#as excruciating as comics are to make. it is very rewarding to look at the finished project | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rotzaprachim · 4 years

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Ok but your soc au was and is absolutely everything I need!! I saw ur draft and was instantly brought back to like 2018 but like in a good way??!? You’re so talented it’s amazing!!

i’m SO GLAD TO HEAR and not sure if this is about the Hunger Games Au or the misfit au but EITHER WAY i am always so so SO glad when people enjoy my extremely niche soc (+ even nicher soc AU) stuff it’s been one of my most consistent interests for five years now.

ALSO! There is MORE of the SOC misfits au and i actually have so many ideas and precise plot points i am going to have to take out a notepad and try to plan this bitch out? Which i NEVER do? But here’s a scene from the opening. Hope you enjoy!

CONTENT WARNING that while one of the biggest divergences i plan to take is that the AU will be far, FAR less sexual than Misfits as a show, taking in mind the younger general target audience and character ages of Six of Crows and respect for the characters, there is a sexual joke in this that felt appropriatedly teenage.

“We were given these powers for a reason. We have to do something useful with them. Use them to help people.” Inej insisted.

“Given these powers by who, then? God?”

“God wouldn’t give them to us as a reward,” Matthias said, suddenly flexing his hands nervously, as if the possibility of his newfound ability to turn things into instant popsicles had in fact been conferred by a far more demonic entity. Looking at Kaz, he thought there was something to that particular theory.

“Everyone shut up with making the fucking community center into some kind of fucking seminary. God’s faker than the blonde hair of the poor girl who delivers off-brand milk to this dump on thursdays, and if there’s any supernatural reason for our powers, it’s that fate decided they’d dealt me a fucked enough hand and might as well give me something with a purpose.”

“And that is?”

“Making myself fabulously, disgustingly rich.”

“Which you plan to do with your ability to inflict plain in what, the fucking community center? None of us have five fucking quid to rub together, except for Posh Boy Here.”

“I don’t have five quid either,” Wylan said quietly, getting mostly drowned up in the arguing.

“Yeah you do,” Jesper said quietly. Wylan almost flinched, unused to being heard in the chaos. “I know the pen you have. Some kind of an old school Lamy that needs fancy ink cartridges. It’s like, ninety at least.”

“You know about Lamy pens? From where?”

“I got a past even the devil would flinch from, merchling. I have seen things. Horrifying things, spine tingling things, th-”

“I’ve seen you before. On Tv i think.”

It was Jesper’s turn to be surprised. “I-”

“There is no fucking way you are going to do that. I’ve been trying for fucking years and I barely make rent.”

“Are you saying you have a sharper acumen for the world of business, Nina dearest?”

“I’m saying I didn’t get fucking arrested for eating pick-n-mix, that’s for fucking sure. Anyway,” Nina said primly. “I agree with Inej. If we have powers we should use them for something.”

“Like what? Fighting the oppressive overarching structures of society that hold us all down?” Kaz’s voice dripped with sarcasm.

“Yes.” Inej said.

“I was thinking more like. I dunno, small things. Loads of hopeless cases around here.” She shrugged. “Maybe we can make some a little less hopeless.”

“That’s going to be really easy, what with the dead body of our probation worker lying around premises. Yes reporter officer sir, we did help that old lady cross the road with her sunday shopping, now come take our interview and take our photos for the Sunday Supplement and yeah, sir, don’t notice the full on bloody corpse lying in the rec room.”

“We do it in secret. Have codenames to mask our identities, like real superheroes do.” Wylan said.

“They organise a cute little meet-and-greet with a real fucking superhero as an extracurricular at Eton, did they now? Give you have so much experience with how real superheroes operate, then.”

Inej’s eyes flashed. It almost looked like a warning, and he filed a mental note that she looked like she might have a little more lightening inside than he’d first judged. Kaz glanced away from her and stared at the wall where they’d hastily moved a big sign for Mommy and Me Musical Magic Monday Maraccas Momzanza!!! (6 months to three years) over what remained of the blood, which, given the deteriorating likely asbestos-ridden condition of this rattrap, would be a goddamn bitch to fully get out of all the cracks and gouges in the wall. After they dealt with the body.

