GANTZ

Synopsis

(from the press literature)

The last thing Kei remembers is the train running over his body. Now he is in a room filled with strangers, all resurrected by the featureless black sphere known only as the Gantz. But their reprieve from death may only be temporary, for unless they undertake the brutal missions that the Gantz assigns, all of them will die again.

(and now, my synopsis)

Kei, a snobby, cynical jerk, gets himself into a really dumb situation and literally loses his head because of it. Next thing he knows, he wakes up in a room filled with random, apparently dead people ... and a dog. There is a big ball in the middle of the room that gives them weapons and tells them to kill things and not question why. He does so, while whining the whole time.

Review

Ohhhhh, boy.

Maybe it's a little unfair that I'm the one reviewing this show. However, the word of mouth had been positive, and actually, this arrived for me to watch right after I saw Elfen Lied, which I enjoyed. (That's another review for another time.) So, I'm not this squeamish person who only watches fluffy romantic comedies -- I have a fairly high tolerance for viscera and gore. My parents clean blood for a living and talk about it in great detail at the dinner table; it comes with the territory. Mature themes? Highly sexual content? Dude, normally I'm all there.

Gantz really wanted to push the envelope. Unfortunately, they succeeded. The result is a show that makes Battle Royale look like Marmalade Boy.

But when I think about titles like Elfen Lied and Battle Royale, they're violent, but they succeed because the protagonists at least have something to them that makes them human. There's something about them that you identify with, that despite all the horrible things they do, you can tell they're trying to rise above it. Just because circumstances force them to become monsters, they don't have to stay that way -- they can redeem themselves or at least try.

The thing that galls me about Gantz is Kei - from the moment he comes onscreen, you just know he's a soulless monster already. There's nothing there. He's already just a tool -- he's mean, extremely selfish, very cynical, and you almost get the feeling he's happy that way, or at least unapologetic. There is no fall from grace; he's already fallen, and has no desire to get back out.

Right at the beginning, the creators let you know Kei is a character you aren't supposed to like. How? In one of the initial scenes, a naked girl appears in front of him, an obvious suicide. One of the other men in the room drags her into the back to rape her. Kei stands there, not quite sure whether to save her ... or just watch and be turned on. When his childhood friend Masaru goes over and selflessly saves the girl, and the girl thanks him, Kei gets pissed off because she's not paying any attention to him. "What a prissy girl." Kei then decides she is there so he can get into her pants. He is no better than the attempted rapist. But that isn't the worst of it.

In the very end of that scene, the girl is molested by the dog, and she is giggling and cutely trying to "stop" the dog, without putting up much of a fight.

And that part of the scene is what makes Gantz itself unredeemable. Honestly ... that they had the gall to depict a girl who had just committed suicide and then seconds after a violent rape attempt, being giggly and laughing over a dog going down on her? I just ... can't compute this. It's beyond offensive, it's just insulting.

I continued on through the first two DVDs, and after that, Gantz just becomes an excuse for morally bankrupt people to blow stuff up. The plot is paper thin, and very stock sci-fi when you stop to think about it. People abducted for an experiment (in this case, social) by a foreign entity with some man-hunting thrown in for fun ... yeah, they're supposed to be hunting aliens, but it just feels like it's all a thin pretense for having hot people running around in tight outfits with cool-looking guns. It is incredibly exploitative -- it's along the same lines as pornography or war propaganda, and almost more offensive in some ways.

The most redeeming factor of the show, at least early on, is the character of Masaru (Oosato Masashi in the Japanese track), Kei's childhood friend who basically got them in this situation by saving a man who had fallen on the train tracks. If this show were centered around Masaru, a troubled teen with a violent past, but a good heart and a strong desire to do good, maybe it would easier to take, especially since Masaru is a much stronger and more well-rounded character. He alone out of the cast is an actual character, rather than just a cardboard cutout or a blowup doll, and he alone questions the situation, but of course, it's already foreshadowing at the end of the second DVD that he's not long for this show. It's a crime, but frankly, Masaru deserved a better show, rather than playing second fiddle to a complete cretin.

At the same time, this is one of the best animated television shows I've seen in years. The artwork is gorgeous, the character designs are beautiful, and the blending of the CG and cel style just looks good. Technically, it's one of Gonzo's best; they also pushed the envelope in that sense, and did it right. The music om the show, both the score and the songs, are awesome. The opening ("Super Shooter") is by Rip Slyme, one of the most popular and skilled Japanese rap groups out there. (Yeah, Japanese rap -- and it's fun!)

The voice acting is also top-notch, both in English and in Japanese, especially considering the material they had to work with. Voice actors really will do anything you pay them for ... but it takes a good cast to put feeling into something as unfeeling as this.

You can tell a good story using extreme methods. Sex and violence aren't inherently wrong - life is often dark and ugly, and people do bad things to each other, and yes, it can be highly entertaining to watch the dark side of humanity. However, Gantz does nothing but wallow in its own depravity. Moreover, with the amount of money and time you'd have to devote to this time given its release format (thanks to Shueisha enforcing its 2-episode a DVD policy on an international level), Gantz simply isn't worth it.

Gantz is really the pinnacle of anime exploitation.

In trying to be edgy and relevant, Gantz glorifies everything that is seen to be bad about manga and anime, and makes you ashamed to be human in the process. — Christina Ross

Recommended Audience: A hard R for extreme violence, sexual content, and very mature themes. Not for the squeamish - you almost have to be a sick, twisted individual to want to watch this, thanks to the main theme of the show.

This manga review was taken from here

The School of Water Business

Mangaka : Inokuma Shinobu

A school to teach teenagers how to pleasure society. That's what the School of Water Business is. Of course, the pleasure would be performed within water businesses. What's a water business? Just think of it like a place you'd go to to get a massage, and any part of the body you wish... And your masseuse could use any part of their body they wished... And they just happened to be girls... Well, you get the idea. As you might have guessed, this manga is not for little kids.

(This isn't Hentai, it's just there are some adult related themes and I would have to consider this to be PG-13 or a little higher.)

This manga review was taken from here

Pluto

Mangaka: Urasawa Naoki

The original Astro Boy manga introduced young readers to the realities of racial conflict by presenting them on a level children could understand and discuss with their parents, but this meant that Tezuka could not fully explore the more mature psychological and moral issues in the background of Astro's grim world. The rough and episodic nature of Astro's adventures and the long time over which Tezuka developed the world and character also limited his capacity to bring to the fore the emotional and philosophical potential of the universe and characters he had created. Naoki Urasawa's Pluto is, quite simply, Astro Boy for adults. The work is a retelling of the Pluto chapter of Astro Boy, originally entitled 'The World's Strongest Robot,' which looks at the seven most powerful robots on earth as their programming and human vanity force them to fight one another. The original story focused on Astro being asking why humans create these temporary life forms, robots, then bind them to specific programs and hardware which lock them into limited roles in life, and why ultimately do humans make robots destroy each other. Naoki Urasawa preserves this central question, but adds to it many subtler questions about the psychological and social tensions which would arise in a society as densely populated with robots as Astro's.

