June 25th, 2014 
AstroNerdBoy ユーキューホルダー! Manga Review
UQ Holder Chapter 39
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Kirie thinks they’ve won as she bites down on a magic poison pill, but she’s petrified by Fate. Fate praises them for surprising him despite the sloppy plan. Fate insists that Touta come with him, but multiple blasts from Al Iskandaria are fired by Ikkuu. The swordswoman waitress shows back up, identifying herself as IWAI Tsukuyomi, self-taught in the school of Shinmei and a member of Ala Alba.
Meanwhile, Karin grabs the petrified Kirie and orders Touta to retreat. He refuses, saying this is the perfect time to attack since their attacks are getting through. Karin isn’t happy by Touta’s response, but Fate encourages Touta to try, stating that it will take five minutes before his barriers return. Karin warns Touta not to trust Fate, but Touta thinks Fate can’t be all evil if he hung out with Touta’s grandfather. Further, Touta doesn’t think Kirie has given up, so he asks Karin to take care of her.
The priest-looking companion of Fate attacks Karin, identifying himself as GYUREI Shaba of Ala Alba. Karin straps Kirie to her back to engage in combat. Meanwhile, Kuroumaru has to deal with the six armed giant TU Asura of Ala Alba.
Meanwhile, Touta starts stomping and breaking up the ground before attacking Fate. Fate easily turns his attack to fling Touta away. Touta stops himself, but Fate is behind him, summoning swords. Touta swipes them away, so Fate brings out more, saying that Touta’s grandfather could dodge this without problem. Fate sends a throng of blades at Touta, who whacks them all away, but not without having his shirt and jacket shredded. Fate praises Touta, but says Touta’s grandfather did it better. Touta thinks Fate likes his grandfather too much and promises to wipe the grin off Touta’s face.
Thoughts/Review:
Well, there’s a lot going on here.
Beginning with Kirie, why does Touta think that her plan hasn’t totally failed? I wonder if the magic from the poison pill interacting with Fate’s petrification will have some unexpected effect.
Fate doesn’t seem to have known Kirie’s ability, but I’m not sure I’m buying that at the moment, at least not totally. As others have stated, Fate is not being serious with Touta in their fight. I still think that Fate came to this fight with helpers on purpose because he knew that he’d be encountering UQ Holder again.
We learn that the swordswoman’s name is Tsukuyomi. That pretty much seals it that this is the Tsukuyomi from Negima, only in an adult form. Of course, Akamatsu-sensei hasn’t specifically spelled out this linkage, but I’m hoping this will come in the next chapter.
Karin’s opponent is some kind of Buddhist priest. Shaba is a new kind of character for Akamatsu-sensei, both in terms of character design, but also in terms of Shaba’s occupation. In Negima, the Catholic church plays a role with some nuns having small but important parts in the story. We’ve seen that element already in UQ Holder, but this is the first time seeing a Buddhist priest in action (giving me a moment’s laugh as I thought about Miroku from Inuyasha).
As an aside, Karin is awesome. Just saying. ^_~
Asura having six arms struck me as interesting, but then some fans remarked that Asura’s family name (TU) is the same as Paio from Negima. I’d forgotten about Paio having six arms (most of the time, we only saw two), so the connections to Negima continue.
Chapter 40 is going to be a bit longer and have a color page, so we’ll see where this battle goes. I kinda see things working out so that Kirie resets things despite being petrified, but we’ll see. Either way, I want Touta to get a spanking. ^_~
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It seems that will fight each one with someone, Kirie was petrified, I wonder if when she gets liberate about it. She will die by the poison pill
It seems that the swordswoman is Tsukuyomi, then she had to join with Ala Alba years ago.
Karin seems to have difficult the fight, because she has Kirie in his back
Fate seems have fun with Touta
Will the next chapter be a bit longer and will have a color page? I’m glad to know it.
Yeah. From what I hear, some shounen mangaka are doing two five chapters in four weeks. However, Akamatsu-sensei can’t do that at his age (and I understand that for sure), so a color page and an extra page or two is the best he can do.
Five chapters in Four weeks ? Oh my god… and my dream is to be a Mangaka like Akamatsu-sensei ! Looks like i`ll be going for that Monthly schedule if I ever become one , Haha !
Mashima-sensei is a beast. There was that one stretch where he was doing two chapters a week. Pretty massive.
As I said in Tumblr… Someone just got stoned. In the current situation, I believe all UQ Holder can do against him is try to buy some time – only because he wants to test Touta and all that. As we’ve already seen, he could obliterate them if he was serious about this fight, but after this chapter I can understand why they’re even putting up a fight: Fate is just playing around. A LOT.
Everything is in his favor, and now he even brought strong allies, like Tsukuyomi!
If he ended up being locked, then perhaps he would get serious, and I guess that would lead to things getting really bad for UQ Holder.
