Its no secret that I have some mixed feelings about Arina Tanemura as a mangaka. While Ive enjoyed almost everything Ive read by her theres usually a ton of issues. Full Moon was rushed and badly executed Phantom Thief Jeanne was good but had a ton of romanticized sexual assault and The Gentlemens Alliance Cross was very clearly just Tanemura making up random things as she went. Sakurahime is her last work to be published in Ribon and its nowhere near as famous as the other three series I mentioned. But Sakurahime is also my favorite of her works by a long shot. Sakura is an isolated princess betrothed to Prince Oura a man shes never seen and instructed to never gaze at the full moon. When the princes emissary comes to bring Sakura to her betrothed she hatches a plan to escape and gazes at the full moon in the sky only to be attacked by a demon. It is revealed that Sakura is the granddaughter of Princess Kaguya the princess from the moon who fought the demons known as youko with her mystical sword. However Sakura herself isnt too different from the youko she must fight especially when her soul symbol her destiny is destroy. Sakurahime explores love and life. Various characters discover their feelings of love as well as what they intend to live for. Many of the characters are trying to find their purpose and reason for living and the majority connect it to platonic familial and romantic love. These characters are lonely and traumatized often with their most precious things taken from them. When something you treasure is gone how do you find the drive to keep going? Why were we born? What purpose do we have? These questions are what the characters are constantly asking. Sakura is very lonely and isolated groomed to eventually become emotionally dependent on the prince she would one day marry. Shes very attached to Aoba Aoba is Prince Ouras real name and cant seem to let him go because of what he represents to her. She hates him because he never was there for her despite her loneliness never visiting never allowing her to leave her palace. And yet she loves him because his letters were what kept her sane. They represented the outside world the fact that someone would one day send for her someone cared enough to send her letters. Her beloved family is gone and Aoba and a few handmaidens are all she has in her life. And for Sakura becoming a magical girl with monster slaying powers is more of a curse than a blessing. Shes immortal but immortality is painful. She can die but she comes back to life with the memories and pain that came from dying. Moon people and youko the demons she fights arent so different. If Sakura isnt careful she will become the very thing she fights and kills with her sword. She also lives as halfmoon person and half human forced to choose a side though both sides are more than willing to manipulate her to join them. In the end she must choose between the two people most precious to her from her past and present. Aoba was actually a very boring character though I preferred him to the vast majority of Arina Tanemura love interests since hes not as prone to sexual harassment and is generally respectful. Of course there will be sexual harassment but its to be expected from Arina Tanemura at this point. I think the only full series Ive read from her that doesnt have it is I.O.N which is one volume. Anyways Aoba is a nice guy with his own tortured past and secrets. Hes a charismatic leader but there isnt much else to him. The other male characters were much more interesting to me. Sakuras companions include Asagiri a small spirit with a dark secret Kohaku a clumsy but skilled ninja aiming to become the head of her village and Hayate Kohakus childhood friend who Kohaku accidentally turned into a frog. Theres also Fujimurasaki Aobas uncle on her side but I hate him Ill explain later. All these characters are properly fleshed out and have their own internal struggles and torments. Asagiri struggles to find a reason to live burdened by her own darkness. Kohaku has her ambitions drive to live up to her familys expectations and guilt for what she did to Hayate. And Hayate I actually didnt like him at first. Hes Kohakus voice of reason but he was also quite pushy with her and a bit of a pervert character Im not a fan of those since they tend to push boundaries a lot. However its his bond with another character and his struggle with his own morals and empathy that made me come to love him. He grows tremendously over the course of the story. One thing I noticed was that the antagonists of the series were all connected to one of Sakuras allies in some way and their bonds affected their decisions and shaped their choices which ties into the themes of love and the eventual answer to the question Why were we born? The antagonists were equally sympathetic wellconstructed and interesting except for maybe one who was a bit weaker and annoyed me. My personal favorite was Rurijo a member of the moon clan but not quite. Shes a sentient stone in a makeshift body of wood and leaves made by the main antagonist in the image of Sakura. She struggles with her own identity aware that shes simply a substitute for the real Sakura. She doesnt get the love and recognition she craves from her master an immortal whose life she could never drain someone who gave her companionship when she had no one. She hates Sakura for being the person she was modeled after the person her master loved most. Rurijo feels like as long as Sakura exists she can never have her own identity. She will always remain her substitute. I find it interesting how the two are complete opposites as Rurijo is far more aggressive and freespirited than Sakura but the two are both manipulated through their loneliness. I appreciated her arc about forming relationships and healthy attachments to people who care for her and show empathy even though the ending really undermined that with some stuff Arina Tanemura pulled out of nowhere. It was frustrating because of how it took away the impact of Rurijos struggle for agency. Im spoiler tagging my discussion of the main antagonist because I want to avoid major plot spoilers. The ending was interesting and thematically relevant. I loved most of the stuff that happened in the ending and found it to be one of the most fitting endings I have seen for a series. However some things made no sense and Arina Tanemura definitely pulled some stuff out of nowhere. I wish Princess Kaguya as a character was elaborated on more since I never really figured out why the antagonists wanted to revive her or how they knew she would be on their side. But my biggest issues are with how Enju the main antagonist was written. The only other thing I got really annoyed with was just how Sakura was 14. Tanemura could have made her 16 and nothing would change and the story would be less weird. Aoba her love interest is 17 which isnt the worst possible age gap since theyd be in high school together and a lot of weird illegal stuff happened in that time period but its still weird to think about. Despite the age difference I do feel like theyre better than most Tanemura couples even though the discussion of sex was kind of weird given how young she was. And Fujimuraski Aobas uncle is also in love with Sakura and hes the second male lead and he sexually assaults her at one point. Aoba is 3 years older than Sakura and hes the most appropriate love interest for her. His actual uncle who is an adult man has feelings for a 14yearold girl he barely knows right off the bat. Its so... ugh. I hated him and Tanemura had the audacity to call him the most purehearted character in the series. The art is typical Tanemura fare. The outfits are beautiful and I particularly adored Sakuras moon princess outfit for combat. Its my favorite magical girl transformation outfit in general from Tanemuras works. The characters could be a bit samey at times but I was generally able to tell them apart. The eyes are also a bit bigger than the Tanemura norm which was not as appealing to me personally as some of her other stuff. Her eyes were already huge we dont need even bigger ones. Overall I enjoyed this manga a lot even though I feel like some of the stuff at the end was poorly executed mostly revolving around Enju. I did like the way the manga ended other than the Enju stuff and found it fitting. The story explores and utilizes its huge cast to its full potential and I never felt like a single character was wasted it reminds me of Pandora Hearts in that regard. If anyone is a fan of Arina Tanemura or magical girls I strongly recommend Sakurahime.