Finally, I have bought my second volume! I had to work for the money to buy this. Without any further ado, let us start with the review. Anyway, I decided to make spoiler-free reviews!
Checkmate by Purpleyhan
In a capsule, this story is about a student named Nadine who manages to beat her school’s “chess king”, Carl. But the rest of the story is yours to find out! I like the chess concept. It’s not usual to find a story where romance comes out of a chess game! I kinda think that Nadine is actually a yandere while she was playing against Carl. Their lines are too cheesy but I think somehow people can make that happen (laughs). Errors are usual. Art is good, as expected from Enjelicious.
Ten Days by Bianca Salindong
“It only took me ten days to get to know her, ten days to get enough courage to and ask her name, only ten days to fall in love.”
I was shocked when I saw that it was written in English. Yes, English! I fell in love with the narration, it’s like a boy is actually the one writing the story. Anyway, I’m not really saying that it’s clichéd but it fits right into the stereotype hole of Asian drama (and Bianca Salindong stated in her Wattpad profile that she is a sucker for stuff such as Korean drama). Riding the same bus (or train, maybe) and leaving stuff in the girl’s locker while no one’s watching! Aren’t they familiar to you?
As for the art, I noticed that Jeff Nice’s art kinda looks empty to me sometimes. He uses a lot of white spaces. I don’t know if that’s really a plus thing, but I was taught that I should never leave big white spaces in layouting newspapers. But I do like Jeff Nice’s art. I learned to embrace it. As for the ending, I heard that stuff were changed (according to the Artist’s Note) because the story originally contained 12,000 words. I assumed that a chapter was made for each day in the story (the story is entitled “Ten Days” after all…) and each chapter contained about 1,000 words. It’s quite long for manga (usually manga contains 28 to 32 pages) but I’m surprised they were able to make adjustments! I was surprised about the end, though.
So You’re a Gangster? That’s Nice! by Alesana Marie
Ah, the author of Talk Back and You’re Dead. I don’t really prefer reading mainstream stuff so I have no idea about the story of ‘TBYD’ (I didn’t even watch the film! I seriously don’t like watching Wattpad-based films for some reason, maybe because of my Humanities teacher’s influence.) so I can’t compare. I want to know the reason why a lot of stories with the word ‘Gangster’ exist. What’s the wiz? I’ve had enough of gangsters here and there!
Anyway, ‘So You’re a Gangster’ is about a girl who has been waiting for a man in her dreams. Hm!
Grammatical stuff, again. I’m doubting the people of the Philippines now. There’s also this one part where the heroine said,
“Isang regalo ang ipinamana sa akin ng mga magulang ko. Hindi ko problema ang pera dahil sa kakayahan ko na makita ang hinaharap. Madali lang sa akin ang malaman kung ano ang lalabas na numero sa lotto o ang resulta sa kahit na anong pustahan. Dahil sa kakayanan nilang ‘yon kaya sila namatay.”
(My parents gave me a gift. Money is not an issue for me because I can see the future. It is easy for me to know the winning lotto numbers or results of any bet. My parents died because because of their skill.)
I was totally confused by that sentence, actually. But that’s not a major part of the story so just ignore it. There’s also this guy clique that’s actually not relevant to the story. I don’t know, there are a lot of stuff going on that shouldn’t have been there in the first place! There’s also this part that I don’t understand:
“So you’re a gangster…that’s nice. Weirdo!”
The source of the title. What’s weird and nice about being a gangster? I just don’t understand the meaning of it! Please explain it to me!
I’m not into these ‘dream guy is actually real’ stories anymore. Even Asian dramas are full of things like that. I’m not even sure if these stuff are real. Make me experience it first! Gah!
Art is done by Enjelicious. You totally have surpassed my standards!
Scores
Checkmate: ★★★☆☆
Ten Days: ★★★★★
So You’re a Gangster? That’s Nice!: ★★☆☆☆
Other notes
Please support Filipino Manga! It definitely needs a lot of love from you, readers! Each copy of GOLD costs 160php so go ahead! Thank you for reading! As for the authors who made the stories I have reviewed, I am not in any way bashing you or your works, I am just giving some constructive criticism, hoping that one day, the gems that you make will become diamonds!
~Kairu
Two-faced life 