Sgt. Frog Manga Volume 14
Keroro Gunsou/ケロロ軍曹

–> Purchase Sgt. Frog 14 from Amazon.com!

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

The first story deals with Kululu deciding that things are just to easy for the platoon at the Hinata residence and so causes the troops all sorts of problem, including having them battle Natsumi, Fuyuki, Momoka, & Koyuki one-on-one. The second story has Keroro find an old kiddie blow-up pool for them to have fun in, though in miniature size. Meanwhile Natsumi and Koyuki find the public pool theme park too crowded and decide to use the kiddie pool, not realizing the others are already in it due to their tiny size.

The third story has Fuyuki and Keroro investigate a Kappa Pond and discover another group of kids interested in paranormal activities. The fourth story has Fuyuki and Natsumi discover an alien exercise class on Earth. The fifth story has Momoka become a ghost to be with Fuyuki all the time and befriend Hinata ghost Omiyo-san. However, she learns that being a ghost has serious drawbacks. The sixth story has Giroro’s older brother Garuru return with a package from their father. Package contains a mutant yam which the two battle until Natsumi comes into the fray to save the day.

The final story has Moa go bipolar (for lack of a better term) as she starts to lose control over herself and her mission to destroy the Earth. When she goes into stasis to protect her adopted family, things aren’t the same without her. As such, Kululu comes up with a solution that will allow her to come out of stasis and destroy a planet in the process.

Thoughts: While I don’t care for fanservice, I still wish that TokyoPop had made the pinup image at the front IN COLOR AND AS A PINUP! Seriously, how difficult would that have been? Not very. I understand color pages add to the cost, but you could have advertised “Color Pinup Inside” to try to pick up a few cheap sales from those who do like fanservice. But what do I know?

Manga-wise, for fun I went back and looked back at volume 1. Man, Yoshizaki-sensei has certainly come a long way in his art and character design work.

For this specific volume, I’m glad that Omiyo, the ghost, finally got some face time. That was nice and sweet. It would be nice if Yoshizaki-sensei could find a way to get her into more stories as Akamatsu-sensei did for his ghost in Negima!.

TokyoPop continues its standard “half” use of honorifics, but its something that I don’t bark about. I would like to see “Fuyuki-dono” and “Natsumi-dono” (“-dono” does get used at times for other characters) but well I’m not going to complain. At least honorifics are used.

Overall, another fun volume.