World Famous Comics: Challengers Volume 3 (Boys Love)
Challengers Volume 3 (Boys Love)
By: Hinako Takanaga Publisher: DramaQueen, LLC Average Rating: Binding: Paperback Label: DramaQueen, LLC Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 224 Publication Date: November 30, 2006
Product Description: First comes love...then comes XXX...then comes Tatsumi-kun’s refusal to let Kurokawa-san put that in there ever again. Who can they turn to for advice? Certainly not family, as Reiko-san throws a birthday bash that no one-including Tatsumi-kun’s gay-hating, loose cannon brother-will ever forget.
Included in volume 3 is the short story, Anything Is Possible, which follows the developments between Souichi-nii-san and his underclassman, Morinaga.
Birthday party! This is a really hilarious one! Love therapy! XD ... and Angel-kun's love confession!!!! this is a great story that becomes better and better while it goes on!!!
Challengers v01 This was an enjoyable manga! The art is clean and crisp, and the characters are hilarious. Tomoe is completely clueless, much to a point where it was getting annoying; his older brother is an overprotective man who is just as naive, but the truly awesome character of all was Isogai... I wish he had a series of his own. For anyone into humor and a bit of romance, this is a recommended read.
Hilarity in Yaoi You'll laugh out loud as you read this love story between an office worker and a college student majoring in robotics.
F'ing YAY! Sorry, I'm a fan, but I kept this volume by my side for three whole days after finally getting it. It's rather a downer for Kurokawa/Tomoe fans, as not much action or development happens bewteen, but those looking forward to Tyrant Who Fell in Love it's a MUST HAVE, of course. We get to figure out what happened that mysterious "year ago". It was totally better than what I expected! So, yeah, I liked it for the better last half. So I give it 5 stars.
Hirarious!!! I Raughed a Rot! CHALLENGERS is a funny and fast paced comedy about a young office worker named Kurokawa who helps out Tatsumi, a college freshman who is a genius with robotics, but otherwise very clueless and naive. Kurokawa falls for him like a rock, and when Tatsumi needs a place to stay, Kurokawa offers to share his apartment. This brings him under the scrutiny of Tatsumi's fiercely protective brother, who hates all homos, and is certain that Kurokawa is having nefarious thoughts. Kurokawa hopes to hide his passion long enough to allow Tatsumi to fall in love with him. But he must contend with his best friend Isogai, who enjoys seeing Kurokawa unhappy in love for a change, and mocks him mercilessly. Then there is Tatsumi's openly gay American classmate, who speaks in tortured Japanese and believes in "free rove".
One thing I don't like in the BoysLove genre is when one partner is treated like a cute little wide-eyed pet. But Tatsumi, clueless or not, has self-respect and is assertive of his own rights and needs. He gets into knock-down, drag-out fights with his brother, pursues his own goals, and sets effective boundaries with those in romantic pursuit, even when he doesn't even know they are pursuing him. Kurokawa, likewise, isn't an aggressive jerk, but is trying to keep a lid on his feelings in the hope that Tatsumi will eventually return them. There is more character development than you find in a lot of shonen-ai, even though the focus is on fast-paced farce. The art is like the characters, lively and full of personality.
The overall impression is of a bunch of people that you want to spend more time with, and an author one would like to see more of. And if you need to laugh till you gasp for air, this will do it.
There is one problem; the preview for the art in Book 4 shows Tatsumi looking like a wide-eyed little kid. The author confesses that she forgot he was in college. That doesn't bode well for the development of the character or (since there's already a bit of an age gap) for the relationship. So that is a bit disappointing, but I will check out the sequels anyway and hope I'm wrong.
It is my first DramaQueen manga, and they do a beautiful production job. They are normal sized manga, slightly thinner than normal, with dust covers and lovely paper quality. Unlike with some publishers, the attention to the actual product within is just as impressive, with proper attention to spelling and translation, and actually getting the characters' names right.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Trevor
