By: Clamp
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Series: CLAMP学園探偵団 [Clamp Gakuen Tanteidan] (#1)
Summary: Welcome to the CLAMP School, Japan's most prestigious place of learning--home to prodigies, wunderkinds and young geniuses of every make and model. In a world where the average student is smarter than the teachers, how can the top students challenge their intellects? Why, by creating a detective service, of course! Meet the CLAMP School Detectives: Nokoru Imonoyama, the world's smartest kid, who can detect a woman in distress from 2 kilometers away; Suoh Takamura, a martial arts master who's cool as ice; Akira Ijyuin, detective by day, master thief by night. Wherever there's a young lady in distress, they'll be there. After all, when you're as smart as they are, you don't have to study.
Review: Here at the CLAMP School, you will find prodigies, wunderkinds, and young geniuses of every kind. In a world where students are smarter than teachers, how can top students challenge their intellect? How? By creating a detective service, of course! The CLAMP School Detectives are Nokoru Imonoyama, the world’s smartest kid; Suoh Takamura, a martial arts master who is cool as ice; Akira Ijyuin, a detective by day and a primary thief by night. Whenever a young lady is in distress, they will be there to assist her. It isn’t necessary to study when you are as smart as they are.
CAMP School Detectives is a very episodic manga with little of a story. Despite its short length, this series only comprises three volumes. Because of its episodic nature and lack of plot, a longer series would probably have been too overwhelming. CLAMP’s campus is actually a neat crossover between several of CLAMP’s works. Unfortunately, CLAMP made this work before most of their crossovers. I think it could have been a brilliant series if characters from more of their other works had come - seeing nudges to other works was really what made this series so good.
Still, I enjoyed going through this first volume. A fun, sweet little read. As an older person, I find it a little bizarre that swarms of older girls run around as über-fans of three elementary school boys. While I understand it’s part of the joke, I can’t help but lift an eyebrow a little, even as a teenager.