One new question is how the existence of extremely human-like robots affects both human and robot identity. How do non-humanoid robots feel about those robots who can 'pass' for human? How do humans feel about their growing inability to distinguish human from robot? How do low-powered robots feel about the sophisticated robots who are immeasurably more powerful and important than they are, not by chance, but by human design? How do other high-powered robots feel about Astro, whose uniquely sophisticated electronic brain makes him the only robot to have real human-like learning capacity and to experience nearly-human emotions, and who is also the most universally beloved robot ever created? One might envy Astro as the 'ambassador of peace,' friend to all humans and robots, destined to bring the two races closer, or one might pity Astro as the first robot truly capable of feeling the pain of the conflict between the races and the loneliness of being the only one.

Another focus is robots' capacity to love and have family. The central character followed by the narrative is actually not Astro but the robot detective Gesicht, one of the original Great Seven robots, who is assigned to investigate the Pluto case. Following him we see the experiences of a humanoid robot working with human and robot colleagues, human and robot victims and human and robot witnesses. We also see him living with a robot wife, and dealing with the widows and orphans left when robots are destroyed. The backgrounds and families of the other Great Seven are also filled in, and we see how different super-robots have or have not imitated human lifestyles and friendships. It is also our first real chance to meet Astro from the perspective of an outsider, rather than taking the boy hero as our point of view. References to Astro's home and family remind us of the grim fate of the robotic parents Dr. Ochanomizu created for Astro who, as we recall from the original manga, will be destroyed at Dr. Tenma's order.

Urasawa also adds a detailed investigation of how the existence of super-robots would affect war and the balance of global politics. Taking the shallow political despot who was responsible for the conflicts in the original story, Urasawa creates instead a very realistic middle-eastern war, similar to those which have been so controversial in the last years, and then asks how the existence of robots would change it. How do robots, who are forbidden by their programming from harming humans, feel about fighting wars for the humans where they are forced to destroy one another while unable to harm others? How would mechanized armies change the speed and cost of warfare? How is it fair for there to be a Robot Law when there is no corresponding Human Law limiting humans' capacity to do harm to one another or to robots? And does making robots more and more human also inevitably mean making them capable of hate, irrationality and murder? These philosophical themes are not absent in the original Astro Boy manga, but here Urasawa has brought them much more to the foreground, presenting a mature philosophy of warfare which is clearly closely related to Tezuka's own treatment of it, both in early works like Metropolis and in late social commentaries like Adolf and Ayako.

The art style of Pluto is perhaps as starkly different from Tezuka's original as it is possible for art to be. In Urasawa's rendition, all people and places are reproduced in near-photographic detail with far more realistic proportions and faces than one sees in most manga today. At the same time, Urasawa preserves a very Tezuka-like pacing and layout, with very detailed cityscapes and landscapes of the style Tezuka used to punctuate his work. Urasawa even includes the characteristic 'emotional abstracts' which Tezuka used to convey very intense scenes. (US readers will know these best from the rape scene in Adolf and the enlightenment images in Buddha and Phoenix, but they may be seen as early as the Moth and Flame scene in Crime and Punishment.) The effect makes the visuals a perfect match for the tone and story – this is Tezuka, but a harsh, adult Tezuka, not stylized for children anymore.

Pluto has received the prestigious Osamu Tezuka Cultural award, and praise and honors from all directions, with good cause. Urasawa reminds us why Astro was the most moving and influential of the many hundreds of stories and characters created by the 'God of Manga.' I cannot overstate the quality of this work, nor its emotional impact. After reading it, I found myself re-reading the original Tezuka manga with fresh tears in my eyes. Masao Maruyama and Rintaro, creators of the Metropolis movie who worked with Tezuka on many of his animated works, spoke at AnimeNEXT 2006. I heard a fan there ask them what manga and anime they liked best out of everything Japan had produced. Rintaro answered that they both treasured each and every page Tezuka ever drew. Maruyama added, 'Also Naoki Urasawa.'

This manga review was taken from here

Fairy Tail

Mangaka: Hiro Mashima

Fairy Tail is a new shounen manga series being written by Hiro Mashima after he finally ended his popular Jump manga “RAVE” in 2005. It is set in a steampunkish world of adventure, magic, mages and guilds, where mages are the main adventurers in this series.

These mages are often members of Mage Guilds which provides access to information and quests but there is one particularly infamous Mage Guild that is a thorn in the side of the Mage Council because of the trouble that its members create - the Mage Guild called “Fairy Tail”

The story starts off with a young girl called Lucy who arrives in the town of Harujon who wants to be a proper mage and join Fairy Tail. While in Harujon, Lucy meets a boy called Natsu who has a serious case of motion sickness and a cat named Happy. Together, they unravel the mystery of the charismatic travelling mage who claims that he is the famous Salamander from Fairy Tail.

So far this story has been a pretty engrossing read and Hiro Mashima brings a new twist to the weak mages of the typical fantasy stories. Here in the world of Fairy Tail, the mages are the ones who fight villains and go on crazy adventures.

I would say that the characterisation and emotional style resembles that of One Piece while the world and fighting system resembles that of HunterxHunter, although I’d say that it is not as complicated and indepth as HxH. So if you like the usual shounen adventure and fighting fare, you can give Fairy Tail a try because it is pretty decent stuff.

This manga review was taken from here

Hikaru No Go

Story : Yumi Hotta
Mangaka : Takeshi Obata
Hikaru no Go (ヒカルの碁, Hikaru no Go lit. "Hikaru's Go") is a popular Japanese manga and animeboard game Go written by Yumi Hotta and illustrated by Takeshi Obata. The production of the series' Go games was supervised by Go professional Yukari Umezawa (5-dan). The manga is largely responsible for popularizing Go among the youth of Japan since its debut, and in other areas such as mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea. More recently it has gained much popularity in the United States. The title is sometimes abbreviated 'HnG'. coming-of-age story based on the

First released in Japan in Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump in 1998, Hikaru no Go achieved tremendous success, spawning a popular Go fad of almost unprecedented proportions; it received the Shogakukan Manga Award in 2000 and creators received Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize in 2003 for the series. Twenty-three volumes of manga were published in Japan, comprising 189 chapters plus 11 "omake" (extra chapters). The anime series, which was created by Studio Pierrot, ran for 75 half hour episodes from 2001 to 2003 on TV Tokyo, along with the 77-minute extra New Year's Special that aired in January 2004.

Storyline

The same basic storyline is followed by the manga and anime, with a few small changes between the versions. While exploring his grandfather's shed, Hikaru stumbles across a Go board haunted by the spirit of Fujiwara no Sai, a fictional Go player from the Heian era. Sai wishes to play Go again, having not been able to since the late Edo period, when he possessed the body of Honinbou Shuusaku, an actual Go player of that period. Sai's greatest desire is to attain the "Kami no Itte" – "Divine Move," or the "Hand of God" – a perfect game. Because Hikaru is apparently the only person who can perceive him, Sai inhabits a part of Hikaru's mind as a separate personality, coexisting, although not always comfortably, with the child.

