Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Let's Talk About: Sumire 16 Sai

I know I said the Let's Play video would come out with the next post but I lied. I have to tell everyone about this great manga.



It's a "Slice-of-Life" type that's kind of gimmicky, but the best part is it's realistic. The manga features a girl named Sumire Yotsuya, the only problem is she's actually a puppet controlled by a middle aged man. She's not a magical puppet, or a robot but literally a mundane ventriloquist's dummy. She attends school and participates as if everything were normal and she never breaks character.

The story lines are really fun to read and it's a mixture of whimsy and sobering reality, halfway through the series you passively begin to think of Sumire as a real girl and you realize the characters do too.

The most interesting character doesn't have any lines, why does the old man attend high school as a sixteen year old girl?

It's a really funny series with interesting character dynamics, from Sumire herself, to a weeaboo English teacher, to her Yakuza boss friend. I highly recommend this to anyone who likes manga, it defies genre as it's very well written.

3 comments:

  1. A lot of manga is very well written. Art and storyline are beautifully intertwined. Thanks for the suggestion!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh wow, just when you thought you've seen every possible manga/anime concept ever - suddenly, high school ventriloquist puppet! Ever since childhood, I've had an intense fear of ventriloquist dummies - not sure if it was Howdie Doodie, or that Goosebumps dummy. Maybe this would help me get over it?

    ReplyDelete