future.

The ending is...perfectly fine for what it is. Its satisfying enough but it kinda leaves things open so it feels a bit incomplete. Before going on to an epilogue it legitimately says "But thats a story for another time" once massive shake-ups have happened as a result of the final battle. I dunno, it feels like a season 3 was supposed to happen but for whatever reason, the writer chose to end the manga there.

The manga includes little bite-sized encyclopedia entries every time a character transforms for the first time. These basically give you information such as what mythology that monster comes from and what basic powers they have. The artist also loved sneaking in little references here and there. Off the top of my head: The Pillar Men's stone mask from Jojo shows up for a sight gag, one of the background students' monster form is a Saibaman, and a guy dressed as Luffy shows up in he background of a beach shot. There are a lot more that I've forgotten to mention. The covers for the manga are really good and some of them have this almost painting like quality to them.

Overall, I enjoyed the manga. Unfortunately, I don't consider it good enough to be a must-read but I do recommend reading at least the 1st two volumes to see if its your kind of thing. With that said, its also out of print now so its going to be slightly more expensive. For me tho, I'm glad I took a gamble and started reading this manga so long ago. The characters are all like-able and the fight scenes are fun due to the variety of monsters they go up against so it doesn't get stale. It was worth my time.

Rosario Vampire: A fun read for Halloween

I love Halloween and monsters but I'm not that big of a horror fan. Not going to get into that right now but a year or so ago, I found a manga that satisfies my love for Halloween without giving me nightmares. That manga is Rosario Vampire. As of the time of this post, I am 15 volumes into Rosario Vampire so this recommendation is made based on what has transpired in those volumes. I will be doing this with as little spoilers as possible.

The basic premise is that Tsukune Anno, an all around normal high school student, gets rejected from every human high school he applies to. However, he gets into the prestigious Yokai Academy, a school for monsters. At Yokai Academy, humans are killed on sight due to monsters worrying about humans finding and killing them. Fortunately for Tsukune, it is school policy for all students to maintain a human disguise. On his first day, he meets a vampire named Moka who develops quite a taste for his blood. The events that unfold in Season 1 of the manga pretty much center around Tsukune just trying to survive at the school between both in terms of his grades and fighting off students he and his friends inadvertently cross. The end of Season 1 and all of Season 2 from what I've so far is really where the things get kicked up a notch. However, the main plot of Season 1 doesn't kick in until the monstrels show up and thats where things tend to get real.

Season 2 (what I've read so far) gets really fun and its one of the main reasons why I love the characters so much particularly in regards to Mizore and Kurumu. It expands a bit on the relationship between humans and monsters while at points showing that they can sort of co-exist. This gets nicely counter-balanced by a mysterious organization known as Fairy Tale which as far as I can tell after 15 volumes seeks to either subjugate humans or at the very least is gathering its forces in case a war breaks out. That is just speculation on my part since I haven't been able to read past volume 5 of Season 2 yet.

The main cast of characters are fun and likeable.The first 5 or 6 issues of the manga are interesting in that it pulls a bit of twist with Tsukune. While he is the main character, he cannot fight on his own and usually has to rely on his monster friends to save him or have Moka give him her blood to fight. All the female characters are shown to be competent in a fight, not just Moka. I don't find any of them annoying or irritating. Mizore in particular is my favorite character and her personality plays rather well alongside Kurumu. Mizore is the typical quiet stalker chick though unlike Kurumu she isn't as forceful and actually wants Tsukune to be happy as opposed to forcing a relatioship. I'd normally find a pervy character like Gin annoying but he works out rather well since that isn't all there is to him. In Season 2, Gin's personality and history get expanded on and it makes him rather endearing. Though for some reason his dialogue gets changed to sound a bit more southern. The accent was missing in Season 1 of the manga. Koko is Moka's sister and her inferiority complex can get annoying at times but its not too bad. Kurumu's personality is interesting. She is a succubus with the power to make men fall in love with her but she wants a legitimate relationship with Tsukune despite being a bit over-zealous in her attempts. She is actually pretty innocent despite being a succubus which is weird given her mother's personality when she shows up.

