Animania

When browsing my manga shelves, the primary companies represented are, of course, the two biggest: Tokyopop and Viz. In the last year or two, a few others have also appeared, such as ADV and CMX. With Blood+, Dark Horse Comics made their debut. Go! Comi one of the youngest companies has, thus far, only had one slot in my shelf with Crossroad. However, I recently discovered and picked up a second title from Go! Comi, Night of the Beasts by Chika Shiomi Like Crossroad, Night Of The Beasts is a relatively short series, with six volumes. It seems to have been a relatively obscure title in Japan, originally released from 1996 through 1999 by publisher Akita Shoten.

In Night of the Beasts we meet Aria, a tall, tough as nails girl who is the enemy of aggressive and rude males, but also an overall kind person. One day a stranger named Sakura appears, stealing her first kiss then claiming that he is possessed by a demon and that only she can save him. Now with a premise set up like that, all kinds of stereotypical scenarios come to mind, and I was worried it would be some lame key to the whole "saving" thing. However, I found the series managed to put a fresh twist on the idea. Sakura's inner demon wants to slaughter 4,000 people, hence his wanting to stop it, but Sakura isn't strong enough to keep the monster at bay for long. Aria, though willing to help, is fairly powerless to prevent several tragic events, and unwittingly becomes a pawn for Sakura's blood relatives (i.e. those 4,000 people slated to die). As the story progresses, the mystery of how Aria was able to do anything for Sakura, and why she is the one who is being called on to save all the other people becomes clearer, and the reason for the demon's unmitigating hatred of the entire family.

Shiomi's artwork is very good for the series with a slightly hard edge in the drawings in keeping with the underlying story. She forgoes background in many scenes to focus on well-designed and easily recognizable characters, but in scenes where backgrounds are included, they are well drawn with attention to scale and detail. In particularly, I think Shiomi does an awesome job of visually differentiating between Sakura when he's himself and when he's been taken over by the demon. The main characters of the series, as well as some of the major supporting ones, re all unique with distinctive appearances, personalities, and roles. The villains are skillfully portrayed in such a way that one finds it hard to hate them for what they do, and to even sympathize with them to some degree while still not condoning their actions. The ending is well done, with a few last minute twists and an almost expected, for manga, tinge of sadness.

As with Go! Comi's other series, Night of the Beasts, carries a higher price point of $10.99 a volume, with slightly better quality covers, but no color pages or anything else to really justify it. As such, while I do think this is a great short series for anyone liking drama mixed with touches of horror, romance, and comedy, I also recommend waiting to buy until you can get it on sale.

Series Grade: B+