Miss Ruki by Fumiko Takano Review

Miss Ruki was a comic strip in the Japanese women’s magazine Hanako which was serialised from 1988 to 1992 - this edition collects all of the strips that were published. It’s about a young woman called Ruki and her best friend Ecchan as they go about their lives as single women in Tokyo. It’s very… “Japanese”. In the popular media representation of Japanese people sense. As calm, quiet, sensible people who go about their lives calmly, quietly and sensibly, but with the occasional quirk to their days.

I enjoy slice of life comics probably more than the next guy but, even so, I found Miss Ruki to be way too mundane. One strip - these are almost all 16 panels long too, 8 panels a page - has Ruki and Ecchan go sale shopping. Another strip has them play polo with friends. One strip is about her enjoying a bath, another about her doing laundry. There’s one strip where she drops a rice cracker while cycling. How is that its own strip?!

I like the character of Miss Ruki. She does her own thing and doesn’t concern herself with fashion or whatever society dictates - ie. get married, raise a family, etc. - and in that sense it feels very contemporary, rather than being a 30+ year old comic; this is how a lot of Japanese women choose to live these days (hence the panic over the declining birth rate in that country).

I can see why readers enjoyed her so much. Considering the background of the time, when Japan’s economy was booming and consumerism was rife, Ruki - in contrast to her more career/men/spending-minded friend Ecchan - is all about living life on her terms, at her speed. Reading the essay on Fumiko Takano included in this book, it sounds like Ruki and her creator have a lot in common - despite being a successful mangaka, Takano publishes sparingly, only when she feels like it, rather than working herself into an early grave.

I just needed more to the comics than I got here. I didn’t need Dragon Ball, but stuff has to happen in the strips - it’s not enough for Ruki to trip over and smile, or for the two friends to get dressed up to go out, and that be the whole story. Fumiko Takano’s Miss Ruki comics are well-made and kinda charming in their own way, but definitely don’t expect to be even mildly entertained by these anodyne, almost anti, stories.