Though I'm still a relative novice to manga, I've come to recognize some of the archetypes and trappings, and one of those is the normal person with a magical guardian, as can be found in Inu-Yasha, Oh My Goddess! and several others. Bride of Deimos, which I'm given to understand is an older manga, actually looks like a twist on that formula, as the "guardian" is more of a malicious spirit, and the troubles that he causes for his human charge are of a dark, horrific nature rather than played for slapstick comedy. Ikeda and Ashibe have crafted a story that is almost a horror anthology, with each chapter providing a different horror story, but linked through the common thread of Minako and her "husband" the demon Deimos.
Bride of Deimos reads like a strange cross between Inu-Yasha and Uzumaki, and though I had some trouble getting into the strange relationship of Minako and Deimos, the horror of the stories drew me in. I was particularly taken with the tragedy of "Love in the Fire" and the story of ghostly revenge in "The Poisonous Lily," which are stories where Deimos seems to play a fairly minor role in the whole proceedings. I like Minako better when she is the observer of horror rather than a direct participant in it, and Ikeda definitely has a strong imagination for horror stories. Though the culture is different, the general vibe I get off of the short stories is similar to the Twilight Zone.
However, it is the relationship with Deimos that brings Minako into these stories in the first place, and while that relationship still struck me as quite odd, I have to admit that it has elements of deliberate creepiness to it as well. Deimos has something of a playful trickster nature, not even acknowledging Minako's wishes in his quest to make her his bride, and it's hard not to feel for Minako as the recipient of this unfortunate attention. The story loses a bit of punch when Ikeda and Ashibe introduce the mythological underpinnings of Deimos's love, with the incest theme that appears so often in manga creeping me out on an unintentional level and Deimos's real feelings for Minako robbing him of some of his power and mystery.
The heart of the story, though, is really the horror tales that Minako is exposed to. Unlike Uzumaki, which has some terrifying and grotesque imagery courtesy of Junji Ito, Bride of Deimos is fairly tame. Ashibe's artwork conveys the general nature of what's going on, but his style is a more cartoony and less realistic one, and the actual occurence of gore or scary imagery is pretty rare. The reader always feels a few steps removed from the horror, which seems odd given that Ashibe shows himself capable of doing the grotesque or creepy thing with Tsukiko's attack on Minao or the ominous rock crusher at the end of "The Poisonous Lily."
Bride of Deimos is an odd mixture of genres, with a touch of horror, some twisted romance and an unusual take on the spiritual guardian story that seems common in manga. It's not quite as creepy and scary as the work of Junji Ito, which keeps it from becoming a must-have for me, but it does have some interesting horror elements to it and an intriguing central concept.