The problem was, he liked the posh twit’s idea. Liked it a lot, far more than he was willing to let on. If there was anything he’d learned in his years in the Dregs, it was that names had power. Images had power, the idea that other people had of you. If they were properly terrified, they stayed the fuck away and did what you told them too. Make something greater than yourself, and have them fear it. That was the closest you came to power in this world.

So Kaz gingerly nodded, levelling his enthusiasm in a slightly bored town. “Yeah, eh. Let’s do that. Codenames. So they don’t know what ours are.”

“You go first, then, genius. What’r you gonna be going as? Cazzo Brekker? Dickhead of the nth degree?”

Kaz thought for a moment. Tapped his gloved fingers against his knee. “Dirtyhands,” he said.

A long, sudden pause. Kaz’s brain worked fast enough to realise the disaster he’d just set off, and he was suddenly, urgently, jealous of Jesper and his powers over town.

The silence was broken by Nina shrieking with laughter, harpy lad and almost doubled over.

“Dirtyhands? You might as well call yourself Filthy Fingers. Or better yet, Massive Fucking Wanker.”

“You could abbreviate that to MFW,” Jesper added helpfully. “In case Massive Fucking Wanker was too long to fit on the superhero cape or something.”

Kaz glanced around. Inej had disappeared, although rather that was using her power or because she’d always been good at doing that even before the electrical storm made them all freaks from one of Wylan’s comics, and Matthias was doing something that looked like praying fervently, hands clasped and searching strips of the grey sky through the cracks in the skylights, looking very much like a man caught in one of the lower circles of hell and searching desperately for deliverance.

“Very funny. I have a suggestion for you lot, then. It’s called D-E-A-”

He was well into launching himself at both Nina and Jesper, certain that if a fight broke out he at the very least wouldn’t be the looser, when he rammed into something small but very solid.

“What the-”

Some very sharp fingernails pinched his ears. Bold move, considering his aforementioned touch-me-and-feel-excruciating-pain powers. It hurt.

“Where-?”

Inej didn’t rematerialise. Jesper jumped up, though, as if someone had sharply stepped on his foot. “Oww, mate.” He reached out, swatted air. Nina tipped sideways suddenly, rubbing at her scalp. “Shit, did you have to yank at my hair that hard?”

She was fast. Tricky, tricky. Kaz mentally reassessed his current pecking order of bullshit-powers-by-order-of-danger

“If we don’t stop fighting, we’re all end up in prison again. Police’ll be here soon, and we need to make alibis. They’ll cross examine us and we need to make sure the stories match, because there’s no way they’ll trust any young offenders on our own. And we have to do something with the body before putrefication really sets in and the smell comes.”

Inej didn’t rematerialise. A veiled threat of another pinch, Kaz realised. He almost had to smile. Nina and Jesper both looked a little gobsmacked, and it dawned on Kaz that that was by far the longest string of words they’d heard Inej say at once.

“Fine.” He thought he saw a dark ripple of her hair, but it was nothing more than a mirage- a tease, he would have said, if it were Nina-” and she was gone again. “We will have veiled identities, but we will refer to each other exclusively by our true, God-given birth names. Kaz, Jes, Nina, Inej, Posh Boy, and Barry.”

“That’s not my name,” Matthias said.

“It’s fine, man,” Jesper says. “You can go by your middle name instead. Kaz does, which is why he’s referred to by the diminutive form of Kazzmatazz, instead of his first name, Demon.”

The clock on the wall hit five. Nina immediately started stripping off the required orange uniform jumpsuit, giving Matthias a good look at her cleavage.

“Don’t play with the poor boy,” Nina said. “He might almost believe we’ve all been possessed. Now has anyone seen where I left my bus ticket, lipgloss, and the half a hazelnut kitkat i saved from lunch?”

The wind, the unknowing observer would think, blew the ticket, tube of gloss, and wrapper, emptied, right back in Nina’s face.

#the soc misfits au #my writings #oh this felt like such a fun throwback for me too writing the Six of Crows characters!#thank you so much for this message agaon #anon #six of crows #kaz brekker #inej ghafa

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nonasuch · 6 years

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dogfather update: realer talk

The penultimate update! Probably.

As always, everything dogfather-related is tagged with the dogfather and story updates are tagged with dogfather story post. If you get antsy waiting for the next update, check out my AO3 or the zines and comics on my Gumroad.

