The Fall 2024 Manga Guide

Red River

What's It About? 

Yuri, a modern teenager, is transported to ancient Anatolia as part of a scheme by the evil Nakia, queen of the Hittites. Only the intervention of Nakia's stepson, Prince Kail, saves Yuri from the queen's bloodthirsty intentions. As an unintended consequence of the prince's actions, the people of Anatolia embrace Yuri as the incarnation of the great war goddess Ishtar.

Finding herself entangled in the social and political drama of a fractured royal family, Yuri begins to maneuver through their manipulations and learn how to survive while stuck deep in the past.

Red River has a story and art by Chie Shinohara, with English translation by Yuko Sawada, and edited by Lance Caselman. This volume was lettered by Mark McMurray. Published by Viz Media (October 15, 2024).

Content Warning: Depiction of sexual assault

Is It Worth Reading?

I love 1990s shoujo manga – I grew up on it. Likewise, I adore Chie Shinohara's work, and I've always been sad that only Red River ever came out in English; both Ao no Fūin and Mizu no Sumu Hana are also excellent. That said, I also recognize that some aspects of Shinohara's works, and Red River in particular, are very much of their time and don't necessarily hold up today. So much as I love this series and am excited that it's getting a re-release, I need to say that this first omnibus is just full of sexual assault, sometimes by the romantic lead, Kail.

If you can deal with that, this is an excellent book. The story follows Yuri, a regular Japanese teenager, who is somehow targeted as a sacrifice by the queen of ancient Hattusa, a Hittite city in what is now Turkiye. Queen Nakia, who is determined to see her son, the youngest prince of the empire, on the throne, reaches through space and time to snatch Yuri into the past, where she intends to kill her. Yuri escapes from Nakia's clutches and is taken in by Kail, the third prince, who through the magic power of his tongue in her mouth grants Yuri the ability to speak the local language. Yuri is completely at sea in this B.C.E. world. She ends up posing as Kail's concubine and the avatar of the goddess Ishtar – the only way to keep Nakia's claws off of her.

The story is a time travel delight. Shinohara has done research (when I saw Hittite swords in a museum after first reading the series, I knew exactly what they were without reading the signs.) Yuri's headstrong qualities are balanced by her confusion and upset at having been wrenched away from her time. Her unsettled emotions are further thrown off by Kail himself, who is certainly not shy about how he feels about her. (At least, on a physical level.) Her new world is rife with danger to the point where there's barely room to breathe in the story, something that's particularly apparent in this omnibus compilation of the first three books in the series. Yuri is whisked from one danger to the next, with Nakia's insidious power – the control of water – inescapably around every corner. It's high drama, a war story, and a palace melodrama all in one, and it is addictive.

There are a few oddities in this book, the main one being that Yuri, who was taken from 1995, keeps saying that she's from the “twenty-first” century. Background characters are not drawn by Shinohara in an oddly apparent way, and Kail's hair is nearly a mullet, which is unfortunate. Despite being very much of its time in some ways, Red River is a story that holds up. It's intense and hard to put down, and that's true of this re-read of a story I've read many times before.

Hey, if you have the cash and are even slightly interested, can you promise me you'll pick up Red River? I promise it's good, and if Viz sees that they can make money on re-releases of classic shoujo manga, maybe they'll do more. Like Basara, From Far Away, or Please Save My Earth. The 90s were a golden age of fantasy adventure shoujo manga and now that I'm an adult with a paycheck, I'd like more opportunities to collect the series that came out when I was a broke teenager.

As you may have guessed, this isn't my first go-around with Red River. I read it when Viz released it when I was in high school, huddled on the floor of my local Borders. The story of a modern (or modern-ish, considering the series was already nine years old at that point) Japanese teenager getting pulled back three thousand years in time to the Hittite Empire pulled me in back then, and a decade later, it's pulling me in again. Chie Shinohara melds historical fiction with modern romance as Yuri finds herself trapped and unable to go home at the hands of the ambitious Queen Nakia, who is scheming to use her as a sacrifice to ensure her young son will inherit the throne. To protect her, Prince Kail Mursili pretends to take her on as a concubine, but those feelings can only remain pretend for so long.

The setting is exhaustively researched and while the historical Kail Mursili probably wasn't a wispy, light-skinned blonde like the one in these pages, Shinohara does everything possible to bring Anatolia to life. Allow yourself to melt into the costumes, the food, the architecture. Imagine yourself as Yuri wandering the imperial palace, falling in love with beautiful, jewel-bedecked men in flowing linen and wool. Shinohara's art has a real sensuality that makes me feel like I can almost taste and feel the flavors and textures of the world.

But keep in mind, Red River is a classic bodice-ripper that won't work for everyone. If I didn't already have a pre-formed fondness for it, it might have been too much for me. Yuri spends a lot of time being physically and sexually menaced throughout these three volumes, up to and including crying in fear while a man strips her naked and forces her into bed. There's brutal, graphic violence against children, which may be shocking to audience members who wander in expecting anything resembling modern shoujo.

…Oh jeez, I just realized I've been doing my math wrong and the series isn't 19 years old; it's 30.

Now this is an isekai!

Like many classic manga of the 90s, Chie Shinohara's phenomenal Red River was lost to time, much like Yuri herself. The series was out of print for a dog's age. We're so blessed to have this series brought back to us, especially considering how well it has aged. Yuri's misadventures in the Hittite Empire are filled with intrigue and daring, from Yuri having to navigate court politics to having to fight down a brutal warrior with her wits. There is mystery and surprise around every corner, from the evil Queen Nakia's water magics to the incredible middle-age element that is iron.

Through it all is Yuri herself, desperate to get back home but headstrong enough to fight for justice for the people who put their lives on the line for her. She's just a fifteen-year-old who has to worry about keeping her head on her shoulders and showing courage and ingenuity beyond her years. It's her character that woos the handsome Prince Kail. Maybe Yuri is the incarnation of Ishtar and she does have a lucky star watching over her. Or maybe she's far braver and intelligent than she gives herself credit for. Who's to say?

Yuri's desires to return home get swallowed up fairly quickly (she stops mentioning her boyfriend from the modern era), and for someone so used to modern conveniences, it's a bit weird that she manages to adapt to a world without air conditioning or shampoo as fast as she does. But that's part of the fantasy, isn't it? Being sent to a faraway land and place, falling into a melodramatic tryst with a handsome prince—and being safe through it all, by wit and your hunky Hittite boyfriend.

That last part is what makes Red River such an amazing story, one that still stands above even modern isekai. Yuri is a fish out of water, but she's a quick study and does not rely on some mysterious stat given to her by the RPG God character. Even her familiarity with iron is more of a twist of her modern origins than anything else, astounding to only her bronze-age companions. Her victories are hers—as are her many failures. As an aside: Red River is a lot more violent than you're expecting. Lots of battles, lots of people getting skinned. Be ready for that.

Red River has aged incredibly well as a manga; the biggest flaw is that the Hittites are still drawn as lily-white fantasy shoujo characters. (Given how much we don't know about the Hittites, we at least can afford Shinohara some wiggle room for details like their wardrobe.) I give Red River a strong recommendation, both for fans of classic manga and for folks itching for that next great isekai hit. This one's a treasure, definitely don't miss out.