Hakase Mizuki Present BA_KU is from (of course) Hakase Mizuki, the creator of Demon Flowers: Kuruizaki no Hana and The Demon Ororon.  This graphic novel (or tankoubon) contains two novellas – one divided into three stories and the other divided into two short stories.

In the novella, BAKU, a young man named Takeshi learns that he is “The Baku,” a spirit that devours people’s nightmares.  This discovery leads him down a path of twisted history of a lost family seeking reunion and a murderous rival who wants to devour Takeshi’s flesh in order to absorb the Baku’s power.

In novella, Mephisto, we meet the title character – known as either Mephisto or “Mephist.”  He has the power to lead ghosts from this world into the next, but when he encounters the ghost of a female college student who supposedly killed herself, Mephist can’t bring himself to just send her away.

In the second part of the Mephisto novella, a short story entitled, Nana, the title character is a diminutive girl who is part of Mephist’s family.  Nana finds a lost doll determined to be reunited with its owner.  The doll, named Francoise, is endowed with its own spirit, a spirit that can’t rest until she finds her owner, but will her owner be as anxious for a reunion?

THE LOWDOWN:  Mizuki’s stylish art remains a fixture in this collection of edgy, gothic fantasy.  The mixture of curvaceous lines and slinky, supernatural characters is occasionally intoxicating.  The themes present in Demon Flowers:  the intense devotion to family, the threat of the past coming back, and the notion that eating a person gives the diner his meal’s powers are all present.  Here, Mizuki pours on the poignancy and sentiment, and sometimes they ring true.

POSSIBLE AUDIENCE:  Fans of supernatural and gothic romance will find that this is the comic for them.

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Shop BAKU at the Amazon aStore.

Read the review of Demon Flowers, Vol. 1.