“To Mr. Draco Malfoy, for having the good sense to ask for help when he needed it, I award ten points,” Dumbledore begins, nodding vaguely in the direction of not blatantly favoring Gryffindor in all things. He promptly gives up the pretense, and drags Gryffindor up from dead last to a first-place tie on the flimsiest of excuses.

Throughout all this, Severus is forced to sit at the high table and maintain a calm demeanor, while the Headmaster upends the point totals with total disregard for fairness or tradition. He is, therefore, in a foul mood by the end of the leaving feast, fleeing the Great Hall and its clashing decorations of red, gold, silver and green as soon as he can manage a decorous exit.

On his way to the dungeons, he has a brief but wildly unpleasant run-in with Black (who is at least dog-shaped for the duration), Lupin, Hagrid, and a pair of Muggles. They ought not be anywhere near Hogwarts at all, let alone be introduced to him with careful politeness, or shake his hand, or thank him for helping to look after their son with entirely too much heartfelt sincerity. By the time Severus manages to extract himself from the pleasantries, he’s sure Lupin is laughing at him from behind his mild expression.

Severus keeps to himself for the last few days of term, rarely venturing far from his rooms or office. He’s rewarded with blessedly little interaction with his students or colleagues. Having received their exam results, the children are too busy celebrating their mediocre achievements to notice the absence of a teacher. As for the adults, he supposes that planning for the reemergence of the Dark Lord is a higher priority than their usual time-wasting efforts at pretending to enjoy his company.

It can’t last, of course. The evening before the students depart, there is a knock at Severus’ door.

Sirius Black is standing in the corridor.

“What do you want,” says Severus. Black looks like he’d rather be absolutely anywhere else, and Severus doesn’t like the twinge of fellow-feeling this inspires.

“I need -- can I talk to you, for a moment?” Black asks. He adds, with apparent difficulty, “Please.”

It’s not as though he’d leave if Severus said “no.” He turns away from the door, leaving it open, and after a moment Black follows him in. Severus sits, and regards the stack of potions journals that had been his original plan for the evening a trifle wistfully.

“Well?” Severus says.

There’s a reason Severus only has one armchair in his private sitting-room, but Black just conjures another and flings himself down into it. “Right,” he says. “Look. I wanted to thank you.”

Severus freezes.

Black is staring down at his hands, and doesn’t notice. “I wasn’t here,” he says. “I wasn’t here, and Harry was in danger. You listened to Draco and you sent for the Headmaster, and if you hadn’t Harry might have died.”

Severus also accompanied Albus down through the trap-maze, and helped him to separate Quirrell from the boy, and carried him back up to the infirmary while Albus tried and failed to save what was left of their former colleague. Unconscious, the boy looked even more like his father than he did awake. But more than even that, he looked horrifically young.

In the days since, Severus found himself revisiting the memories of his benighted childhood with adult eyes. Without the vivid sting of rage and humiliation they carried at the time, everyone looks just as young. As unformed and foolish as his current students, who even now are preparing to leave the castle for a summer of poor decisions and minimal revising.

He can’t say he likes it any better.

Not that he would say as much, and certainly not to Black. “Very well,” he says, as levelly as he can. “Is that all? Your gratitude is very touching, I’m sure.”

“Hah,” says Black, perfectly toneless. “I expect you want my gratitude -- oh, about as much as the invitation to dinner with Harry’s parents I’m meant to pass on.”

Severus genuinely isn’t sure which of those he wants less.

Black reads it off his face, of course. “Yeah. I’ll tell them you politely declined.”

“You needn’t do me any favors,” says Severus.

This time, the sound Black makes is very nearly a real laugh. “I think I’d better, actually.” He stops staring at his hands, and looks up at Severus.

In Severus’ memories, Black never looks at him without some mixture of scorn, contempt, and incipient devilry. This -- is not that.

“Look,” Black says. “The Ministry’s finally remembered that they lost track of Harry once, and got his aunt and uncle killed. They didn’t bother doing anything to protect Tim and Caro while he was at Hogwarts, of course, but now that he’s going home they’ve decided to give a damn about his safety. So Remus and I can’t stay close, the way we ought to.”

Severus fails to see how this is his concern, and says so.

“We’re going after Pettigrew,” Black says. “Properly, this time, not stealing away for a day or two to follow a lead. If I can’t be Harry’s last line of defense, I’m damn well going to go out and find the biggest threat to his safety.”

