Oh, you were hoping for a continuation of the story? Too bad! You get backstory instead.
So, this was actually the first chapter of Twin Spica ever written, published as a one-shot about a year before it became a series. This chapter was followed up by the four other flashback chapters found in this volume and the next two. Despite them being originally written with no real plan towards making it a series, the events of these chapters are largely canon - the one or two things that don’t quite mesh with the series can easily be handwaved away.
Despite the painful cliffhanger in the main story, I found this prequel pretty engaging and moving.
So, I guess this settles the question some of us had in chapter 1 (is Mr. Lion a ghost or could he also be Asumi’s imaginative friend?) pretty decisively. And we found out what cell phones look like in this alternative 2015.
Ooh, it’s a bit frustrating breaking from the main story for three weeks of backstory! Having said that this was an engaging chapter.
I must admit I found the story a little difficult to follow first read through and had to go back over it again. It helped to realise that Suzunari and Yūko are the same person, and that sometimes she has glasses on and sometimes she doesn’t! (Like Superman I completely failed to recognise her without her glasses on…)
Interesting that the Lion character appears as a ghost for Asumi, but that the lion character also has special significance for Yūko. Also that the lion character hasn’t chosen to manifest himself to Asumi, and was quite surprised when she was able to see him.
I’m not sure if I’ve missed something about the town Yuigahama or if there is more yet to be revealed. As I understand it is the town the Shishigou rocket crashed into causing civilian casualties, including Asumi’s mother. And the action in this chapter in the present appears to be taking place in Yuigahama, where Asumi and her father continue to live. I was a little surprised then that one of the astronaut’s lovers was living in Yuigahama. It would seem pretty bad luck if the rocket crashed into the town where one of the astronauts was from. I wonder if something has drawn her to move to the town after the crash.
(Also this reveal is forcing me to make changes of plan for my Bingo card, was totally going to use ふたつのスピカ for “Read a book with a non-human protagonist” because of ライオンさん, but now I think that “human ghost” is still a kind of human… Will have to find something else with non humans to read!)
I finished reading the chapter that I got halfway through last week by mistake until I realized that there was no mission 4, I thought it was cute although it really messes with the pacing of the story and almost completely elucidates the nature of Rayon san which cheats us of some mystery and speculation going forward.
Also I was trying to decide if I wanted to continue reading the story in an offshoot club and then as soon as I opened the manga I was reminded of the terrible scan quality and that convinced me to put the sequels aside, at least temporarily.
I didn’t have any problem with the quality myself. I enjoyed/enjoy the story and would like to read more but I found it hard to stop after one chapter, so I think I would rather continue reading by myself afterwards! (and also because then I don’t add yet another offshoot book club to my list, phew)
I like to read digital manga on a tablet while zooming and panning across the page and the quality of this one is particularly bad, even by BookWalker standards:
Same, and the scan quality also bothers me, but I’m into the story now and would like to keep reading. I already bought the second volume in that sale Bookwalker had when we started, so I’ll definitely read that. I’m up for any kind of off-shot, including something with a faster pace or a flexible schedule.
So precious
