my humble opinion on 'Tegamibachi' manga ~ there is a genre called 'thriller'

there is a genre called 'thriller'. I know people usually use it to describe movies with detective, mystic, action and other aspects, with cars blown up, a lot of bad guys chasing the good one, and the whole planet in danger. 'Letter Bee' is a thriller too, but thrilling has a different sense here. Tegamibachi makes you thrilled because...


story and characters
let me start with good points. after reading manga I understood that the anime filler episodes were really good. I could not distinguish which of them was in the original and which was thought up by Studio Pierrot. some of them even were for the better - like the one with the little girl who gave her ribbons to Lag and Zazzie, and the latter gave his ribbon to a stray cat, and then the same ribbon was seen at the floor near 'Hell's Kitchen', hinting on the fact that the cat must have been there and therefore it might have been dissected by Dr. Thunderland Jr. since there was no such episode in manga, the ribbon was not used either, which is not a bad thing, but still I think the ribbon trick was well thought

the second good awesome point is the humour. Kappelmaister Prince Steak >____<

yes, things like that do not thrill. what does?
while stories about relations between Bees and dingoes were touching enough in the anime, they were really touching in the manga, too. what is their essence, in the end? they are stores about true friendship and support, feelings almost absent in human society where no one would accept you as you are, and no one would love you as sincerely as dingoes loved their Bees. take Darwin or Bolt - such loyalty is nowhere to be found. I am not a spoilt child of fortune to have seen the same happiness shining in someone's eyes for seeing me, meeting me and being near me, as there was in the eyes of dingoes. dingoes - ready to take care of you. dingoes - trying to say 'rely on me, rely on me, rely on me'. dingoes - never betraying you or leaving you. living in Amberground is hard and I would not wish to be there, but I envy some of the Letter Bees a lot. having such selfless dingoes is truly a blessing...
apart from moments that almost made me cry because of what I described, there was another problem. though on one hand, reading the beginning was pleasant because it once more let me drown into the calm and warm world of mutual trust and support, where everybody was so kind and nice, on the other hand, reading this peaceful story was even more painful that I knew about the coming disaster which was to break and crush everything. therefore I had mixed feeling throughout the whole manga
while reading the same pattern as in the anime I was getting tired with waiting for the difference to come. when in volume 9 the events finally took an unexpected turn I felt a relief and the will to read further again, like in vol. 10 when the events had such a pace that I just could hardly stop reading at 3 o'clock in the night, and it seemed to me that I was almost hearing everything that was taking place - the voices, the sound of wind blowing, Jiggy's bike roar, Aria's violin melody... but the fear of seeing once more that one thing I did not want to see, and read what I did not want to read - that fear was again making me feel feverish, though not as bad as when I was watching the anime
finally overcoming the desperately sad point, I bothered myself to dive into additional information. from some point, JAC group stopped translating the last pages of each volume where a lot of things are explained. I actually felt too tired to read all of them, too, and I did not really feel all of the info was necessary for me, but I could not help reading the 'Dr. Thunderland's comments' (the father one, not Jr.) section in the last volumes. this, of course, does not mean anything particular, but he (Dr. Thunderland) stressed that Lag's mother told Gauche that he lost 'almost all memories', which could hint he did not lose absolutely all of them. this was Dr. Thunderlands speculating, as if he was reading the story with us as did not know what comes further, and we are supposed to believe it, but since Dr. Thunderland's comments are the invention of Asada-sensei...
considering the part which is different from the anime, I have nothing but positive words to say. 'tis not that the anime looks worse to me now, but the manga version is even more attractive. since manga is longer, mangaka can indulge himself in writing anything he wants, inserting as many characters as he wants, describing as many places, drawing as many beautiful scenes, imagining as many flashbacks, thinking up as many intriguing hints... as he wants. I love and admire it when authors of any artwork create a WORLD, be it a part of our real world or an imaginary place

graphics
there are 3 artists whom I remembered while reading 'Tegamibachi'. they are Abe Yoshitoshi, Kumakura Yuichi and Murata Range. why?
the colouring and the atmosphere - to some extent dark and 'dirty' - were really close to that of Abe-sensei's style - especially when he paints his works in one colour range like this

the black'n'white pages are also extremely beautiful. the thing I love most is the wise use of light-and-shadow which really reminded me of KoBJ. I am not saying they are absolutely the same but there are points that look alike a lot. they are the fractured 'triangled' alternation of lights and shadows, thick and thin outlines, postures that are as if captured in a split of a second, static but conveying so much movement, and the most characteristic point in my mind - the lines being interrupted in some places but nevertheless creating visible shapes - for example, the lip, hair and other contours

and Murata-sensei's art is memorable to me because of its super realistic angles and shapes which make the pictures look somewhat less manga-ish, the same as sometimes Asada-sensei's pictures do

even characters who looked... well, average to me in anime, are HOT in manga. yes, go beyond the limit... including guys like 'kanchou' and Dr. Thunderland Jr., and Aria-san, who looks really cool

is it my imagination or Felidae-lover-Zazzie's eyes are made to look like those of a cat?

and the last point I consider important is that Asada-sensei's graphics does not change to the worse  become more primitive as it did in case of Watsuki Nobuhiro. I know many fans, and I also belong to those who were unhappy with the fact that Watsuki-sensei's last volumes of RuroKen were looking too plain and lost their original style. I also hear many Kaichou wa Maid-sama fans saying that the best pictures used to be seen in the middle of the manga, and then the quality dropped, and though I would not say it truly 'dropped', I cannot but agree the middle part was the best. Asada-sensei's graphics did not lose its charm, and is steadily improving without becoming unrecognisable because of the progress made in seven league strides

conclusion
I already promised myself I would never again read ongoings. it hurts too much when you have no access to fresh chapters or at least volumes. 'Kaichou wa Maid-sama' and 'Dantalian no Shoka' were enough for me to learn this lesson. and still I watched 'Tegamibachi' thus stepping on the same rake again. this time my reasoning was - I would not want to read manga after such a long anime, both if it turns out to be good and bad. a good anime would provide me with enough pleasure, and a bad anime would not make me interested in the original. oh how silly I was. now I have to wait patiently for the next volumes to be scanned. on one hand I am truly tired after more than a month of living with Tegamibachi, but you cannot imagine how bad I feel now to be parting with this amazing work. amazing, amazing, amazing!

p. s. wonder if I go too far in speculating if I notice that Ray Attlee also looks like an Albisian and her parents are said to have been promoted after the Day of Flicker