Urged by Sai, Hikaru begins playing Go despite a lack of interest in the game. He begins by mimicking the moves Sai dictates to him, but Sai tells him to try to understand each move. In a Go salon, Hikaru defeats Akira Touya, a boy his age who plays Go at professional level. Akira subsequently begins a quest to discover the source of Hikaru's strength, an obsession which will come to dominate his life.

Hikaru becomes intrigued by the great dedication of Akira and Sai to the game and decides to start playing solely on his own. He is a complete novice at first, but has some unique abilities to his advantage; for instance, once he has a basic understanding of Go, he can reconstruct a game play by play from memory. Through training at Go clubs, study groups, and practice games with Sai, he manages to become an insei and later a pro, meeting various dedicated Go players of different ages and styles along the way. While Hikaru is at this point not yet up to the level of Akira, he demonstrates a natural talent for the game and remains determined to prove his own abilities to Akira, Sai, and himself.

Effect on the popularity of Go

Hikaru no Go dramatically increased the popularity of Go in Japan and elsewhere, particularly among young children.^[1] Go professional Yukari Umezawa served as the technical advisor for the manga and promoted it on behalf of the Nihon Ki-in.^[2] She had a short 5 minute special at the end of every episode instructing kids how to play Go. One of the reasons that she helped make Go so popular was because she was called "best looking Go Professional". The manga also spread Go throughout The United States. As a result, many high school and middle school Go clubs were started by students influenced by the manga.

This manga review was taken from here

Battle Royale

Writer: Koushun Takami and Masayuki Taguchi

Illustrator: Masayuki Taguchi

Content Guide: Intense scenes of violence, sexuality, and language. Not recommended for younger readers.

You've Won!

Imagine you won the lottery.

Now imagine that the prize was to be dropped off on a deserted island with your classmates. Add into the fact that the only way off the island is to kill each and every one of them. If you don’t, you will die, either by their hands or by the bomb that’s in the collar around your neck. Now who wants to play?

The Story

Battle Royale is about an alternate future in a military society that is ruled by a dictatorship. For one reason or another, 9th graders in a graduating class are pulled by random to compete in a game of life and death, but mostly death, called The Program. The kids are told that there are rules to the game:

• All kids must kill each other until there is only one student left.
  
• Each student is supplied with food, water, and a random weapon.
  
• Each student wears a collar that has a bomb in it and monitors life signs.
  
• There are designated danger zones that are addedd throughout the game. If you go there, your collar explodes.
  
• If, at the end of a 24 hour period, someone has not died, then all of the collars explode.

They are each given their equipment and sent out on an abandoned island. After that, its every person for themselves.

The story centers mostly around Shuuya and Noriko, a young couple banded together to find a way to beat the system. There is Kawada, a grade repeater with surprising knowledge of the game. Most of the kids are like Shuuya and Noriko, desperate to avoid the true nature of the game, to kill. But then there is the too cool and calm Kazuo Kiriyama, and Mitsuko, psychotic and over sexual, especially for being a 9th grader. These two rapidly rack up the kills in an attempt to be the last one left.

Pulling all of their strings is the enigmatic Yonemi Kamon, the headmaster of The Program. Yonemi is sick, twisted, and violent, the perfect person to oversee such a gameshow.

Soon, the body counts start to grow. Either by themselves or others, death seems inevitable to the students of Junior High Class B. Will they massacre each other, or is there another way.

History

Battle Royale started as a novel by author Koushun Takami. What was to be an entrance into a mystery writing competition was passed over due to its controversial content. The book was later published in 1999 and became a smash hit in Japan, despite people in the Japanese government calling for censorship. The book has since been translated into English.

The book was later redone as both a manga series and movie that came out with one month of each other. The manga was written by Koushun Takami and Masayuki Taguchi and stayed close to the novel. The film was directed by Kinji Fukasaku and quickly became a hit in Japan. Although the film has not been released in theaters in America, it quickly established a cult following through its DVD releases. It can be rented and bought at many different locations. A sequel to Battle Royale was released in 2003 under the title Battle Royale 2. Many fans consider this movie not as good as the first. Novelist Koushun Takami had no involvement with the film.

Review
The idea of this story completely intrigued me. A whole 9th grade class taken to an abandoned island and forced to kill each other? Sounds very sadistic. I’ve read a few volumes of the manga, watched the movie, and plan on getting the novel soon. Guess I’m hooked.

One appeal to this is that it is so over the top. Like movies, books, and comics before that have used violence to help make a point, Battle Royale appears to fit into that mold. The movie was very bloody and gruesome, with the manga being more so. In the first volume there are full splash pages dedicated to showing close ups of students with their faces shot off. Very disturbing indeed.

At times, Battle Royale felt like a guilty pleasure, like I was doing something wrong just by reading it. The manga and movie have stuck with me and I find myself thinking about why this or that happened. About the point of the whole thing. About what my reaction to a situation like that would be. Would I give up and kill myself either in fear or protest, band with others to find a way out, or revel in the chance to go utterly psycho and let forth every dark inhibition that my mind can conceive? Kind of a sobering thought.

I think these are the things that make Battle Royale an interesting journey. Be warned, the manga and movie are very graphically violent, more so because of who is doing the killing, namely children. There is also a lot of foul language and the manga was at many times sexually explicit. All of it was so over the top as to force you to think about the point of it all.

Conclusion

If these kinds of things put you off, by all means, pass this one up. But if you like to struggle with your own inner demons to arrive at perhaps a better place, then you might want to give Battle Royale a try. In any event, it will stick with you for awhile, and that is one mark of a very good piece of work. In the end it is up to you.

This review was taken from here

Beauty Pop

Mangaka: Kiyoko Arai

Gender roles are explored, distorted, and finally turned upside-down in this quirky, irreverent and absolutely hilarious manga. Kiri Koshiba is a fifteen-year-old high-school freshman with a rare talent. Her father owns Koshiba Beauty Salon, and she has become his unwilling heir. She has learned a thing or two from Pops, but has no intention of becoming a hairdresser herself. That is, until she encounters the S.P.

Narumi, Kai and Ochiai are second-year students and together these three make up the Scissors Project—widely known as S.P.—a makeover project that takes place at Ryokufuu High School. They select a lucky female student and give her a makeover in front of the entire school. All the girls who are selected have one thing in common: they are all pretty. Ugly girls need not apply.

Narumi Shougo is vain, handsome, and temperamental; the heir to the great Shougo Beauty Salon Empire. Narumi's extraordinary ambition is to become Japan's number one hairstylist. He is obstinate and obnoxious, with one hell of a superiority complex, but don't be foold by his gruff exterior. Narumi isn't completely without charm. He has a deeply hidden sweet side (yes, you have to plunge very deep) that he rarely shows. He's a self-proclaimed hairstyling genius ("You should worship this golden right hand of mine!") who has won every national hairstyling competition for seven years, with the notable exception of one that was wrested away from him by a mysterious little girl, number 19, whose memory haunts him to this very day. Kei is a bubble-gum-chewing, spiky-haired, Nike-wearing manicurist (If that isn't enough to elicit a chuckle, then I don't know what is). Ochiai, responsible for makeup and overall composition, is a bespectacled schemer, really the mastermind behind S.P., who maneuvers Kiri into having a makeover competition with Narumi.