The manga features the widest variety of monsters I've ever seen. It encompasses monsters from mythologies all over the world. There are even some monsters who are basically just classified as monstrels. They can basically transform their bodies into different disturbing looking weapons and those dudes are downright scary. Due to that, it leads to villains with potentially the most diverse set of powers and natures I've seen in a shonen manga. Hokuto from the end of Season 1 of the manga is my personal favorite. While his role was relatively predictable, he paints a very nice paralell with Tsukune's character. It illustrates just how badly Yokai Academy could've screwed Tsukune up if it wasn't for his friends having his back.

It is an interesting mix of genres with aspects of shonen, slight ecchi, harem, romance, and the supernatural. The ecchi aspects aren't that bad but they are rather notice-able and some of them happen often. They are quite a few panty-shots and Kurumu tends to tackle Tsukune a lot with a method I have termed the chest hug. Ruby's schtick can be a bit awkward but its fine since the main female cast tends to run the gambit of harem tropes. Any complaints I have with some of the ecchi-ness are minor complaints at best as it is more than made up for by all of the characters being like-able. With that being said, Lamia's chapter can be a bit awkwardly suggestive.

Above all else, the characters are memorable, particularly the psychotic disciplinary council who are basically only there for a couple of chapters. A lot of the one-off students/teachers are memorable as well with Lamia being one of the most memorable for the shear awkwardness she has to her. The fight scenes are intense even though Moka can end a lot of them with a single kick. My particular favorite battle was the first arc of Season 2. A doppleganger duplicated Moka's vampiric strength so the other female protagonists are nickle and dime-ing the guy until he is weak enough for Moka to finish off. Overall, the manga can be a bit generic but its enjoyable enough to overlook it. Its got its faults but I'd definitely recommend this to anyone who likes Halloween and monsters but isn't too big on horror.

What I love about One Piece

Ok, I know I already talked about this during my post on the Big 3, but I've been playing One Piece Romance Dawn almost non-stop so I figured I'd elaborate on why I consider One Piece to be the king of the Big 3. Pardon me if this ends up turning into a crash course on One Piece.

This thing is arguably the most popular anime and certainly best selling manga series in the world. I have yet to actually meet anyone in the anime community with something bad to say about it other than its length. It is quite honestly an anime that is worth all the acclaim that the fans give it. It is also one of the strangest anime I have ever seen yet the show makes it work so well that it just results in a really fun show.

All of the Straw Hats are great characters and each of them has gotten great moments so far. Unlike the other members of the Big 3, where the main character is usually the only one shown getting stronger, everyone gets the chance to become stronger so they don't just get knocked out of a fight immediately. They all feel like legitimate characters. My personal favorite being Ussop because I feel he has come along way since his cowardly beginnings both in terms of his tactics and in terms of his creativity. Characters that might seem broken actually aren't as the anime/manga makes it very clear that no matter how strong someone gets, there will always be someone stronger down the line. This leads to a lot of very gripping, intense fights. My personal favorite arc so far is the CP9 arc because it shows exactly what each of the Straw Hats are capable of. The villains are unique, very memorable, pose a great threat, and in general are just fun antagonists. Every battle in this anime/manga has this sort of grand feel to it which lacking is really lacking in Naruto and Bleach.

One Piece is that at that level of weirdness where everything just seems to make sense no matter how odd or outlandish it gets. Seriously, only in One Piece can a cola-powered cyborg shipwright, fish people (not just mermaids), a skeleton musician with an afro, and a talking shape-shifting blue-nosed reindeer doctor make total sense. My personal favorite example of its weirdness however comes from the Alabasta arc. It is during the battle where Chopper and Ussop are fighting Baroque Works agents Mr.4, Ms. Merry Christmas, and their cannon dog Lassoo who is quite literally a cannon that ate the Mutt-Mutt fruit Dachshund Model.

Ussop asks Ms Merry Christmas how it was even possible for a cannon to do that and she basically responds by saying "Its a new Grand Line trick. You haven't seen anything yet.". That one line speaks volumes about One Piece's weirdness.

