Yasuhiro Fukuda

It's the final volume of Cells at Work! Baby, which means it's time for the moment readers of this series likely saw coming since F's informational box changed in volume 2, or possibly even as early as volume 1 and the start of pulmonary circulation. But first, we have food allergies.

Although it's not that funny from the outside (I have a niece who has had eczema due to food allergies pretty much her entire life), I got a kick out of watching the regulatory T cell try to get everyone's attention as they were freaking out over the apparent invasion of a bunch of monster chickens.

The rest of the volume, dealing with RBC and F's relationship (more entertainment than education, here) and F's disappearance, was surprisingly emotional even though I was expecting it for a while. Yes, the edutainment manga made me tear up a bit.

I still need to complete all of the original Cells at Work!, but I felt that this spinoff found the perfect place to end things. Overall, I really enjoyed Cells at Work! Baby.

Extras:

A short interview with Dr. Shirai, the medical advisor for the Japanese editions of volumes 3 and 4.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)… (plus d'informations)

This volume covers the reabsorption of primary urine in the kidneys, diaper rash (injury + platelet involvement and immune system response), IgG from mom no longer functioning and then disappearing (baby begins making its own), first baby food, and some flashback stories to when F first met Red Blood Cell (RBC).

As usual, there is advice for parents in the informational boxes. I continued to get a chuckle out of the baby's cells wondering about the mysterious being (parents!) who must be watching out for the body they're in, since there are times that things turn out okay when there's very little the cells can do for the body they're in themselves.

The body all these cells are in is growing up, and we're seeing it in how the cells function. Everyone is learning to do their jobs better and more efficiently. The help provided by the mother's cells (IgG delivered to the fetus via the placenta) is starting to fade away, but it's okay, because everyone's been preparing for this time without realizing it.

I love the "nice lady from the placenta" character and how she's basically a mom stand-in. Yeah, there are elements to anthropomorphized cells that are kind of weird, but I have to admit that my heart squeezed a little when F and Nice Lady did an "in the air pinky swear" (because the mom's blood and baby's blood can't mix).

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)… (plus d'informations)

In this volume the baby deals with its first bump, gets its first vaccination, gets the RS virus, has constipation, and almost suffocates, presumably in its crib. We meet Killer T Cell, some rectal muscle cells, and Red Blood Cell (RBC) gets into a fight with F.

Once again, I don't know enough to say how accurate the information is or how good the advice for parents is.

Platelets are in this volume, and they're even tinier than they were in the original series.

The author comments on this themselves, but wow, there are a lot of terrified immune cells in this series. White Blood Cell was a dedicated and frightening killer in the original Cells at Work! - here, White Blood Cell does his job while constantly terrified he's going to die. Killer T Cell acts like a big shot when in reality he doesn't 100% know what he's doing and worries that this will be obvious if he's ordered to do something.

The weirdest part of the volume was the section devoted to constipation, which includes RBC drooling in happiness at witnessing stools (represented as a pile of garbage bags) get expelled and several of the cells talking about how good it feels when feces are expelled.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)… (plus d'informations)

As with the original Cells at Work! series, this stars anthropomorphized cells. This time we're inside the body of a baby. The volume begins shortly before its birth - its red blood cells receive oxygen and nutrients from the placenta. The main protagonist is a regular red blood cell (we'll call her RBC). A red blood cell bearing hemoglobin-f (called F from here on out) watches out for RBC - while the fetus is still in the womb, F is better at carrying oxygen, and he's presented as RBC's older, more competent brother/coworker. One of the mother's cells is represented by a nice lady wearing gloves and a mask, who only interacts with the fetus's cells via the placenta and never touches them.

After the baby's birth, we get the start of pulmonary circulation, baby's first meal (breast milk), and baby's first risk of infection.

I need to start off by saying that I don't have the knowledge to say how accurate the information presented in this series is. The original Japanese version had a medical editor, but there was no mention of whether someone with similar medical knowledge was involved in the English translation.

This was super cute. As part of introducing readers to the functions of the various cells, the baby's cells were depicted as kids trying their best but with only a vague understanding of what they were supposed to be doing. As a result, you get a manga about a bunch of kids doing factory work while the kids in Control (the brain) tap away at their computers and look through books trying to figure out how best to respond to yet another brand new potentially worrisome situation.

I was just as confused about where RBC was supposed to go after the start of pulmonary circulation as she was. I tried, but I couldn't really wrap my brain around the "before and after birth" routes of the red blood cells.

As much as I enjoyed the overall volume, I had some thoughts/concerns about a couple things. First, the portion of the volume about what happens when the fetus is still in the womb - there are details given about the strain the fetus puts on the mother's body, but they're presented in terms of the needs of the fetus and advice about supplements pregnant people should be taking (calcium, for example). Getting to see the mother's body's side of things would be fascinating, but that's not the focus of this series. (Maybe Cells at Work! Lady deals with it, but I've heard that's one of the weaker Cells at Work! series.)

Second, baby's first meal. The interview with the Dr. Hashimoto, the medical editor, at the end of the volume indicates that one of the goals of this series is to reassure parents and give them a better understanding of their baby's body. While we know there are antibodies in breast milk that help babies develop strong immune systems, it would have been nice if one of the informational boxes had made it clearer that formula feeding, while less ideal, won't leave babies defenseless. Formula feeding doesn't even come up in this baby's experience.

All in all, I enjoyed this and thought it was a good new entry in the Cells at Work! franchise.

Extras:

Four pages of full-color artwork at the start, as well as a 2-page interview with Dr. Hashimoto, the medical editor of the original Japanese edition.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)… (plus d'informations)