Aug 24, 2019
Sumomomo Momomo: Chijou Saikyou no Yome (World's Strongest Bride) is the first manga written by Ohtaka Shinobu, the creator of Magi (more famous), its span was 5 years with a total of 92 chapters (+4 extra chapters added at the end of some volumes), 12 volumes, from 2004 till 2009.
Following the synopsis, it's about a guy who gets a sudden visit from a martial arts cute girl who proclaims that they should married and live happily ever after with healthy children, the hook of the story is simple: our main boy character, Inuzuka Koushi, doesn't want to do martial arts and hates girls that do
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martial arts and our main girl, Kuzuryuu Momoko, thinks that Koushi is a great martial artist and she is not worthy of him. What we get is the "misadventures" of Momoko in trying to convince Koushi to become her husband (they are teenagers in high school). The overall atmosphere of the manga is lighthearted, with comedy elements, funny jokes. The action scenes and the fights are comedic in the beginning with Momoko one punching everyone, but after all this, we get some fights filled with drama and interesting reasons and motivations. Rinse and repeat and that's "SumoMomo".
It's not like it wasn't done before, in fact, this manga is a cliche on top of another cliche, we have martial artists, regular high school main character, and your regular high school comedy high jinks, our main guy isn't interested in girls whatsoever, he wants to study, and his everyday life is destroyed by the appearance of Momoko. The audience will be probably shocked at why doesn't Koushi accept Momoko. She's almost perfect. Careful and attentive, makes lunch for him, wants to do ecchi things with him, what's wrong with him?
In the early chapters, the manga has a simple plot which will develop in the middle and later chapters, we still have the high school comedy inserted, now with some martial arts fights. We will get new friends for our mains and new characters to the story, of course filled with cliche elements. The battles will be dramatic too, kinda like Gintama serious arcs style.
The work isn't harem per se, there are girls (not many) that want to be the main guy's girlfriend but they don't fight for his attention like in your usual harem ecchi comedy (Sekirei, DxD), he has some moments with them, some jealousy appears and that's it. And he will make a clear statement as to who's the girl he loves. I think that's great, that we won't have to wait for the final chapter to see Koushi choosing a girl out of nowhere.
The type of humor used is:
- regarding the characters (incredible funny faces, over reactions, dumb characters doing dumb things)
- misunderstandings
- jokes (The manga has even sexual jokes, stuff about losing virginity, sex positions, if you are a fan of these kinky jokes you will like it)
The manga keeps its consistency till the end, we get jokes, I laughed at every chapter, even the serious chapters had some funny scenes there, but the fight intensity is still kept untouched. Cliche alert: we get a some sort of a tournament arc (it lasts 1 volume I guess), a school sports festival arc (1 volume), a training arc (very short) and not a final duel but an ultimate duel.
About the art, I'm no expert but I draw a little, I read manga and watch anime. The first chapters are not that impressive, the characters look cute, the backgrounds are very plain and the shots are simple, looked like the manga was made in a hurry. The author was 22 when she began serializing this manga, that's impressive, there is talent there but we don't see much.
In the second half (aprox) of the manga though, the creator starts to show her talent, the character expressions are exaggerated over the top for the comedic scenes and enhanced in the serious scenes, the background too looks amazing, the buildings, the roads, the school, I felt like I was in that city, I was walking the same roads as the characters, that's the atmosphere that it gave me, so different feel than the first part when I only laughed at the ridiculous shenanigans.
The manga isn't over the top ecchi but we get some sexy shots from time to time of Momoko and another girl (which is the walking ecchi fanservice girl cliche), we get some panty shots (not that many and not that in your face), some cleavages (keep in mind that our main girl is short and has s small chest, so we get the ecchi fanservice from other girls), if you are a girl you won't have problems reading this if you dislike ecchi.
The characters were your regular cliche:
main strong girl
wimp annoying main guy
otaku stupid guy
girl who wants to revive her clan (where did we hear that before?)
Sexy glasses girl class-rep
dumb muscle guy
evil villains
So, what makes them good in the manga it's the atmosphere, all of them have interesting backstories (they don't last chapters, they're short) and with each passing of a chapter, they learn something new. Sometimes they argue but when they make up, they remember what they did that annoyed the other one. We have great character development, even our main guy who's a wimp, who only cares about studying will learn to like/enjoy his life, his friends, Momoko. Imagine the Naruto story: a boy wants to become strong so after 70ish volumes he becomes. Koushi wants a normal life but because of some circumstances, he will be obliged to fight. Again, cliche alert! If he'll develop that strong a fighter it's up to the future reader to find out because, cliche as this is, the author didn't make a villain so over powered that Koushi has to become even more over powered in order to beat him. It will look too ridiculous.
Koushi is our main guy, a wimp and he only want to study, he hates Momoko because she disturbs his everyday life, he doesn't want to be involved in the martial arts world (but he can't avoid it), he's not Ikari Shinji or Amano Yukiteru level, he's a coward but there is room for chance. He's very rude with Momoko but it's kinda understanding for me. She wants to marry him and she's obnoxious at the beginning, she lives at his house too. People who he meets and stuff that happen really change him for the good I think.
Momoko is your one dimensional perfect girlfriend, strong too, as the title suggests, she is the strongest girl on Earth, trained in the mountains from a young age with her dad, she now masters the perfect martial arts skills. She's kinda like Gasai Yuno except the killing stuff, Momoko will stalk Koushi, will try to go to bed with him, will cook for him. Why is she so obsessed with Koushi? We get the answer in the first pages of the first volume and it's not a stupid reason, her feelings grew in time so when she met Koushi at the beginning of our story, it's not a "plot hole" her love for him.
Momoko and Koushi encounter some great friends along the way and they bond great, they help each other and do things together, each one of them has a different dream, a different personality, that works great for the manga because with only Momoko and Koushi, it would have been boring.
As for the villains, they too have great backstories and they do have motivations for their actions, they're not just evil, end of story. If you empathize with them it's up to the reader, I very much loved them. At the beginning they look like pricks but then, I saw them as humans, fighting for their dreams, whatever dream one had.
The story is concluded as the author wanted, she even wrote that at the end of volume 12, there aren't any loose ends, maybe the couples weren't formed in your face but the ending was correct.
I enjoyed it a lot because it catered to me perfectly,
cute and hot girls
mild ecchi fanservice
over the top fights with characters shooting lasers outta their eyes or making a kamehameha look a like
over the top comedy, high school shenanigans
sex jokes
main character who's a wimp but he doesn't cry or runs away, he's a logical person and he can change depending of his environment
It was a weird love story filled with friendship, I liked all the characters, the bad guys too, and even if my ship didn't sail, I respected the ending and I understood why the final couple was as it was. The comedy was great for me, I like kinky jokes and misunderstandings, I'm a simple guy and the action scenes filled with drama glued my eyes to this manga. It was a perfect past time for me, after a long hard day at work, I read this and it really calmed me down. There are no major secrets or intricate conspiracies, I tied up the knots perfectly fine on my own, the dialogue was easy, it took me 20 minutes to read 2 chapters (I read 2 chapters a week) and I'm a slow reader, the plot is simple and concise. I recommend this to all the readers that like lighthearted action within a high school setting sprinkled with some drama and comedy.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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