Beauty Pop Volume Two is a manga by Kiyoko Arai, and it was published in North America by Viz Media’s Shojo Beat imprint in 2006. The series is rated “T” for Teen, and I agree with this rating.
High school freshman Kiri Koshiba has a talent for being a beautician and giving makeovers, but she tries to hide this fact. Three popular boys at the school (Shogo Narumi, Kei Minami, and Kazuhiko Ochiai are part of a group called the “Scissors Project,” and they randomly give girls at their school makeovers if they feel a girl has potential. Through various instances that happened in Volume One, Kiri started doing makeovers as “X,” and disguising herself in such a way that it would be hard to identify X’s gender. This culminated with the Scissors Project challenging X to a makeover competition, and the first volume ended right before the winner was announced.
This volume starts out by revealing the winner of the makeover competition, and the results make it where some of the students would like X to give them makeovers. Meanwhile, Kiri’s life is complicated by the return of Iori Minamoto, a boy whose family worked closely with Kiri’s family. Iori comes across as an egotistical poseur, and Kiri really wants nothing to do with him. Unfortunately for Kiri, Iori messages Kiri’s mother (who has been working in Los Angeles and has been absent from the manga previous to this point), claiming that Kiri is being bullied. Kiri’s mother returns home and tries to meddle with her daughter’s affairs.
There’s a rumor going around school that one of the male teachers will be marrying the school nurse. The Scissors Project learns that the nurse feels like she’s too old to wear a wedding dress and have a proper ceremony, and they end up offering to give her a makeover. Meanwhile, Kiri learns that the teacher is having doubts, and Kiri’s mother offers to have the family’s beauty salon give him a makeover. On the day of the makeover, Kiri’s parents disappear before the teacher arrives, and Kiri is forced to take on the X persona and do the makeover. Once again, Kiri finds herself pitted against the Scissors Project.
Article comments