スピリットサークル （1）

Spirit Circle #1

by Satoshi Mizukami, 水上悟志

桶屋風太は中学2年生。平凡な中学生生活だったはずが額に大きな傷のある美少女の転入生・石神鉱子の出現によって一変する事に！　壮大な輪廻転生スペクタクル！

Genres: Manga, Fantasy, Comics, Seinen, Supernatural, Romance, Young Adult

Kindle Edition

First published December 10, 2012

About the author

水上悟志

Reviews

[Selena Pigoni]

I read Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer a few years back, and so when I saw another manga by Mizukami-sensei, I had to pick it up. This did not disappoint. If anything, this one's even more bizarre and heart-wrenching from the get go than the Biscuit Hammer!

Much like Biscuit Hammer, I have no idea where this is going beyond seeing Fuuta's past lives (and maybe see those lives through Ishigami's perspective, I hope!). Even if that's all this is, I would still be happy with that because dang this one's an emotional rollercoaster. It has the same bizarre sense of humor and comedic timing as well as on point dramatic timing.

If you liked Biscuit Hammer, I think you'll like this one, and if you haven't read either, I highly recommend both.

[Juho Pohjalainen]

This girl has absolutely no chill.

[Just]

Spirit Circle is a manga I picked up on a whim, and the synopsis sounded interesting.
It follows two characters who seem to follow each other through their past lives until now. Ishigami is a new girl in Fuutas class and immediately feels attracted to her, but little did he know that Ishigami would come to realise that the scar on his cheek revealed him as her mortal enemy across their many lives.
I thought Spirit Circle lent itself to a pretty interesting story line, but had a number of areas in which I feel it could have been more succinct in what we were viewing. I also found Ishigami a little frustrating throughout our story, in the ways that she couldn’t pick killing Fuuta over helping him almost.
Overall, I wanted to give it a 3.5, but I’ll stick to a 3 here.

[Kristin]

3.5

Spirit Circle is a typical manga tale whose unique twist on the 'reincarnating doomed couple' story is that the tragic pair aren't lovers but sworn enemies. Fuuta and Kouko have met seven times before but only Kouko remembers. She wants to destroy Fuuta and put an end to their curse, but only after the confused Fuuta has remembered what he's done to deserve it.

Satoshi has a clean art style and his designs are distinct enough that characters are instantly recognizable when drawn as their past selves, even when body type, hair, or skin color are different.

[Terrence]

Pretty solid little opening to this series.

Our protagonist is drawn to the new girl in class. Unfortunately, she's got a bone to pick with him... For his past life (make that lives, as he's reincarnated a few times).

The set up of the past lives scenario is definitely more macabre than you might think from the character designs. The story promised to show the protagonist die in every one of his previous lives (I think 7 lives?). In the present, he's having trouble recalling all those previous lives, but with a good whack upside the head with a magical device, he slowly recovers from his memory loss. As you learn more about the past, it'll explain his troubles with the girl he likes in the present.

I'm curious where they'll go with relationship stuff in the present day. It seems he's had varying relationships with the immortals in the different lives.

[rue]

It wasn't exactly a secret that I'm a big fan of this mangaka, but this series of his takes the whole cake. It's my most favorite, most relatable, most personal read yet, especially with all the reincarnation business going on. Satoshi Mizukami always managed to write a both heartwarming and tragic story with so much patience, with each details and twists unfolding slowly into a hard smack to the face.

[Kaleb]

Given my dislike for Mizukami's previous work, Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer, I didn't expect Spirit Circle to be anything special. Glad to say I was horribly wrong! Spirit Circle knocked the wind out of my sails, hitting me with a whirlwind of emotions as it introduces this breathtaking story of reincarnation and reconciling with mistakes made in a past life. The last few pages of this volume nearly brought me to tears. Hope quality remains consistent from here on out.

[Sarah Lou]

It was an interesting premise but sometimes the body swapping parts were a little unclear. Overall it was like a series of short stories within one character. I'd like to know more about the boy and his friends than the story of reincarnation forced out of the protagonist.

Only grip - the rival girl character had a flat personality which was basically'I need to kill you' to the boy throughout the story.