I still think Evangeline will make an appearance at some point to deal or help with this matter, but I won’t speculate on how. And speaking of her…
I find it interesting that first Fate acts like he completely despises Yukihime and says that she will never accomplish anything, then he compliments the team by saying he wouldn’t expect anything less FROM A GROUP ASSEMBLED BY HER. Behind all those harsh words and actions, It seems he can still respect Evangeline enough to give her credit where credit is due(at the very least).
A rematch between Eva and Fate would be interesting.
I think back to their first fight in Negima during the Kyoto arc. So yeah, I think he respects Eva.
I hope Kirie doesn’t die again, i don’t want to start this arc again, explaining to everyone what’s going on and fighting Chao again.
Although, Akamatsu would hopefully mix it up if they started this arc again, like bring Evangeline with them or something.
It seems like every second character introduced in this series is related to a character from a previous work of Akamatsu or is a character from a previous work, I hope there’s a reason for this and not fanservice.
Fate toying with Touta is pretty entertaining, I also liked Touta saying that Fate seemed a bit too interested in Negi, this arc is very promising I hope it keeps getting better from here.
Not exactly this is the contrary, kirie Fate has already affected, if they win meur after me. More Tota seems to have understood something. Once again, the last few chapters, Tota proves he has a brain. Certainly it was not an intelligence as “calculator” and “mathematician” that his grandfather was more of observation, but is not bad.
If not for me, or they manage to “kill” kirie and successful plan, or they receive reinforcements of a member of Uq (a new member please, not one of those we saw! The Gravekeeper? Vampire? the Mazoku who knows? ^ ^
Otherwise Astro, Tota already take the spanking:
. 1 Fate openly said the low point of his shield – translation: you are all so insignificant that I do not even worry about my magical barrier
. 2 It is not clear uses all his strength – translation: I’ll sprayed when I want but I want to play.
. 3 He said without shame Negi when he was 4 years younger than Tota had no problem dodging his dance swords stones, while Tota severe galley – translation: you is not even the tenth level where me and your great-grandfather we are going back entreiner you poor waste lol.
Is not bad eh? lol
I want Touta to remember the spanking. The first one where he was beheaded is one he doesn’t remember. ^_~
Even if Kirie dies and resets, I don’t think it will be tedious as you think it might be. Did you see The Edge of Tomorrow movie, now out in theaters? They handled repeating the same day over and over quite well.
He started that in Love Hina. There was some reference back to A.I. Love You in there. Basically, all of Sensei’s manga works are in the same universe.
The connections between his works never were as blatant and repeated as they were in this one.
“Did you see The Edge of Tomorrow movie, now out in theaters? They handled repeating the same day over and over quite well.”
Is the crew of The Edge of Tomorrow doing UQ Holder? No, right? So it’s a moot point.
True, BUT (there’s always a “but”), the point is that time jumping can be done quite well. Indeed, Kirie has jumped back multiple times already, and there’s been no weariness.
Can be done well, sure, but that’s neither conducive to this particular writer doing it either well or keeping it from not becoming repetitive. Seeing as how Kirie is not the focus of this series, I wager she’ll either stay a statue for quite some time to keep the plot from abusing her powers, or Touta uses the power of his intense FEELS (what a crock) and somehow accomplishing the entire mission through his sheer plot coupons.
I would have thought she’d stay a statue for a bit longer as well, but…
We’ll have a better idea of the Touta aspect when the chapter comes out.
The connections to past works in Love Hina and Negima are nowhere near as extensive as the ones in UQ Holder, and it’s only been 39 chapters.
True. In the case of UQ Holder, it was a blatant attempt to carry on a part of the Negima story by having Eva brought over.
Eva’s probably the only one I don’t mind, she was definitely in my top three characters in Negima, possibly my number one.
I hope we find out more about Eva’s past, when we found out that the Lifemaker turned her into a vampire and s/he even called her daughter, I thought we were being set up for a flashback about Eva.
Also, the fact that Nagi sealed her in the same area where the Lifemaker was sealed, that had to be on purpose, it’s way to coincidental.
Also I’m looking forward to seeing what part Touta’s friends play in all this, they’ve turned up a lot sooner than I thought they would.
Eva made for an interesting villain to me, but when she bailed Negi out of the fire in Kyoto, she became one of my favorite characters as well.
I agree. I always lamented that we never got more information about her backstory and how she came about to partner with Chachazero.
Eva didn’t know about that until way later, of course, but I suspect you are right. After all, the curse forced Eva to investigate things, such as when Chamo passed through the barrier. Count Herrman was keen that they avoid detection by Eva when he and his minions came to do their work. I found it interesting that she found him anyway and had Kaede with her when they watched Negi fight. I always believed was because Eva did detect him, the curse caused her to investigate, and she got Kaede as backup (or Kaede sensed Herrman as well and they got together coincidentally).
Anyway, one wouldn’t have Eva forced to be a guard of sorts just on a whim.
I seriously want Fate to go all out serious already against Touta….
