Manga Review: Ran and the Gray World

Ran and the Gray World
Aki Irie

 

Ran Urama is a 4th grader in Japan with a unique set of magical shoes that turn her into a grown-up! Her mother, a powerful sorceress, visits seldom, and Ran cannot wait for the day she can join her in the witchy village she lives in. Currently, Ran is living with her father and her older brother Jin, and they try their best to keep Ran safe and secure and home. Ran has other ideas, and wants to experience the world as a grown-up… if only she didn’t act like she was still 10.

The premise for this reminded me of a manga I was tempted to read when I was first getting into manga: Instant Teen: Just Add Nuts. I never wound up reading it, but after reading the summary on Wikipedia, they sound remarkably similar. Girl finds magical item that turns her into a Woman. Woman meets a Man, romantic plots ensue.

The first chapter features her room (messy) and the hunt for the magical shoes (missing), and gave me a false sense of security. The art was whimsical and worked with the depiction of clutter, and Ran’s oversized style of clothing was still cute. As a fellow messy former child, I related to the struggle of looking for something and not finding it because of the sheer amount of stuff in the room. Usually on the floor. But then she puts on the shoes and things turned south…

The rating for the book is Older Teen, which should have given me a warning about the fact that a story about a 4th grader who suddenly looks like a grown woman wasn’t going to be aimed at other 4th graders as the audience. Ran’s character, while sweet and innocent, doesn’t gain maturity with the donning of the magical shoes, and the manga takes full advantage of that. Older men, and men the presumed age of her older body, leer and sexualize her. Which is uncomfortable on so many levels, but mainly because Ran is 10.

The blurb on goodreads includes another line I wish I had seen sooner: “Even though Ran looks like an adult during her transformation, she doesn’t really know what perils the outside world holds. When she meets rich playboy Otaro Mikado, does she gain a friend or foe?”

For those of you who may be unaware, or want to reaffirm your knowledge of the Japanese primary education system: most 4th graders are 10. So, essentially, you have a pre-pubescent mind in the post-pubescent body of a 20 year old. And there’s something unsettling about that, especially as the art featuring her grown form is intended to be provocative.

Otaro Mikado, the rich playboy mentioned above, appears to be close to Older-Ran in physical age. His initial reaction to finding Ran unconscious on his roof is to state he doesn’t touch underage girls, but upon realizing she is probably legal, goes in to kiss her. The manga doesn’t portray Ran reacting to this in any particular way when she awakes to find a grown man inches away from her face. Most manga will at least have the girl freak out because she knows what almost happened. Ran is blissfully ignorant of that because she’s 10(!!!) and Otaro capitalizes on that innocence. In some ways, the manga almost positions him to be a love interest which, again, Ran is 10. Have I mentioned that she’s 10? The deepest love she’s capable of extends to food, as she enjoys stealing and eating extra eggs from the cooking pot.

There is no way that this manga is ever going to make me think that her and Otaro romantically involved will ever be okay. In a few chapters before meeting Otaro, Ran continuously finds/puts herself into risky situations. Luckily nothing happens to her, but the implication that something could happen to her is more than readily apparent. I’m not sure if the manga is trying to convey a sense of “childhood innocence vs the corrupted world” or not, especially because of how Older-Ran is posed and drawn. The messaging is very unclear.

The art is the redeeming force behind this review. I loved it. Despite using a fairly stark palette of black and white this manga does an excellent job of conveying movement and showing off spacial differences. I wish it was almost a little inkier at times, but the magical, whimsical attitude of the art operates in contrast to the lascivious nature of how it portrays its adult female characters.

The position of the English translations in their blurbs often cut into the flow of dialogue and even thought bubbles. I can’t tell for certain if this is a problem in the original kanji version of the manga, or if it’s just a translation issue, but it’s jarring enough that as a seasoned manga reader I was thrown off by it.

Ultimately, I don’t think I’d put this in the hands of my kids, although I’m sure they’ll like it for all the titillating reasons it’s labeled as Older Teen by the publisher. I wanted to love this manga. The art reminds me of Miyazaki, and the story looked like it would be cute. But there were too many glaring issues I couldn’t look past.

For a better read check out The Girl From the Other Side: Siúil, a Rún.