What happens when a lonely junior high school student uses his imagination for company, creating a king who in turn entrusts him with knowledge of the future? It becomes real, of course. Sakae Esuno’s Future Diary makes a quick leap from misfit Amano’s dreamy self-absorption into the surprise revelation that Deus Ex Machina, the King of Time and Space, has involved him in a deadly game that makes use of Amano’s habit of keeping a diary on his cell phone. The future is written in his diary now; the loss or destruction of his cell phone would mean the end of that, or any, future for him. Amano discovers that he is not alone but merely one of twelve players charged with a solitary survival, a survival that will translate into transformation into the god himself. The writing habit that initially puts Amano “at ease” now sets him on a fight for his life, and while he has no interest in attaining a god status, he must escape those who do, including Mimene Uryu, who harbors a vicious ambition – and the appropriate facial expressions thereof – to rival that of Battle Royale’s Mitsuko Souma. He has the help of rival candidate Yuno, who has been secretly crushing on Amano while his nose was buried in his phone, but he is unsure how far to trust her. After all, his survival ultimately would mean her death. It’s “just a game,” Deus Ex Machina assures him, “nothing but fun.” One wonders if perhaps Amano’s solitary life has led him to lose his mind completely and he is carried off into this fantasy in which he is the star, much as he might like to be in reality.
The award-winning Ryu Fujisaki’s science fiction adventure, Waq Waq, feels futuristic in a strange, Planet of the Apes sort of way, and like Future Diary, pulls someone out of one reality and into another. Waq Waq is a world created by the red-blooded Kami, who left the machines and black-blooded people to fight each other after he gave them life, and the guardians do their best to protect the people by crushing the hearts of the machines. When a mysterious girl appears without explanation, her red blood makes everyone wonder if she is the Kami. She has no idea why and how she came there, but is pretty sure she is not the Kami they await. Unfortunately, tradition tells that an offering of the Kami’s blood grants wishes, so her safety as well as her identity is in question. There are undertones of the complications of competing and conflicting religions in this battle-focused saga, and the title, which is also the name of a mythical island of African and Arab legends where human figures grow from trees, does not seem accidental.
Shonen Jump shared a preview of the first volume of Waq Waq in its August 2009 issue, which is a special treat primarily because of the four full color pages of Fujisaki’s artwork. A two- time Tezuka Award recipient, Fujisaki takes special care with the array and blend of colors in his extraordinary illustrations. Readers who begin with the magazine preview and move on to the black/white/gray of the manga will certainly ache for the intensity of the artist’s use of color. Thankfully, a visit to his site – which is in Japanese only – might alleviate any withdrawal symptoms we might have.