I also loved the comparison that he made between Negi and Touta escaping those swords , But Fate forgot to add that not only did Negi escape the swords unharmed , But dodging the spell ( Banshou Tsuranuku Kokkui No Enkan ) with Raiten Taisou mode… So bad ass xD !
I think we already saw that during Kirie’s flashback. ^_~
Negi was pretty awesome for sure. ^_^
“I hope Kirie doesn’t die again, i don’t want to start this arc again, explaining to everyone what’s going on and fighting Chao again.”
According to what Touta sensed, Kirie haven’t given up on this timeline yet (so not dying just to reset and start a new one). Maybe they will be able to make it work somehow and get Fate to touch Kirie as she dies rather then another reset without being able to do anything.
I think she has ALREADY hit Fate, it remains for her to die.
No, no…
…Kirie must die WHILE touching her target, or this won’t work.
And that priest’s design was quite unexpected. In all of Negima, never seen anything like it! lol
Very true on the priest. He’s very unique to be sure.
If she dies, which I think will happen.
i will just leave you this http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2014-06-25/japanese-comic-ranking-february-16-22/.75966
P.S.: Fellow manga readers, before anyone complains about the number of uq holder sales, if you look closely there´s a manga called silent no voice (koe no katachi), please just read it, since it´s one of the best manga of this year. Or at least try to read the first chapter. You can read it at crunchyroll.
P.s.s.: Now you can complain 🙂
I read it (man, that first volume was hard to get through with all the bullying). Now you have to read Hayate the Combat Butler. 😉
Ok i will start reading
Let me know what you think. I’m going to write a review of what I read. ^_^
Koe no Katachi is such a good manga..
I was terribly depressed after reading everything Crunchyroll had up.
Lots of love for Koe no Katachi here as well. (^_^)
I’m extremely glad it’s a weekly and not a monthly – after this week’s cliffhanger, I don’t think I could wait that long.
I’ll be writing a piece for it in the near future.
That’s an actually quite a low number for Kami Nomi, considering it’s the final volume.
Oh god your title. It hurts my very soul.
Tolerable chapter, but its only Karin’s leg block and the monk with the crazy eye (I hope he turns out to be a cool character) making it marginally entertaining. The concept of this becoming Ala Alba can go die in a fire though.
*lol* Sorry about that, though it was done deliberately on my part.
Shaba is a new kind of character for Akamatsu-sensei, both in terms of character design, but also in terms of Shaba’s occupation
Well there was Bouzu-Mokoto from Love Hina 108, does that count? XD
Oh yeah. I forgot she’d cut her hair and was going to become a nun. She never went through with it, so it is a close but no cigar. 😉
About Tsukuyomi, I wonder… What if Tsukuyomi herself was the enemy of Shinmeiryu(who wielded the Hina blade in the war that almost made them extinct), a descendant or reincarnation? I mean, even before she used the Hina blade she already had eyes like those who are using it, when she displays killing intent. Her Shinmeiryu is self-taught, and she fights with two swords instead of one, as opposed to all the other users – what if she learned it after fighting the Shinmei again and again? In the Kyoto field trip Chigusa Amagasaki said the Shinmeiryu users are all used to fight with giant monster exterminator swords, and because of that it would be hard for them to fight against an opponent who uses two swords. Tsukuyomi had youkais in her sleeve since the Kyoto field trip(something that even Setsuna questioned), and above all else… Her words to Negi in the beggining of the final battles against Cosmo Entelecheia: “There’s no meaning in this world, I seek naught but blood and carnage.” sounded like something a being like that would say, to the point where even at his current power he questioned WHAT she was. Also, she was able to split the Hina sword into two to match her fighting style! What if Tsukuyomi was immortal from the beginning? Just a theory. And since I’m speaking of theories, I like that one about Tsukuyomi being befriended and joining Ala Alba YEARS IN THE PAST, when everyone was still together. Maybe she had a change of heart after following Setsuna for so long… The only thing I’m sure is: It would have been funny as heck to see her interactions with the rest of the group, especially Setsuna and Konoka. xD
It is an interesting theory. I would love it if we got more character development for Tsukuyomi, but somehow, I doubt Sensei does this.
So ala alba vs uq holder… The immortal allies of justice vs the world saviours… Asura having 6 arms kinda make sense because the god ashura is normally depict with 6 arms and 3 heads.
Fate seems like he will test touta by volleying with the same spell set he used against negi during the final fight. Though whilst touta did a good job dodging them… Negi came out unscratch and rakan pretty much sliced his way threw…
If he is using the same spell set then likely the barrage of darts will come next that manage to impale that Jack Rakan and forced negi to go raiten taishou ver 1 to bypass the barrage but as fate said… 10 year old negi was far better than happy go lucky grandson
I’d forgotten about Jack’s handling of that situation, which is the solution that Touta went for.
Negi had purpose, and thus was focused on his goal, which is why he was (1) better and (2) more interesting. Touta’s lack of meaningful purpose causes him to lack focus, which is why his abilities to do anything are not interesting to me.