Currently Running Manga Discussion

[Spark Of Spirit]

This week's rankings:

One Piece (Cover, Lead CP)
1. Black Clover
2. My Hero Academia
Samon the Summoner (CP)
3. Food Wars! Shokugeki no Souma
4. Haikyuu!!
Nisekoi (CP)
5. Hinomaru Zumou
6. Kimetsu no Yaiba: Blade of Demon Destruction
7. Straighten Up! Welcome to Shika High's Competitive Dance Club
Takuan and Batsu's Daily Demon Diary (Not Ranked)
8. Hunter x Hunter
9. The Disaster of PSI Kusuo Saiki
10. Gintama
11. Yuna of Yuragi Manor
12. Kochikame
13. World Trigger
14. Mononofu
15. Toriko
16. Bleach
Chronicle of Isobe -Life is Hard-

Weekly Shonen Jump #30
Cover: Food Wars! Shokugeki no Souma, The Disaster of Psi Kusuo Saiki
Lead CP: Food Wars! Shokugeki no Souma
CP: The Disaster of Psi Kusuo Saiki, My Hero Academia

I'm not sure if HxH is being ranked yet or not. There haven't been any straightforward answers on that yet. Either way, that's not good for Yuna or Mononofu.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

HXH is literally ranked on this and the last list that you just posted.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Yeah, but I wrote not ranked on the others I posted because that's how they were originally given. Since then it's been mixed messages. For instance, I have to keep adding Not Ranked to Takuan and Batsu because they stopped labeling it despite the fact it's clearly not ranked yet.

It doesn't really matter either way. HxH's rankings don't make a difference since it already sells by the buckets.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Nobuhiro Watsuki is working on a new manga.

No, it probably won't top RK, but there's no reason to not hope for the best anyway.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Nobuhiro Watsuki seems to have lost his way after Kenshin. Clearly there's an extremely talented mangaka there, and perhaps he just needs the right editor or story set-up to filter his ideas through. His post-Kenshin works, while far from bad, have been rather middling in quality and seem to lack the same sort of drive and inspiration which he clearly possessed back when he was working on that series.

Despite RK being nearly two decades old now, I still genuinely hold out hope that we can see a return to form from Watsuki. I really do believe that he's capable of better.

[Spark Of Spirit]

I do think it's a combination of inspiration, effort, and investment, that made Rurouni Kenshin so good. All you have to do is look at his other series to see where he failed (relatively failed, I mean) to reach the standards of RK.

Gun Blaze West was an inspired idea. A western gunfighter shonen had not been attempted before other than Trigun's first series. But he put no effort into it at all. He stated he made everything up week to week and it showed. As a result, he didn't really have any investment in it.

Buso Renkin clearly had effort put into it. Watsuki said he wanted to put everything he enjoyed about shonen into the work and it showed. But it had no inspiration at all. He put the effort in, as he did plot it out, but the lack of inspiration was a real hole in the series.

Embalming was a project he was clearly invested in. He built a world with all sorts of rules and lore. Some of his choices in character designs were even inspired. But the writing and plotting were simply not there. The series was a confusing mess that was clearly not plotted out and suffered for it.

Each series had different problems. Even his Meteor Strike one-shot was a really good idea that could have been great if he felt like focusing on it. To me, that shows he still has it since he has no consistent issue. The problem is that he hasn't landed on that one idea where he put in all the chips yet. I sincerely hope this new series is the one that does it.

[VLordGTZ]

Kochikame is getting a new TV anime to celebrate its 40th anniversary.
I'm hoping Crunchyroll or some other streaming service brings it over.

I'm not sure if HxH is being ranked yet or not. There haven't been any straightforward answers on that yet. Either way, that's not good for Yuna or Mononofu.

I think HxH is being ranked now since we are past 7 chapters since its return.  It's a shame that Mononofu isn't doing so hot right now, but I'm holding out hope that it can recover.

[Markness]

The last few Nanatsu no Taizai chapters have been pretty intense. The way Ban broke Merascylla's neck was probably the most painful thing I've ever seen happen in a manga. Also, the way Estarossa stabbed all of Meliodas' hearts was pretty gut wrenching. Nakaba Suzuki really knows how to bring the pain in his mangas.

Now that the Ten Commandments have taken over Britannia, the series has taken a darker turn, almost Berserk-like. However, the fact Arthur and Nanashi are still fighting shows that there is some hope.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Really strong week.