“Wouldn’t that be the Dark Lord?” Severus asks.

“Dumbledore says he’s not strong enough, without followers,” says Black. “That if he’s just a scrap of disembodied spirit, he can’t hurt Harry.”

“Dumbledore has been wrong before,” says Severus.

“Which is why I’m asking you this,” says Black. “If we can’t finish it before Harry comes back to Hogwarts, I want to know you’re looking out for his safety.”

Ah. There it is. Black does want something from him, though Severus can’t imagine why it’s this, in particular.

“Why ask that of me, of all people?” Severus says. “Your godson thought I was the one after the Stone.”

“His friends did,” says Black, “and he panicked when I wasn’t there and they were sure it was you and not Quirrell. But you’ve been ignoring him all year, when I know damn well you look at him and see James standing there instead. Anyway. Dumbledore trusts you.”

Too close to the mark, on that shot about Potter. If it were Lupin, Severus might not be quite as surprised by that sort of insight, but from Black it feels unprecedented. Perhaps spending all that time as a dog has, somehow, rendered him less self-centered.

“And that’s all the recommendation you need?”

“No,” says Black. “Look. I know you and Lily cared about each other, once.”

Severus says nothing; there is nothing to say to that.

Black carries on talking. He does still love the sound of his own voice, it seems, so not everything has changed.

“It was my idea to switch Secret-Keepers at the last minute, you know. If I hadn’t been so impressed with my own cleverness, James and Lily might still be alive.” He looks up at Severus again, clear and level, nothing in it but but excruciating sincerity. “Do you really think I don’t know what guilt looks like?”

That is beyond the pale, entirely. Severus springs to his feet. “I have work to do,” he says, and immediately regrets it: he does not need to make excuses for himself. He has every right to order Black out if he wants to, which he very much does.

But Black is already retreating. “Sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry. It’s none of of my business.”

“I don’t need platitudes,” Severus spits out. Black has him off-balance, and scrambling for firmer ground. He dislikes it immensely. “Just because you think you’ve learned to act contrite -- I suppose Lupin’s managed to house-train you a bit over the years -- ”

Black’s expression hardens for the first time, a little of the old familiar anger appearing. “Leave him out of this,” he says. “Hate me all you like, but he never did anything to you.”

“I can think of one time he did,” says Severus. “Rather memorably.”

But the outburst Severus expects doesn’t come. Instead Black heaves a sigh, and the anger drains away. “Oh, all right,” he says. “We’re having this out, are we?”

“Oh, by all means,” says Severus. He feels foolish, standing there, and turns away to pace; at least if he’s moving he has an excuse to look at anything but Black. “Do you have a speech prepared? You will excuse me for my lack of counter-remarks, I hope.”

Rather than rise to the bait, Black very nearly smiles. “I do, I’m afraid,” he says. “Or something like one.”

“Plenty of time to rehearse in Azkaban, I suppose,” Severus says.

“Oh, no,” says Black. “That’s not a place you can string a sentence together, much less remember it later. I already had most of it before then, though, and worked the rest out after.”

“Well?” says Severus. “It had better be good, in that case, with so much practice.”

There’s that sincere look again. Severus dislikes it heartily. “I was selfish, at fifteen,” Black says. “Selfish and short-sighted and impulsive. I very nearly hurt you and Remus both, very badly, and I’ve regretted it since about ten minutes after I did it. But you know all of that.”

“Well before you ever did, I expect,” says Severus.

“Probably, yeah,” says Black. “So I’m sorry for it, and I’ve tried to be better than I was. You’re welcome to hate me, though, as long as you leave Remus and Harry out of it.”

This implies that Severus is also welcome to hate Potter. It’s intriguing, in a way, although it’s not as though he needs anyone’s permission to hate James Potter. Least of all Sirius Black’s.

Black never had any talent for Legilimency that Snape can recall, which makes it all the more disconcerting when he says, “And if you’ve got to hate James, go ahead; it can’t hurt him. But Harry isn’t James. You’ll need to remember that, if you’re willing to help protect him, because he’s not going to do the things that James would do.”

Severus has yet to see much evidence of that. But it’s true that he hasn’t been looking.

“Fine,” he says. “It’s not as though I would let any of my students wander into harm’s way, if I could help it. You needn’t have come begging a favor. Oughtn’t you Gryffindors have a bit more dignity than this, anyway?”

