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Manga: S.A (Special A) vol.1

Warning: This document contains spoilers

Story: 6.5
S.A is short for Special A. It is the top class of an elite school where only the 7 top students belong. They have a special building within the school apart from the others. All students of this elite school are very rich, except for Hikari who is the daughter of a carpenter. The only reason she insisted to go to this school is because of her rival Kei.
She lost to Kei in an impromptu wrestling match at age 6 and she swore she would defeat Kei some day. Now at age 15 she is still fighting every day to meet up to her goal. She wants to beat him someday whatever it takes.

This first manga contains 4 chapters and an unrelated short story. The first chapter is an introduction chapter and it tells one way how Hikari tries to beat Kei. And so do the other chapters. It is really weird, that in each chapter this whole introduction thing starts over again. The school system gets explained and all the characters are introduces again and again and yet again. That makes it feel it are four short stories rather then one story that it ongoing.

Further it is all about the members of S.A and their school days with as main focus the rivalry between Hikari and Kei. It kind of reminds me of Ouran High School Host Club only absurd in a different way.

Art: 7
S. A is drawn by Maki Minami and this is her first published manga. Even though this is the case I didn’t notice anything that felt off. Character designs are cute. The panels are in the right places and she actually dares to experiment with the placing of the panels. There are a lot of scenes where bodies are in hard to draw positions but she pulls it all off.
Only the hair of the characters is too long, especially the bangs. She already admits in her manga that she does this on purpose to camouflage the fact she cant draw faces too well. However because she made this a part of her style, you don’t notice this. The backgrounds vary a lot, from detailed scenery to fluffy romance backgrounds with sparkles. It makes it a very varied whole.

Character development: 7.5
I have to say that when I read the back cover I couldn’t imagine that there would be characters this shallow. I mean in reality who would strife for such a thing as Hikari does? However even though her goal in my eyes is absurd, she works hard for what she wants. She is actually the only one in S. A who has to follow classes to keep her number two position. It seems that all other members have some super human abilities and they basically don’t do anything except loafing around.

All though Hikari never manages to beat Kei, Kei admires her for her hard work. Hikari on the other hand is so dense that she doesn’t notice this. She stays focused on her goal even though Kei says that she doesn’t have to push herself so much. On the other hand he teases Hikari with always being number two. The relationship between Hikari and Kei is one of love and hate. However Kei really does show concern for Hikari and everyone seems to notice except her. It seems that Kei has changed from an icy, emotionless person to a human being who cares for the people around him. This mainly shows because we also meet some of Kei’s family who point this fact out.

Then there is also the rest of S. A. Their roles are kind of stereotypical and they mostly are being used as side characters who cheer Hikari on. They all do have individual traits but they don’t show so much yet.

Overall: 7
While I didn’t expect much of this manga when I read the back cover, it was a fun read and it was better then I thought it would be. All though I still have doubts about the chosen theme for this series. It seems this will be an 12 volume series (so far) and I really wonder if it will keep me entertained for that long. However I guess we will just have to wait and see. For a first timer this manga is of good quality and especially if you are into the Ouran like setting, it will be worth trying it out.