Gakuen Alice Manga Volume 5

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SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Mikan and the others discover that Luca-kun is playing the role of Snow White for the play his group is putting on for the school festival. An accident caused by “Mind Reader-kun” takes out many of the actors, causing Mikan and the others to be last-second replacements. Luca-kun’s Snow White character will be put to sleep (Sleeping Beauty style) in the play. Since Mikan-chan is the prince, this means Mikan will have to kiss Luca. This seems to make Natsume jealous and he secretly flings an object at Mikan to prevent her from kissing Luca while Hotaru provides cover by killing the lights at the moment the kiss was supposed to happen. Despite this, both Luca and Mikan are blushing heavily over what almost happened.

Noda-sensei suddenly returns from his accidental time-traveling. After a tearful reunion with Mikan and the others, Noda-sensei meets with Narumi-sensei and discusses how he was finally able to get to the “turning point,” where he saw “her” carrying a baby named Mikan. The two feel that Mikan’s time at school won’t be an easy one.

With the festival winding down, Mikan gets to see the student leaders of the high school, junior high, and elementary school divisions. Afterward, Hotaru wins an award for her invention in the festival and Mikan’s Special Ability group are the surprise winners of the Special Award for their festival attraction. As a final surprise for Mikan, Narumi-sensei gives her a letter from her grandfather.

Afterward is the school dance with everyone dressing up in special costume, Mikan finds her good mood ruined by Natsume. However, she’s surprised when he has words of caution for her about getting into things over her head since someone like her should stay in the light. He then returns to his rude self by calling her a name. This angers Mikan who demands Natsume learn her name. She’s stunned when he addresses her by name for the first time, giving her his third and final order as his slave — don’t complain about what he calls her.

It is time for semester finals to begin and Mikan is in trouble. So she works hard to study. When the tests start, her Social Studies class gets a substitute teacher — Makihara-sensei. This troubles Natsume, who confronts the teacher afterward. It is actually Persona in disguise, who’d been ordered to do so now that Natsume is reported to have calmed down a lot. At the same time, Persona could check out Mikan too. Seeing Natsume calmly take a test has amused Persona, but he has words of warning for Natsume from the Headmasters, who don’t want their pet getting a new favorite. Natsume is frustrated, reminding Persona that he was forced to partner with Mikan. Persona informs Natsume that his partnering with Mikan was not what the headmasters wanted.

Mikan is depressed at having the lowest grades in the class but is distracted by a group of stuffed animals carrying a bucket of water. The plushies plead with Mikan to help them and she carries the bucket to a sickly Kaname, the creator of these “alive” stuffed animals. Turns out Kaname is the creator of Bear, who’d given Mikan so much trouble. Kaname is only briefly out of the hospital and the girls whom he’d given his creations too come to visit him. Mikan learns that Bear doesn’t talk because it is Kaname’s first creation before he’d mastered his skill. However, she also realizes that Kaname’s Alice may well be what is causing him to be ill. Before returning to the hospital, he places Mikan in charge of Bear. Mikan and Bear’s relationship will be a tough one though.

Thoughts/Review:

As I seem to always say, I just really love this manga. It is such a delight to read because Higuchi-sensei not only has an interesting main story and sub-stories, but her art and presentation just are done quite well. There’s just a lot of fun that oozes out all over the place in Gakuen Alice Manga Volume 5. And with Mikan being a character who has so much energy, Higuchi-sensei gets that energy to come off the page and hit the reader. There are just so many things that I like about this manga, I can’t put them all into words. I’m glad that TokyoPop is using honorifics here because that makes it even more fun for me.

I rather enjoy seeing Natsume getting jealous about Mikan, such as when she nearly kissed Luca in the play (and I think Luca is somewhat attracted to Mikan as well). I think it is pretty clear at this point that his tough talk is just elementary school boy way of saying, “I like you a lot.” Of course, he throws in a twist, as when he addresses Mikan by her actual name and has words of caution for her.

Natsume and Mikan appears to be where the main part of the plot will be centered with Persona giving Natsume a warning about getting close with Mikan from the school’s Headmasters. What amazes me is that if Mikan’s mother were someone who challenged the system somehow (Noda-sensei apparently witnessing her taking an infant Mikan to safety) and was a threat (which has also been implied), then why wouldn’t Gakuen Alice have wanted to grab Mikan when they finally tracked down Hotaru? Did they not know or feel that Mikan’s Alice is one that they didn’t want in the school. We’ll see how things play out with the main plot though as there is still not enough information for a good analysis.

Anyway, if you haven’t started Gakuen Alice yet, take a chance. I think the first volume is enough to let one know if Higuchi-sensei’s sense of fun meets your standards or not. If you don’t fall in love with Mikan right away, it won’t be your kind of manga but if you do, you have five volumes to read from TokyoPop. ^_^