This chapter officially ends the current arc in MHA, and boy is it powerful. The series has been on a roll since the end of the sports festival and it hasn't let up yet. All Might is officially retired, the police and the heroes are making changes, and everyone else has to deal with the realization that an era is actually over. Hopefully he'll still mentor Midoriya and the rest of the students, but MHA is probably going to be very different from now on. And we still haven't hit the 100th chapter yet.

Food Wars was great. The usage of "show, don't tell" in regards to Erina reacting to Soma's cooking was very well done. It is clear that she enjoyed it, and it effected her decision, but they don't have to tell you that outright for you to get it.

Good reveals in World Trigger. Tamakoma-2 is a very balanced team, but it is true that they need another powerhouse to really push their combination forward. Hopefully when Hyuse joins, they can finally reach the end of this arc, win the rank wars, and we can move the story along. I really want to see an Aftokrator arc now.

Black Clover was more of a character episode, and it was fun for it. I do like the shift in Gauche's character from being completely unlikeable to being a more rounded character. Also, I did not expect Grey to look like that. Genuinely surprising.

On the other hand, this fight in Bleach is the kind of ridiculous that made me lose interest in the series. Pointlessly convoluted where no move or technique matters except the Deus Ex Machina move that Kubo wants to end the fight with.

[Spark Of Spirit]

This weeks' ranking:

Food Wars! Shokugeki no Souma (Lead CP)
1. One Piece
2. Hinomaru Zumou
The Disaster of PSI Kusuo Saiki (CP)
3. Black Clover
4. Haikyuu!!
My Hero Academia (CP)
5. Samon the Summoner
6. Hunter x Hunter
Takuan and Batsu's Daily Demon Diary (Not Ranked)
7. Kimetsu no Yaiba: Blade of Demon Destruction
8. Yuna of Yuragi Manor
9. Toriko
10. Mononofu
11. Kochikame
12. World Trigger
13. Straighten Up! Welcome to Shika High's Competitive Dance Club
14. Bleach
15. Gintama
16. Nisekoi
Chronicle of Isobe -Life is Hard-

Next week I believe is Takuan & Batsu's first ranking, so that should be interesting to see. That's the highest Toriko has been in a while, but it's sad to see Straighten Up and World Trigger dipping low again. Things will probably reverse themselves soon, though. On the other hand, I've never read Hinomaru and yet it always ranks really well. The art looks good, but is the series?

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

After the out of nowhere but welcome detour that was the Hisoka Vs. Chrollo fight and aftermath, it looks like Togashi finally jumped back into the Dark Continent arc, and as of the previous two chapters I'm definitely much more into it than I was before. With all of the overabundance of set-up out of the way, we can finally see Togashi do what he does best, which is to put his characters through unique, interesting, and desperate situations and see them work their way out of it.

In this case, now that the cruise has started, the members of the royal family in line for succession have obviously started to make their moves toward taking each other out, and with the prince and his mother who Kurapika is responsible for protecting having their guards (who were clearly given way too little information on the situation at hand) eliminated one after another, Kurapika (being the only person on her side who actually realizes what's going on) must find the culprits fast. First, however, he has to make sure that none of the men on his team are double-agents, which should make for an interesting scene in the next chapter.

I also like how the lower-class decks are realistically out of control with things like crime, disease, and famine, and in danger of rioting, which will be bad if Kurapika and the queen and prince have to escape and blend in over there in a crisis like he predicted that they might have to do if things go south up top (which they already have started to).

I love it when Togashi puts his characters into a real bind like this, and IMO this is some of the best material that he's brought to the table in years. I can't wait to see how the rest of the Voyage sub-arc progresses.

[The Shadow Gentleman]

So after putting it off for many years, I've finally started taking a crack at Yotsuba. It's a very refreshing read compared to all the dark or intense stuff I've been reading lately. Really like the simple charm of it all.

[LumRanmaYasha]

I've never read Hinomaru and yet it always ranks really well. The art looks good, but is the series?

I enjoy it a lot myself. It has just about everything I like and enjoy in sports manga in terms of character development and rivalries, and the action sequences are really exciting and adrenaline-pumping. I really hope it gets a good anime one of these days, hopefully one on about the same level of quality as the Haikyuu!! anime, so it can get more exposure and licensed over here.

