Oishimbo: Sake, Zelda: Majora's Mask & Nightmare Inspector Vol. 7 - Manga Review

Comfortable favorites, new demos and new subjects constantly pepper the diversity of manga. With three new releases the tone, direction and implementation is of key presence but comes off with varying degrees of results.Oishimbo - A la Carte: Sake This form of manga is based in love of food and spirits. Sake has always been an evolving perception in American culture as it is a way that we see the Japanese, much like sushi. The detail here is in terms of full breakdowns for breweries and distinctions between ones made with certain kinds of prepared and filtered rice. This bring to the forefront the different storing and ways to age them much like wine. The story across this structure in terms of the manga tends towards examining current perception and cultural references to the drink itself and then establishing its ambience. This is done showing it consumed in various restaurants and talking to people inside the shops who become the main characters. In terms of dialogue the entire basis is exposition based in static talk and not action. The reasons for sake's disappearing culture is attributed to the influence of Westernism which tends to taint a bit of the culture. As a comparable drink, champagne is examined when offered to a skeptic scholar for comparison. The thought is to draw the similarity to sake in terms of aging and how storing in certain temperature affects the real nature of the spirit. From there the story becomes more episodic in terms of saving a floundering brewery who doesn't pander to low grade sake which is what is found in stores. According to the story, sake in liquor stores is not stored in refrigerated compartments to savor its taste. The gang who rallies around the proud owner needs to secure a loan but must convince the bank that their thoughts in terms of supply and demand are sound. This manga gives great insight into sake should the reader be interested in the concept but these volumes also examine in different volumes various culinary aspect. But in terms of spirits, it gives a rounded understanding of this famous but perhaps misunderstood drink.Legend Of Zelda Vol. 3: Majora's Mask Unlike HACK/G.U.'s world where perceptions of the difference between real and virtual worlds are examined, this manga takes the basis of Nintendo's very popular franchise specifically the game of the same title. The great aspect of these games is their simple structure and resolution. Although released for Viz Kids, which it definitely plays to, the use of the different monsters in this manga infusing them with backstory takes on a bizarro world aspect where the motivations of characters in the games are instiled from the perspective of a curse. The mask mentioned in the title, like archetypes before, changes the life and course of a disturbed young man. Like Darth Vader before him, he cannot tell the anger from the lost parts of himself. But unlike that character and more suceptible mind, this specific one delves into madness. He latches the evil onto the essence of four characters who is their many respects represent the elements. From a snakelike scorpion to a thrashing turtle to a would be abominable snowman, the motivations of the characters are marked by rage. One that sticks out specifically is the yeti type character who has been separated from his son but in serving his penance has become a pariah of sorts. Link, our hero, after being sabotaged by Skull Kid, who is the individual inflicted by the mask, must use his intelligence and not just his sword to make the seemingly not so black-and-white villains realize the error of their ways before attention can be turned to the Skull Kid who himself has been the victim of the mask's power. The mask can represent any emotion: deceit, anger, joy, jealously or love but creates a different reaction in each one. Link, in the last section, learns something about his own self and his insecurities. Despite its motivation and ability to be read more as a simple adventure story, Majora's Mask has many layers of interpretation.Nightmare Inspector Vol. 7 Nightmare Inspector as a series is always very different because the story is about different perspectives of fear and how it can be both a strength and a deterrent. Here, the interaction, which was abstract in previous volumes, becomes even more so. The first two involved altered perception using a mode of interaction. The first one is when the character becomes trapped in a manga and unaware of its larger world doesn't understand that you have to think outside of the box until the very end to understand that the box could be round. The second story involves a man whose nightmare is about being part of a board game where life is dictated by the roll of the dice. In an abstract sense along the lines of a "Choose Your Own Adventure", the appearance and perception of destiny is put to the test although fate no matter which way you play it bounds to find its course. The second two stories involves the senses and are based in sight and sound. One has a female character being trapped in a room after her brother lures her there. The more she panics, the smaller the room gets. The metaphor is apt to being trapped in your own mind which is harder to get out than anything. The sound based is of a nursery thyme where the images are conjured perceptions of dialogue cadence and ignorance. Finding the right aspect of what the words mean, just like the former exercise in the earlier nightmare about being trapped in a manga, works here since it has to do with interpretation and perception which, for the most part, is different for everybody. The next three are based in wildly different bases. One is from the perspective of a dog who seems to be in emotionally pained. Through a regression of the dog's nightmare, you can see that the dog's perception of his owner, betrayal and love all work together but are spoken simply. The dog was the only one there when his master died and was unable to resolve its impact. The second story of this trilogy has a girl who is unsure of her sexual identity as a man or a woman but is thrust by the constraints of society which confuse her natural instincts. The last story is a literal exercise. It involves a photo taken by a photographer who died. It looks a suicide photo but upon the revelation of the nightmare it is found that it is simply a altered perspective which is just the opposite.These three manga highlight very different tonal progressions with varying degrees of detail, metaphor and psychological layer, the most surprising being the depth of archetypes and morivation of "Majora's Mask".