Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Tale - Mallory Reaves

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Author: Mallory Reaves

Illustrator: Studio Dice, Gabriella Sinopoli
Genre: Manga, Retelling.
Rating: 3.25 stars.

Okay, first things first. This is based on Disney’s live-action version of “Beauty and the Beast” released in 2017. (I’m a fan of the original Disney animated movie released in 1991 but the 2017 version is pretty good too.)

I don’t need to sum up the story this time, right? Everyone knows “Beauty and the Beast”. This is a faithful rendition of the original “tale as old as time”. To a great extent, having familiarity with the movies will help you appreciate the plot better because there are a couple of abrupt scene changes and skips in the narrative. Of course, if you know the original fairy tale, that would help too. But the movie will make a difference to your experience.

I’ll focus mainly on the manga aspect of this book. This is part of a two-volume manga series which was originally released in 2017, just after the movie. This latest edition is the full colour version of the original B&W manga. (Obvious then that this is aimed at the Western audience. Japanese manga is almost always in B&W.) The colouring for the two books has been done in two distinct styles, to represent the personality of its lead characters. This version, which comes to us from Belle’s point of view, is painted in a style inspired from shoujo anime (manga aimed at young girls.) Thus the colours are bright and quite fluid. They don’t hit your eyes by being very flashy. They suit Belle’s story perfectly.

The illustrations are wonderful, drawn in typical anime style. Beauty especially is a joy to behold. However, some of the panels (or koma) are blurry. This spoils the effect of the overall illustrations. There are a couple of speech bubbles where the script isn’t in English. I am not sure if this is a problem only in the ARC version.

At the same time, the manga in the book isn’t consistent. Traditionally, manga stories are read from right to left and from top to bottom, in the same way as Japanese writing. However, this book mixes this up many times. So some pages come in the traditional order while some other pages are in the Western left-to-right order. This becomes confusing while reading. Either way would have been fine by me; having both is what creates the problem.

Overall, I did like this manga, but not as much as I had expected. I’d rather watch the movie again instead. I am yet to read the second book in this series, which comes from the point of view of the much misunderstood Beast. I’m looking forward to that one as it would be a perspective not seen in the movies. Let’s hope that book goes better.

My thanks to TOKYOPOP and NetGalley for the DRC of “Disney Manga: Beauty and the Beast - Belle's Tale (Full-Color Edition)”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.

UPDATE: I did like Beast's tale much better. To read my review for that book, click HERE.

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