New blog feature! Every week I will attempt to post a few scans from Amethyst Princess of Gemworld and an issue summary. Amethyst had a couple of short-lived mini-series in the 80s which detailed the adventures of an ordinary girl named Amy Winston who finds out that she’s actually a princess from a magical world.

Reading this series at a young age partially explains why I continue to enjoy magical girl shoujo manga to this day. Although I usually don’t look upon the mangaization of existing comic book properties with much enthusiasm, I wish DC would make a manga version of Amethyst. It has all the elements a shoujo manga needs; 13 year old girl transforms into 20 year old princess with the aid of some nifty jewelry, flying unicorn sidekick, evil guys with goatees, and an intensely traumatic love triangle. It is very unfortunate that there isn’t a collected edition of Amethyst available, but it isn’t hard to find a complete run of the individual issues on Ebay.

The cover of the first issue shows Amethyst ready for action, working the rather daring combo of a turban and large earrings. Personally, I think that most women don’t really want to be wearing a turban until they are at least 50 years old, but Gemworld fashion is a little whimsical.

Amethyst evokes a fantasy that most children probably have at some point; that they’ve been secretly adopted and their real parents are actually royalty.

A tiny lizard creature enters an empty house with only one purpose - substituting a birthday present with a mysterious box he brought with him. 13 year old Amy Winston returns home from her birthday dinner out with her parents, and she’s delighted with her new amethyst necklace. Amy’s parents are confused, but they don’t say anything since she loves her present.

Up in her room Amy opens her closet door only to be confronted by a giant scary ogre! Who has a habit of carrying a snake in his hand as some sort of weird ogre accessory.

One thing I really enjoy about the art in Amethyst is the way characters and objects will frequently break through the lines of the panels like the Ogre’s shoulder and hand above. It helps add to the unsettling feeling as Amy encounters a new world that’s filled with danger.

He’s going to take her to a place called Fortress Opal, and as she’s carried through a magical portal Amy feels something funny happening:

She’s been kidnapped and taken to the Gemworld. Amy meets Sardonyx, one of Dark Opal’s lackeys. He instructs the Ogre to take Amy to their lord, but the ogre and one of his buddies decide to have some “fun” with Amy first. She’s rescued suddenly by Granch, a servant of House Amethyst. Amy is reunited with Citrina, an old woman who is also known as the witch-mother. She arranged for Amy’s adoption on earth after her true parents were killed. Citrina also sent Amy’s necklace to her with the intention of gradually introducing Amy to her true heritage. Unfortunately Dark Opal interfered with her plans.

Granch is a badass!

Citrina takes Amy to the Castle Amethyst; there are 12 houses in the Gemworld, each with a different focal stone. Amethyst is the ruling house, and Amy is heir to its magic. Since time flows differently on Earth than the Gemworld, Amy is 20 years old when she visits her true home. She doesn’t have much time to assimilate all the information Citrina discloses to her, because Castle Amethyst is under attack. Amy has the typical reaction of a 13 year old girl; she freaks out and wants to go home. Citrina points out that Amy has a responsibility to help defend all the people that she’s put in harm’s way.

Amy works some magic without really understanding what’s going on.

“An ecstasy of wild abandon such as she never imagined,” that’s gotta be heady stuff for a 13 year old suddenly trapped in a 20 year old woman’s body. Amy and Citrina fend off Dark Opal’s and Sardonyx’s forces, but Amy is confused and upset, wanting only to return home.

Dark Opal is not happy that Amy and Citrina have defeated his army. He has an interesting character design, with blue skin and black lines all over his face that look almost like fingerprint whorls. Note the goatee, which is a handy way to designate that he’s evil.

Amy returns to Earth and discusses the strange nightmare she just had with her parents, who are not happy that their daughter seemed to disappear without a trace for several minutes. So often when teenagers get powers in comic books, the parents seem blissfully oblivious. But in Amethyst’s case Amy’s parents know something is wrong and gradually Amy will have to deal with the consequences of her double life.

