oyceter: man*ga [mahng' guh] n. Japanese comics. synonym: CRACK (manga is crack)
Oyceter ([personal profile] oyceter) wrote2006-07-05 11:05 pm

Narushima Yuri - Planet Ladder, vol. 01-02 (Eng. trans.)

Ummmm.... I read this one really fast, so I don't quite remember what it's about. There's a beautiful black-haired, blue-eyed girl named Kaguya, who is not only adopted, but also the secret princess of somewhere or the other. There's a robot boy who looks exactly like a prince that Kaguya keeps dreaming of. The robot (named Gold, I think) is of course a soulless killer who possesses a hand of living gold. I think. And there's a long-haired insane guy who controls said robot, and another guy who seems to be trying to rescue Kaguya.

Also, there are nine different dimensions, and Kaguya can somehow pick the one that will survive, while the others fall into confusion.

Alas and alack, I did not get to meet the giant robot chicken.

The best thing is that Rachel was reccing this to me as a fairly standard, non-cracktastic manga, with the exception of the Giant Robot Chicken.

On page two, I said something about the emotionless killer robot with the hand of living gold.

"Oh yeah. Maybe it's not that standard," Rachel admitted. "I forgot about that. It's really not that cracktastic, except for the chicken and the robot boy!"

A few seconds later, she added, "Oh, and the mysterious disease that makes people's heads randomly fall off."

The best thing of all is that she is absolutely right, particularly when compared to Cross.

Anyhow, I can't even do a standard plot summary, because I have absolutely no idea what happened. This was probably not helped out by the fact that the character introductions in volume two were misprinted so that the villain and the hero were switched around.

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-07-06 02:07 pm (UTC)(link)
It took me until book 4 or so to really figure out what was going on, and by then the long-haired insane guy had hit enough of my buttons that I kept reading. :D

[identity profile] telophase.livejournal.com 2006-07-06 08:48 pm (UTC)(link)
Long-haired, emotionally repressed bishounen are a Thing of mine anyway*, and it hits extra-hard on him as we learn his (tragic!) backstory, and we that much like Jin, he's a bit of a dork, is also mechanically inclined, and that he literally cannot be touched by another human, or he gets emotionally overloaded and passes out. XD The disease that causes people's heads and other limbs to randomly fall off is a big part of his backstory, and as [livejournal.com profile] rachelmanija says: people's heads randomly falling off = High Comedy, while people appearing with bandage-wrapped stumps where their hands used to be: High Tragedy.

And, really: you've got to read far enough to meet the chicken.



* Sanzo fails in that he's not long-haired, but he's got emotional repression in spades to make up for it. XD
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[identity profile] coffeeandink.livejournal.com 2006-07-06 02:16 pm (UTC)(link)
Good news: The giant robot chicken and the disease where people's heads fall off are both in V3, so you don't have far to go. (I have only read as far as V3.) And also, compared to Kaori Yuki? So sane and noncracktastic.

So far I am not particularly struck by the crazy long-haired guy, but I am cooing over the emotionless robot boy with the hand of living gold. Also, V3 has much f/f slashiness, yay!
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[identity profile] coffeeandink.livejournal.com 2006-07-06 08:55 pm (UTC)(link)
Yes -- it's from "The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter," which I think explicitly inspires Planet Ladder in some ways, but I need to reread it to make sure.

[identity profile] rachelmanija.livejournal.com 2006-07-06 10:49 pm (UTC)(link)
The crazy long-haired guy didn't get to me until a later volume where he interacts with Kaguya, insofar as he is capable of interacting with another human being.

In volume 4 the giant robot chicken is harnessed to a royal carriage.