A Certain Scientific Railgun, Vol. 19 | By Kazuma Kamachi and Motoi Fuyukawa | Seven Seas – The flashback that never ends continues, and it’s still not over, though we are at least at the end of this PART of the flashback, showing all the various factions trying to outdo each other, and learning—big surprise—that some of them are connected to the Dark Side of Academy City, and their goal is to completely destroy the school’s reputation. Fortunately Mikoto is in this volume, though she’s still not as relevant as I’d like. We don’t get Kuroko till the end, for the cliffhanger, which also shows that Mikoto’s roommate and best friend who we have never seen in the present day is—again, big surprise—a traitor. This is Mikoto’s series, so the plot twists tend to be as twisty as a pocky stick, but hey. Time to wait another year. – Sean Gaffney

Choking on Love, Vol. 1 | By Keiko Iwashita| Seven Seas – I’ve been trying to read more good old-fashioned shoujo lately, and this is an excellent example. An art student has been struggling at school because her designs are too staid, mostly as she lacks confidence. Then while working on her laptop at a ramen shop, it gets drinks spilled on it by a hot guy, and she screams at him, only to find that a) he’s also at her school, and b) he’s in a band. After helping her with her project, the two grow closer, and he asks her to design their band’s flyers. The title seems to refer to her own feelings about this guy, as she clearly likes him almost immediately but is very frustrated by that fact, and he too is surprised by how well they get on right off the bat, as he usually tries to ignore women. I’ll definitely read more. – Sean Gaffney

Colette Decides to Die, Vol. 2 | By Alto Yukimura| Viz Media – The bulk of the first volume of this omnibus sees Colette literally going up to heaven, as there are gods there that are asking for her treatment. As it turns out, their issues are more psychological than physical, but that doesn’t matter to her. The second half of the omnibus sees Colette trying something she’s never done before, as she has to assist a midwife with a pregnant woman. This basically involves her and her coworker (both coworkers get slightly more to do this time around) learning that there’s a lot more to being pregnant than just getting bigger till the baby comes out. Interspersed with this are scenes with her and Lord Hades, especially in the first half, where she’s searching heaven for a rare flower and almost gets stranded. This is really good stuff. – Sean Gaffney

Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya: The Complete Manga Collection | By Hiroshi Hiroyama and TYPE-MOON | Seven Seas – Just as Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha was a spinoff of an eroge (no, not Nanoha herself) that turned into a massive magical girl franchise, so the Fate/Stay Night series has this manga, which is an alternate continuity where Rin and her rival Luvia (this is the series where she really makes a real appearance) are magical girls, but when they annoy their magical sticks Illya, a “normal” girl living with her brother Shirou and her maids Sella and Leysritt, and Miyu, a mysterious girl with a dark past living with Luvia, get to be Card Captors, only with the battles being a lot more bloody. This is pretty much exactly what you’d expect from a Fate magical girl spinoff, and Fate fans should greatly enjoy it. – Sean Gaffney

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End, Vol. 12 | By Kanehito Yamada and Tsukasa Abe | Viz Media – For the most part, we’ve only really experienced Frieren’s journeys with Himmel and company in flashback. But now she’s back in time, and we get zero Fern and Stark and a lot more of her original party. This is good—they’re all great characters, and I like how they all notice, but never actually say out loud, how much she’s changed and emotionally matured over the years. Unfortunately, there are also demons in this time, and Frieren has to be very careful to avoid using magic so powerful that it hasn’t been discovered this far back in time. All this plus a lot of walking around looking for a way to return to the future and coming up empty over and over again. But then, the journey is what’s important. Great stuff. – Sean Gaffney

My Hero Academia, Vol. 40 | By Kohei Horikoshi | Viz Media – I know Bakugo has his fans—he’s been the #1 in the character polls since the series began—but I know at least a few people who were really annoyed when, as you might expect, he turned out not to be quite dead despite having his heart destroyed a few volumes ago. And to be fair, Horikoshi does give us a way to explain it besides “power of shonen,” even though that’s what it is. I was less fond of the connection between Bakugo and All for One, which even All for One admits is a coincidence but allows the narrative to slide him off the screen so that the final battle can be Deku vs. Shigaraki, as we know it has to be. We’ve only got two volumes to go after this, and it’s probably for the best, as by god this is exhausting. – Sean Gaffney

Ninja Sarutobi Sasuke | By Sugiura Shigeru | New York Review Comics – At this point, only three manga have been published by New York Review Comics, but they have all been remarkable; I’m very curious to see what else may be translated in the future. The most recent volume to have been published, Ninja Sarutobi Sasuke, originally released in 1969, is largely a redrawing of some of Sugiura’s popular work from the 1950s. I don’t think I’ve read or seen anything quite like it before. Nominally, the plot follows the eponymous hero as he travels throughout early Edo-era Japan, recruiting others to the warlord Sanada Yukimura’s cause and wreaking havoc for those who would use ninjutsu for ill. On top of this historical framework is layered a cacophony of impressive visuals, a multitude of anachronisms, and pop culture references originating from both Japan and the West. It’s surreal nonsense, a gag manga that leans heavily into its outrageousness to great and astonishing effect. -Ash Brown

The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, REALLY Love You, Vol. 12 | By Rikito Nakamura and Yukiko Nozawa | Ghost Ship – After a brief arc about the power of addictive Korean barbecue, we meet the latest girlfriend in this volume, who is a) a teacher, and b) a mess. You could argue Naddy is the same, but Naddy 100% has her life together compared to Momoha, the school’s ethics teacher who spends most of her time when not teaching drinking, gambling, masturbating (no, she tells us herself), and living in a tent on school grounds. The biggest gag is that despite this, when it comes to people OTHER than herself, she’s an excellent ethics teacher… so the polycule may be in danger, what with its 13-year-old cousins and 89-year-old grandmas who look eight. Let’s not even get into the huge arc where everyone pretends to be drunk. For fans, as always. – Sean Gaffney

The Revenge of My Youth: Re Life with an Angelic Girl, Vol. 1 | By Yuzi Keino and Boiru Iseebi | One Peace Books – After working himself to the point of collapse, thirty-year-old Shin’ichiro Niihama, completely dissatisfied with the course his life has taken, somehow wakes up in the past as his high school self. He doesn’t understand what’s going on, but that’s not going to stop him from trying to change things, hoping that life will be different for himself as well as for the young woman who is most important to him. The ways in which basic workplace skills are applied to solve teenage problems in the story is highly entertaining; Shin’ichiro finds not only his school life significantly improved, but his love life, too. (Or, at least what will obviously become his love life, even if he’s being incredibly dense about it.) But one of my favorite things about The Revenge of My Youth is actually the wonderfully wholesome relationship between Shin’ichiro and his younger sister, who is absolutely delightful. -Ash Brown