Sparks between the lead characters in the form of constant arguing. Things start off kind of calm when Momo and Okarun meet, but as soon as the double dare goes sour, the comic flies. It enables the dialog to whip without the visual aspect going to waste. I ripped through this book in a single sitting and part of why was that. I kind of love it? I can see people going either way, but I love it. Sometimes the icon bubbles are over a square of screentone. Soon it is just that, icon-in-bubbles laid over a David Fincher establishing shot of the building everyone is in, or some abstract insert shot of a meaningful object, some significant space. But the frequency in this book was a surprise. I’ve seen the person in the balloon plenty, a fun manga practice where you get to add a little comedic emotion into characters’ back and forth. The characters are reduced to an icon- a cartoon version of their own head, that appears inside their speech bubbles. Tatsu has a solution to the endless cascade of words that I thought was amazing, and I could also see really pissing people off. Momo’s grandmother Seiko is the bombshell slice of cheesecake with a cigarette dangling from her lips. Ken- call him Okarun, please- he’s got glasses and typically the look of someone who just fell down the stairs. Momo is easy to identify, she’s the one who is always yelling.
Monster is the easy way for me to categorize them, as most of the demons are actually aliens, though some of them are definitely spirits. Then comes a goliath sumo monster that looks like it came from a lithograph, the history museum. One Turbo manifestation looks like if Clive Barker was doing 90s X-comic villain designs. Goddamn Ultraseven nightmare fuel in the spaceship. Imagine a troll who was made of liquid smiling at you as their face swirls down a drain. Turbo Granny mostly manifests herself as Rudimentary Peni album artwork.
Tatsu is constantly messing with the art style, familiar as it is. Clean and traditional, what I think of as a serious-leaning mainstream shonen equivalent to the direct market publisher “house style.” It’s just that Dandandan is so high energy, super silly with machine gun frequency.
Ultra balloon rom series#
Tatsu’s art style fits comfortably with the kind of contemporary long series manga that draws me in, like Ryoko Kui’s Delicious in Dungeon. The monsters of Dandadan absolutely rule. Dandadan is his answer: funny, horny, and unpredictably creative. Sound like a rom-com? What’s a girl to do? Where’s a guy to poop? Yukinobu Tatsu asks the big questions and rubs his sweaty palms together. He goes somewhere cursed and she goes somewhere UFOs frequent. They hardly know each other, and here they are on opposite sides of town putting themselves in danger over a stupid dare. She doesn’t believe in aliens, though, and he sure is obsessed. He doesn’t believe in spirits, but she does. Written and illustrated by Yukinobu Tatsu.
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