Since I'm feeling pretty good after Phantom Thief Jeanne,the inevitable crash should be coming pretty soon. What's that over there, is it a great series for me to read? Nope,it's just a poorly paced and boring waste of a cool setting or as it's called in common tongue Time Stranger Kyoko. Was that playing my cards too early,probably, not that I care too much.
Time Stranger Kyoko lays out an
interesting premise then proceeds to never flesh it out and throws in
new elements to it without warning. The Earth has been united as one
nation and we follow the princess of Earth,Kyoko. She is gathering
mystical stones and their respective users a.k.a Strangers to awaken
her sister Ui. That's all we get for how the world seems to work,
which is lacking to say the least. It leaves quite a few more
interesting aspects relegated to sidebars,such as hybrids of humans
and earth's other life forms. Something that should probably be
explained is mentioned once as a definition then never explained
further. How this works or how people like that came to be is instead
pushed aside for wacky thieves and helping a guy over come his daddy
complex.
This brings up the second big problem
with the story:pacing. The first volume moves at a glacial pace with
little to no world building and getting involved in adventures that
just happen to tie back in to the main plot. This continues well into
volume two before finally getting to interesting events,involving
Akira the thief and the snake tribe's political turmoil. After this
stretch of still not explaining much else the plot starts running at
breakneck speed to get all the macguffins needed for the ending to
happen. Throwing in plot points and trying for a bit of foreshadowing
that all gets lost because it never takes anytime to breath.
There are some interesting ideas that
actually do work, once the main group figures out that the stones are
in the hands of the various tribe's rulers they call them all to the
castle instead of cavorting about to find them. Also to be fair the
foreshadowing with Kyoko's true nature is actually done rather well
early on but fails by being a bit ham handed once the plot kicks into
overdrive. The series also plays fast and loose with the time travel
aspects. Which is better in the long run since closely examining the time travel would not turn out well for this book. Since
I'm being nice to the series,I'd be remiss if I neglected to mention
Akira.
Normally when talking about characters
I'd start with the main one,Kyoko in this case, but in the interest
of putting my best foot forward,I'll start with side character
Akira. He's a lovable rouge and unlike the others flits between goofy and serious rather well. The brother of the Snake tribe's leader that commands a band
of thieves in the capital city. Everything about him works: he's
funny,cool,has a tragic yet believable back story and brings energy
to a main cast that has none. The way Kyoko is characterized it seems
to be setting him up as her love interest as opposed to her actual
one. They instead just send him off in the end to do his own
thing,probably for the better because everyone else is kind of boring
and crap by comparison.
Speaking of Kyoko,she's all over the
place in terms of character. It's clear she's supposed to be the fun
determined kind of person but she keeps getting these selfish
moments. The plot is kicked off by her being selfish to avoid be
exposed as Earth's princess. You can have a character like this work
if the balance is right, Josuke Higashikata strikes a solid mix of
kindness and being greedy. It's like Tanemura is afraid to make a
straight forward and honest protagonist so she shoe horns in these
more selfish actions to hide it. When she has to be gone for a few
chapters after she is revealed as the Time God's daughter, which is
also never really explained by the way. The others miss her deeply
but it seems to be because the reawakened Princess Ui is rather
unpleasant.
Sakataki and Hizuki,
step brothers and the body guards of Kyoko probably fare the worst as
along with Kyoko get into one of the worst subplots in the book. They
kick of a few plot points with the stones and establishing a monster race that seems to be here simply so the characters has
something to fight on occasion. Near the end the get into a terrible love triangle that serves little purpose other than to extend
the story and so that weird plot Tanemura set up has some resolution.
They do get some funny bro-con moments but it's intermixed with
serious angst. Sadly, this works about as well as Kyoko's
characterization.
The brothers are both Strangers and
Hizuki happens to be the last Stranger they are searching for and
this plot point is just dropped so unceremoniously that it's
laughably bad. It doesn't help that he is the Ice Stranger when there
is already a Snow Stranger. Yes snow and ice are rather different but
she could have used a different element or made Sakataki the Snow
Stranger in lieu of him being the Crystal Stranger. It'd work better
from a theming stand point at least
The reminder of the cast is
forgettable,especially the remaining Strangers that don't even have
their own chapters. Making their desire to see Kyoko come back to the
world even more bizarre since they've known her for all of about five
pages. Chronos the time god comes out of no where and like most other
probably important points in this story is never expanded upon. He
seems to be here again to add drama and draw out a plot that should
have finished ages ago but didn't because we didn't have a romantic
ending yet. Then we get an epilogue and no offense but half these
characters had maybe a handful of panels. So why in the name of all
the is unholy would I give a crap about what they did after this.
This is a series that doesn't seem to
want to focus on anything,squandering a rather interesting setting
and neglecting to build up the world. Instead focusing on
inconsistent characters that range from unpleasant to just outright
cardboard cut outs whose role could be fulfilled with a ambitious
batch of custard and a plot that is determined to break some sort of
speed record. See you next time at the bottom of the ravine for
Mistress Fortune.
Till Next Time:Stay Positive.
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