MAGIC KNIGHT RAYEARTH - MANGA
Magic Knight Rayearth is a magical girl manga and anime series created by CLAMP, a team of four female artists and writers whose trademark style is unmistakeable in the characters' large, finely detailed eyes, heavily detailed backgrounds and character designs, and recurring sword & sorcery motifs present in the magical items and mythical emblems sprinkled throughout the world of Cephiro. The two parts of Magic Knight Rayearth were serialized in Nakayoshi from 1993 to 1996 and later compiled into six deluxe size tankouban by Kodansha. As with many of CLAMP's works, the manga was soon after turned into an TV anime series which aired from 1993 to 1994.
Consisting
of 3 volumes of Magic Knight Rayearth and 3 volumes of Magic Knight Rayearth 2, the sequel, the manga moves along very quickly and finishes off villains rapid-fire while giving the main characters a lot less
time to develop than in the anime. However the characters are so finely illustrated
that their expressions clearly reveal their intentions and natures. As well,
the art is very dramatic and exciting, full of gorgeous full page spreads.
The absence of chapter breaks adds to the impression of non-stop action. The
story moves along at a quick pace as the girls achieve more impressive armor
and weapons in their quest to retrieve the mashin ("spirits" or "rune
gods"). The second part of the story, Magic Knight Rayearth 2, diverges significantly from
the anime's second season, which examines both the villains' and "good guys" motives
in much more depth. The ending of the manga reveals a big surprise that is
not explained as clearly in the anime finale.
The manga can be purchased new at Sasuga Japanese Bookstore or secondhand at Japan Book Mart and JPQueen. Covers and ISBN are provided on the Book Data page.
MANGA IN OTHER COUNTRIES
The six volumes of the Magic Knight Rayearth manga have been translated into a number of languages including Spanish, Italian, French, English, and numerous Asian languages. The English version can be purchased online.
CLAMP
MKR was created by a popular and prolific shoujo manga team named CLAMP which consists of the leader, OHKAWA Nanase, who scripts CLAMP's stories, the main illustrator, APAPA Mokona (hmm), and assistants IGARASHI Satsuki and NEKOI Mick. CLAMP is not unusual in consisting of more than one member, since most manga-ka have assistants, but they differ in that the assistants are given full credit and make up part of a consistent team for each of their works. CLAMP has had other members in the past, numbering seven at the time of their first major work, RG Veda. The CLAMP influence can be seen very clearly in such manga as former memeber AKIYAMA Tamayo's Cyber Planet 1999: Hyper Run. While CLAMP is often best known for their darker titles such as RG Veda, X, Tokyo Babylon and Clover (even MKR isn't all light and happiness despite initial appearances), they are equally proficient with cheerful, cutesy manga like Wish, CLAMP School Detectives, Angelic Layer, and the recent smash hit Card Captor Sakura.
CLAMP-NET.COM
- official CLAMP homepage (Japanese)
CLAMP - list of works