Ahiru no Oujisama by Ai Morinaga

Ahiru no Oujisama (Duck Prince) by Ai Morinaga



Genre: Comedy Shojo
Length: 6 Volumes – 22 Chapters plus an extra at the end

Art and story (c) Ai Morinaga

            The art style of this manga is very appealing, with good tone use on the faces and excellent facial differences between the characters. The head shapes are a little generic, and the backgrounds are sparse from time to time, but those are the only downfalls. The bodies have variation and the clothes fit the frames well, even all the silly things are given as much care as the full figures and faces. Its very appealing, though familiar, and the cover really grabs attention at a glance. The eyes have a nice sparkle and show the emotions well, and the hair has nice weight and style.
           The story goes that the ugly duckling became a beautiful swan when he was grown, but Reiichi Shiratori knows that that isn't true in real life, ugly stays ugly and he will never look any different than he already does. To drive home the truth, the girl he likes calls him cute, but only because he reminds her of her very strange looking dog. Yet, when the dog goes missing, Reiichi promises to help find him because he would do anything for the Yumiko-chan who was nice to him when no one else was, no matter her reasons. When he dives in front of a car to save the pet and gets hit, Reiichi asks the fates to make him handsome in his next life. The next thing Reiichi knows, he awakes in a hospital so handsome he looks nothing like the boy he was before! Is this fate, or something much stranger...?

The two funniest jokes, imho, put together for your pleasure.

            This is one of those 'bizarre' shojo manga, where, instead of a full romance plot, strange and wacky things happen instead. Now, I've got nothing against that type I loved Ouran Host Club, what I took offense to was the fact that at the end of all the wackiness everyone got a satisfying ending except for the main character! I read six volumes just to be teased with a will they won't they ending. I liked the art and the jokes, still, the lack of satisfaction though the ending really made my enjoyment plummet at the last chapter. I don't regret reading it, though, I just probably wouldn't read it again, I'm thinking I'll try another manga by this mangaka just to see if I picked the one that is the least comprehensible. Its always a disappointment when the art is just the way you like, but the plot is opposite of that. As far as Ahiru no Oujisama goes, the slap stick sort of runs away with the story too much for it to really be called a good manga, unfortunately, the main character hardly ever learns his lesson or even improves his terrible personality. It seems a lot of chapters start with "I'm such a coward, I need to fix that part of me....!” then something really silly happens and the chapter ends with “I'm such a coward, nothing changed...!” Seeing characters change and evolve is a major point of most stories so when that simply doesn't happen because funny stuff is funny, it detracts from the overall impression. The other thing that really bothered me was the rape, yes, whoa, rape. It was just thrown at you and regarded as another joke, since Reiichi is a man and that means it isn't rape. To be serious, it almost made me quit reading because of how it was so casually allowed (and, spoiler alert: his sister was the one who did it! Even if they are not blood related, incest, ew.). Several manga I've read have thrown the rape card in and I have to say, it just ruins everything for me, especially when it is handled as a joke or as if it is mundane. You've got to wonder when an author needs to use such a method to move the plot off in a separate third direction how the under thought things were, especially when they never give you a good resolution at the end.



2.5/5 Solidly middle ground, not enough plot and too much everything else.