So after putting it off for many years, I've finally started taking a crack at Yotsuba. It's a very refreshing read compared to all the dark or intense stuff I've been reading lately. Really like the simple charm of it all.

Kiyohiko Azuma is a master of feel-good slice-of-life comedies. Yotsuba&! is easily his best work, and the unrivaled king of slice-of-life childhood manga stories. It's a series with such endearing charm and universal themes that it's almost unheard of to find someone who can't enjoy it in some capacity.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

You see, the past few weeks of MHA, and this chapter in particular, have done such a good job of showcasing what a great writer Horikoshi is. Yes, MHA unquestionably follows a standard enough shonen formula with its set-up. The All For One arc was about the group rescuing one of their friends who had been kidnapped, and about the old generations of heroes and villains having their final battle before passing the torch onto the new generation, our protagonists. Tons of shonen manga have done this. Naruto, One Piece, Hunter X Hunter, and various other popular shonen have all had their spins on this, and have done it in their own way that makes them stand out from one another despite essentially telling very similar stories with plot points like this. And whereas a lesser writer would feel like he's making a pale imitation of what those stories did to entice readers so much, Horikoshi knows how to make this very familiar story-line feel like his own in a way that stands up there with the iconic stories of those kinds of series rather than being lumped in with the less noteworthy stuff.

And how he manages to do it is simultaneously rather simple, yet takes a lot of skill as a writer to pull off. He lets you see how his characters, and his entire world for that matter, react to what has just happened. To explain what I mean, let's play out how this arc would have gone had a lesser writer handled it. The main plot points would all be the same, except when we got to the villains taking Bakugou, he actually would prove to be the shallow character that we all initially thought he was and he would be tempted by them. Then the whole hero ambush would take place, and despite it clearly going against orders, Midoriya and his friends would expose themselves and have a series of one-on-one fights, except only Midoriya's, and maybe Todoroki's, would feel like they mattered since one is the main character and the other is really popular among the readers. Midoriya would have a fight with Bakugou and then knock some sense into him. All Might would have his fight with the final boss, but there would be no stakes because after some struggle he'd pull out another epic attack and win. His secret wouldn't be exposed, people would cheer, and that would be the end of that, and everything would go back to status-quo with Bakugou returning with his friends to UA Academy. The kids' parents wouldn't even be mentioned in all of this. And there would be your problem right there. On its own it's not a bad story, but it would be woefully underwhelming due to a serious lack of stakes for readers to become invested in. For as much as I don't like the majority of Naruto as a series, I will at least give Kishimoto credit for using story arcs like this to dramatically alter the status-quo of his series and make it feel like actions had long-lasting consequences like with Sasuke becoming a villain and then staying that way until the end of the series. Granted, he handled it really poorly and it was insanely stupid to see him be forgiven for everything in the final two chapters LITERALLY right after turning heel AGAIN and trying to kill Naruto, but I'm starting to get off-topic here, so that's a rant for another day.

What I have particularly been enjoying about MHA over the past year, and especially in regard to the last several chapters, is how Horikoshi focuses on what affect the events which take place in his Universe have on his characters and story. Bakugou doesn't take the bait and join the villains' side because his character is far less simplistic than that. Midoriya and his friends don't idiotically expose themselves because they realize how stupid that would be when they are already walking on thin ice, and being found out by anyone other than All Might would mean instant expulsion for them. Both before and during this arc, Horikoshi brilliantly set-up how parents were concerned over the safety of their children due to recent events, how the media was taking this as an opportunity to crucify UA Academy, how the government was getting much more pushy and forceful toward trying to run things their way in order to instill more confidence in the regular citizens, and how All Might's health was still rapidly declining from the previous arcs and the time window with which he could hold his battle form was becoming increasingly narrower. We also got an understanding of how villains like Shigaraki and his master think, so we knew their motives going into this and that it would affect their own stakes in the battle as well. Get it? These are all reasons for us to be invested in the story and characters. These are all things that are subject to change, and thus serve as real consequences for what will happen based on how the events of the story arc play out.