The Devil Fruits bring a very nice variety in abilities to the table. Though each fruit has different strengths, they all share the same weakness: people who eat the devil fruits can no longer swim and will sink like a rock in water deep enough to drown in. On its own, that doesn't sound a like a big weakness but it becomes a major possibility when you consider that the two most common occupations in the show/manga are Navy and Pirate so just about every devil fruit user falls into one of those two categories. That isn't the only threat to the devil fruit users either. There is a special stone from the bottom of the sea that can shut off a person's devil fruit abilities as long as the stone touches them. There is also Haki and one of the types (Armament Haki) can counter devil fruit users abilities and is especially effective against Logia types.

One of my favorite Devil Fruits: Ace's Mera Mera Fruit.

Overall there are three basic types of devil fruits: Logia, Zoan, and Paramecia. Logia devil fruits allow the user to change their body into a specific force of nature like Ace's fire based powers thanks to the Mera-Mera Fruit. Zoan fruits give the user the power to transform into animals such as Chopper's humanoid form and ability to speak via the Human-Human Fruit. The Zoan type is not limited to just regular animals, there are some that grant the powers of mythical creatures like Marco's Phoenix fruit as well as the Ancient Zoan fruits that allow the user to turn into dinosaurs. Parameicia fruits grant the users general super-human powers such as Luffy's ability to stretch via the Gum-Gum Fruit. To make it even more interesting, certain devil fruits render the user immune or resistant to other devil fruit abilities, like the Gum-Gum fruit rendering Luffy virtually immune to Enel's Rumble-Rumble fruit due to Luffy's body being rubber or the Wax-Wax fruit being able to neutralize/block the Venom-Venom fruit's poison.

One of the more fascinating things about the show is how Oda set up the Navy wanting the Straw Hats heads. The Straw Hats are pirates in name and symbol only, they have for the most part done nothing that is actually illegal. It shows how corrupt that the Navy and the World Government actually are if they're willing to hunt down people doing more good than harm. The testimony from all the people they've helped would be more than enough to clear them of the charges but as long as they fly the Jolly Rodger, the World Government will only ever see them as pirates. That is a stroke of genius.

However, the most impressive feat of the anime/manga by far is Oda's ability to keep things consistent with previously established continuity and character backstories. Now on its own, that compliment doesn't sound like much of a compliment but consider this: At the time of this post the manga currently has over 748 chapters which is a total of 78 volumes and the anime has 708 episodes with about 12 movies. That in and of itself is amazing. I can't help but think Oda reads through some of his notes before writing a new arc just to make sure he doesn't repeat himself. Oda also really knows how to handle character deaths. He rarely kills off characters but when he does, he always does it in a grand fashion so no matter what happens later, you will always remember the character's final moments. Anyway those are my thoughts on One Piece, an anime that I consider to be the current king of the shounen genre and it is definitely worth the acclaim that the fans give it. The anime is just plain old fashion-ed fun. And with that, I'll leave all with this:

My thoughts on Attack On Titan so far

Well, episode 16 of the dub aired on Toonami so it is about time that I do my usual mid-season review. Honestly, this anime is one of those where I'm struggling to understand why it got popular. The same can be said of Sword Art Online. Anyway, without further adieu, lets take a look at how Attack On Titan has been for me so far.

Characters:

I'm just gonna come right out and say it, I don't like Eren Yeager. His dislike of humanity has yet to be explained and from what I've gathered so far, he has been this way since he was a child. He seems to blame humanity for his inability to leave the walls instead of the blaming the titans. He also seems to blame humanity for not throwing themselves at the titans. Early on, he showed very little care for the lives of people around him save for his mother, Mikasa, and Armin. He didn't even acknowledge that his squad was getting eaten during the Trost arc. I was actually surprised that someone actually had to tell him that people were dying and that he should at least acknowledge them for their sacrifice. The secondary and background characters seem to just be there to up the body count. A lot of them seem to be very weak-willed with the ones being afraid of the titans usually being motivated by Eren giving an uninspiring speech that amounts to him saying "Lets go kill some titans!". Mikasa is a character that I can just barely get behind since she at least admitted during the Trost arc that she screwed up and cost people their lives. A lot of the characters exist just to increase the body count.