Kiri decides to help a fellow classmate, Aoyama—who has been rejected by long-time crush Ochiai—"add a little magic." Perhaps one of the greatest moments is when painfully-shy Aoyama, post-makeover, delivers to Ochiai a crushing set-down when she tells him that she really must learn to be a better judge of character. True, her new-found beauty gives her the confidence to speak her mind to Ochiai, but it is at this crucial moment that Mangaka Kiyoko Arai really drives home her point: beauty is only skin-deep and what really matters is not outside appearance. What is more telling is that Aoyama chooses to return to the way she was before the makeover. When questioned by ochiai as to the reason, she responds by saying she was uncomfortable with the new her. It's nice to be pretty, but don't sacrifice who you really are to attain it.

On the surface, Beauty Pop is a light-hearted comedy. If you look closer, you realize that it breaks down gender-role stereotypes and ridicules the beauty standards that rule our society, and explores how those standards often warp self-perception. Beauty is, after all, in the eye of the beholder. A noble sentiment, most eloquently realized in Beauty Pop.

This manga review was taken from here

School Rumble

Mangaka: Jin Kobayashi

A couple of weeks ago I decided to start hacking my way through School Rumble, for no better reason than it had furigana so I wouldn’t need to constantly resort to the kanji dictionary.

I found myself at first mildly interested, then eventually sucked into the story in spite of myself. It’s a pretty typical shounen high school romantic comedy, and as such I’m finding it a bit difficult to justify my interest in the title. The art is mediocre, especially at first, but it does improve over the five volumes that have been thus far released. Probably its biggest selling points for me are 1) like Boys Be, another shounen high school romantic comedy I inexplicably like, the story doesn’t center exclusively around one couple, nor is it a harem show, and 2) it’s packed with light-hearted, quirky humor.

As I get deeper into the story (currently part way through the fourth volume) the ratio of gags to plot and character development has gradually come to favor the latter, which is quite effective in keeping my attention but may eventually become frustrating if this web of misunderstanding continues indefinitely and the characters don’t grow beyond their obstinate silence regarding how they really feel about each other. What has thus far differentiated School Rumble from the many other stories that rely on this premise is the speed at which relationships are made and misunderstandings occur, their apparent fluidity, and the steady introduction of new characters serving to broaden and render even more confusing this comedy of errors.

Despite the constant evolution of the web of relationships in the story it never lead to any of the characters seeing their goals realized (of course - if they were the plot would lose its fuel), which will eventually make this series as tiresome as any other. I hope the author (Kobayashi Jin) has some more tricks up his sleeve to keep things interesting for as long as possible. Regardless, it has the potential to make a really good anime (for as long as the source material holds out), or a really mediocre one. The first episode is slated for October 5th, so we’ll see.

So what is the story about?

The main character as School Rumble opens is Tsukamoto Tenma, a good-natured if rather simpleminded high school junior and Mahoro look-alike. She has a crush on Karasuma-kun, a fellow of few words who dresses as a kappa when it rains and really likes curry. A lot. Needless to say she is unable to express her feelings for him, and he doesn’t make the task of confessing any easier.

Enter Harima Kenji, a punk with a goatee and sunglasses who is in love with Tenma, and has an equally hard time confessing to her. He is skilled at brawling and drawing manga in which he hooks up with Tenma in various improbable situations. He’s probably my favorite character in the story.

Tenma has a sister who is a year younger, Yakumo. Yakumo is popular among the guys but doesn’t know how to handle their advances, and generally spends her time tending to her hapless older sister and her pet cat. If she were good at sports she would be Sakaki.

Tenma has three good friends in her class whose names I can’t remember off the top of my head. One of them is a jock with a crush on an older classmate who graduated last year, one is a Yankee, and one is a rather silent and thus far mysterious short-haired girl.

Rounding out the list of the main characters is Hanai, the childhood friend of the jock and a karate expert/nerd himself who has a huge crush on Tenma’s sister Yakumo. He and Harima develop a rivalry early on when Harima mistakenly believes Hanai is after Tenma.

Aside from the main cast there is a boatload of supporting characters: another classmate falls for Tenma later on, a flirting guy shows up who hits on jock girl for awhile before discovering another superhumanly strong and yet demure jock girl in the same class, Yakumo makes friends with a transfer student who looks exactly like Saber from Fate. I’m probably forgetting a few here - oh yeah, Harima’s cousin is the hot school nurse/science teacher, and at one point he hooks up (is dragged off) by another hot woman known only as “onee-chan.”

…In the final analysis, if you like high school romantic comedies you’ll probably like this. There is some FIGHTING but not enough to recommend it on that basis alone, and there is some random wacky humor but it’s not wild enough to recommend it on that basis either. The manga relies on pacing and placement of page-turns for a lot of its humor, so whether the anime will be worth watching will be due in large part to the editing job it recieves. At the best it could be another Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu, but to make that comparison could just be inviting disappointment.

This review was taken from here

Blue Dragon

Story: Tsuneo Takano

Art: Takeshi Obata (Hikaru no Go, Death Note)

Synopsis

In a world reminiscent of our medieval Europe, creatures called Shadows have invaded the world. Born in darkness, Shadows have no shape or form, but when they emerge into the world of light, they take over the body of living creatures, and through these they gain bodies for themselves. There are 3 types of Shadows, but regardless of what type they are, they cannot manifest themselves without light.

Ral, a prisoner kept in perpetual darkness by his father Lord Roy, was possessed by a Shadow when he was just a baby. For 15 years he was kept in darkness, but one day the assault of the Shadows grow too strong, and the people of the castle must rely on his power. Yet he’s been kept as a prisoner for 15 years, and Ral had promised Grado to take revenge on the people who first took them prisoner. In addition to this, Grado wishes to overthrow the current ruler of the Shadow world, and in exchange for lending Grado his intellect, Grado will lend Ral his power.

Ral attacks Roy as soon as he is freed, but Rin protects him from the guards who rushes to protect their lord. Seeing Rin for the first time, Ral is greatly interested by the difference between males and females, and asks Rin to teach him about women. In exchange, Rin asks him to kill the Shadows currently assaulting the castle.

Jumping off the tower, Ral and Grado fly down amongst the Shadows. Grado manifests himself in Ral’s shadow, which the largest of the Shadows recognise as The Raging Demon Blue Dragon. Grado easily dispatches all but the largest Shadow, which tries to run away, but is killed just as easily by Ral. Amidst the cheers of the villagers, Rin takes Ral away for his ‘lesson’, and the villagers wonder if their saviour has finally come.

Thoughts

Takeshi Obata is back with a new serialisation, and that is some good news indeed. His track record shows hits after hits - with his most recent and famous series being Hikaru no Go and Death Note. Blue Dragon is something markedly different from his previous works though - it’s unlike Hikaru no Go or Death Note, which are mostly set in the modern world with a fantasy twist, but is set in a medieval fantasy world where monsters run free.

