A review of the ‘Omamori Himari’ universe, characters, and short stories about the early lives of the main female characters.
Creative Staff
Story & Art: Milan Matra
Translation/Adaptation: Christine Dashiell
What They Say
Ever since he met the feline cat spirit and bodyguard Himari, life with the supernatural has brought adventure, danger, and plenty of raunch to Yuuto Amakawa’s world! And this companion volume of ‘Omamori Himari’ will bring more of the same to fans of this New York Times bestselling series, with a titillating color manga chapter and anime design gallery, a detailed guide to the characters, and more!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
This book starts off with an impressive 16 color pages on glossy paper, something manga fans don’t get much of these days, but greatly appreciated. A portion of those color pages detail the character designs from the anime, which are a decent representation of Matra’s original character design from the manga series. Beyond that, this volume is a collection of short stories written and drawn by Matra and four additional artists to create an anthology that includes a number of comics, some 4-koma, detailed descriptions of the main and secondary characters, summaries of the first five volumes, and even a novella.
This book acts as an introduction to the ‘Omamori Himari’ series for the new reader, but also a refresher book for those of us that have already read many volumes into the series. I’ve read eight volumes before this book, and it was nice to go back and revisit some of the earlier interactions between characters to remind me of the roles some of the secondary and tertiary players have. I also enjoyed the full break down of why the Demon Slayer families exist, and detailed descriptions of each family and what their particular special powers are, or were since some of the families are presumed extinct.
For fans of this series because of the fanservice, then this volume is a good buy. The first story in this anthology is basically an excuse for all the girls to have a pool party. Plus, since much of this series uses fanservice as a story vehicle, other portions of this book are ripe with the usual panty shots and awkward positions and situations. Even Yuuto’s horndog school friend, Taizou, has a small section where he shares his favorite fanservice scenes for the whole series. With that said, this series certainly isn’t for everyone.
In Summary
I enjoyed this anthology volume for the background story on Himari’s life before coming to live with Yuuto in volume one, and Jinguuji’s life at magic school. Himari’s story wasn’t much of a character development story, but entertaining. Jinguuji’s story on the other hand, showed some of the reasoning behind her personal motivations through the telling of her school days spent learning magic, which was less than pleasant for her. Readers that didn’t enjoy high school will probably be able to relate to Jinguuji’s story, ignoring the whole magic part, of course.
While I enjoyed much of the various portions of this book that explained the story and reminded me of some of the lesser well known characters, and I enjoyed the background stories for Himari and Jinguuji, I would recommend that readers new to the ‘Omamori Himari’ universe avoid pages 66-70 where the author breaks down the story in each of the first five volumes. This section is basically a recap of the first five volumes and a major spoiler for any reader new to the series that is hoping to check out this volume 0 to see if they want to invest in this series. Aside from that caution, I would recommend this volume to fans of the ‘Omamori Himari’ series.
Content Grade: B
Art Grade: B-
Packaging Grade: A+
Text/Translation Grade: B+
Age Rating: 16+
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: September 25th, 2012
MSRP: $11.99
