Rosario + Vampire, Volume 3, by Akihisa Ikeda

I'm happy to report this manga keeps getting better.

When we last left our friends at Yokai Academy--a school for monsters, where the only human is freshman Tsukune--our motley band of heroes was being threatened by the school "enforcers," who had discovered Tsukune was human.  Or had they?  After Tsukune is beaten up and comes close to death, Moka, a cute vampire, pumps vampire blood into his veins and suddenly he's totally kick-ass!  Yeah, Tsukune!!!  Of course, Moka still has to save him in the end, but at least he got in a few punches.

In the latter half of the manga, word has spread around the school that Tsukune beat up the school bully.  The captain of the wrestling team is shocked and wants Tsukune to join his team.  Being no dummy (unlike the captain), Tsukune refuses, which eventually leads to him getting another dose of vampire blood from Moka and kicking the captain's trolly buttocks. 

What are the effects of all this vampire blood, you might be wondering?  Well, so far no one knows.  Tsukune himself doesn't remember becoming a vampire and the fact that Moka bit him without permission causes something of a rift in their relationship.  But don't worry, after a few minutes Tsukune appears to return to his completely normal, human self.

In the last chapter, Tsukune is tutored by the sexy math teacher who likes her students to be very, very obedient.

As you can probably tell, the characters are developing more now and the formula is starting to become interesting.  I have to say I found this volume to be very exciting and fun to read, and Tsukune is simply adorable.

As for the objectification of the female characters, there were six gratuitous panty shots (a good half of them for poor Kurumu).  Don't even get me started on the cleavage.  And the math teacher is a dominatrix.  Other than that, though, there's not as much creepy sexual stuff going on in this volume as there was in the previous one, which is fine with me.

So far this manga is definitely on an improving trend, and I can't wait to see what comes up in the next volume.

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Rosario + Vampire by Akihisa Ikeda-Volume 2

I've said it before and I'll probably say it again:  manga is some subversive shit.  At least by US standards.

You might recall that after I had finished Volume 1 of Rosario + Vampire, I was on the fence about continuing the series.  The stories were just too repetitive.  But one of my lovely blog readers told me the series improved, so I decided to give Volume 2 a try--and if this volume is anything to go by, the series definitely gets better!

In case you missed my first review, the manga is about a normal human boy, Tsukune, who attends a school for supernatural creatures.  Since no one is supposed to reveal their inner monsters, no one knows or suspects that Tsukune is human, except for Moka, a beautiful vampire whom Tsukune met the first day of school and has been crushing on ever since.

While the first chapter (or test) in this volume was still a little formulaic, the plot is clearly starting to get more varied as it centers on the group of friends that make up the newspaper club, which Tsukune and Moka started along with Kurumu, a succubus who is in love with Tsukune (and the girl on the cover of this manga).

In "Love Is a Witch," Moka is stalked by an 11-year-old bisexual witch who keeps squeezing her breasts.  She wants Moka all to herself, so she tortures Tsukune with voodoo and other magic, making him flip up Kurumu's skirt and show the reader wayyy more than I needed to see.  Everyone is annoyed by this little witch except Moka, who understands what it's like to be alone.

In "The Art of the Birthday" (creative title), Tsukune is having his birthday and wants to tell Moka he loves her on his b-day.  But Moka's too busy modeling for art class and the seriously creepy art teacher.  "You're so pretty, just looking at you makes me want to create art," she purrs.  Meeeeanwhile, girls are disappearing from the school, so it's creeptastic all around.  Is Moka in danger?  And will Tsukune man up and profess his feelings for her?

For "Deadline," the newspaper club is in a rush to report Moka and Tsukune's discovery of the identity of the person who was kidnapping girls from the school.  But Kurumu keeps wandering off, a she's being blackmailed by some Hayden Caulfield type with a camera.  Once again, we peek up her skirt.  Every female in this series is sexually objectified, even the 11-year-old, but with Kurumu it seems especially bad.

Finally, in "Wish Upon the Moon," the newspaper club faces down the school bullies who want to extort money from them for handing out newspapers.  However, this gang doesn't go down with a simple fight, and the story will continue in Volume 3.



The sexual objectification of the female characters continues to bother me, but overall this manga shows a marked improvement over its predecessor.  I do want to find out what will happen next in the story, so I'll be reading Volume 3 soon!

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Rosario + Vampire by Akihisa Ikeda

This is a very fun, cute manga, although it's insanely repetitive and I'm not sure I want to keep reading it.

Average guy Tsukune can't get into a decent high school, so he finds himself enrolled in Yokai Academy, the only place that will accept him.  At Yokai, Tsukune is anything but average--because he's the only human in the entire place!  Unbeknownst to Tsukune or his parents, Yokai is a high school for supernatural creatures who need to learn how to integrate with the human population.  Because of this, they're supposed to keep their monster identities under wraps--but very few of them can keep to this rule.

Fortunately for Tsukune and his continued bodily existence, the first day he arrives he meets Moka, a cute vampire girl.  Moka and Tsukune become fast friends.  Then for the rest of the series, Tsukune is lured into danger by some monster (usually female), Moka gets offended, then winds up changing into her kick-ass vampire form so she can save him from said monster.

I like formulas as much as the next person (perhaps more), but when a formula is already predictable and boring by chapter two, that's a problem.  This manga became repetitive very quickly, and while I really liked the characters and found Yokai Academy and the art work to be quite charming, I got pretty bored with the story line.

Another thing that started to bug me about this manga is how sexually objectified the young girls are.  There's an entire chapter where the plot revolves around peering up the girls' skirts.  It would be pretty obvious the author was male even if we didn't know who wrote it.  I also find it very interesting that all the girls at Yokai--who for the most part very sexually aggressive--are all MONSTERS.  Even though there's no overt sex in this manga, it's very sexually suggestive--but in strange, creepy ways.

I can see why this manga is so popular, but I'm not sure I want to continue with it.  Not because of the sexual objectification stuff, because that's a relatively minor part of the stories, but mainly because the formula is already wearing on me.  That being said, if I was younger I could see myself enjoying this series A LOT, so I think I actually would recommend it to people who are interested.

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