This hasn’t stopped Obata from delivering his high quality art though. The change in setting doesn’t seem to hamper him, but rather provides him with more creative freedom. Like the death gods found in Death Note, the Shadows take various forms, some even having the ability to transform. Their non-humanoid appearances gives Obata more space to exercise his imagination and design, and although none yet are as memorable or as full of impact as Ryuk and his ilks, Grado looks truly fearsome. In short, Obata’s art is as good as ever, and there’s really nothing to complain about.

What about the story? So far it’s hard to judge, but it seems the story is going to center around how Ral and Grado overthrows the Shadow Queen. The two protagonists, Ral and Grado, who constantly talk to each other, provide two different types of hero - Ral, who knows nothing about the world, has infinite room for evolution and growth, while Grado seems to have a deep and interesting background, though how much focus will be given to him remains to be seen.

The first chapter also leaves a number of mysteries waiting to be solved. Apart from Grado’s background, what is the reason for their special blending, why wasn’t Ral completely taken over by Grado like the others possessed by Shadows? The Shadows claim they want to exterminate humans before they destroy the planet, so what is the world of Blue Dragon really like, how are the humans, who lack our destructive technology, on path to destroying the planet? Why did Grado, who is obviously a powerful Shadow, pick a little baby to possess?

Although it’s hard to say what the story will turn out to be like, I have some faith in whoever it is that picks the writers for Obata’s manga. Both Hikaru no Go and Death Note had outstanding stories, although they were great in vastly different ways. How Blue Dragon will turn out remains to be seen, but I really look forward to reading more of it.

This manga review was taken from here

Firefighter Daigo

Mangaka: Soda Masahito

18-year old Asahina Daigo has just become a firefighter. He’s assigned to Central Medaka-Ga-Hama station, commonly called sire company M. At first, Daigo thinks he’s in a station full of slackers in an area that doesn’t get many fires. He quickly learns there’s more to firefighting than running into burning buildings. And even that’s harder than he thought. Daigo finds his courage and resolves to be the best firefighter he can; especially when he learns his school rival is working at a busier station nearby!

I was attracted to manga that focused on stories in the real world. Series like “Slam Dunk”, “Lone Wolf & Cub”, and “First President of Japan” are exciting dramas rooted in the real world. They’re driven by characters and their passions. Such stories are rare in American comics. Only in manga have I found stories that make real life look exciting.

Then again, it’s not hard to make the life of a firefighter look exciting. But to do a story without a fire, that’s tricky! Daigo’s first call is the rescue of a suicide attempt in a house full of natural gas. A single spark will cause a massive explosion. Soda does a fine job creating a sense of danger and maintaining suspense. Numerous details about procedure and firehouse life show Soda did plenty of research on his subject.

The art style is also rooted in the realistic. Rarely is there any exaggeration, except for humorous effect. The story’s easy to follow. Movement flows from panel-to-panel. Soda isn’t just a fine artist; he’s an excellent craftsman.

I would recommend “Firefighter” to those of you trying to introduce others to manga. Not only is it a fine story, it’s also a great example of the variety within manga series. I’ve noticed manga with fantasy or sci-fi themes gets the most mainstream attention. Romantic series are also prevalent. “Firefighter” demonstrates how, with the right creator, “ordinary” subject matter can inspire a great series.

This manga review was taken from here

Law Of Ueki

Mangaka: Tsubasa Fukuchi Synopsis:
In a world of powerful celestial beings, an epic contest is being held to select the next king! Each Celestial selects a kid in junior high to be his champion and grants him a special power. The kids battle it out - losers are eliminated, and winners are granted new talents! Seemingly ordinary Kosuke Ueki has been chosen to be a contender. Granted the power to change trash into trees, Ueki has two disadvantages to overcome: one, he doesn't know he's a participant in the tournament, and two, how the heck can anyone win a battle with the power to turn trash into trees?
	Review:

If you didn't know any better, you would think that the story was the creation of a secret recycling organization. The power to turn your everyday trash into trees is definitely one of the oddest concepts for a special power I have ever come by. That is not to say however that it is a useless power, especially when you consider the amount of trash you can easily find laying around on your average street. Being able to turn that useless food wrapper into greenery has to have some merit. Unfortunately beneath the wonderful ideas and humorous scenes, The Law of Ueki is just another run of the mill shounen title. Ueki's unique talent is shown off very early on in the story. It is only after a few demonstrations of his unique powers however that we find out the origin of his abilities. It is a very straight forward story from here though as we further follow Ueki and watch the many uses his ability has. As what would be expected from a shounen title, the end of the novel concludes unsurprisingly with Ueki tangled in his first fight against a rival kid with unique talents. Intertwined with all this is an abundance of comedic scenes, primarily aimed at the main character Ueki. These help provide some amusement in-between the clichéd moments, but will certainly turn a few people away. The art by Tsubasa Fukuchi is simple in design. The character art reminds me of shows like One Piece as there is vagueness in a lot of detail. This however is perfect for the many comedic moments that arise throughout the novel. Backgrounds also appear at the appropriate scenes, leading to quite a clean and easy read. The art is also very consistent in that the character detail doesn't change much at all when the comedy and action scenes occur. As you would expect, speed lines get used a lot in the novel, both for comedic and action reasons. With the story based around these two things, it is very rare to find a page without their use. Some panels however are overused in them, creating a very big mess of lines and sound effects that does not look very appealing. Overall however, Fukuchi has done a fairly good job with the art. The art chosen suits the tone of the story well; however it is definitely not a style that many will enjoy. Viz manages once again to pull off a reasonably good translation and package for The Law of Ueki. As is the standard for most of Viz's works, the sound effects are given a cartoony font and are slightly enlarged. This would generally be a good idea, considering the story features a lot of comedy. For the most part however, they always seem to be a font size or two bigger than what was required, which also makes some panels look like an uninviting giant mess. The artwork tells the story enough though that you can easily ignore the sound effects if you choose. On the production side, the detail is mostly printed sharply as you would expect. There are a few sections where the shades of grey tend to not show up as well as they should. The back includes a small manga insert from Tsubasa Fukuchi, as well as a few pages of Viz advertisements. This first instalment of The Law of Ueki has made it very clear about the path the story will take. It also makes it very clear that at the end of it all, an abundance of comedy will not break the Law of shounen. All the trademarks are intact, such as the young male hero, the girl in his life being the one who keeps him in check, the goal to gain godly power, and the fact that he will have to fight everyone else on earth to get it. If you enjoy your shounen stories, or even like a good comedy, then it may be worth checking out The Law of Ueki. There is a lot of promise in the story; however whether it can break the shounen mould enough to do it is something to be seen.

Overall : B- Story : C+ Art : B + Comedic scenes usually hit the mark. Interesting concepts. − Predictability. Forgettable characters. This manga review was taken from here

Bleach

Mangaka: Tite Kubo

I was surprised Viz picked up the work of Tite Kubo for english translation. So who is Tite Kubo? That’s a very good question I can’t answer but here’s what I do know of him. Tite Kubo’s first manga work Zombie Powder became a hit in japan’s Shonen Jump running for twenty seven volumes. Zombie Powder was cancelled and never finished possibly due to Tite Kubo being in a state severe emotional trauma during writing. To date Zombie Powder is yet to be published in english but hopefully if Bleach is a success we may yet see Zombie Powder in english, fingers crossed.

