Oneshot: Covered in Cinders

Covered in Cinders
( Hai Kaburi )
by Kotogawa Aya
A beautifully drawn, but chilling account of the the classic story of Cinderella. (Shoujo Magic)

When I saw the title of this shoujo manga, the "Cinders" word made me think of Cinderella, and after skimming the plot, I was right! It really is based on Cinderella! I no longer thought twice on downloading it . . . I'm a sucker for manga that are based on fairy tales~

And it turned out to be a nice version of Cinderella~ It's the bloody version of Cinderella after all~ Hehe. Fairy Tale turned horror FTW!

It had been loyal to the original story, at least the main story. It's still about a girl being bullied by her stepmother and her stepsisters, and there's a ball, in which she was ablt to attend through some magic, and the prince fell in love with her, but she can't stay long but left her show, and the prince searched for her, and when he did, they married, and lived happily ever after. Yeah, main story's of this oneshot is also like that.

But there had been changes: there's no pumpkin carriage, fairy godmother seems to be leading girl's actual mother, and what happened to the stepsisters have been really bloody. When they tried to put on the shoe, they didn't just force their foot in. They actually cut off a portion of their foot to make it come in, and of course when they reach the prince the shoe becomes so bloody. And during the wedding, some doves violently poked the sisters' eye out. And they ended not having any eyes at all. Whoaaaa . . . . so morbid.

I like the bloody stuff, but I wish the manga had shown more of the cruelty of those sisters. All that was shown was just bossing her around. I think it would be better if the manga showed the sisters' evilness towards the leading girl to the extremes (like burning her, pushing her to the stairs, spitting on her, lots of suggestions). In that way, once we see the morbid ending of those sisters, it would make the readers exclaim: "SERVES YOU RIGHT, BITCHES!".Errr . . . I hope I wasn't being vague . . .

Anyway, aside from that, I also think that this manga had been fastforwarding or skipping some parts (like how the hell the leading girl got those pretty clothes in the first place). I know showing those scenes is like retelling what's in the original story, but that's what's the whole oneshot is about anyway . . . .I don't care about the oneshot pages limit . . . I think the mangaka would be able to figure something out. I know the majority already knows Cinderella's story, but those who don't will get too confused on reading this oneshot because of the missing narrations.

As for the other stuff, characters are okay. They played their role well. Even the leading girl. She seems like a helpless weakling, but behind her smile it seems to me she had some morbid thoughts. Haha! And the art . . . very pretty~ Ah well, as expected from a shoujo manga~

[ OVERALL RATING ]

I like this retelling of the Cinderella Story (it's much better than the other Cinderella-based manga I've read . . . . which I haven't continued yet). Even if I put aside the entertainment I get on the bloody parts (LOLz), it's really good~