A new month means new releases! I don't have specific numbers for this crop of releases --and this is a pretty short month in terms of stuff coming out from weekly Sunday (or at least it certainly feels like it is) but a little Sunday is better than no Sunday, I think.
First off is Volume two of Marry Grave! Admittedly these covers aren't exactly what I imagined for the series but I'm slowly warming up to them. In fact, this one was going to be my cover of the month, but another series baaarely beat it out. Although I like that Yamaji's name and the volume # are small and unobtrusive, the logo is still a little big for my liking. Otherwise the color, Rozalie's position, and the BG behind her are all impeccable! These covers look like "doors" into the world of the series and I'm all for it as they fit the dark fantasy theme that the series is known for.
Volume two of Ariadne is next up, and it's oddly...plain. I like the scene depicted here, as well as Rashil and Leana's positions on it, but the white BG doesn't do this one any favors. That being said, the color design is really well done, and Yagi knows how to let his artwork do the talking, relegating his name to a small corner on the bottom. The logo is also pretty awesome, and to be fair the white background does help to accentuate that, even if it does make this cover come off kind of threadbare.
The volume cover of the month award goes to Xeno! What can I say, I'm just really fond of Ayla and Xeno's poses here, as well as the use of light and shadow depicting them in the twilight glow of the city. I do sort of wish Sugiyama hadn't pasted the title of the series right over the skyline, and that volume two is a little big for my liking, but by consolidating the title/authors information to the upper left, we at least get to see more of the artwork than if it had all been separate. One curiosity of mine however is that I thought Ayla's hair was pink? I could swear I saw it in another color page like that, but it's brown here. Not really a big deal as color page art can often differ from illustration to illustration, but it did have me wondering.
Hatou's fifth volume is a little better with white space than Ariadne's but it again suffers from being a little plain. Granted this isn't really the type of series that one would expect to be very flashy, I suppose, but Kusaba's artwork just isn't represented as well as I'd think by this cover which is a shame. Plus Minato has already been on a cover and while I get he's the protagonist and thus will be featured much more prominently as the face of the series, but it's not like it's been a while since we last saw him on volume one, and he hasn't had any changes that'd require him being back so soon.
Volume 9 of Souboutei is gloomy and dark as Sakamaki takes over and makes the cover his home base. It's a great cover and everything, though Sakamaki's already dark color scheme kind of make this look a little too homologous. Like if this had been another character with a slightly different colorization, it might have been way better, but the colors just seem to run together here slightly tainting the artwork. (Maybe that was Fujita's intention?) I do like the use of white space here (or grey space?) to give Sakamaki a frightening aura, and the splotches on top really do make this feel more like a canvas than a cover of a manga.
And last but not least is the penultimate volume of Tenshi and Akuto! This cover probably has the best usage of white space of everything out this month. Plus it's simplicity is actually endearing rather than detracting, and the different colors work in concert with each other to make a straightforward but compelling volume cover. Of course because it's so simple it's hard to really appreciate it unless you're a fan of the series, but I guess with sixteen volumes under it's belt that's to be expected at this point.
That's it for the covers this month! If you're able to buy, which ones are you interested in? Please by all means leave me a comment and let me know! Until next month!
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