Unfortunately as good as life is we are all going to eventually die. Manga covering such an aspect of life from an eastern point of view I have read and reviewed once before in the form of Shuri Shiozu’s Eerie Queerie, which is available from Tokyopop. Bleach is another spiritual story but shot from another angle. If any of you have seen those U.S tv series Dead Like Me or Tru Calling they will give you a fair idea of what you are in for. Bleach is also still running in Shonen Jump anthology stateside and in japan.

Bleach is a supernatural action adventure. A special secret order of females known as Soul Reapers was established to help those of the spirit world once a human passes away. Decked in black and white samurai robes Soul Reapers are invisible to the living, all except those humans with a spiritual power or ki of some sort. Enter one young student Ichigo Kurosaki who in a very Sixth Sense kind of way can see the spirits of dead and has been able to do so since he was a child. Because spirits are drawn to Ichigo along with some of this other family members Ichigo and co are force into helping them find a way to rest in peace (as in Eerie Queerie too).

Things change with the sudden appearance of Rukia, a Soul Reaper with a magic samurai blade hunting for a hollow (evil spirit that preys on humans for their psycho-spiritual energy). In strange circumstances the hollow starts to attack the other Kurosaki family members. Rukia is wounded in the fight and lends Ichigo some of her powers so he can save his family from the hollow’s bite. Unfortunately Rukia gives Ichigo all her power, through no fault of her own and Ichigo becomes a rookie Soul Reaper. Ding Ding! Round one of Ichigo VS Hollow, who will win?. And was Rukia giving power or was Ichigo taking it unknowingly? Elsewhere Ichigo has to deal with a hollow haunting close friend in need Orihime, various school friends are introduced one in particular Chad (who looks like a refugee from Capcom’s Street Fighter games) has a very strange, nasty injury and a caged parakeet.

Bleach is another kick arse series worth buying. It’s got the fingers to push your action, comedy, ghosts and ghouls buttons. This will sit nicely next to Berserk on my shelves.

On the character front Ichigo is a very punk like ruffian possibly in a Billy Idol (ex-u.k 70-80’s punk rocker) design influence, he’s also convincing as a brat family member and would be hero ( I suppose spirits will have no problems ever finding him with that orange mop on his head he calls hair). This makes Ichigo feel more down to earth even though he has a rough edge. The dark haired Rukia is feisty and seems old fashioned but watching her adjusted to modern setting she’s now dumped in will no doubt add to the comedy. She’s not just a pretty face mind and pulls no punches putting Ichigo in his place now and then.

Tite Kubo’s english language debut has some lovely art. Looking kind of sketchy at times it has a charm that is growing on me. Before reading Bleach from a distance the art looked odd because I’m used to looking at more clean, detailed work (like from Ghost In the Shell, Full Metal Panic etc and also because I also like to draw) but Tite Kubo now has a new fan in me. He definitely has a thing for angled jawlines in his character design but somehow it works well for those that need it. And as manga like Hiroaki Samura’s Blade of the Immortal have proved sketchy artwork can look spectacular too. Cross-hatch shading can be a good thing.

Yeah, so I’m a sucker for this type of manga but despite what some might see as sugar coating in this review that’s not what I’m about. Bleach is a good read and one of the better and larger series available in english. Tread with caution if you don’t want a large series like this. Seven chapters of spiritual sword swinging sweetness laced with school contained within a nice cover. You’d be a dead wrong to miss out on it but the final choice is yours to make. It’s your life (and money) after all.

This manga review was taken from here

Salad Days

Mangaka: Inokuma Shinobu

Maybe there’s something about romantic manga, but one can never seem to get enough of unrequited love, stammering confessions, cantankerous side characters, and of course the obligatory stolen kiss. If you’re looking for a high school drama or simply a one-shot of light romantic fare; look no further. Salad Days is a collection of short stories (often about two chapters long each, though some only have one- and a few, three chapters) each dealing with a different story line; all involving some sort of romantic tale.

The pacing moves quickly- a full story is told well without seeming rushed and characters are established clearly and immediately without confusion or excessive exposition. However, there is a reason author Inokuma Shinobu chose the name “Salad Days,” the stories are about as filling to the voracious manga reader as a salad in a three course meal; but in the end, it all depends on what you have a taste for. With interesting storylines that are exciting enough to keep the same theme alive issue after issue, on a site that has good scans, is easily navigated, and has a dedicated one-man powerhouse for a scantalator; “Salad Days” is a manga that deserves a look; if not a prolonged, sparkling, rose-emblazoned gaze.

This manga review was taken from here

Parfait Tic!

Mangaka: Nanaji Nagamu

Summary: Fuuko Kameyama's life was perfectly fine until one day, the Shinpo cousins move next door. Although both of them are equally hot, Daiya and Ichi Shinpo are as different from one another as night and day. Daiya is a wild and wacky playboy while Ichi is the cold, mysterious type. Which cousin does Fuuko fall for, and which will she end up with?

Comments: I love Parfait Tic! It's just so sweet and mushy and cute :) The premise may sound like your typical predictable shoujo manga but the story has many twists and turns. The story never gets too sickeningly sweet and the plot, though simple, will keep you guessing and rooting for a cousin until the end. The drawings -- the character designs, the clothes they wear, and Fuuko's hairdos -- are just as cute as the story.

This manga review was taken from here

Midori no Hibi

Mangaka Kazurou Inoue

Summary: Seiji "Mad Dog" Sawamura is notorious for his fearsome right hook. Because of his image, most people from school, especially the girls, tend to stay away from him. During one of his loneliness bouts, Seiji wishes for a girlfriend and remarks that he would give anything in exchange for one. Lo and behold, his wish comes true the following morning, except that the girl happens to be attached to his arm, where his right hand should be.

Comments: Midori no Hibi is just hilarious. Add a couple of love rivals here and there, a mad scientist, a touchy foreign exchange student, crazy classmates, stalkers, and gangsters out for revenge, and you've got a winning formula for unadulterated entertainment. The cover designs are cute, too.


This manga review was taken from here

Godhand Teru

Mangaka Kazuki Yamamoto


Synopsis: It's difficult to believe that Dr. Mahigashi Teru is the newest surgeon at the Yasuda Memorial Hospital, being really clumsy and all. Inspite of this, his utmost dedication to his patients and respect for life makes him determined not to let any of his patients die. When faced with an insurmountable challenge, he changes personality in the OR. Unbeknown to many, Dr. Teru has inherited his father's so-called "godhands" which enables him to perform the most difficult of surgeries successfully and gives him amazing insight into his patients' condition more accurately than any medical equipment can.

Comments: How come Dr. Teru looks like an elementary school kid? And how come this manga doesn't seem to have any female doctors? But other than that, it's heart-warming and funny as hell. Lots of medical jargon, too, but the scanlators try to explain everything in laymen's terms and even if you don't understand the terms, you'll still get the story so don't worry about that. Inspite of the medical theme, this manga is leaning towards comedy and mythology more than heavy drama, so if you're looking for something ER-like, you won't find that here.

