Hiwatari Saki - Please Save My Earth, vol. 01-04

[oyceter]

I will attempt to do an incoherent plot summary, but first I would like to say that the manga opens with DINOSAURS! Gazing wistfully at the moon and leaving in their alien spaceships!

Ok, it's all in the heroine's mind, but still: DINOSAURS!

(come to think of it, why hasn't there been more manga with dinosaurs? clearly an untapped well of crack and awesomeness! also, i would like to add dinosaurs to the long-standing battle between zombies and robots, though my current political stance is that giant zombie robot dinosaurs are the best solution.)

Oh right, PSME... (in another aside, the acronym bugs me because I keep seeing "PMS")

Alice/Arisu discovers that some of her classmates have been having reoccuring dreams about a station on the moon; eventually, they all realize they are reincarnations of the scientists there. While most of them attempt to figure out what exactly happened and why they're reincarnating, one of them is manipulating the rest, to who knows what end.

I'm really not sure what to think of this series so far. I'm incredibly uninterested in Alice and Rin and the fact that Rin is eight years old and a romantic interest! Agh! Yes, yes, reincarnation, but still. EIGHT! And while some of the manga meta comments by the characters amuse me ("Look at that two-page spread! Hiwatari just needs more pages."), mostly I wish it were just in the author's notes. I also cannot keep any of the characters straight in my head. Bad enough that most of them look the same, with only minor variations in hairstyle, but then I have to remember their past lives as well!

On the other side, I keep reading because I desperately want to know what happened on the moon. It feels grand and epic and tragic, and even though I already want to whap Mokuren and Alice, I do not care! I want to know! Also, more dinosaurs would be nice.

Comments

[larryhammer]

Around volume 4 or so, I started being able to tell the characters apart -- though I'm not sure whether that's because the art sufficiently improved or I started only reading them in 3-4 volume chunks instead of spaced apart. Fourteen major characters, plus friends-and-relations, is a lot to keep straight when the art's not spot-on.

This is one of those shoujo series where I don't mind that it turns into being about the male lead instead of the female lead, because Rin and his past life is more interesting than Alice and hers. Especially once the reason he's so much younger is explained, and the reason *mumgphlespoilermph*. It doesn't help that she gets progressively more like a bathmat as the story goes on.

It does need more dinosaurs, though.

---L.

[kyuuketsukirui.livejournal.com]

Their previous lives are definitely the more interesting part of the story.

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

I keep reading because I desperately want to know what happened on the moon. It feels grand and epic and tragic, and even though I already want to whap Mokuren and Alice, I do not care! I want to know! Also, more dinosaurs would be nice.

This is EXACTLY how I felt. Parts of this series will be VASTLY ANNOYING and yet it is PURE EMO PORN.

[umadoshi.livejournal.com]

Bad enough that most of them look the same, with only minor variations in hairstyle, but then I have to remember their past lives as well!

...ugh, I really dislike the PSME artwork. It's especially rough because I saw the OAV before I tried reading the manga, and the anime designs are much better, IMO. I quite like the series overall, though, even though Alice doesn't do much for me.

[This vague comment brought to you by it having been a long time since I read through the manga, and not really remembering what happens in each volume.]

[tatterpunk.livejournal.com]

Oh, PSME... that was my very first anime. I have love for the six-part OAV like a burning thing. Between that and the image video (these gorgeous, slow sequences shot to ethereal music exploring certain relationships and plot points) I never really felt the need to finish the manga. I just wasn't a big fan of how some of the plotlines developed. (I.E., the engagement is treated with a lot more humor in the anime.) Plus Alice is voiced by Shiratori Yuri, aka Nanami Kiryuu, since I just received your thesis. ;)

[etrangere.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I do adore this manga. Emo-porn indeed. You gotta love a manga when the relationship diagrams are that complicated.

I don't mind Rin's being 8 because it is presented as being a problem. Sure it's squicky, but it's supposed to be.

(also, I just friended, hi!)