That attempt at a blow slides off, too. Black used to be much thinner-skinned, Severus is sure.

“I made James and Lily a promise, when they made me Harry’s godfather,” Black says. “It’s my job to keep him safe. It doesn’t matter if I have to do things I don’t like.”

He adds, as if it doesn’t cost him anything to say it, “I spent my first year with the MacIntyres pretending to be a dog. It’s a bit late to put my dignity ahead of Harry’s safety, don’t you think?”

Severus gives up. If nothing else, Black has apparently learned to hold his temper, and Severus is hardly going to let Black goad him into an outburst of his own.

“Oh, fine,” he says. “Very well. Consider it done.” He sits back down. There follows a long and very uncomfortable silence.

Severus isn’t fifteen anymore, either. He can manage a peace offering, even for the likes of Black.

Severus pulls a journal out of his stack and offers it to Black. “Damocles Belby thinks he’s close to perfecting his formula,” he says. “I expect he’ll have it within the year, if these results are accurate.”

Black takes it cautiously, as if it might bite. “He’s been saying that for well over a decade. You really think so?”

“Yes,” says Severus, and waits for the snide remark about his presumption of expertise.

It doesn’t come. Black flips to the relevant article, brow furrowed. “I’ve had to talk Remus out of joining the patient trials half a dozen times,” he says. “Told him to wait until they’d ironed out the side effects.”

“That… may have been for the best,” Severus admits. There were several fatalities in the early trials, he’s heard, though the details went unpublished.

“I hope so,” Black says. “A year, though. That’s something.”

Silence falls again, as Black puzzles over the article. It’s not anything you could call companionable, but the lack of overt hostility, in itself, is notable.

“You know, Lily was going to do an apprenticeship with him,” Black says. “Belby, I mean. After the war.”

Severus does know. He hadn’t realized anyone else did. He would rather face a phalanx of Death Eaters, wandless, than talk about it.

Mercifully, Black doesn’t press the issue. “I’d better go,” he says. “Thank you, Severus. I’ll owe you for this.”

He doesn’t even appear to be gritting his teeth as he says it. It’s fascinating, and a bit eerie. For a moment Severus suspects Polyjuice.

But Black changes into his Animagus form, which rules that out.

Before he can leave, though, Severus has a thought. “Wait.”

Black changes form again, and looks surprised once his shape settles back to human. “Yes?”

“Draco Malfoy sent for you, when he needed help,” Severus says. “If possible, you ought to encourage that tendency.”

“Offer him a sympathetic ear?” Black says.

“Certainly not. His parents already do that, and encourage all his worst impulses,” says Severus. “But the elder Malfoy is highly placed among the surviving Death Eaters. There may be some strategic value in offering his son an alternative path.”

Lucius has been one of Severus’ oldest and most loyal friends, in his way. He won’t be grateful if his son is turned against him. But it would be fitting, perhaps, if Severus has a hand in ensuring that Draco grows to be a better man than his father.

Given Black’s own family history, it’s not surprising that he seems to understand. “I’d be happy to,” he says.

“Very well,” says Severus. There. A favor for a favor, and nothing owed in any direction. He dislikes loose ends at the best of times, which this decidedly isn’t.

On his way out the door, Black says, “Oh, and by the way — thank you for giving Harry those photos. I won’t ask how you got them; I’m sure I don’t want to know.”

He leaves without waiting for a reply.

Severus remains ill at ease long after Black is gone. He feels better after Banishing the extra armchair, if only a very little.

But the students are leaving in the morning. He can regain his equilibrium far more easily in an empty castle, he’s sure. And Black won’t be coming back in the fall, in all likelihood. The thought is cheering.

Severus settles back into his reading, and doesn’t think of anything but potionmaking techniques and ingredient comparisons for the rest of the night. Anyone trying to prove otherwise would be unlikely to survive the Occlumentic backlash.

