Nikki LeDree

I read quite a bit of manga and usually have several series on the go as well as reading the odd one shot now and then. I must admit that I do most of my manga reading online which I feel guilty about at times. I know all too well the effort that goes into creating one. I endeavoured to make up for my terrible freebie taking habit by at least buying the mangas that I truly enjoyed. You know a manga just has to be good when I read the whole thing online and still buy it.

I stumbled across Vassalord while looking for a trashy vampire manga to read. I skipped it quite a few times because of the name which in my head read as lord of vaseline. I kept on seeing it being updated though and thought I’d give it a quick look over. The first page with a naked dripping wet long haired man made me think I knew exactly where this was going, especially with the yaoi tag. I am pleased to say that I was totally wrong.

The story focuses on the relationship between a (very) sexy vampire named Johnny Rayflo (when I imagine a vampire I imagine him) and a half vampire cyborg named Charley Chrishunds who fights crimes and hunts vampires for the vatican.

The bloody fight in the opening scene between them made me want to jump up and down I was so happy. Chrono understands vampires. First of all they actually seem to be interested in blood and it’s a sexual kind of thing. I’ve said it before and I shall repeat myself; blood should be a sexual thing for a vampire, that’s the point. She also includes some good ol’ vampire mythology as well which is always a plus in my eyes. Too many series stray too far from the mythology and if you do that you just end up with twilight fairies.

I want to get this out of the way early on. I effing love the style of these books. Nanae Chrono’s artwork is so beautiful and detailed. I simply adore it. Even if the story of Vassalord wasn’t any good (it is) I would still buy these books. There’s a very distinctive style to her work but it’s kind of subtle, not like Hirano, but there is defiantly something unique about it. One criticism for the artwork is that in more complex scenes it’s sometimes hard to tell exactly what’s going on.

I love that it doesn’t take itself too seriously. Chrono isn’t afraid to add a bit of silliness or hilarity into the wonderfully gothic style story. I really thought I could figure out what Johnny was going to be like as a character from his looks, and while he does fit that over confident, devilish kind of personality I couldn’t have guessed how funny and sensitive he is at times throughout the books. The way he teases Charley is endearing rather than annoying like the way he always calls him Cherry.

I must admit I did not like the design of Charley upon first seeing him. I mean the hair… but he has grown on me. I think it was the scene with Rayfelle that made me really start to like him. His serious demeanour is a perfect contrast for Rayflo’s free and easy personality and his devotion to Rayflo is incredibly sweet rather than obsessive. The flashback to when he was a child is so cute (yeah that’s right I said cute).

The characters aren’t your usual effeminate pretty pretty anorexic type you usually see in a “shonen ai” type of manga which earns extra brownie points from me. Guys that look like guys and act like blokes, huh well that different. When it comes to the whole BL thing I like characters that don’t fit into those typical seme – uke roles that make me want to stab myself in the eye.

The story has an over arching plot with lots of smaller stories intertwined. As the books go on it seems to be turning into a detective kind of story, not that that’s a bad thing at all. There’s a strong For some reason I find myself getting strong Cowboy Bebop vibes from it. Johnny reminds me of Spike somewhat and Craig makes me think of Jet.

I think the books take a few read throughs to get everything. I think some of the story could have been explained a bit clearer but I must admit I did get a certain amount of satisfaction when I noticed things I didn’t on the first read through. For example in the very beginning Johnny is talking to Barry on the phone. All in all Vassalord is very enjoyable and highly underrated in my opinion.

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