Tokyo Mew Mew

Publisher
Tokyopop
Writer
Reiko Yoshida
Artist
Mia Ikumi
Country of origin
Japan
Year
2001

Tokyo Mew Mew V. 4

By David Rasmussen
26th Feb 06

You can’t keep a good girl down… whether or not you can keep her strange romantic magical girl Sailor Moon team action meets environmental messenger title down is something else though.

Once again we return to the title that combines two things that don’t seem likely to work together.
The Sailor Moon slash Wedding Peach all female team with romantic entanglement problems combined with the environmental issues thing ala Arjuna… only without the intensity of Arjuna.
But since only one of these two concepts can be driving this bus (and this story) that means somebody has to take a backseat, and as of this story that somebody has finally been revealed… only don’t be too surprised to find out who got sent to the back of the bus.

Yes, as of this story the environmental angle stops having any forward momentum and we see the whole girl power team slash romantic element step forward. Sure, in this issue there is something about a gigantic cocoon carrying a virulent airborne substance that could kill millions but it seems this is not so much anything to do with eco-destruction as it is a tried and true relentlessly used plot device seen in many team titles (especially Sailor Moon clones). But even in the “heat” of so called battle (when the strange alien guy who has been vexing the girls of late reappears to challenge them again) the romance part still bleeds through as it looks like our girl Ichigo (the star) might not make an important date with her now more solid boyfriend Masaya (after she apologized for what happened last volume and they grew closer together).

Well, while the back of the book talks about “The End of the World As We Know It” and this fight of their lives, the fight is actually just there to keep Ichigo from making her date and putting her in a situation where she could lose… yeah, you heard this one. At this point the fighting seems to be fading away from it’s angle with the endangered species thing and the destruction of the ecosystem seen in previous volumes, and now have strayed into the bad territory of being just cannon fodder for testing Ichigo’s lovelife.
So much for a fair and balanced title in terms of fighting/romance and eco-issues.

Well this shouldn’t have been a surprise. The title was mostly cutesy and seemed to have been headed down this path from word one of book one, but if you were hoping it would be otherwise… well, apologies, it isn’t otherwise no matter how much you might have wanted it to be so.
Oh, and as if to insure that you know that this title is going to go the romantic side… though not seriously since the book still “proclaims” to be “action/sci-fi” (which is becoming a false advertisement since it is becoming more a romantic entanglement thing)… while transformed into a cat (again, though not to the same amount of annoyance as the duck transformations in Princess Tutu the Anime) Ichigo runs into that weird cat who helps her out again, only to later run into a new hot guy named the Blue Knight (who, yes, is probably that smitten kitten who helped her out the last two times she was a cat).

On another front the backstory has the prototype of what the series might have been if the duo of Mia Ikumi and Reiko Yoshida did not do this… and, really, this is probably what they should have done… and I’ll go into that in the breakdown which is right -- now!

Tokyo Mew Mew Breakdown the 4th
What’s Hot?
Well… if you stuck it out with this title then you’ll keep going. It’s not that the title is a particularly bad one, which it isn’t, it’s just that Tokyo Mew Mew is not really shining as a standout runaway hit either. It’s not bad, but it’s not good… more like a middle of the road kind of pedestrian read. I wish it was better, because I kind of like it. I wish it was more into the romantic side of the story since it seems to be falling out of interest with all the fighting anyway (they seem kind of uninspired now as the focus seems to be on Ichigo’s love life over her transformations and battles). And I wish they didn’t introduce the obvious character of the Blue Knight (who you know is going to give Masaru a run for his romantic money).
Not to be rude to the ladies who made this, but -- well -- I kind of -- ah… I won’t say it. Let’s move on.

What’s Not?
Well if you were hoping that this would be your next great environmental read after watching Arjuna then by now you have found out that you have been tricked. This title is going to turn away from that it seems for the romantic angle so you have found yourself a little… disappointed. Yes, when this started there was a nice angle about the whole endangered species thing, as well as the danger to the eco-system, but soon afterward it seems the duo of Ikumi & Yoshida got bored of that and moved on to the love life of Ichigo since that seems to have center stage over the whole eco thing.
I guess if you were getting bored of that then your day has come because it got sent to the back of the bus. However if you were actually enjoying it then you are not a happy eco-lover.
Either way? Somebody had to drive and somebody had to sit in the back and you know the rest.

Moments to Remember?
Since it seems the better focus of the writing is on the romantic angle that’ll be your memories of this.

What to Ignore?
I’d like to ignore that such an obvious character like the Blue Knight had to show up.

Overall?
I’d like to say that this worked out, and the title rolled onwards towards many future volumes… but the read ends at volume 7 and has one spin-off, Tokyo Mew Mew : Ala Mode which lasts for a few volumes, and that seems to be that. Yes, there’s an Anime, and yes I’m sure somebody is going to release it here in English… eventually… maybe.

Well, you’ll see another review this week, and then I have more reviews coming in the next month (wrapping up the seven volume set), so stay tuned.

-- David Rasmussen 26th Feb 06