Kingdom Hearts by Shiro Amano, Part 1

Sora is a small kid with big hair that lives on an island seemingly in the middle of nowhere. His two best friends are Riku, who also grew up on the island, and Kairi, a girl from another universe who somehow fell out of the sky and ended up in Sora's world.

Sora, Riku and Kairi want to escape the island and go somewhere... anywhere... else. But the day before they are to leave on the raft they built together, Kairi gives Sora a Thalassa shell ornament, given to sailors to bring them home safely. That night, Sora has an encounter with a mysterious figure in black robes who spouts mysterious phrases at Sora about doors and worlds and darkness, and then disappears when he is interrupted by Kairi. After she leaves, Sora continues packing and hears a noise from outside. He wonders if Riku and Kairi are still there, and goes outside to find Riku surrounded by strange little dark beings. Riku smiles cruelly at Sora and tells him to come and not be afraid of the darkness.

Sora finds himself in darkness, And then sees a light. He heads towards it, to see Kairi standing by a closed door. He calls to her, and she turns to him, but is engulfed in an explosion, A voice tells him not to be afraid, because he has the strongest weapon in the world. As he hears this, a huge key forms in his hand. He is now possessor of the Keyblade, the only weapon that can save the worlds. He fights a huge black monster with a heart-shaped hole in its chest, and he falls unconscious on the streets of Traverse Town.

Back on another world, Donald Duck and Goofy, magician and guardsman in the palace of King Mickey, find that Mickey has disappeared. They attempt to keep the information from Daisy and Minnie, but are unsuccessful. Instead, the two women send them off to find Mickey, bearing the instructions that he left behind to go to Traverse Town and help the bearer of the Key. They are accompanied by Jiminy Cricket and Chip and Dale, who are the mechanics of the worldship.

They travel to Traverse Town, and meet Sora, who has also made the acquaintance of Cid, who destroys the little black creatures following Sora. He tells Sora their name, the Heartless, and what they are, creatures with no heart. Sora also meets Squall/Leon and Yuffie, who tell Sora that as long as he has the key, the heartless will chase him, because the heartless want the key.

Sora, Daffy and Goofy literally run into each other, and are attacked by a huge robotic heartless with a strange insignia, a crossed-out heart on it. Donald and Goofy help Sora fight the heartless robot and destroy it. Later, they tell Sora of their quest, and ask for his help in finding the King. They agree to help Sora look for Riku and Kairi on the way, and Sora agrees to help them. But, they tell him, he cannot tell anyone he or the others are from another world.

Meanwhile, they are being spied on by a number of people, including Maleficent, the Evil Queen from Snow White, who says they could be useful...

Leon and Yuffie tell them to look out for reports by Ansem, a researcher who was looking into the problem of the heartless. He filed a report, but the report is missing. If they can find it, they might solve the problem of the heartless.

Meanwhile, Riku finds himself alone in a strange place, on a piece of stone drifting in mid-air., He wonders where he is....

Sora, Daffy and Goofy take off for space and land on another world. This is the world of Alice in Wonderland, where they first encounter the Rabbit. They chase him, but he ducks away into another room, and emerges very, very tiny and scurries through a small door in the wall. The doorknob tells them to take the medicine so they'll fit. When they do, they find themselves in the Court of the Queen of Hearts, who is charging Alice with attempted theft of her heart. Sora tries to tell the Queen that Alice is innocent, but she demands proof. If they cannot find it in a day, Alice will have her head cut off by the Queen.

The Cheshire Cat gives them a box with a heartless in it, and when the Queen sees it, she recognizes it as the thing that tried to steal her heart. She orders Alice set free, but Alice is missing from her cage. The Queen, infuriated, orders Alice found, but then an even Bigger Heartless shows up, and The Cheshire Cat gives Sora magic to deal with it, but Donald must school him in how to use it before it can be effective.

After the battle, Sora seals the world away from the heartless with the Keyblade, and recieves a gummi block in return. It's not the usual sort of Gummi block... But the Cheshire Cat tells them Alice was stolen away by the shadows and is no longer on this world.

And in the darkness, more shadowy figures plot what to do about Sora, Daffy and Goofy. But Maleficent is still sure that they can be used... with the right incentive...

This is a most unusual manga, mixing Disney characters and worlds with characters from the Square Enix Final Fantasy games. Sadly for anyone who is really enamoured with the series, Disney will come down on any fan like a ton of bricks if they write about the characters in the series or even do pretty much anything else. They feel they must to defend their copyrights to the characters.

That being said, I have a hard time accepting Mickey as any sort of "Wise King". The voice of the character just doesn't lend itself to that kind of characterization for me. But since he is only incidental to the story, I suppose it doesn't matter much. The story is a good and interesting one, and the Disney characters do bring ready-made characterization to the story. Sora is a kind of anime everykid, short and with big hair and the power that comes from his heart and his ability to believe. And where haven't we seen that before in Anime/Manga?

Nevertheless, a well-done manga. This kind of character and story may have been done before (and more than once), but at least it's done well here. And if you like this, there is the inevitable chain of sequels to look forward to, what with Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts 2 following on the heels of this series.