Jabberwocky (manga)

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From Mangafox: One of the Japanese promos calls it "The Da Vinci Code meets Jurassic Park". I think that sums it up pretty nicely. It's got dinosaurs, spies, intrigue, action, and conspiracy, all rendered in lovely film noir-esque art with a little fan service cherry on top (Lily!). And for the slightly geeky, it's got cool (and sometimes obscure) references to art, literature, film, history, science... you name it. Definitely a manga for adults!

Jabberocky is a manga by Hisa Masato and "adventure/sci-fi/action" doesn't really do it justice.

British secret agent Lily Apricot gets an assignment to steal back a Russian treasure only to discover that dinosaurs are real, they walk among us, and they're really pissed at being overthrown by humans!

Not to be confused with Lewis Carroll's poem Jabberwocky or The Jabberwockeez dance group.

Tropes used in Jabberwocky (manga) include:

• The Alcoholic / Functional Addict(?): Lily loves her booze. "I drank two bottles, I can't be drunk!"
  • Exacerbated by the fact that she creates her weapons from wine bottles.
• All Myths Are True: or at least have a rather disturbing twist.
• Ancient Conspiracy: Dinosaurs have been living in the shadows, though their control over human affairs is spotty as of the time of the story.
• Animesque: Inverted, it's pretty Sin City / Hellboy-esque aside from Lily and the head of the Chateau L'If.
• Badass: Sabata Van Cleef.
  • Badass Longcoat: Nice and tattered; sometimes makes it seem as if he has wings or multiple tails.
  • Good Smoking, Evil Smoking: Definitely of the "good, cigar-chomping badass" variety.
  • The Gunslinger: Has at least six guns on his belt.
  • Hollywood Cyborg: Has a mechanical lower right arm
  • Improbable Aiming Skills: Him and D'Jango.
  • Last of His Kind: After it was (erroneously) reported that the ruling oviraptor family were -- from a dinosaur's point of view -- descended from baby-snatching cannibals, dinosaur kind turned against them and Sabata's entire family was murdered.
  • Off with His Head: The first time we meet him Lily knocks off his head; it's actually a prosthetic.
  • Paper-Thin Disguise: Somehow manages to get away with a beard and hat combo in public despite, you know, being a freaking dinosaur.
• Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: Galileo was a humanoid dinosaur and so was Helen of Troy! Surprisingly, Nicola Tesla is human, just really insane.
• Bunny Ears Lawyer: Nicola Tesla.
• Chess Motif: Lily repeatedly refers to herself as just a pawn to be sacrificed in order to take the king, which irritates Sabata to no end (she gets better).
• Complete Monster: The feathered dinosaur who lobotomized her own children while they were embryos so they could revert back to their flying forms; D'Jango shot at Van Cleef for sport and also killed his sister.
• Driven to Suicide: Lily's mother couldn't take being an exiled traitor and killed herself in front of Lily
• Eyepatch of Power: D'Jango has one with a coffin on it where Sabata ripped his eye out with his broken arm bones after D'Jango shot his arm off.
• Feathered Fiend: The flying dinos and their cruel "mother". The "ninjas" that they carry bear a striking similarity to the monkey ninjas of Kim Possible.
• A God Am I: A dinosaur who claimed to be descended from Adam (they were dinosaurs) wanted to use Adam's rib to unite dino-kind to defeat the monkeys. He's actually just Dumb Muscle being manipulated by D'Jango.
• Go Out with a Smile: The Glory Hound archaeologist who found Adam's Rib dies with a smile -- after all this date will now be the anniversary of his death!
• Historical In-Joke
• Holy Hand Grenade: It's actually the unborn son of the Russian dinosaur king
• In Space: Hellboy / The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen / Van Helsing with dinosaurs!
• Incendiary Exponent / Monumental Damage: The Leaning Tower of Pisa is turned into a flaming cannon
• Instant Awesome, Just Add Ninja: Chinese ninjas that fly with the help of bird-like dinosaurs!
• Kill All Humans: A lot of dinosaurs don't like being kept underground.
• Kill It with Fire / Shock and Awe / Death From Above: Tesla accidentally discovered how to spontaneously combust people
• Latex Perfection / The Masquerade: The dinosaurs can pass as humans by wearing masks... somehow.
• The Man Behind the Man: The Empress of China has two dinosaur advisers.
• Meaningful Name: Lily and Sabata are named after a real life idol singer and a spy novelist, respectively.
• The Men in Black: The Pinkertons are really eccentric and really deadly.
• Ms. Fanservice: Lily Apricot.
  • Boobs of Steel
  • Cleavage Window: On par with Molotov Cocktease, but with a proper clasped collar.
  • Combat Stilettos: Actually chunky stripper heels but impractically high heels nonetheless.
  • Most Common Superpower
  • Of Corsets Sexy
  • Spy Catsuit
  • Stripperiffic
  • Underboobs
  • Whip It Good
• Not So Different: Sabata and Lily both know how it feels to be the last of their hated family; Dorohov and Sabata are both oviraptors; Lily and the feathered dino "lady" both come from the idea that living things are just tools to be used and discarded.
• Odd Couple / Interspecies Romance: Lily and Sabata; possibly Paris and Helen.
• Pet the Dog: The feathered dino saves one of her "experiments" despite not caring about them as living creatures, let alone her own children.
  • Kick the Dog: She crushes it anyway.
  • The Dog Bites Back / Hoist by His Own Petard: Her "perfectly trained" children don't like that one bit.
• Petting Zoo People
  • Lizard Folk
  • Horned Humanoid (of a sort)
• Purely Aesthetic Era
• Room Full of Crazy: Tesla's. He takes notes with a weird machine hooked up to his head and has notes on top of notes and takes note of all of them or lack thereof.
• Science Marches On: Oviraptors aren't baby-stealing jerks (noted by the author) and the "evolution cycle" of embryos has since been debunked (not noted).
• Shout-Out: Too many.
  • Shown Their Work: The author's notes at the end of the chapters.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism: Very much on the ideal side, after all, little Mao hasn't done all the terrible things three kinds of divination say he'll do yet...
• Spot of Tea: Sabata takes time out for one while his train goes through a curve and D'Jango can't fire on him. Unfortunately they forgot that Adam's gigantic rib is also curved and in the hands of a very strong, very deluded dinosaur...
• Tyke Bomb: Lily's father/parents were traitors; the only thing anyone felt she was good for was dying for her country.
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?
• Who You Gonna Call?: The Chateau L'If, that's who!
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Dorohov (Dolohov?) had to basically perform dinosaur abortions, smashing living eggs for years.
• X Meets Y: The Da Vinci Code (Historical In-Joke conspiracies) meets Jurassic Park dinosaurs are alive meets Anonymous Rex (they're humanoid and disguised) meets The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen/Van Helsing Dorian Grey is a British spy while the Count of Monte Cristo funds a secret protective league. Style-wise it's Hellboy meets Sin City.