Content Warning: Violence, gore, fatalism, violence towards children by cute mascots, and PTSD
This ain’t your daddy’s Magical Girl manga. Since we’re in Magical May, it’s time to cover something current. I know, some people reading my review of Sailor Moon might be younger than the show, so I think I need to cover something more recent. Don’t want to lose the younger folks. When it comes to how I came across this series, I was walking through a book store with a buddy (remember being able to do that?) and saw the cover. I glanced at the back and flipped through it and thought that it looked like an interesting read. Oh, boy, this isn’t what I expected.
Our story begins with a flashback to Mount Aso, with a ton of soldiers dead and military equipment destroyed. Two soldiers, a Russian with the GRU and a Japanese man from the Japanese Ground Self Defense Forces, encounter each other on an empty battlefield, with the Japanese soldier having lost and arm and is high as shit on the painkillers. Because he’s just that badass. We then cut to a group of Magical Girls about to engage with a large monster that looks like its made up of magma. Before throwing themselves into the final battle, we see the group motto: He who laughs last, laughs loudest.
Three years later…
We meet Nozomi and Sayako, a tomboy and nerdy girl in gym class, watching Otori Asuka kick ass in gym class. We get a bit of exposition here, with it revealed that Asuka is a recent transfer student but doesn’t seem to have a lot of friends and isn’t part of any clubs. Asuka, is of course, the title character of the manga and part of the group of magical girls we saw a few pages ago. We then follow Asuka around, getting a glimpse of the American Magical Girl, Mia Cyrus. Gee, I wonder how they picked that name? We also get one of our first glimpses of horror as Asuka mistakes a costumed mascot for one of the monsters she fought, ripping a child apart. The child is fine, Asuka just can’t forget the horrors she’s seen. I have to say, until I saw online that she has PTSD, I didn’t understand this scene, but in this context, it makes sense. As my grandfather used to say, the war is right behind her. That means to say that the war may be over, but it isn’t far away from you. Anyway. Nozomi and Sayako then have a run in with a rude adult and Asuka proceeds to take him to the ground, stopping herself from breaking his arm. Later that day during a break at school Nozomi and Sayako interrupt Asuka’s reading of Franz On The Shoreline to thank her for kicking that guy’s ass. This becomes a turning point in Asuka’s life as she starts to open up a bit about herself and adapt to a normal life, kind of. This is interrupted when Iizuka, the soldier from the opening with a badass cybernetic arm, turns up at Asuka’s school and offers her a chance to join a new Special Forces unit he’s in charge of named M Squad. Asuka turns him down and we get some more back story. The real important part is that the enemy, the Disas, kidnapped her parents. She said she’d give up everything to get them back but the cute little mascot animal things working of Disas say they’re going to return her parents to her, piece by piece. My blood went cold when I read it, every damn time. The art also changes from the standard style to this very minimalist style that reminds me of horror manga, which is a solid choice.
From here, Asuka tries to live something resembling a normal life, ignoring the problems of the world around her. She still has trouble fitting in to the normal world but it’s clear that she’s trying to forget the last few years. All that comes to a crashing halt when a terrorist group tries to free their leader as he’s being transported through town. Sayako happens to be in the area, as is Asuka, and is about to be gunned down by the terrorist when Asuka transforms and uses her knife, Karambit, to cut them to ribbons. No joke. She goes absolutely ballistic on them. And they can’t even scratch her, even with a .50 on a truck. During this, there’s a lot of explanation of magical Girls and their powers, so I had to re-read this more than once to really get it.
After this, the main plot really gets started, with the introduction of the main villainess (who doesn’t get revealed for some time), as well the first evil Magical Girl Asuka faces. They’ve teamed up with the terrorists to cause some mayhem, unleashing Disas biological weapons. This shit gets real, let me tell you. During this attack, we meet another one of the “Famous Five” Magical Girls from the beginning, War Nurse Kurumi, who has a history with Asuka. Kurumi does her best to fight the Disas monsters but she’s not exactly a combat specialist, more of a support Magical Girl. After defeating the monsters, Kurumi and Asuka catch up and we find out that Kurumi has some baggage about her life before she was made into a Magical Girl. And this is why I like this series, these characters feel a lot more human and normal than most others I’ve read in the genre. But, let’s wrap this up.
The volume ends with us following around Mia Cyrus, the American Magical Girl who’s weapon is, of course, a gun. Hey, it’s what we’re known for, I’ll leave the political commentary for the people who get elected to office. Besides, any joke I could make about gun-toting wouldn’t age well, and I’d rather not give them any of my time. Mia and her two military companions are raiding a place in Tijuana, Mexico and proceed to kill the ever living fuck out of everyone inside except for a weird old man who’s mumbling numbers. He then gets crushed into a magical cube while muttering “Babel Army Corps.”
And that’s where things end. Well, there is a bit that sets up the next volume but you can buy it yourself if you like what you’ve read here.
All in all, this is very much a “Magical Girl manga for boys” sort of thing. I really find the characters and the setting interesting but I’m no longer a teenage edgelord, so the violence and gore turns me off. That said, I did end up buying the next two volumes and might end up continuing from there. If you want me to keep reviewing the series, let me know.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Suggestion: Gritty and intense magical girl action is found here. It that’s something you like, pick it up.
