Manga Review: Kamichama Karin Chu Volume One

[Jason]

Title: Kamichama Karin Chu
Volume: 1
Manga-ka: Koge-Donbo
Publisher: Del Rey
Originally Serialized In: NakayoshiGenre: shojo
Rated: 13+

This is the first volume of the sequel to the highly popular Kamichama Karin and it probably won’t make a whole lot of sense if you’re unfamiliar, as I was, with the first series. Still, you can pick up most of it as you go.

Karin Hanazono is now in eighth grade and the story opens with Karin getting caught sleeping in class, face down on a typical teen magazine. She later leaves to pick up Kazune Kujyou from the airport after his return from London. Both of them were once and future lovers and have the ability to transform into gods via powerful rings (as laid out in the first series). Even though Kazune is a chauvinist, Karin loves him, and as one can imagine, things are a bit awkward when she brings him home since they know they’re to marry in the future but right now they’re pretty much young adults. Exhausted, they fall asleep in the same room.

When they wake up, they have a child in their bed calling them mommy and daddy. Suzune has come from their future bearing more god rings and warning them to bring together the three noble gods and try to stop the seeds of chaos now, before they take root and bear fruit in the future; a future where Karin might be losing Kazune to another woman.

To complicate matters more, the teen idol, Jin, in Karin’s magazine is now attending her school and Jin thinks she’s his goddess. Worse, Jin and Kazune take an instant hate to each other. Still, it offers up funny moments, such as when Kazune and Karin get roped into one of Jin’s modeling gigs.

Other familiar faces from the first series pop up in chapter three, such as Micchi. Karin will need all the allies she can get because of a misunderstanding; you know, the kind where if they just stopped for a moment and talked instead of working up wacky plans to stop someone, there would be no crisis. Karin thinks Kazune is going to London without her, and she can’t bear to lose him again, so she enlists Micchi’s help to stop him.

While there is a thread of drama in this with the ‘seeds of chaos,’ very little time is spent on it. There’s mostly a lot of fluff here. The art is very cutesy and sweet, overly so for my tastes. Karin has some of the hugest eyes I’ve ever seen and almost the entire cast looks a lot younger than eighth graders. Still, the art and the storyline will appeal to the fans of the previous series.

Reviewer: D.M. Evans
Proofed and Edited By: Lissa Pattillo