This manga review was taken from here

Yakitate!! Japan

Mangaka Takashi Hashiguchi


Summary: Have you ever tasted french bread that can make you feel like a Frenchman? Or animal-shaped bread that can actually make you act like an animal? Or bread so good that it can literally send you to heaven? Azuma Kazuma, thanks to his extraordinarily warm hands and intense passion for his craft, is that good a baker that he can make such wonderful tasting bread.


Inspired by a zealous baker he met when he was a young boy and his grandfather who initally refused to eat bread because it's no substitute for rice, Azuma strives to make the perfect Japan (pan is another word for bread so Ja-pan is pun for Japanese bread), bread that can replace rice as staple food. In his quest, he tries to join renowned bakery Pantasia and participates in numerous baking contests. Think typical shounen manga tournaments but instead of sports or martial arts, you have baking (hehe!).


Comments: A manga about bread may sound dull at first but the ridiculous themes of the baking tournaments, Azuma's crazy opponents, and how our hero overcomes each challenge are entertaining. The silly reactions of the people who taste Azuma's bread are also hilarious. Please set aside whatever prejudices or misconceptions you might have about this manga. The story is hardly boring so you might want to give it a try :)

This manga review was taken from here

Eyeshield 21

Story: Inagaki Riichirou
Art: Murata Yuusuke

Short Synopsis:
Eyeshield 21 is a story that revolves around the American football experiences of Kobayakawa Sena. Sena is a small guy who has been bullied in school and as a result has gained amazing running speed to keep himself from being beat up. As he begins school at Deimon High, he meets Hiruma and Kurita, the only two members of Deimon's American football club. Their ultimate goal is the Christmas Bowl ¡V Japan's American football high school championships. They convince Sena to become their team's secret running back and play under the name Eyeshield 21. Sena and his new friends struggle towards their goals, encountering new teammates and rivals along the way.

Storyline: 10/10
The storyline for Eyeshield 21 was created by Inagaki Riichirou. Because it is a sports story, Eyeshield 21 carries many sports themes and follows a sports tournament timeline, but is unusual in its main character choice, with a seemingly weak character as the focus of his story. This changes the impact of the story and also lends itself towards the team dynamic that Inagaki focuses on, giving each character a change to explore their strengths and weaknesses. 10/10

Characters: 10/10
The character designs for Eyeshield 21 are quite good. Inagaki works to come up with unique characters while Murata Yuusuke creates artwork to match each character's personality. The designs of each team are also interesting as Murata has many athletes reflect their respective team mascots.

Artwork: 10/10
The artwork for Eyeshield 21 is done by Murata Yuusuke. Murata is especially skilled at drawing from multiple angles and giving the reader a sense of the action and movement that takes place in the story. Even the backgrounds and peripheral characters of the manga are drawn with detail. Murata's attention to the characters also brings out a lot of the emotion in the story.

Overall: 10/10
Eyeshield 21 is a great manga with an interesting mix of humor and serious storyline. An obvious read for fans of sports manga and even enjoyable for those who know little about the sport, as most of the athletic focus is on individual skills and explanation is provided throughout the story. With many likable characters and a compelling storyline, I highly recommend Eyeshield 21.

This manga review was taken from here

20th Century Boys

by Naoki Urasawa

Plot/Story
To be the greatest superhero you have to understand one thing and thats how to be the greatest supervillian. Kenji runs a former liquor store that is now refurbished into a convience store. Running on hard luck, Kenji has had to fumble with his duties to his convience store and his niece, left in his care by his runaway sister. All these pressures pale in comparison to the coming of a conspiracy that only he and his childhood friends will have to face. Will he be able to figure out the mystery? Can he stop what is to happen in time? Can they really prevent what is foreseen to happen? It really seems impossible.

Characters
The story begins with Kenji and mostly centers around him with his childhood friends. I'm not going to give every character since there is way to many to describe. I will say that each character has his/her own personality. You will start to feel as if you are these character's friend and not just reading a manga... more like you are part of the story trying to save the world along with them.

Drawing Style
I was really amazed by this style. At first I was skeptical thinking it was just another typical style, I was completely wrong. I truly appreciate the characters that exist in this manga and the detailed backgrounds. Urasawa Naoki doesn't do the sexy girls/guys. If you are hoping to find busty girls this manga doesn't have your ecchi intentions in mind. You will find scenes that will give you goosebumps and make your hair stand on the back of your neck as you read on.

Enjoyment
Enjoyed isn't capable of describing what I felt about this manga. I spent 8 hours one night trying to finish this series off. I couldn't put down the volumes even if I had wanted to. The complex and always changing storyline keeps you wanting more. Even if you aren't a fan of mystery which by chance I'm usually not, you will most likely appreciate this one. May turn out not to be a favorite but I have a feeling you will still enjoy reading. When I do finally finish this manga I truly believe I'll be satisfied but at the same time begging for more.

Overall
Excellent story, great artwork, and this all adds up to be one of my all time favorites. I've read lots, lots, lots, (this could go on for a bit) of manga. In the end I always mention 20th Century Boys as a manga someone should pick up or download. Every person I've passed this manga along to has become a radical fan as I have. Nothing more to say than I hope you will join the fan ranks as well.

Story/Plot - 5 out of 5
Characters - 5 out of 5
Drawing Style - 5 out of 5
Enjoyment - 5 out of 5
Overall - 5 out of 5

This manga review was taken from here

Confession

story: Nobuyuki Fukumoto
artwork: Kaiji Kawaguchi

Old school buddies Asai and Ishikura are out hiking the 3,200-meter peak of Mt. Obari when they get lost in a storm. Ishikura falls and injures himself and is ready to die then and there in the snow when he confesses to having once murdered someone. Then, miraculously, the two manage to find a lodge, and their lives are saved. Ishikura begins to regret his confession. And Asai, who senses this, begins to panic.

Might Ishikura kill him, too?

CONFESSION is pure horror and suspense, all on a snow-capped mountain top. This is a one series manga. The story is thrilling and very high paced, you will be impatient when you are turning the pages and I think you will definitely like the ending. The art is average, nothing special but it is still nice to watch.

Review Score:

Story : 9 / 10

Art : 8 / 10

Monster

by Naoki Urasawa

The bright white cover of Naoki Urasawa's Monster (VIZ Signature) belies the subject matter of this gloomy suspense series: a serial killer story centered around a gifted Japanese surgeon who may have saved the life of a nine-year-old murderous psychopath.

Set in Düsseldorf, Germany, both before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Monster's hero, Dr. Kenzo Tenma, is introduced as a young brain surgeon on his way up in the highly politicized world of Eisler Hospital. He's engaged to the beautiful and acquisitive daughter of the hospital's director and appears to have it made until a young boy and traumatized girl are brought into the ER. Their parents, a former East German advisor and his wife, have been murdered while the boy Johan has been shot in the head.

