October 16th, 2013 
AstroNerdBoy ユーキューホルダー!/UQ Holder Chapter 8 Review
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Touta and Kuroumaru are uncertain about Jinbee, who says he’s been stuck down here for two years after consuming the last of Yukihime’s special sake and grilled chicken. He asks them if they have any food since all he’s had is these eyeless fish and sea cumbers for the last two years. They say they don’t, but Jinbee uses magic of some sort to teleport Kuroumaru’s emergency CalorieFriend (CalorieMate) to his hand, whereupon Touta and Kuroumaru are not happy by this.
Jinbee tells them they should have gotten out of the water as some giant, monstrous seal-like creatures attack. One bites Touta’s arm off as he’s rescued by Kuroumaru. The two flee to safety, whereupon Kuroumaru uses a kind of magic to create a flame from a pen. Two hours later, they two are still walking as Kuroumaru has been explaining ki and how ranged attacks can be used with it. Touta claims ignorance, but Kuroumaru thinks Touta’s using ki subconsciously. To demonstrate, Kuroumaru launches a Shinmei-ryuu Ougi Zankuuzen attack with the use of a sword. It takes five seconds for the blast to hit something, meaning it is roughly 1.7 kilometers away.
A further two hours later, Touta’s arm still hasn’t healed even though the bleeding has stopped. They come to a waterfall, where they see a giant, serpent-like creature in the waters below. Another two hours later, the pair are hiding from a massive spider that could easily hunt them for prey. Twenty four hours later, the exhausted pair take a break, whereupon Touta starts thinking it might take them a month to get out. Kuroumaru notices that Touta seems to be in pain from his missing arm. He acknowledges it, saying he can almost feel it and it feels slimy as well as being in pain, but he doesn’t understand why.
Jinbee shows up, saying that since Touta’s arm was eaten, he has to act quickly or he won’t get it back for thirty years. They want food, so Jinbee suggests the giant spider. He then talks about the serpent creature, which if it swallows them, they’d take three years to be pooped out. As such, that’s why the UQ Holder test time limit of eight years was felt to be about right. Touta freaks about this, especially at the thought of thirty years passing, since his friends would all be middle aged by then. Touta demands a hint on where the exit it, but then discovers he’s missing his other arm after Jinbee takes it from him.
Jinbee goes to explain that Kuroumaru has massive healing and regenerative healing powers, meaning that when a limb is lost, the body simply forms a new one. For Touta, his limbs are still alive via magic, thus when he loses a limb, his body needs to have said limb reattached, at which the limb is healed. As such, Touta’s arm won’t regenerate itself on its own for thirty years if he doesn’t get it back and if one of his limbs were to be sealed away, it would never grow back on its own. Jinbee returns the arm he took and says that Touta has been way too overconfident because of his immortality, something Touta denies. Jinbee cites the fact that Touta’s lost an arm as proof. So, Touta decides that he’ll return to defeat this monster to get his arm back, but since he doesn’t know which one ate his arm, he’ll have to defeat them all.
Thoughts/Review:
Wow. There was a lot of exposition in this chapter.
Considering what Eva did to Jinbee for touching her food and drink, I’d say that fears of her getting soft are overblown as well. She clearly has a soft spot for Touta, but she’s still Eva. I wonder if she’s able to observe their progress from above.
Touta’s finally starting to get the schooling he so desperately needs, but he still needs a lot more. That being said, having lost an arm and having to experience the sensation of it being digested is a good start. His acknowledgement that they might need a month to escape shows that he’s just barely starting to accept a hint of reality. I expect that this forthcoming fight against the seal monsters will further his education (or at least, I hope it does).
I liked the explanations of Kuroumaru’s and Touta’s immortality differences. In the forthcoming (expected) fight, I hope we get to see Kuroumaru really kick some bottom.
Kuroumaru suspecting Touma of using ki is something I think as well. I wonder if this will mean anything significant later.
As to Jinbee, he’s a character alright. His remotely stealing Kuroumaru’s emergency ration made me chuckle, more so after I learned of why he is down here (stealing Eva’s food).
As I saw Touta with no arms, I really couldn’t help but think of the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Touta could play the part of the Black Knight.
Arthur cuts off Black Knight’s left arm.
Black Kight: ‘Tis but a scratch.
Arthur: A scratch? Your arm’s off!
Black Knight: No, it isn’t.
Arthur: Well, what’s that then?
Black Knight: I’ve had worse.
Arthur: You liar!
Black Knight: Come on you pansy!Arthur cuts off Black Knight’s right arm.
Black Knight: Come on then.
Arthur: What?
Black Knight: Have at you!
Arthur: You are indeed brave, Sir Knight, but the fight is mine.