Amy’s uncertain if what she experienced in the Gemworld was a dream or reality, so she decides to test out her abilities to prove to herself that what she saw was real:

There’s a nice touch in this scene where Amy enters the portal. She’s saying goodbye to her faithful dog Taffy and the lizard creature that delivered the amethyst necklace to her in the first pages of the comic is on the other side.

There’s a guy with a knife in Castle Amethyst! He also has a goatee, so he must be evil! But since he seems to have trouble growing a mustache, he might be evil but ineffectual. Will Amy escape from this latest minion of Dark Opal?!!!

I tend to enjoy most Clamp manga, but one thing that’s frustrating is the amount of unfinished series that they’ve put out. This book was so fun to read, I wish that the series had continued for more than one volume. The Legend of Chun Hyang is Clamp’s take on a traditional Korean folk tale about a common girl who becomes engaged to a nobleman and preserves her chastity. The Clamp version of the story features a spritely Chun Hyang who is the daughter of the village medicine woman. She fights against injustice in her town while also taking on the role of protector for her mother since her father is absent. The Yang Ban, the local government official, is throughly corrupt and the Yang Ban’s son trades on his father’s position to abuse any of the village women who happen to be attractive. Fortunately, Chun Hyang has some kick-ass martial arts skills.
Chun Hyang’s Mom has just made some tasty treats for dinner, when a man sitting in a tree outside their door invites himself to dinner. He’s Mong Rong, a handsome traveler. Mong Rong is the type of hero that Clamp excels at - he seems feckless and irresponsible but he has hidden depths. He’s often found sitting on the sidelines, clapping and saying things like “Such a brave maiden you are!” after Chun Hyang has administered a beatdown to someone.
After some horrible events in her village, Chun Hyang joins Mong Rong on his journey. He’s actually traveling around the country in order to stamp out government corruption. The dynamic between the two is cute, as Chun Hyang is quick to charge ahead and get into fights while Mong Rong appears to be mainly concerned with filling his belly. He obviously finds Chun Hyang attractive, but she’s rather clueless about noticing any romantic attentions on his part. It is a shame that there is only one volume of this series, because it would have been nice to see the relationship between Chun Hyang and Mong Rong develop.

I’m not tagging anyone, but if you want to play along, feel free

Comics:

ZOT Vol. 1: Complete Black & White Stories 1987 to 1991 - I have most of the single issues for Zot! but I’m looking forward to being able to sit down and read them in a collected edition.

All Star Superman

Manga, new series:

SUGAR PRINCESS SKATING TO WIN by Hisaya Nakajo, the author of Hana Kimi. I’m hoping this is good. Mostly I’m very amused by the title, and I wonder if the heroine will somehow manage to win at BOTH ice skating AND love?! I’m guessing she will prevail!

Manga, ongoing series:

ONE POUND GOSPEL 2 - I’m buying this even though I haven’t read the first volume yet simply because it is by Rumiko Takahashi and involves a boxer and a nun. I don’t see how it can fail to be entertaining.
TAIL OF THE MOON 12 - My favorite comedic ninja romance manga. Also, the only comedic ninja romance manga that I read.
APOTHECARIUS ARGENTUM 6 - This is a nice, low-key fantasy series from CMX with plenty of court intrigue.
VENUS IN LOVE VOL 4 - Another CMX series. I’m hoping that the male character with a crush on his best (male) friend doesn’t suddenly turn heterosexual for the heroine of this book, but I’m not counting on it.
BOYS OVER FLOWERS 31 - Ah, Tsukasa and Tsukushi, will they ever get together? I think there are only 5 volumes left after this one.
HER MAJESTY’S DOG 10 - The only GoComi title for me this month, I decided to wait on getting Cantarella to keep within my budget.

Dojo is pensive:

The kidnappers call and demand the documents the library corps retrieved in the previous episode. They put Iku on the phone and she babbles about having to cancel a reservation with her friend Asako at a very expensive restaurant. Asako realizes that Iku is actually using her brain, and she’s provided the team with a clue to her whereabouts. The commander also takes off his prosthetic leg, which activates a homing beacon.