[Sol]

Though not quite as strong as Mizukami's masterpiece, Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer, Spirit Circle does have a similarly extremely satisfying ending. It's also 4 volumes shorter, so I'd recommend readers new to him start with this series. The reincarnation theme was done extremely well, with lots of unexpected relations between reincarnated characters.

[Sesana]

There's an interesting take on reincarnation here: the "doomed couple" that meet in every life aren't lovers, they're enemies. Only one of them remembers, and she wants to finally put an end to their cycle by destroying the other. The art is pretty standard, but at least the faces of the different characters are distinct enough that you can see instantly when one character is another reborn.

[Albert Qian]

a natural follow up to lucifer and the biscuit hammer, another creative premise…has all the heart that the author is known for. the only downsides is that it’s so earnest that at times it can be weighed down by its straightforwardness of the characters. i wish i could give a 4.5 but all in all, it’s worth being called a classic

[Aritra Dasgupta]

The character design here is a little generic and I kept confusing characters but otherwise this was solid. I loved the stories here and they were wonderfully tragic. Philosophical and very adult in sensibility though it has middle graders as its protagonists. Very very good.

[Ryan Johnson]

I don't begrudge anyone having to follow up Biscuit Hammer, but this is fun, cute, and WILDLY original, as I've come to expect from Mizukami. Hasn't quite reached the heights of Biscuit Hammer yet, but there's still a lot of manga to go, and I can't wait to see it unfold.

[Nikolas Totiev]

(THIS IS A REVIEW FOR ALL OF SPIRIT CIRCLE)

A nice story that had many ups and a few downs. 4 of the 7 lifetimes described were excellent storytelling. The rest were ehhhhhh. This manga surprised me but overall the ending was lukewarm

[David Doel]

Paging through this manga before starting it, I did not expect to enjoy it. Perhaps low expectations explains my high score. It is an interesting, well-told story with reasonably good art. I have only one remaining volume.

[Z]

1.75. Read all 6 volumes. Kind of a waste of time it got a little bit interesting in volume five for a bit, but then still ended in kind of a dumb way and I didn’t really care about much of anything at all

[Sarah AK]

I like the idea here, but the execution of it feels very surface level. I want to feel more, and go deeper. I like that it started delving more into the past lives, so I'll give the next volume a go and cross my fingers that it can emotionally hook me (because so far it hasn't).

[Rebecca]

I suspect that there's some sort of religious metaphor lurking in here, what with the prominent roles priests and priestesses play in the past lives.

[Vi]

violent, and yet, goofy and funny.

[Yuiko]

I liked it quite a bit

[Hal Incandenza]

Manga stranissimo, ma ho assolutamente voglia di vedere come finisce! Insomma, un’altra droga, meno male che sono solo sei volumi!

[Luciana Ducceschi]

It's closer to 3.5? But the world building is pretty cool so far.

(Also I somehow completely missed the reincarnation plot line in the summary so that was a cool surprise)

[Simon]

some lame fan service in here, although it wasn't as bad as it was in Biscuit Hammer

the story itself is pretty great tho

[Kayla]

I love this idea, reincarnation is such an interesting theme to explore

[Jeffrey E]

On the cusp of being fantastic

[Tasha Leigh]

This was weird but fun and I may need yo continue the series

[Briana]

interesting concept and after reading the first volume I have more questions than answers. Will continue on to volume 2 to see if the story is worth finishing.

[Squilvia]

I was skeptical at first because of the art style, but I really liked the story.

[marcia]

Good start. I'm invested! That said, I have a bone to pick with how the story's being told. So far, we're only seeing the past lives from Fuuta's perspective. Kouko's barely present in either of them. If Kouko wants Fuuta to understand why she hates him so much, shouldn't the past lives be from her point of view?

[Pete]

Infinitely prolonging my life defiles it. The ephemeral emotions and moments (in other words, experiences) in life are so special because of their rarity.

Love and embrace this wonderful life in those brief moments that you are afforded.

-
An interesting bit from future scenario in which brains are sustained for an eternity of dreaming after the physical bodies have reached their limits:

"Can those who make no progress say that they are alive?" The non-living continue dreaming for eternity. But is dreaming the same as living? If they cannot pick up their child, enjoy baked goods, or spend time with their loved ones. To me, that is suffering. Dreaming endlessly of the past or future that will never be here again.

Embrace the absurd. The end (death) is imminent. Make the most of now.