Black Knight: Oh, had enough, eh?
Arthur: Look, you stupid bastard, you’ve got no arms left.
Black Knight: Yes I have.
Arthur: Look!
Black Knight: Just a flesh wound.
Arthur: Look, stop that.
Black Knight: Chicken! Chicken!
Arthur: Look, I’ll have your leg. Right!Arthur cuts off the Black Knight’s leg.
Black Knight: Right, I’ll do you for that!
Arthur: You’ll what?
Black Knight: Come ‘ere!
Arthur: What are you going to do, bleed on me?
Black Knight: I’m invincible!
Arthur: You’re a loony.
Black Knight: The Black Knight always triumphs! Have at you! Come on then.Arthur cuts off the Black Knight’s other leg.
Black Knight: All right; we’ll call it a draw.
Arthur: Come, Patsy.
Black Knight: Oh, oh, I see, running away then. You yellow bastard! Come back here and take what’s coming to you. I’ll bite your legs off!
*lol* Yeah, that’s how I see Touta, only not so funny.
Beyond that, not a whole lot to say. We’ll see how things go next chapter.
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For some reason, I don’t much care for UQ Holder. I don’t really know why. Maybe it is because I don’t like any of the characters I have seen this far. The plot feels sort of generic to me, as well. Well, it is still early days. Maybe I will think better of it as it goes.
Other than Touta getting on my nerves, I haven’t had a problem. Of course, it took two whole volumes of Negima! to pass before that really became interesting and non-generic. ^_^
A very boring chapter. By this time in Love Hina and Negima, 8 chapters in, I already cared about several characters. Here, I only can care about Kuromaru so far (no, I never was a big fan of Eva, much less in this form). It doesn’t help that Akamatsu seems far more interested on explaining the immortality magibabble than about properly introducing the characters and making them endearing.
I can’t really speak to Love Hina since I saw the anime first, then read the manga. As for Negima!, after volume 2, I wasn’t impressed at all. It wasn’t until volume 3 that things done got good there (so to speak).
I didn’t mind the exposition in this chapter. As I see it, Akamatsu-sensei is simply setting the table behind immortality, then he’ll move onto the characters.
The immortality explanations might be interesting for someone who doesn’t play a lot of jrpgs or watch a lot of anime but someone who does will just find it tedious. And I’m gonna guess that most most people who read this do. This kind of explanation could have been done in a more elegant way without charts and visual references. I know that’s how Akamatsu-sensei does it most of the time but I don’t think it was needed here, especially if he needed practically the whole chapter to do it. I could already tell the limit of Touta’s immortality the secend that I saw his arm hadn’t regenerated right away. Kuromaru’s exposition could’ve come at another time, maybe during a fight and from his own mouth.
BTW, did you notice Akamatsu-sensei covered Kuromaru’s chest with his(?) hair again in the reference picture? lol
Speaking of the Quest for the Holy Grail. I would really love to say this to Akamatsu-sensei if I could
http://i.imgur.com/tFxvM60.gif
>The immortality explanations might be interesting for someone who doesn’t play a lot of jrpgs or watch a lot of anime but someone who does will just find it tedious. And I’m gonna guess that most most people who read this do.
I’m not that versed on various forms of immortality so I fall into the latter category. That said, as a writer, Akamatsu-sensei can’t assume everyone will know about all this and thus he has to take time to lay out some foundation work.
> This kind of explanation could have been done in a more elegant way without charts and visual references.
Maybe, but there is the “show me don’t tell me” rule to consider as well. And I’ve seen several manga titles where explanations are accompanied by charts and such.
>BTW, did you notice Akamatsu-sensei covered Kuromaru’s chest with his(?) hair again in the reference picture? lol
*lol* Yeah. I’m starting to think Kuromaru is really a girl who attempted to become male in order to be a warrior in the clan, but that body shift failed.
>Speaking of the Quest for the Holy Grail.
*lol*
I’m not ready to throw in the towel just yet – I can enjoy this a simple delivery vehicle for akamatsu-senseis slapstick leanings – but I have to agree that this seems somewhat under-cooked compared to Negima, for one. Guess we’ll have to wait and see.
On another note, was anybody else surprised by Kuromaru’s lack of knowledge in regards to the existence of the magic world? At least I think it was Kuroumaru who said that. Shouldn’t the existence of the magic world be very basic common knowledge in this time/world? I mean where does everybody think the magic beasties suddenly came from?
I guess I didn’t think that was Kuroumaru expressing lack of knowledge of the magic world. I need to go back and reread the chapter.
The thing that strikes me funny about the whole thing is that…I don’t know how to word this, I guess it just doesn’t feel like this is supposed to take place early in the manga. It sort of seems like something that’d take place after we get a little more context about the characters, or at least had a little plot development.
