Story by Satoru Akahori with Art by Yukimaru Katsura, original character design by Sukune Inugami
Published in the US by Seven Seas



Slugline: A guy who is a girl, who turns into girl, gets more action then when he, no she, no whatever, was a guy.

First off, I will have to beg the reader's indulgence. I, the bitter old anime/manga fan, who first saw Ranma 1/2 from a tape off Japanese TV with someone the room yelling out relevant plot points since there was no such thing as subtitles, have a singular weakness. It's yuri. Romantic titles with all-female leads. Not to say my brain completely turns to mush, but I notice that I am lot more forgiving of these titles than most others. I think I have managed to be impartial here, but take what you will with a grain of salt.

Hazumu, a guy, likes Yasuna, a girl, and thought the feeling were at least appreciated, but when he confesses to her she does not take it well. His feelings squashed, Hazumu takes to the surround hills, where he is squashed by a falling spaceship. The aliens, feeling bad squishing someone, decide to do some repairs, but there were only so much genetic material left (when they squish someone, they really squish someone) and they could only rebuild him as a her.

Thus, the main conflict of the series. Hazumu as a girl manages to connect to Yasuna in a way he couldn't as a boy, and discovers a new connection to a childhood friend Tomari (a tomboy neighbor) and she isn't quite sure how to handle it. Is a boy in a girl's body a hetero girl, a lesbian, or what?

These sorts of questions could have been really delved into, but they are only explored in connection with the main characters' relationships. I would have liked to see more about Hazumu wrestling with his/her own questions of identity. That would have been a much heavier title than the light, fluffy romantic fare we have here, which I still find it interesting, though some of the supporting characters are sillier than they need to be.

Kashimashi vols. 2 and 3

First of all, Kashimashi the manga diverges significantly from Kashimashi the anime, so if you like one, you may not necessarily enjoy the other. Volume 2 is pretty much a holding pattern with Hazumu and the two other members of his/her love triangle, along with their friends, trying to have typical high school adventures and shenanigans, but the undercurrents of Hazumu's transformation into a woman and the status of his/her feelings for Tomari and Yasuna keep on reasserting themselves. In the beginning of the third book Tomari and Yasuna have come to an understanding, and even a weird kind of friendship between the three of them (try to keep your minds out of the gutter,) but a revelation at the end of the third book will undoubtedly put pressure on all three of them as they try to deal with a ticking time bomb that now is part of the story.

Maybe it's just my fondness for yuri, but some of the problems of Hazumu's transformation come up in the third volume, along with a compelling reason (even if it involves a lot of handwaving to believe) that the status quo of their relationship/non-relationship has to be upset, make it more interesting for me. The second volume is actually fairly skippable, with some of the character's traits being revealed, especially among the supporting characters, but what I feel as the main drive of the story is starting get into gear only at the end of volume three. And I think it has a good ending, suggesting that everyone's relationship will have to change but not invalidating what has gone on before. It also gives the main character Hazumu a reason to stop being a pushover, which is good. Right now I would say that the 3 1/2 stars I gave to the first volume is teetering down to a 3 star rating, but if the fourth volume lives up to the promise of the end of volume 3, it will easily keep its current rating and possibly climb.

Kashimashi vol. 4

After the story wandering around uncertainly for a while, Kashimashi vol. 4 finds it metaphorical feet in the revelation that Hazumu's near-death experience of volume 1, the one him to a her, was fated. Fate is not something that can be denied, and Hazumu's death is approaching once again. With that sort of ticking clock in the background, suddenly the characters have something that drives them, so that things matter. True, there is a bit of soap opera business where all of the characters know that Hazumu has a month left to live but no one knows that everyone else knows, but it prevents everyone descending in maudlin crying. I do wish that the characters had handled the revelations at the end of the third volume a little better, especially the potential 'cure' for Hazumu that was introduced at the end of that volume that wasn't really followed up in this one. Overall, the introduction of the ticking clock has pushed the series back up in the 3 1/2 stars category.

There remains one volume left of the story, which I will be hope to review soon.

This is just one of the many reviews that gets posted at Prospero's Manga, a manga review site with over 400 manga and manga-related reviews. We also has previously posted reviews here and articles here on TokyoPop Online. Please come check out our new reviews, a new one every Monday, Wednesday and Friday on Prospero's Manga!

The Kashimashi vol. 1, vol. 2, vol. 3 and vol. 4 are all available from Right Stuf, Intl., an online retailer specializing in anime and manga.

-Ferdinand