New Flavors: Esprit

ESPRIT
by Tsutsui Taishi
"You can do anything if you put your mind to it." That is how Mio was raised... if you could call it that... by her rather lazy guardian Reki. Born on an island she has never been off of, Mio grows bored of her everyday life... That is until Sara comes along. Sara is a member of an organization that explores and manages many "Homes", islands much like Mio's. For Mio this is her ticket to adventure, excitement and the most interesting thing of all... school! But is the school ready for Mio?
(Plot Source: Manga Heaven)

The title caught my attention because it's the same as the brand name of one of my t-shirts! Wahehehe! I read the plot afterwards and it's pretty unusual and interesting, so I decided to check out the available scanlations. Hehe.

I like the idea of someone being at the same place all the time to explore other places and get to learn other cultures. It's really interesting and the characters had been fun so I almost thought that this will be a new series for me to follow!

Unfortunately, they just had to add the school thing. Before you could become an agent that travels to different places, you have to attend school to train, for knowledge and defense. I'm tired of the school setting. Do they always have to undergo that process? Can't just they go straight to the adventure and just have a mentor together with the main character for guidance? School settings will have the usual school troubles and friendship bubbles and stuff. I've had enough of that with the few slice of life series I'm following, so please enough with the school thing!

Oh well, as if the story will change if I complain about it. Perhaps I'll read this again once I've heard that school's over and something has began to really happen. Ehehe.

Anyway, the art is nice. About the characters out so far . . . Mio is okay. At least she wasn't the typical naive type. She really just doesn't know. Her guardian Reiki(?) is totally awesome! Sarah reminded me of Dragonball's Bulma for some reason. It's cool that she's actually some young genius. Her assistant is so-so . . . but I envy her fast sketching skills! The school director surprised me, but it's interesting that way. Reminded me of the female chairman from Zombie-Loan. We don't know much about the two teachers except that they seem nice. Ehehe.

Sarah and her one-sided love . . . at least she has tastes! Because Reiki is such an interesting character! I really hope he had been at the school as well; not just left at home. Maybe the series would have been more fun and interesting if he'll have more appearances. I'm not really being bias because he's a favorite character; but seriously, it's cooler with him around! And we don't know much about him. Knowing about his background and more of what his personality and experiences are like will definitely be interesting. However, it really sucks if the most interesting character won't appear much anymore. So I don't think I'll be that excited to continue reading this that soon.

But I did like this manga. It's pretty nice, so I think it's worth giving a try. Hehe. There doesn't seem to be any annoying perverted fanservice in this anyway. Hehe.

Sapphire Pyro	READ: 2 chapters (out of 2 scanlated chapters of a 2 volume ongoing series) VERDICT: Hiatus (Liked But Couldn't Follow So Temporarily Dropped)
I actually liked it and became fond of some of the characters, but even if the story idea has been pretty unique, the school thing made the show generic. Moreover, the most interesting character for me isn't going to make much appearances anymore, so following this series won't make me hyper. Perhaps I'll catch up on it when I find the time, but for now, it's on hiatus.