When they pinpoint the captives’ location Genda immediately buys the building where they are being held so the Library Corps have jurisdiction over the police, and they can send in the guys with the guns to attempt a daring rescue. I wish my library had an acquisition budget like that, it would certainly come in handy.

He laughs at the police:

Dojo heads out to lead the rescue mission, thinking about how similar Iku is to the way he was when he was just starting out. Ah, the memories!

Fighting Dojo!

As the commander is being wheeled away, he thanks Iku and says he told Dojo she did a good job:

Dojo compliments her on a job well done, but they get into a fight again:

Iku says she definitely doesn’t like Hikaru, so she can’t go out with him. He’s ok with that, as he only asked her out because Dojo said he could learn something from her. Iku is dismayed that she got all worked up for nothing.

Next episode: Iku’s parents come to visit, and they have no idea that she’s been serving in the Library Corps! Aiee!

With a title like “Foxy Lady”, I was halfway expecting this manga to be about the misadventures of an attractive woman in the 1970s. Since this is manga, the book is an example of the mystical girlfriend subgenre of shonen manga, where an ordinary schmo suddenly finds himself with an incredibly hot alien/goddess/demon/magical girl who demands to marry and/or have sex with him. The shining example of this genre would be the sadly out of print Urusei Yatsura.

Jin is the heir to his parents’ shrine. He lives in the deserted dorms attached to the shrine with his friend Sogo, a nearsighted cigarette fiend with a severe pornography habit. Jin is about to defile sacred ground by reading a manual on picking up girls in the shrine when he has has second thoughts. He heads back to the dorms and finds a girl sprawled out over Sogo. She’s Kogane, a half-human, half-demon who announces that she’s come to the human world “to beget” with Jin. After Kogane realizes that Sogo isn’t Jin she quickly switches her affections. She wants to become human, and the only way to do that is to get it on with a mortal boy. If she kisses Jin her ears, tail, and mystical powers disappear for a brief period of time.

The art is slick and attractive, with plenty of shots of Kogane in miniskirts and skimpy outfits. The reader learns disturbing things about Jin’s Dad, as he seems to have a closet full of naughty Santa-girl and nurse outfits. Some of the panels seem overcrowded and cluttered, with too much explanatory text and multiple shots of the characters from different angels. Sogo seems to exist as lecherous comic relief, as he often tries to get together with Kogane or any other female that happens to be in his vicinity only to become violently injured in the process. Jin decides that he has to protect Kogane as part of his shrine heir duties. When the kids go to school, all the sports clubs start fighting over Kogane due to her demon physical prowess. There were a couple amusing details like the portal to the demon road being placed in a linen closet and Kogane’s reaction to fried tofu, but the title didn’t capture my interest. I’m not really a member of the intended audience for this title. There’s plenty of madcap action and jokes about people being perverts, but this is a manga that doesn’t transcend the limitations of its genre to have much appeal for people that aren’t already seeking out titles about girls with animal ears.

Review copy provided by Tokyopop

Dorian reviews a ton of the FCBD comics, so you know what to look for.

If you can’t make it out to your local comics store, you can enter online to win free comics at Yet Another Comics Blog.

Books

Bad Kitty by Michele Jaffe
Grave Peril by Jim Butcher

Manga

Emma #7
Gun Blaze West #1
Good Witch of the West #5
B.O.D.Y. #1
Blood Alone #4
ES (Eternal Sabbath) #8
Queen’s Knight #10
Nana #10
Yurara #4
Honey and Clover #1
White Night Melody #1
Tea For Two #1
Samurai Deeper Kyo #1, 2
Fairy Tail #1
Hellgate #1
Heavenshield #1
Foxy Lady #1
Pearl Pink #1
Knights of the Zodiac #1
Your & My Secret #1
Teru Teru x Shonen #1
A Wise Man Sleeps #1
Yumekui Kenbun Nightmare Inspector