#the dogfather #dogfather story post

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recentanimenews · 6 years

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Bookshelf Briefs 12/12/17

Captain Harlock: Dimensional Voyage, Vol. 2 | By Leiji Matsumoto and Kouiti Shimaboshi | Seven Seas – Harlock has a scar. This is useful information in this volume, as in some panels it’s the only way to tell that you’re looking at him and not Tadashi, who has that same hair that seems to be blowing in the wind even in the corridors of a spaceship. The highlight of this second volume, though, may be the flashback to the first meeting of Harlock and Tochiro, which we’ve seen before in other adaptations and no doubt will again, but is always fun to show off what a badass Tochiro is despite looking like a short creepy guy. There’s also more drama from the Mazon, who now have a bounty out on Harlock. Dimensional Voyage continues to be a decent adaptation in any case. – Sean Gaffney

Cells at Work!, Vol. 5 | By Akane Shimizu | Kodansha Comics – We reunite with a cell with a history of befriending germs. He’s feeling lonely and bored, and wishes he could save someone and earn their gratitude. The chance presents itself and he ends up saving… some cute bacteria. Turns out, they’re good bacteria, and the whole volume consists of White Blood Cell giving the cell a tour of the digestive system, during which each variety of good bacteria finds its specialty and ends up saving the day. The cell bravely protects the bacteria throughout, and meanwhile we get an actually fairly dramatic return of Cancer Cell who is being protected by a regulatory cell, and who pitches his version of utopia in which the body’s cells revolt and refuse to kill each other for the body’s sake. There was almost some kind of plot there for a second! All in all, this was a pretty fun volume. – Michelle Smith

A Centaur’s Life, Vol. 13 | By Kei Murayama | Seven Seas – You never quite know from chapter to chapter what kind of Centaur’s Life you’ll get. Sometimes the “wtf” comes from the historical or political chapters, such as the retelling of the movie The Thing with snakes, or the ongoing war with the frogs (and their human advisor). But oftentimes it’s also with our main cast. We get another chapter devoted to Michi and Mitsu, the lesbian couple in the series, which shows us that one is the heir to a yakuza family, complete with assassination attempts. And sometimes there’s bizarre dream sequences, like Suu and Hime setting fire to the creepiest “factory” you’ve ever seen. Sure, sometimes we get adorable toddler sequences, but they’re fewer and fewer in number. The author has dreams, that’s for sure. – Sean Gaffney

Food Wars!: Shokugeki no Soma, Vol. 21 | By Yuto Tsukuda and Shun Saeki | Viz Media – More exams, and much as I’m enjoying these chapters the arc is already feeling dragged out. Turns out that when you actively try to suppress the resisters by cheating, it doesn’t work, as they’re clever enough—and good enough chefs—to get around such petty tricks. Which leaves more time for sightseeing in Hokkaido and bonding with unusual pairings—I was amused at seeing Ikumi, Isami, Erina and Megumi walking around town and thinking it’s an unusual group, only for Isami to say the exact same thing. Things may get harder soon, though, as now Soma has to fight Hayama, and the ingredient is absolutely stacked in his favor. Is this the end for our hero? Well, no. But find out why next time. – Sean Gaffney

Giant Killing, Vol. 8 | By Masaya Tsunamoto and Tsujitomo | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – ETU’s game against Osaka continues, though it’s not going well, as the first half ends with the score 2-0. And yet Tatsumi smirks, sure that his counterattack is going to be effective. Soon, though, it becomes clear that he had misjudged Natsuki’s confidence, as the latter fumbles chance after chance that his teammates worked their butts off to create. Seeing the continued growth of ETU members is great, but I also really liked getting a glimpse inside the mind of Kubota, one of the Osaka forwards, who looks plain and unassuming, but who makes great split-second decisions (wholly unlike Natsuki) and who spurs Tsubaki to greatness. I kind of want him to join ETU, in fact, though that seems unlikely. The volume concludes before the match does, so I am definitely looking forward to volume nine! – Michelle Smith

Haikyu!!, Vol. 18 | By Haruichi Furudate | VIZ Media – Karasuno has made it to the finals of the qualifying round, where they’re up against the prefectural favorite, Shiratorizawa. They lost the first set, but in the second they’re starting to get a hang for how to combat their powerhouse rival. Surprisingly, Tsukishima is utterly key to this, as he’s the one who figures out some of their patterns and timing, and starts blocking them in such a way that allows Nishinoya to do his thing. Somehow, Tsukishima has really endeared himself to me lately, and I love seeing him actually get fired up and relentless about something in his own way. (I also adored the Potteresque poster at the end featuring him!) The volume ends with each team struggling to make two consecutive points and take the second set. How does this series manage to become even more nail-bitey each time?! Not that I’m complaining. – Michelle Smith

