Worst. Manga. Ever.
So they finally did it, those crazy bastards. Gutsoon actually
went through with their plans to collect the atrocious series
Bomber
Girl into trade paperback. Damn them! Damn them all to
hell!
Shawn
Fumo links to a negative review over on the
AnimeOnDVD
forums, but that review is much too generous. Although the
reviewer gives
Bomber Girl a
D (still too
generous), he slips from time to time and writes things like "it's
pretty funny to see the characters Niwano thinks up" and "if you are
into cheesy corny violence this might be entertaining."
This is incorrect. There is absolutely nothing redeeming about
Bomber
Girl in any way, shape, or form. As
Paul
O'Brien once said, "I can prove it with graphs." But since
making graphs would take time, I'll take the easy way out and excerpt
some old reviews of mine. Here are my thoughts on
the first
four
installments
of
Bomber Girl as serialized in
Raijin Comics:
BOMBER GIRL: The weakest of the four stories, both
in terms of story and art. Storywise, it's little more than a flimsy
vehicle for the gratuitous depictions of sex (or at least T&A) and
violence. In a sense, then, the creator can be complimented for
utilizing his story and art to serve each other so seamlessly.
BOMBER GIRL: I wouldn't have though it was possible, but this
installment was even worse than last issue's chapter. The art is even
cruder and more amateurish than before. Look at the perspective (or
lack thereof) on the car in panel 51: It looks like a drawing a
grade-schooler with no formal art training would make in the margins of
his math notebook while bored. I'm sure Niwano Makoto, the creator of
BOMBER GIRL, is earnest in his affection for this series, but I don't
want to pay for material of such unprofessional quality. According to
the letter column in the first issue, the ongoing line-up of RAIJIN
COMICS will be determined by reader votes, with unpopular titles
dropped from the magazine. There's a questionnaire on the last page
that directs readers to the Raijin Comics website to register their opinions,
but so far the survey is still directed at the preview zero issue. I'll
keep checking back to cast my vote against BOMBER GIRL.
BOMBER GIRL: I was going to go through and count all the panty
shots once again, but even that seemed unamusing and unappealing at
this point. Instead, I decided to pick out some of my favorite bad
lines from this chapter. "How do you spell 'sex'?"; "But feel free to
show us your panties!"; "My customized tonfa, 'Yashamaru.' are
invincible, cuz all I need to do is beat the crap out of people with
them." Yes, Emi, but I still doubt that
even your customized tonfa could inflict as much pain as your series
does.
BOMBER GIRL: Dear God this is bad. This issue Niwano attempts
to engage in a bit of self-parody, introducing a character who makes
fun of Emi's "big boobs" and breaks the
fourth wall by asking things like, "Is the main character allowed to
say that?" Self-aware meta-humor is tricky to pull off, and it's doomed
to fail when your satirical character is just as objectionable as the
character she's supposed to poke fun at. And on a completely nitpicky
note: It's annoying when the "secret weapon" Emi
was supposedly carrying all along was *clearly* not visible throughout
the story. What a cheat, not to mention it was yet another excuse for a
gratuitous shot of Emi's breasts. The plot
device offends on so many levels...
Bomber Girl was so bad it affected my overall enjoyment of
the
Raijin anthology, as evident in the closing of my
review for issue #4:
Overall: Strong chapters of MOUFLON, SLAM DUNK, and BAKI
get this issue off to a good start, but it's all marred in the end by
an especially bad chapter of BOMBER GIRL. Like a bad dessert that ruins
your memory of a good meal, BOMBER GIRL once again leaves a bad taste
in my mouth. Setting that series aside, I'd still recommend this book,
but I can't wait until BOMBER GIRL is replaced by something else that
matches the quality of the other serials in this anthology.
Normally I'd feel guilty for reusing old material to fill up a blog
entry, but recycling feels appropriate for trash like
Bomber Girl.
And if my warnings prevent even one person from purchasing this waste
of paper, then it will have been worth it. Please, please,
please
avoid this manga, unless you're purposely looking for something bad, like for a manga drinking game or something. If so, make
sure to buy lots of alcohol: You'll need it blot out the pain
once you start reading.