Our hero, still smarting over the death of an Arab laborer from the night before, saves the young boy, but at significant cost to his career. He refuses to leave the operating theater when a politically important patient is also brought into the hospital ("No life is worth more or less than another," he states more than once, but as the story progresses, this belief will be severely tested), and the politico dies. Fast-track Kenzo is quickly relegated to a less prestigious position in the hospital; his promised promotion to director of surgery is taken away from him and his fiancé quickly dumps him for a new rising star. In frustration, Kenzo vents his anger to the seemingly unconscious Johan. And before you can say, "Careful what you wish for," both the director and Kenzo's rivals are slipped some poisoned hard candy.

The story quickly moves forward to 1995 – where Kenzo is once more firmly established in Eisler Hospital. A series of murders is in the news, and they look to be duplicates of the killings that originally brought Johan and his sister to the doctor's attention. Investigating both sets of slayings: Inspector Lunge of the Bundeskriminelamt (the German equivalent of the FBI), who looks to be this series' Javert. Sharp-eyed and with a fully catalogued memory that he accesses by tapping an imaginary keyboard at his side, Lunge is sure that Kenzo is connected to the still-unsolved hospital killings. This suspicion will doubtless be compounded when a potential witness to the serial slaying dies while under Dr. Tenma's care.

Throughout the first volume, there are hints that the boy and his sister are connected to something larger. The candies that were used to poison the hospital director, for instance: were they meant for their final victims or for Johan himself? Our serial killer is described by one of his henchmen as a monster, and his ability to show up from one place to the next borders on the preternatural.

Too, throughout the book we're regularly reminded of the first killings' political dimensions. "I thought the world would be a better place with the fall of the Berlin Wall," one disgruntled cop observes as he contemplates the city's escalating crime rate, "but nothing good has come out of it." As with Kenzo's moral decision to save the life of that helpless boy, what seems to be a positive act has possibly led to negative consequences.

Urasawa lays this potentially murky morass straightforwardly. If at times his characters speak more bluntly and thematically than necessary, in part this can be seen be seen as characteristic of the diagnostic world in which they live. Urasawa's art is clean and immediately accessible to Western eyes, while his page layouts frequently can be quite compelling (he's especially strong setting up silent suspense sequences, but can be equally striking just building up to a significant conversation between Kenzo and his flighty fiancé).

Rated for "older teen" readers, Monster has its bloody murderous moments (not to mention a few overhead brain surgery shots), but it's nothing that a CSI fan can't see any night in pre-prime time reruns. Me, I wonder how many teen readers will get caught up in this well-mounted serial's moral ambiguities which, in best noir fashion, are effectively designed to make the reader question what at first seem fluorescently lit moral certainties.

Review Score:

Story : 8,5 / 10

Art : 8.5 / 10

This review was taken from here

Death Note

Story by Ooba Tsugumi
Art by Obata Takeshi (The mangaka of Hikaru no Go)

Story & Characters

In short, the story, as already said, is mainly about a notebook which is a tool of the gods of death to, as the name of the notebook already says, causes death in people. This book falls into the hands of a high school student, who has his own idea of an ideal world. However in his journey of achieving it, he faces powerful adversaries who try to stop him from reaching his ideals, or tries to take the note. I shall stop here in case i provide too many spoilers.

The story is very deep, with well-created characters with unique personalities. The thing i like about this book is that the characters are all very human like (apart from their unbelievably strong analytical thinking) and each of them have a unique personality.

Light, the main character, for example, is illustrated to give a very clear image of a high-school genius who has surpassed most of his peers' academic abilities, and is bored with his routine life, and yearning for something new. He also gives us an image of a person who will go the distance to get to his ideals (why not, since he has the ability to kill).

even Ryukuu and Remu, the gods of death in the story, are given well-described personalities, and the gods of death are different themselves. Indeed it is a great addition to the already deep human characters.

The story by itself, is also full of twists and turns. Frankly, i myself have not completed the manga, but the story is such that one will never expect what will happen, except that he/she will expect that whatever that happens will be unexpected. The prospect that anyone will suddenly die also will lead a reader to be very much interested in the book, and will yearn for the next book after the current one. The twists in this story is so unexpected that, somewhere in the story, the reader faces an almost complete change of characters and roles. Indeed, the plot-thinking skills of Tsugumi Ooba cannot be under-estimated. The only bad thing is that, somewhere the changes are so sudden that i myself have no idea how the writer is going to end his story.
Great plot indeed. i give it a 10.

Rating

10 (excellent)

Art

The characters are rather lifelike as compared to other artists like clamp, where everyone looks almost the same. Not that i do not like stuff by clamp, but the art of deathnote is indeed very well drawn.

Characters also have faces which match their personality and backgrounds. The image of Light for example, being of a respectful, middle-class, background, gives the air of a gentleman. Misa, being a young and innocent girl is also depicted very well, with her blonde hair(or white in the manga) and large eyes, is exactly what you expect to see while viewing a teen idol.

The gods of death are also drawn very well. They are in no way pretty nor handsome, but pretty much the opposite. They are scary looking, with tentacles as hair, sharp teeth and sometimes rotting parts of bodies. However it really gives one the image of a 'god-of-death'. The realism in the art shows us that indeed, there is ugliness in the world, and this realism really fits in well with the dark story.

Expressions are also very well depicted. Expressions of shock, hopelessness, and agony are common in this story, and all of them are very well drawn, and kind of makes the readers feel exactly what they are feeling too.

Settings in the story are well drawn too. say, in a certain room, much attention is given to the details, such as the stuff on a table, being well arranged or messy. Indeed takeshi obatataks much pride in his work, and gives absolutely no nonsense. There are not much action scenes however, so theres actually not much chance for the artist to show off his skills in drawing such scenes.

Rating

8 (good)

Sound

haha there is obviously no sound, as already said this is a manga review. I shall just review on the dialogues.

The dialogue takes up pretty much of the manga, as this is mainly a story about a person's mind and his ways to achieve what he wants. This can be a good thing as it makes each book worth its money(since the reader takes so much time to read the dialogue). However the dialogue may be a bit too much for some people and they may deem it boring. I myself slept while reading book 1 halfway, not because it is boring, but rather i got tired from reading the large amount of words in the book.

The thing i like best about the dialogue is that, there are NO STUPiD CaTch phrases. Characters in the book talk and think like normal people, which is a very very good thing...

Rating

7 (above average)

Presentation

Overall a very nice presentation, totally worth it.

The only bad thing was jus that there are too many words in the book. Not that it is anyone's fault, as the words are necessary to tell the story well. This happens in the chinese version of the comic, at least.
The presentation of the comic itself is clear cut, and different situations, for example flashbacks are well represented by a black border.

Desperate situations, scenes of suspense, etc are also very well presented, and in such a way that the reader may realise his heart is beating quickly and his hands are starting to swear(at least in my case).

Though this is mainly a serious story, there are few times of humour, not too few such that the book will be boring and droning, but also not too much as to make this story a complete joke. The use of humour in places are certainly appropriate, as it does lift up the readers' spirits in the process of reading such a suspense-filled story.

In conclusion, it is a very good mangas that teenagers and certain adults will enjoy. It is indeed a good read.

Rating

9 (very good)

Final Verdict

8.83 (very good)

This manga review was taken from here