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A review by reddyrat
Skip Beat!, Vol. 1 by Yoshiki Nakamura
4.0
I picked up Skip Beat, because it is a massively popular series. The first volume was interesting, but didn't establish itself in my mind as anything spectacular. However, it has piqued my interest enough that I want to continue with the series. I assume it becomes more interesting.
Kyoko starts out as your stereotypical shoujo manga girl. Quiet, kind, sacrificing. She dropped everything - including school - to run off to Tokyo with childhood friend Sho to help him on his path to stardom. Once Sho becomes popular, he drops boring Kyoko like a hot potato. Here is where the book diverges from standard shoujo. Kyoko has a dark nature. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. She decides to join Sho in the show business industry - to show that she's just as good as he is.
The ultimate message of this volume is that revenge may be a good motivation to start, but you can't succeed by only having a negative attitude. Thankfully, I don't think that this is going to turn into a happy happy series. Kyoko may learn to balance her personality, but I'm guessing she'll always have a fun edge to her.
I can't really get an opinion on this volume because I'm not invested in the characters yet. I like Kyoko. I'm guessing that I'm supposed to be interested in Sho and Ren (Sho's pop star competitor), but I didn't get a feel for their personalities. I wish she'd done a better job introducing them. If I hadn't heard so many good things about this series, I don't know that the first volume would have been enough to keep me invested. The only other odd thing is that both Ren and Sho have very long legs. I guess this shows that they're tall, but they look slightly out of proportion.
All in all, this volume is just okay but I'm going to keep going in this series. Hopefully I'll figure out why it's so great soon.
Kyoko starts out as your stereotypical shoujo manga girl. Quiet, kind, sacrificing. She dropped everything - including school - to run off to Tokyo with childhood friend Sho to help him on his path to stardom. Once Sho becomes popular, he drops boring Kyoko like a hot potato. Here is where the book diverges from standard shoujo. Kyoko has a dark nature. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. She decides to join Sho in the show business industry - to show that she's just as good as he is.
The ultimate message of this volume is that revenge may be a good motivation to start, but you can't succeed by only having a negative attitude. Thankfully, I don't think that this is going to turn into a happy happy series. Kyoko may learn to balance her personality, but I'm guessing she'll always have a fun edge to her.
I can't really get an opinion on this volume because I'm not invested in the characters yet. I like Kyoko. I'm guessing that I'm supposed to be interested in Sho and Ren (Sho's pop star competitor), but I didn't get a feel for their personalities. I wish she'd done a better job introducing them. If I hadn't heard so many good things about this series, I don't know that the first volume would have been enough to keep me invested. The only other odd thing is that both Ren and Sho have very long legs. I guess this shows that they're tall, but they look slightly out of proportion.
All in all, this volume is just okay but I'm going to keep going in this series. Hopefully I'll figure out why it's so great soon.