Back in April, I reviewed the first volume of Moare Ohta's Teppu—one of three initial offerings from the newly established Kodansha Print Club program. While I was thrilled to hold a copy of Ohta's underground classic in my hands, the quality of that print-on-demand release left me wanting. After a few months of radio silence, Kodansha USA announced at SDCC 2025 that they had another round of Print Club releases on the way in early August. Namely, the second volumes of Teppu, Fujimono's Love, That's an Understatement, and the topic of this review, Narumi Shigematsu's Blade Girl.

Looking at the title alone, some readers might be led to believe that Blade Girl is yet another ho-hum fantasy manga—oh boy, that's far from the case. In just two volumes, Shigematsu surprises with a rock-solid shoujo sports story that's taken a couple of notes from one of the genre's greatest hits.

The opening pages of Blade Girl's first volume introduce the reader to Rin—a morose 16-year-old who's been understandably struggling to make sense of her life following the loss of her right leg. However, she's even more frustrated with the clunky and painful-to-use prosthetic leg she's been trying to wrap her head around. Worried that the fit of Rin's prosthesis might be causing her unnecessary pain, her physical therapist takes her to visit a master prosthetist who's set up shop in a nearby training center.

As soon as she walks in the door, Rin is at a loss for words when she encounters the Blade Runners—a group of athletes who use prosthetic running blades to zoom down the track. But instead of finding solidarity with runners, Rin is insulted by how matter-of-fact they are while discussing their own disabilities. This is an understandable reaction, as she's a kid who is still trying her best to come to terms with a reality her peers have seemingly made a degree of peace with.

However, the teen's tune starts to change when she meets Kazami—a taciturn prosthetist who aims to surpass all athletes without disabilities by developing his own state-of-the-art running blades. Even though he's a bit brusque in their first meeting, Kazami manages to convince Rin that her life is far from over. With a new lease on life, Rin takes up running while figuring out how to better use her prosthetics on and off the track. In the process of competing, testing Kazami's blade, and joining her school's track team, the young runner also comes across Kei. This graceful upperclassman isn't exactly tactful at first, but she gradually helps Rin improve her running form and accept her prosthesis as a part of herself.

For readers who know their classic sports stories, they might find a handful of parallels to be drawn between Blade Girl and Sumika Yamamoto's Aim for the Ace! I started noticing these similarities as soon as Kazami walked onto the page. Kazami's stoic demeanor, his relationship with his pupil, and motivations deeply mirror those of Ace's Demon Coach, Jin Munakata. Similar to Munakata's goal of establishing power tennis in Japan with Hiromi, Kazami aims to have Rin surpass all limits while running his blade. The broad strokes of Ace can be felt in the sports side of Blade Girl, but those elements feel as if Shigematsu is smartly taking notes from one of the greats rather than simply retreading them.

This is most strongly felt in Blade Girl's dedication to doing right by the community of athletes it shines a light on. In her acknowledgments, the author gives credit to a whole host of running, disability, and prosthetics experts who helped her get this story right. It's very much the same case on the Kodansha USA side of the production, with authenticity reader Sarah Sunfire brought in to ensure that this level of care was maintained in localization.

This effort is greatly appreciated as Rin deals with a fair bit of internalized and external ableism throughout both volumes. A less skilled set of editorial hands would most likely lose the nuance being portrayed. Between Blade Girl, Spacewalking With You, and Boys Run the Riot, I've been floored regularly with how well Kodansha USA rises to the occasion when that extra bit of care is needed.

As part of the Kodansha Print Club's second run, I've found these volumes of Blade Girl to be more dialed-in when compared to Teppu's first volume. By the way, this is much the same for Teppu's second volume as well. The unflattering warble of darker tones is still present here, but it's much less noticeable this time around. Unless it's an issue that can be worked out as the program continues, there's a chance that this warble could simply be an inherent quirk of on-demand printing.

Though the pages themselves are a tad thinner and less opaque than before, they're way more satisfying to flip through—like newspaper stock. Upon reflection, the pages of Teppu Volume 1 felt a bit like printer paper. It wasn't bad per se, but those pages were a touch stiff. Additionally, it appears as if the size of these Print Club volumes has been slightly reduced since the program's first outing. This change is fine by me, but it is a little jarring for readers who've been keeping up with these releases.

The only real glaring issue I had with Blade Girl revolves around my copy of the first volume—it arrived yellowed. Now, yellowed manga isn't uncommon when searching for certain titles on the secondhand market, but not something I'd expect on a new release. According to printing information on the inner cover and my initial order info, these volumes were seemingly printed at the same time. This may have been a fluke, but it is still a bit concerning when taking consistency into consideration

Looking at the editorial nuts and bolts of these releases, translator Megan Turner and editor Sage Einarsen wonderfully spin Shigematsu's sport tale into a new language. Particularly, I loved when the duo busted out “MacGyver” as a verb at the end of Volume 1 to best describe how Rin's team modifies her socket for use with a racing blade. Meanwhile, Aiden Clarke goes for the gold with a combination of dynamic sound effects and understated yet emotion-filled lettering.

Finally, as a three-volume series, I believe a regular print run omnibus would've best served Blade Girl. But after looking at both this and Teppu, I'm starting to think that a longer sports series would be a perfect fit for the Print Club's mission. Regardless, Blade Girl is the strongest of the program's offerings so far and a rock-solid sports story to boot. Needless to say, I'm looking forward to seeing how the series wraps up in the near future!