Ultimate Venus Vol. #1
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November 05, 2008
by: Adam Beck
What are my eyes seeing? Quite possibly another book in the fireplace.
Manga Description: She went from rags to riches. Can he take her from klutz to princess?
Poor Yuzu is an orphan who’s too clumsy to hold a job. She’s reduced to living in a playground -- until a handsome stranger named Hassaku informs her that she’s heir to a fortune, and whisks her into a world of wealth, power, and more hot suitors than she can shake a scepter at! But there’s a catch: Hassaku must turn this klutz into a lady of refinement, or Yuzu will lose everything!
Manga Review
Content: (This section may contain spoilers.)
Yuzu’s mother has just died; she has no relatives, no money; how can this young girl survive in the world? This is the basis of Ultimate Venus as the main heroine, Yuzu Yamashita comes across a rather generous offer. The first volume offers quite a bit and moves relatively fast as Yuzu finds herself in many awkward and difficult situations. What I enjoyed right off the bat is the emotional distress that Yuzu has to endure on the first pages of the volume. While I was a bit disappointed that we couldn’t connect with her, so I didn’t find myself sad that her mother would die, the way Yuzu narrates her life with her mother made me feel sorry for her.
Yuzu definitely isn’t the heroine everyone is used to. She is a bit of a tomboy, but she is really lazy and tends to give up and go her own way. I do like that about her as she has a strong heart and will raise her hand and voice in order to protect anything she holds dear. Sadly, she is the only character in the entire first volume that sticks out as an interesting character. In the first chapter, we are introduced to two additional characters that become rather large additions into the series. First is Yuzu’s grandmother. She is a complete rich-snob who seems to have a fetish with cute men as her household is just filled with them. She appears at times, but she really has only a couple instances when she makes a point, so there isn’t much to say about her. The other character is Hassaku Kagami, Yuzu’s grandmother’s personal assistant – not to mention they seem to have a “different” relationship. He disappoints greatly. Well first off, Ultimate Venus reminds me so much of Wild Ones as a mother dies and an unknown grandparent picks the child up into a rich surrounding. The main males in both of these are both rather dull, but this one is even worse. This guy, while he does look out for Yuzu, he has absolutely no attitude nor emotions. All he has is a smile that fills the pages with too much useless junk.
Being taken against her will, Yuzu finds herself in the world of a rich life - a life she is slowly getting use to. The first half of the volume focuses on Yuzu’s rebellion against her grandmother, a rather stuck-up bitch that doesn’t care about anything other than her family image. There are a couple strong moments, like when Yuzu stands up for herself when a couple smug, rich-folk talk behind her back, but what really had me interested is the betrayal and two-faced actions of someone who seemed so innocent, but turned out to have his own agenda. Sadly, this takes place in the second half of the volume, repeating this exact action. The only difference is that it only sets itself up for it, trying to make you guess what is going to happen, only to point to one answer. Other than these two moments, there really isn’t much here as all that Yuzu does is sob over her new and awkward lifestyle. The performance here is fair, but executed poorly for Yuzu to only learn one thing: don’t trust anyone on appearances alone.
The second half of the volume moves to the scenery that is way overused in romantic-comedy/dramas: a school. I don’t know many shojo titles that don’t venture into this territory and this series seems to take all the generic situations and brings them forth. The only thing that I didn’t expect too highly is the more two-faced ideals that have been shown earlier in the volume. We are also introduced to two new characters: one being an old friend of Yuzu’s, and the other being a possible love interest but is currently an enemy. Yuzu’s friend Setoka makes an appearance twice, but she does a good job to establish there are actually a couple sweet people in this story. Iyo Hayashibara is the other who is established as another rich-slob, but is actually willing to risk his own hide for someone. He is actually an interesting character considering his mixed attitude that allows a variety of actions from him. Sadly, other than the two-faced actions of another character, the second half of the volume really isn’t all that exciting and comes off as a little boring.
I think Ultimate Venus has a promising storyline, but my first impression comes off poorly. There are moments that either bore me or just make me shake my head in disappointment. Yuzu and Iyo are intriguing characters, but other than that, the others are pretty dull or way too predictable. There are many more titles out there that will entertain you much more than this, so your money should be invested there instead.
Art: I have a bit of an issue with the artwork in Ultimate Venus. There are moments that look very nice, but, generally speaking, this is a bland and sometimes eye piercing experience. The character models are decent as each contains a fair bit of detail, but most of the time, they really aren’t varied and becomes rather boring. The environments are what destroy any visual experiences you may have with this series. I just can’t get over how awful the backgrounds are drawn. There are a couple nice scenes, I won’t deny, but generally speaking, it almost feels like a child’s drawing. The worst has to be the castle that Yuzu and her grandmother live in. I don’t know what Takako Shigematsu was thinking when she drew it up, but it looks like a very rough drawing - both plain and designed horribly - that just takes you out of the experience. The worst is that the castle is shown various times, sometimes spanning out and making it look way too bolded for its own good. The artwork in Ultimate Venus is not good. There are a couple nice moments, but it really will damage your enjoyment with this fairly decent title.
Translation: There really isn’t anything wrong with the first volume of Ultimate Venus as I can’t find any untranslated sound effects nor grammar errors. The Japanese sound effects are left completely intact with an English-translation placed nearby. The dialogue is done well, with a couple interesting conversations, but I found that a lot of it was either repetitive or just boring. I can’t get past that dialogue makes a character, and the majority of them are pretty dull.
There are a couple translation notes and a look into the next volume – which I really don’t consider a preview, but other than that, there really is nothing else in terms of extras. You are paying full-price for a boring sack of potatoes; you’d think you’d get some sorts of extras.
The Bottom Line: I didn’t have high hopes for the title when I first picked it up, and it proved to me that it was actually worse than my expectations. The story is decent in terms that Yuzu is actually an enjoyable character and the story does have some promise, but the rest of the cast and the execution of awkward moments are very disappointing - not to mention that the visuals are just so awful that you never want to read this again.
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Content |
I wish some of the characters were better explored. While the series has promise with a couple interesting characters, the execution of the first volume is devastating. |
6.0 |
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Art |
You may as well poke your eye out considering how poorly the artwork section has been handled. |
4.0 |
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Translation |
There really aren’t any issues with the English-translation, with decent dialogue and no overlooked errors. |
8.5 |
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Verdict
Ultimate Venus shows some promise, but with dull characters, horrendous artwork, and an awkward storyline, it’s really hard for me to recommend this title. This may be the first volume, but it definitely is one a bad first impression.
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5.5
[not an average]
+ Yuzu and Iyo are interesting.
+ Story shows promise.
- Repetitive scenarios.
- Bland characters.
- Blinding artwork.
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