Haikyu!!, Vol. 18 | By Haruichi Furudate | Viz Media – The evolution of Tsukishima from “tall grumpy asshole” to “CLEVER tall grumpy asshole” has been highly rewarding, and this volume shows off his maturation to excellent effect, to the point where he actually leads some of the strategy. He’d do well in JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, I think. Nishinoya is also impressive throughout, and there are the occasional moments for our two leads. It’s still a tight game, though, and we get a lot of chapters devoted to showing us that while they have one really talented guy, that’s not quite all they have. The cliffhanger shows us veering back and forth between set points, but this is best 3-of-5, so I’m sure we have a ways to go. Excellent sports manga. – Sean Gaffney

Helvetica Standard: Italic | By Keiichi Arawi | Vertical Comics – As with the first volume, we start with the Helvetica Standard 4-komas. They have the strange sense of humor we know and love from Arawi, but do suffer a bit from lacking a lovable main cast—there are some recurring roles, but it’s even more random than Nichijou was. After this we get the original art that was used for the DVD/Blu-Ray covers, and again I like the way he works surreal art styles into them. He enjoys playing with the space given to him, sometimes in a very Escher way, and dislikes leaving blank space when he can fill it with something else. This is inessential, but I was pleased to see it anyway, and it’s whetted my appetite for the new series City in the spring. -Sean Gaffney

Kuroko’s Basketball, Vol. 17-18 | By Tadatoshi Fujimaki | Viz Media – As you’d expect, Seirin have managed to score some points by the end of this omnibus, so they aren’t shut out. Things still aren’t looking good, though, despite their amazing secret weapon—Kuroko actually shooting and scoring! He’s sort of hit-and-miss, but it’s another unpredictable aspect to his game. Things aren’t going nearly as well for Kagami, who’s finding it very hard to get past the huge and somewhat arrogant Murasakibara on the other team. He wants to get back in ‘the zone,’ but easier said than done. As for Kiyoshi, well, he’s still injured, and thus can’t contribute the way he wants. Though hopefully Riko beating the injury out of him offscreen may help. Exciting stuff. – Sean Gaffney

Queen’s Quality, Vol. 2 | By Kyousuke Motomi | Viz Media – After some terrifying sequences last time, we’re dealing with the aftermath—a lot of the students that Ms. Hayashi had been “dealing with” are also infested with bugs. As for Ms. Hayashi herself, she’s dying—and only Fumi seems to want to try to take the “save her” option. Of course, saving her might involve becoming the Black Queen again, but Fumi is able to move past that and become… possibly Fuyu? Whoever it is that takes over Fumi, she brings a memory of the traumatic death of her mother with her. But it’s not all drama and thrilling tension—Fumi’s choice of a weapon to fight with is a gag that will make you laugh hysterically, something Motomi excels at. Definitely recommended for shoujo fans. – Sean Gaffney

Waiting for Spring, Vol. 3 | By Anashin | Kodansha Comics – This third volume shows off more of the love triangle between Mitsuki, Towa and Aya, but two of those three are just so awkward that there’s not really any danger of sparks flying—even the one-on-one basketball game between the two guys is cut short by Mitsuki, who has a sneaking suspicion it would go badly for Towa. We also get the addition of another female friend, not always something that happens in a shoujo series. She’s shy but also straightforward, and has a pretty obvious crush, so I hope their friendship can survive things. This isn’t top-drawer shoujo, but it’s pleasant enough, and the lead girl is indecisive but not dragged around by the plot as much as some. – Sean Gaffney

Welcome to the Ballroom, Vol. 8 | By Tomo Takeuchi | Kodansha Comics – It’s not that this volume of Welcome to the Ballroom is bad by any stretch, but for 99% of it, Tatara and Chinatsu are failing to communicate as partners, and it’s a bit excruciating. I suppose enduring this does make it all the sweeter when they finally achieve a few measures of harmony whilst competing in the Metropolitan Tournament, though. I did enjoy seeing Tatara briefly looking manly, and it seems like he’s on the verge of overcoming his timid personality. There are a couple of brief panels that look like Tatara’s mother abandoning the family when Tatara was a kid, which suggests he’s afraid to drive people away by really expressing himself, but Chinatsu is just the one to demand that from him. After all of their struggles, it sure will be gratifying to see them get it together. – Michelle Smith

By: Michelle Smith

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