And consider how this all ends. All Might and the other professional heroes win their battle against the villains, Bakugou is rescued by his peers, and All For One (the character) is captured and placed under arrest. Yet, in doing all of this, All Might has finally burned out the last embers of his ability to use All For One (the Quirk), and as Midoriya's mentor and father-figure, he can no longer provide any physical protection or training for him, but only serve as a guiding figure and adviser. And that's not all; his true form was exposed to the public as well. Now everyone knows that he has lost his abilities, and with his retirement he can no longer stand as the symbol of peace that inspired so much hope in the citizens of the world. And aside from just him, several top-level heroes have been severely injured and put out of commission. Meanwhile, Shigaraki is on the loose and has no shortage of villains who are willing to flock to his side now that so many heroes are out of the picture, so that whole defeat that he suffered at the end of this arc was barely even a set-back for him. On top of all of that, the government is in a panic on how to restore the people's faith in their ability to protect them, and all the while the staff of UA Academy must try their best to convince the parents of the students to allow their children to stay with them in their dorms and under their constant protection, even though they have failed to properly protect them in the past. And while they've had luck with several parents so far, Midoriya's mother is firmly against her son going back to UA Academy, and we as readers can actually find her thoughts completely reasonable. It feels very relatable when I could imagine my own parents doing the same thing in a situation like that. It's nice to know about how the kids' parents actually react to them being in constant danger (something that made Digimon Adventure and Tamers such stand-out series compared to other toyetic shonen anime), and it's even better to see how much they really do care about their children, which is something that so many other series ignore.

The heroes may have won a major battle, yet somehow they are losing the war and have been dealt several huge blows at once. Despite all of this, we still have a silver-lining of hope at the end with characters like Bakugou. Despite everything that happened in this arc, although it's subtle, you can tell in the scene with his mom and talking to All Might afterwards how he has changed somewhat in a positive way. He's perceptive to the relationship between All Might and Midoriya, and even though he looks up to All Might just as much, he doesn't show any jealousy or frustration, but instead thanks him for all that he has done. The old Bakugou never would have said that out loud, even if that's what he was feeling inside. When we have consequences, stakes, and developments like this, it's very easy to get invested in the outcome of everything that's going on in the series. The action and fight scenes are cool enough on their own, but when working in tandem with the characters, story, themes, and world which Horikoshi has set in place, all of a sudden the action is infused with meaning and feels like a natural part of the story itself, rather than the story feeling like it has been specifically structured to work around big action set-pieces.

As a writer, Horikoshi clearly isn't interested in maintaining a status-quo. He's interested in telling a story, and what's the point of telling a story if it doesn't change its characters in some way, or having characters if they don't affect the story in some way? Just like the best shonen mangaka from Osamu Tezuka to Yoshihiro Togashi, Horikoshi clearly understands this concept and applies it beautifully to MHA.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Once again, MHA hits it out of the park. Awesome Brian the Sun reference. That ED song was so perfect for the anime. I'm going to miss it when season 2 rolls around. Bakugo's mom was hilarious. It says a lot about his personality why he is the way he is. His dad being so much like Midoriya probably proves just why he was ever friends with him in the first place. Speaking of Bakugo, he must know the truth about All Might's quirk and Midoriya by now, especially since he is the only student who knows it can be passed down. I also liked All Might's expression when he saw Midoriya's room. It was a small moment but it was very nice. But the biggest moment was with Midoriya's mom. All of her concerns are very valid and she has every right to be worried about her son. He has almost killed himself to save others multiple times by now. The only way for her to change her mind might be for her to learn the truth about where he really got his quirk from. She has been through a lot in this series, so she does deserve some sort of explanation.

But I also like where World Trigger is going. This whole chapter felt like a preview of what's to come in the next arc, and I really wish we could get there already. But we still need to see how Tamakoma-2 can get there to the end of the Rank Wars. It's funny that this chapter has the same sort of cliffhanger as MHA does. I definitely didn't expect that.

Food Wars was a fun set up for the next arc. I like how far Erina has come since the beginning of the series and how interesting this arc looks to be. Definitely am looking forward to next week.

Also I was glad to see Asta lose in Black Clover. He was due. This guy is on a level above any of them, and it seems they're going to need to work together to win this time. I always enjoy team up fights, so I do hope Tabata takes the story in that direction.

And special mention goes to HxH for turning the recent arc into a murder mystery starring Kurapika. I haven't been all that invested since it came back, but this chapter was enthralling. Other mention goes to Toriko: I have absolutely no idea what is happening at all. Also to Bleach: Deus Ex Machina the series, where literally anything can happen because Kubo wants it to.