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Comic Review: Shinobi: Ninja Princess #1
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Shinobi: Ninja Princess #1 review header
Shinobi: Ninja Princess #1
Written/created/illustrated/colored by Martheus Wade
Color Assists by Marvin Cheveallier
Copy edit by Kevin L. Williams
Variant cover by Tressina Bowling
Variant cover colors by Janet Wade
Action Lab Entertainment
Release Date: August 27, 2014
Cover Price: $3.99

In Shinobi: Ninja Princess we’re introduced to Shianndrea and her squadmates: Megumi and Hamasuke. One day they’re ordered to go on mission to spy on the rival Azumi Ninja clan by their master.

After finally reaching their destination, they overhear that the evil Emperor, Shianndrea’s father, recently ordered the Azumi Clan the to capture and deliver her to him. The hot-headed Hamasuke decides to go deeper into enemy territory to find out their plans to take Shianndrea, and now it’s up to her to save him from taking on more than he can chew.

The art is decent, and it’s colored well, but on some panels it feels a bit flat. As for the story, I have to be harsh here, but the story is a tad plain for me. It feels generic, and the characters don’t really have depth to them. I’ll cut them a tiny bit of slack, since it’s the first issue and the first issue doesn’t always go off without a hitch. I certainly didn’t hate it, that’s for sure. I think it has potential, it’s just a bit hidden.

I do have two main issues though. I would have personally liked a little more exposition in this chapter. Now, maybe later chapters will fill in gaps, but with just in this chapter alone, the lack of some details like setting, groups, and other little things make it hard for me to immerse myself. Here’s an example: on the first page, we’re tossed into new Tokyo with robot ninjas. That’s it for anything looking futuristic. The rest looks like it’s set in the feudal era without any explanation for the discrepancy or why the characters are on the run from the evil emperor, and we’re not even given the name of the organization that Shianndrea is part of.

And the second thing is the pacing. it feels like the first chapter ends too early and without any suspense. I feel like there should be a bit of build up for the next issue.

There is also a third thing that really bugged me though. A Kunai is thrown at a wall and the wall explodes, for no reason. At no point are we given any explanation for this. The Kunai didn’t hit a candle and cause it to fall into gunpowder, or hit a self destruct button or something; we weren’t even told if the Kunai had one of those exploding magic seals that the ones from Naruto had all the time. The wall just explodes. For no reason.

Now this isn’t to say this is a bad comic. It’s probably because I’m not in the target audience. This comic is marketed at kids and teens. Though after reading it, I’d have to say it feels more kid oriented than to teens, so they might like it more. Now, I’m not saying kids are dumb, they’re clever, but at that age, we were a lot more forgiving about things like exposition, pacing, and characterization. We’d just focus on the fact it’s about ninjas fighting and enjoy it for what it is.

So taking that into account, I’d say if you’ve got a kid, say 6-8, possibly even 10 years old, and they’re into ninjas and you want to get them away from the TV to read a bit, this might be something to look into.

Shinobi: Ninja Princess #1 cover

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