Reaching the end of this horrid month,we arrive at Mistress Fortune. I originally planned this as the follow up to Jojo month but for reasons lost to myself I didn't. Now I'm back with a vengeance to talk about my very first Arina Tanemura book. I have no deep story about why I picked this,it didn't call to me with a ground breaking premise or because a friend fervently recommended it to me. Nope,just picked it up because the pink and white spine looked nice. Well, now that I've outed myself as a vain idiot,let's talk about Mistress Fortune...finally.
Mistress Fortune shares a lot of
similarities with the earlier I.O.N, in that both girls have psychic
powers and are close to boys as a result. There is even a nice little
call back to the flying scene from I.O.N as well as a few other
series including Phantom Thief Jeanne. They both also feature a
romance plot that slowly but surely overtakes the more fantastical
elements. The only difference here is that the psychic plot is meant
to play second fiddle to the main romance. Indeed everything is a
side note to the romance between Kisaki and Giniro and every
characters is semi aware of it.
The plot is a rather loose magical girl
set-up that serves to help the main couple grow. The monsters or EBE
as they are called are less harbingers of destruction and more
oblivious tourists. Heck the first one the team fights, becomes a
regular character and gets her own side story about becoming a
socialite. The interpersonal drama between our two leads is mostly
played for laughs,he's more interested in her tracts of land and this
makes her angry. However when they do buckle down and get serious for
a bit,there is some surprising tenderness in the relationship despite
it seeming to be an aesthetic attraction. Once the apparently
inevitable rejection scene comes up,it actually works this time.
Mostly because again the romance is the focus so it's fairly
important and she is actually rejecting him for a solid reason
instead of just plot extender.
The characters themselves are not
bad,more generic than anything else. Kisaki is one missing parent
short of your typical shojo heroine and Ginro is the hot guy with the
troubled past. Their director,Dr. Gunjo is a goofy jokester and
Ebe-ko,the monster,is your wacky non-human sidekick. This can be
forgiven as the cast is rather funny and likable. Ginro's love for
the Kisaki's lady lumps and his inability to keep his mouth shut
about them at risk of injury is funny. They all play their role well
and get a few good jokes off.
This is shojo fluff through and
through, attractive characters having a relationship that will be
forgotten soon enough. I feel that Arina Tanemura is acknowledging
her worse habits here and working with them as opposed to letting
them run wild. It's just self aware enough that I can forgive the
weaker elements while not being over reliant on them to the point of
taking me out of the story.
So as I lay here at the bottom of the
ravine dying slowly,alone and in pain, at least this month ended on a
high note. I started this month for no real reason other than to have
an excuse to read through some works of a prolific manga-ka. It's had
it's ups and downs and while I won't claim I really know Tanemura's
works better, I have a better feel for her when I get to her longer
works. So I'll see you next time where I'll probably be a ghost or
not mention that I died ever again
Till Next Time:Stay Positive
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