The Titans: Honestly, I don't like the Titan' designs and I don't understand why the characters are even remotely afraid of them. Yeah they're big and can move fast but they don't even look scary. They evoke laughter given their designs, not fear. Most of them aren't even that smart so a simple strategy is enough to take the regular ones out of the equation. It sort of feels like the only reason humanity has struggled with them for so long is because they aren't thinking and just reacting to this big lumbering oaf coming toward them. There has only been one titan in the show that I've liked. It was a one-off titan who I have since dubbed "Santa Titan" and hilariously, he ate Eren. Unfortunately, that didn't last long. Confusingly, they are essentially made of hot air and are light as a feather yet can still somehow punch through a wall. That shouldn't be possible even if I suspend my disbelief. They are also photosynthetic which leaves me scratching my head even more, not so much in disbelief but because it renders their hunger for human flesh pointless from a biological perspective. They're just eating to eat and it doesn't make them look anymore terrifying.

The Body Count:

The body count in this show is absurdly high. It feels like there is almost no weight to anyone's death because it throws death after death at you so fast. It really gives off the impression that no one in this show matters at all. It makes it very difficult to feel for these background characters since most of them are being introduced at the exact moment of their death. No matter how large the cast of characters, even the most minor characters' deaths should be treated like a big event, especially when you're killing them off in big numbers like this because that is the only chance we'll have to feel for them. The "anyone can die at any moment" mentality doesn't really work in the show's favor since its usually the cannon fodder getting eaten. One death I did find funny was in episode 13, some nameless soldier was watching horrified as his friend was getting eaten and then a titan just swats him like a fly. The show also features an absurd amount of gore between the titans eating people and Eren's fights in titan form. The gore gets old very quickly to the point where it isn't even a unique aspect of the show anymore.

Pacing and Raccoon Faces: These 16 episodes felt like 32 and definitely not in a good way. This show has a ton of exposition in it. Unfortunately, it is usually used to pad out the episodes. This is one of the few anime I've seen that has so much exposition but doesn't actually say anything useful or important at all. The padding is also extremely obvious. Take the battle of Trost for example, the Titans are ravaging the city and while Jean is in the supply depo, he spends about 3 minutes doing an inner monologue and the entire time two titans are just staring at him through a broken window. While that was probably in the manga it doesn't work in the anime for one simple reason: It is supposed to be an urgent situation and everything is supposed to be happening in real time. There is no indication of a slow down time-wise that would usually go along with something like that. It just makes the show feel like its dragging its heels. The show features a bizarre phenomenon given the art style where everyone turns into raccoon people during the close-ups. Their eyes always sink-in during dramatic moments so it makes it look like they're wearing a raccoon mask. It takes away from the seriousness of a scene when all I can think during said scene is "Jeez man! What happened to your face?!".

Raccoon!! Seriously though that is gonna become a meme one day.

Overall Thoughts: There really isn't much more that I can say. I am somewhat astounded that this thing got popular. The show is insanely boring and for a show that has been applauded for its action sequences there are far too few of them with it being padded out instead by exposition. The show lacks a sense of urgency overall. Even in the middle of the Battle for Trost while titans were swarming the city the characters still found time to hand out exposition in real-time. One of the other issues I have is that the show fails to set up viable rules for the titans and even when it does, those rules vary from titan to titan. For example, titans draw their nourishment and energy from sunlight which is why they don't attack at night. Doesn't sound so bad right? Well here is where the problem comes in: Some titans take longer than others to become inactive once the sun goes down. Yeah I understand that it is done so humanity isn't just walking beyond the walls at night with no consequences but because of that, it is only a matter of time before the writer introduces titans that are powered by moonlight. Every fantasy story does one of two things: 1. They follow real world laws to some degree or 2. They don't follow those laws but explain their own rules so you understand why they work the way they do. The writer is so busy trying to make the titans mysterious that he has created situation in which he can do anything that he deems necessary and it will still fit the narrative. Because of the vagueness or outright lack of rules regarding how the world works, the show almost requires you to think of it using real world logic. Once that happens, the story and its so-called logic fall apart at the seams. Anyway, those are my thoughts on Attack On Raccoon City...I mean Titan.