Order Fusion! …is honestly pretty underwhelming.
Creative Staff
Story/Art: Sakae Esuno
Translation: Caleb Cook
What They Say
Sena’s awake! Rushing to see her, Eiji heads back to Dazaifu, only to hear Hiiragi reveal to her that she’s got six months left to live! Eiji is livid, but Hiiragi has one more bombshell to drop–they’ve located someone who can cure Sena! Now it’s off to Hiroshima to find this mysterious Order! Could this be the chance Eiji’s been waiting for, or is Hiiragi hiding something else?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
So, after some foreshadowing, we start this volume off with Eiji being told of an order nicknamed Kamimusubi that could potentially cure his sister, setting him up to once more act as an underling for Dazaifu. But before he heads out on his mission, we get some of Hiiragi heavily messing with our hero, including showing off his ability… which is to swap any truth with any “lie” he wishes. So in other words, he has “nuh-uh, that’s not what happened” as an ability, which is just stupidly overpowered to such a degree that he should just instantly win whenever he appears. Which is what happens here, so I suppose that’s fair enough, but it really leaves no wiggle room for using him in pretty much any situation, and feels like a really awkward ability to write into a series. Like, either he immediately takes absolute control of the situation, or you have to come up with a contrivance to make it so he can’t, and that’s all that can be done with the character.
Anyway, Eiji and Rin get sent off to Hiroshima, where they get caught up between two rival yakuza groups, with them accidentally ending up working for the opposite sides. And like, I think it’s supposed to be humorous, but like everything in this series… it amounts to nothing of substance. But regardless, things quickly shift with Eiji ending up in a battle with someone with a similar ability, one based around controlling people. But then the guy blocks Eiji’s power by having everyone wear headphones, and we get a shuffle of “oh no, this isn’t even the real guy!” But to top it off… Rin ends up getting kind of brainwashed by the enemy, or turned to his side, or something…? She gets a weird eye indicative of this at least, but it’s kind of wish-washy on exactly what’s going on here over the course of the volume, and what exactly has been done with her. It just makes her attack Eiji a bit more openly, I guess, but then she kind of un-betrays them later anyway?
But then we get the big dumb reveal of the volume, and that’s that this guy is the mastermind of everything, and is actually Eiji’s dad, Gennai Hoshimiya! Which, y’know, great job not foreshadowing that in the least and just dumping it in the middle of some random arc, and not even having the damn guy as even a bit role in flashbacks to make us care at all. We get a very, very minor bit of that later at least in relation to the guy’s past with Hiiragi, but it’s brief and doesn’t even come until the end of this book, well after such a thing would make sense to do. So instead, this big bombshell falls super, super flat.
Anyway, Eiji then follows up on trying to find Kamimusubi with Iyo. And man, does this arc suck, by the way. It turns into a big training arc essentially where Iyo and Eiji are forced to play a game where they try to steal a ball from Kamimusubi and her personified Japanese gods, which is secretly to get them to work in sync. Which is bland, but then a guy in a wetsuit shows up with the power to control water or whatever, who just looks like a dorky middle-aged dude on a surfboard. But then Eiji and Iyo do “Order Fusion” to fight him… which is just them doing what they already were doing in their training, with Iyo using her ability and conveying the info to Eiji non-verbally… but with the “flashy” imagery of… Eiji’s Order with some extra armor crap tossed on while holding dowsing rods? And then they just use Eiji’s ability to punch him with some fish, which it seems like they could’ve done without the info of “he’s coming from behind!” anyway… Oh, but then Daisy shows up and opens up a visual feed or something to the bad-guys, and then one uses his power to cut through dimensions to just kill Kamimusubi from where they were.
Oh, and to top things off, an intruder attacks the base at Dazaifu. And this is facilitated by the most random reference I’ve seen in quite time, in which Rin is given a PlayStation Vita of all things that has been modified to be a communication device (and then she shouts something about Shiren the Wanderer, to keep the “why are you referencing that thing?” train going), which she contacts Eiji with… but that commercial flop of a gaming handheld was bugged and feeding the enemy information! Anyway, Eiji’s sister gets kidnapped I guess, ending the volume.
In Summary
There’s not a whole lot to add here that wasn’t said with the review of last volume, as the same complaints of everything just feeling shoddy and poorly thought out still stand, which still make the series a real drag to read. We get plenty of new dumb powers (including the dumbest, most broken one yet), and a big villain reveal that’s rather shoddily handled. Oh, and Eiji gets a really stupid power-up after an unsurprisingly unexciting training arc. But still, the whole thing is just repeating and carrying on with my complaints from last time, and my feelings remain much the same here as they did there. Perhaps in future volumes the author will realize that planning ahead or actually thinking up interesting scenarios and things to do with the characters really help a manga, but I’m not too hopeful on that happening, as if anything things get just a bit more poorly plotted out by the end of the book. So as with last time, at least for now, I’ve got to say that ultimately, this series just plain isn’t worth anyone’s time or money.
Content Grade: C
Art Grade: B
Packaging Grade: A-
Text/Translation Grade: A-
Age Rating: Mature
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: May 23rd, 2017
MSRP: $21.99
