Ranked #4056

Helen ESP (Manga)

i cant stress enough how much i enjoyed reading this manga.

made by Kigitsu Katsuhisa, the person who made franken fran, you know it will at the very least be interesting.

here, i will tell you in 3 questions if you will like this

do you know who helen keller is?
do you know what exp is?
do you think the two combined could be intresting (keep Kigitsu Katsuhisa in mind)?

if you said yes to all 3, you will enjoy this manga. its highly episodic, which is both a good and bad thing. it makes the story seem longer, and doesn't dwell on things to long, but some people would have liked to see more of that.

i don't want to call anyone out in the review but because it helps, moritheil, as of 26/12/10 just did not get the manga at all. i suggest you read his review too. if you find what he says very agreeable, than this may not be for you. but what he failed to realize was this was a light hearted (at least as light hearted as the author is capable of) and borderline fantasy, not set in the "real" world and meant to be heavy drama.

but there is only one thing that i personally can complain about, and that is the manga only lasts 18 chapters.

and here is a possible spoiler, but in the whole manga, nothing really seams to move forward, or gets resolved, leaving a mildly unsatisfying ending, which is only patched up by the VERY interesting chapter 2 extra. the manga almost feels like it was meant to go on a little longer, but that complaint aside, you are doing yourself a favor boy reading this. read more

There are great works of literature on disability. Rather than focusing only on the helplessness of disabled individuals, they turn into affirmations of life. These works serve as important reminders that it is doing what you can that counts, not lamenting what you can’t do.

Helen ESP, on the other hand, takes ignoring one’s disabilities so literally that it is difficult to say the main character is really handicapped. The title character, Helen, is a blind-deaf-mute ripoff of Helen Keller who uses ESP to sense her surroundings and telepathically hold long conversations with her guide dog about subjects as diverse as spirituality, the human condition, and physics. One might give author Kigitsu Katsuhisa credit for the bizarre novelty of reducing a disability to a fashion statement, except that the “disabled superhero who isn't really disabled” concept has already been done to death elsewhere.

Instead of being shocking but original, Helen ESP is merely tasteless. The struggles of the title character are almost wholly unrelated to those of the average disabled person. Choosing to emphasize a character’s identity as a handicapped person while giving them a power that almost completely negates the handicap is cheating. Worse, it is tantamount to arguing that a handicapped person cannot really be a compelling main character, and their handicap requires supernatural mitigation or compensation in order to make them human.

Comparing Helen ESP to visual novel project Katawa Shoujo leads one inescapably to the conclusion that even 4chan ascribes more depth and meaning to the struggles of the handicapped than author Kigitsu Katsuhisa does. This is truly a shame, because the moral complexity of his earlier work (Franken Fran) suggests a grasp of the subtleties of life. However, in Helen ESP he has opted for the easy way out. The main character’s disabilities turn out to be moe traits akin to generic clumsiness rather than something she must struggle meaningfully against. Indeed there is nothing gained in the series by making her blind-deaf-mute; she might as well simply be a dojikko instead and spare the reader some agony.

Readers desiring a lighthearted romp through ESP with some social commentary should try Apple; for a more serious treatment of teens with psychic powers, consider Zero. Readers who desire a story about a child who can see spirits are encouraged to instead read the opening story arc of Bleach. Helen ESP is not recommended for anyone desirous of a story that relates to real-world disabled persons. read more