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Reviewed by Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane Although a truly gifted hairstylist, Kiri Koshiba has no interest in using her talent to pursue fame and fortune, unlike the three popular boys in the "Scissors Project" at school. Determined to become the best makeover team in Japan, they give showy makeovers to handpicked girls. As much as Kiri tries to shy away from the Scissors Project spotlight, she finds herself responding to beauty's call... Beauty Pop sat on my "to read...sometime" list until I was sent review copies of the last two volumes, at which point I finally put in the effort to track down vol. 1-8 and catch up. It's a shoujo title I've heard mentioned often enough that I always figured I should check it out, but what I knew of the premise (which turned out to be fairly accurate) made me suspect it wouldn't be my thing. And sure enough, I'm really not the ideal target audience for a manga about the pursuit of an exciting career in hairstyling, even with the clear focus on how nice it is to make people feel better about themselves. Making people feel more comfortable with their appearance--"adding a little magic", as she says--is the main reason Kiri seems to ever do anyone's hair at all, despite the buckets of raw talent she's inherited from her genius stylist father (who is by far my favorite character. I have a tremendous soft spot for laid-back manga dads who adore their kids). But she's still been sucked into unending schemes and competitions with the SP guys, and in these last two volumes they're participating in a contest with some ludicrous goals and some really nasty sabotage. Unfortunately, Narumi and Ochiai are both getting pretty interested in her (not that Kiri shows any signs of noticing), which creates conflict the group can't really afford. There's a lot to like in these two final volumes of the series: fans will already be familiar with the cheap tactics that Narumi's detractors stoop to, and they're no more over-the-top than usual. There's some real tension in here as the SP group tries to overcome external opposition and their own limitations, which are fairly believable--for example, Narumi's habit of pushing himself to the point of injury has been a constant theme for several volumes now, and that kind of thing takes its toll. Meanwhile, Kiri's attachment to the group is still developed and shown in nicely understated ways. Other than the actual subject matter not being up my alley, the one thing that kept distracting me from the story was some of the characters' similarities to characters in Ouran High School Host Club (a later series, but one I'm much more familiar with). It wouldn't be so striking if Ochiai weren't creepily like Ouran's Kyoya in many ways, but once that comparison was established it was hard to not read Narumi as being a bit like Tamaki, only hot-headed instead of charming. A small thing, but distracting, as I said. Vol. 10 has some solid extras tucked away at the back to wrap up the series. In addition to a couple of bonus side stories and a flash forward after the main story's action concludes, VIZ editor Nancy Thistlethwaite assembled a favorite-scenes collection from the English version's team. It includes a comment from Kiyoko Arai as well as notes from the translator, adapter, editor, touch-up artist/letterer, and design artist, and it provides a particularly nice touch. Review copies provided by VIZ Media. Interested in writing for MangaLife? We're always looking for talented reviewers and columnists, so drop us a line! Charles Webb Editor-in-Chief, MangaLife.com |
1 September 2010
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