Alice in Murderland

Alice in Murderland has all the features that made Kaori Yuki the great artist she is. I think it is necessary to introduce briefly the mangaka herself. She is one of the "old guard" having started her career back in 1987 before breaking popularity at the beginning of the 90s with the Cain series and later on with the highly acclaimed (and pretty controversial at that time) Angel Sanctuary which took religions and twisted them heavily (you know in a classical Japanese way). While belonging to the shoujo demographics could be a necessary label I have always found her work pretty tangent and transversal as she definitelyhas her style and the demographics categorization may be pretty limited. Alice in Murderland is a good entrance to the artist as it is short and has all the peculiarities of Kaori Yuki's style. The manga was serialized in a defunct magazine which lasted less than a decade and was shut down at the beginning of 2018 leaving Alice in Murderland without a host. And while "Aria" (that was the name of the magazine) was pretty much shoujo, the following host "Shōnen Magazine Edge" had definitely the grip for a younger male audience who probably wasn't interested in a gothic battle between beautiful ladies and boys. I have the feeling that this was one of the reasons why the last chapters felt so rushed. I guess the magazine pushed her to close it quickly. But is it good? I am biased as she is one of my favourite authors, but trying to be objective I would say for a beginner reader that: "It is good but the journey is better than the destination". Surely our lady Kaori Yuki has always a way to create plot twists every couple of pages and this is her advantage, but what I felt in this particular entry is that she wanted to put so many things on the table - and believe me it is full of topics and plots all over - without really giving that feel of empathy towards one or the others. The plot is pretty straightforward, nothing new under the sun. The Kuonji family is a powerhouse worldwide, even stronger than heads of government. This juggernaut of a family is ruled by Olga who needs to decide the new head of the family and opens a battle royal among all 8 siblings (almost no one blood-related). From here on we follow Stella through the rankings but despite the battle royal premises many plot lines open and we have a huge number of events condensed in 11 volumes. Due to the fast pace, we never get attached to the characters. Typical of these battles manga (and one of the reasons why I tend to avoid them) is the continuous elevation of every character to a dramatic river of tears - where the "bad" does not really exist and each one has a dramatic trauma that made them "bad". Here more or less is the same. We follow everyone involved with background stories that are already outdated and over-abused, additionally, due to the above-mentioned high rhythm we really do not get engaged in them. This is to say that despite the "classical" features they are still memorable characters because the author is a veteran and knows how to treat even tropes in a way that is fascinating. Olga herself is worth the price, she has been a great villain (sadly in the end Kaori Yuki tried to humanize her too much). What keeps the manga going is definitely the insane mystery and twists crafted well with an open ending that I personally liked, ending in a climax and leaving there mysterious. So, I give this a 60 out of 100 but consider that as a fan I am pretty critical too of her, and you need to give this a chance because it is still an above-average product and even in her minor works Kaori Yuki remains an incredible artist.