Akamatsu seems like he wants to chug along and act like this series has been out a year or so, despite there being nothing to actually work with. Maybe if this was a direct sequel to Negima, it wouldn’t be as bad since we’re by in large more familiar with the overall setting, and there’d be other things to distract the fandom with. As it is though, I don’t find this series very compelling, and unless Touta gets some serious development through its course, its going to be a labor just to read through it.
Gotta agree , The way how things are going on so fast in earlier chapters , I feel like UQ Holder will be a short series and In my opinion , Iam not liking it so far , The reason iam hanging with it , Is because i want answers that wasn`t answered in Negima , But that clearly won’t happen.
Not to mention , I Dont like how ” Immortality ” Is such a big deal in this Series , I Mean , It was stated by Setsuna and Evangeline herself , That ” Immortality ” Isn`t possible , Many ” Wacko Magicians ” Have tried , But they have failed , Even Evangeline wasn`t immortal to begin with , She was ” Turned ” Into an Immortal by Lifemaker.
@Anon – I hear ya. I guess it isn’t bothering me yet because I like Eva and Kuroumaru is interesting at some level. Plus, Negima didn’t become interesting to me until volume 3.
>I Dont like how ” Immortality ” Is such a big deal in this Series , I Mean , It was stated by Setsuna and Evangeline herself , That ” Immortality ” Isn`t possible , Many ” Wacko Magicians ” Have tried , But they have failed , Even Evangeline wasn`t immortal to begin with , She was ” Turned ” Into an Immortal by Lifemaker.
Setsuna wouldn’t know much about immortality since she was an abandoned hanyou from a very young age.
As for Eva, I’d have to go back and reread her comments on this. In all likelihood, she’s referring to humans attempting to become normal through magic and such. Yet as a shinso vampire, she knows there are immortals out there. The manga implies that while she’s the most fearsome, there could be others.
Of course, there’s the group Negi and company fought on the Magic World (too lazy to look up the name) – in essence, the top members were immortals of a sort as the Lifemaker brought them all back to life for the final battle.
Plus, immortality was an element in Negima. Negi became one; Zect (sp) was one; and there were others.
Negi became one only in the very last stretch of the series, and then it became yet another dropped plot thread; for all Negi’s supposed to have become an immortal, we’ve seen his grave in two timelines now and no exploration at all on his immortality, so it made no difference at all. As for the Kosmo Entelekheia members Lifemaker brought back, they were there only for what, three chapters? No, immortality wasn’t such a big theme in Negima, and was only brought in to a semi-important degree once the plot had jumped the shark.
I didn’t mean to suggest it was a big theme or the like in Negima, just that there were members of the ‘undying’ there. ^_^
Would it be awful of me to remark that if the rumors are true for how Negima came about (i.e. Akamatsu-sensei wanted to do a shounen fighting series, but his publisher wanted him to do another romantic harem comedy)… maybe UQ Holder shows his publisher was right all along?
>maybe UQ Holder shows his publisher was right all along
I think it is way too early to make that kind of judgement. After three volumes, sure.
Negima was a major exception to the rule (and yet, I’ve always thought the first two volumes have always been very malignously judged, often in a ‘Me too’ way. They’re leagues above the last two volumes, for starters), but with most series, the first volume tends to either be a fair indication of the series’ overall quality (except graphically speaking, since most manga tend to perfect their artstyle as they go on), or, if anything, the writing goes downhill after a later point (since most writers eventually either grow tired or have used all their better ideas).
I’m gonna hang with it until volume three, since that is where Negima really got going for me. Everything before Library arc at the end of volume two was bland and meh.
So far though I’m not impressed with UQ Holder. The first few chapters were nice enough, hinting at a kinda epic quest to the capital with shadings of the Hero’s Journey, but then the “Yakuza” guys showed up and shot the nice mood it had going in the face.
It feels like a rush job now, like Akamatsu was itching to introduce the other UQH immortals without creating a solid foundation for the series, and now the pacing is all over the place.
Well, I’ll wait and hope Akamatsu knows what he’s doing, since I actually DO like the premise and the UQ characters piqued my interest.
Library Island was at the START of Volume Two.
>I’m gonna hang with it until volume three, since that is where Negima really got going for me.
Volume 3 was where Negima got good with me as well.
>Library Island was at the START of Volume Two.
Yeah, but it wasn’t that great for me. It was OK, but nothing special.
You guys thought that it’s the underground library… how come mine is in Eva’s Villa? O_o
~LoneWolfx03
[…] yeah, I know I’ve used that Monty Python quote before as a tag in a UQ Holder chapter review, but it is a good one, so why not use it again? […]