TIME STRANGER KYOKO by Arina Tanemura was only 3 volumes long, so I was able to finish it rather quickly. I usually enjoy Arina Tanemura’s work and art style so the manga was definitely enjoyable. My only issue was that it felt rushed – which I think it was. I believe I read that Arina Tanemura was either working on something else or dealing with personal issues at the time so it didn’t end the way she’d have liked it to. That makes sense, because the ending was.. rushed and weird.
Also I feel like there were a lot of characters that just really didn’t get the amount of attention they needed. Each character was interesting, so I’m sad about that. The third book has a beautiful cover with 12 characters that were important to the story but I feel like you really only get to know three of them. Too much was shoved into these three books. I like short manga series a lot, but Time Stranger Kyoko definitely could have been stretched out into a few more books.
What would be cool is if Time Stranger Kyoko had been developed into a 30 episode-ish anime, because it had a really good story and cool concept but it really wasn’t explained and deserved more. There was an OVA made in 2001 based off of one of Time Stranger Kyoko’s side characters, Chocola. (I am going to have to give this a watch!)
[Spoilers past this point]
Anyway, here’s how it ends. After Kyoko goes on her quest to find the eleven strangers to awaken Ui, you find out she’s actually no Ui’s sister or a princess at all. Ui was a hologram. Kyoko was using Ui’s body for the time being. She was actually the daughter of Chronos, the God of Time or something like that. The time had come for Kyoko to take his place as the God of time but she was too in love with her hot body guard, Sakataki Jin. Her body guard was also in love with her and managed to somehow get to end of time to find her. Kyoko’s REAL dad, Chronos, says it’s fine if she goes back and enjoys Earth for a while, but Kyoko doesn’t actually have a body since Ui is awake now and using her body. It just so happens the Earth King, Kyoko’s fake dad, had a body saved for her. His wife’s. Her adoptive mom’s. What even. Anyway, Kyoko hops into that body, and her and Sakataki Jin date. The ending makes for a lot of questions – what happens when she actually has to be the Time God? Do they break up? Why did the Earth King send her on this long ass quest to awaken Ui when he could have just told her the truth?
Yeah. The ending was rushed.
Anyway, hope you enjoyed my thrilling review of Time Stranger Kyoko. Even if it wasn’t 10/10, I do enjoy Arina Tanemura’s work and I can’t wait for the next Idol Dreams book.
TCG fairy 