3.5

This first volume of Drug & Drop is miles better than its first iteration, Legal Drug. The art style has greatly improved, which makes sense since CLAMP had 10 more years of experience under their belt for this one. The story seems more grounded and like there is an actual overarching plot to it. I didn't expect the crossover with xxxHolic, but I think xxxHolic shows up somehow in all CLAMP works? I'm glad that the weird reactions to even the hint of "gay behavior" has toned way down from Legal Drug. It's still there, annoyingly, but it's nowhere as near as bad as it was in Legal Drug. They still joke about it, but now it's much more in the tone of "They clearly deeply care about each other, but they're pretending they don't". It reads now as "The love is mutual, they're just idiots" instead of the weird "internalized homophobia" style of "jokes" from before. The story now has the floaty mysterious feeling that the entire xxxHolic series has, and I can't decide how I feel about it. Some people have described it as "psychedelic", which I hesitantly agree with. Thankfully, this series has way more focus on Kazahaya and Rikuo and their pasts, which was the only interesting plot point of Legal Drug. ( )

horray! Watanuki is here! ( )