Yor Daily Briar 🔪

While the antics of Anya and her classmates deliver plenty of entertainment, these moments are only able to land as well as they do thanks to their unexpected opponent. Their opposing class’s star student is certainly an intimidating character. Seeing what they are capable of doing with one of those flying bruise factories they call dodgeballs, I almost feel like Anya’s entire class deserves stars just for surviving.

As one would expect, all of these elements land so splendidly thanks to the visuals. This episode leans completely into the over-the-top action, despite the mundane nature of the game at the story’s center. From the first time we see Yor wind up a throw until the final brutal dodgeball flies, the visuals deliver speed, power, and hilarity in every throw.

I do not buy for a second that Twilight doesn't know Yor is an assassin. He correctly deduced her brother was in the secret police just by realizing that what he claimed his job was would be decent cover for it. You cannot seriously expect me to buy that a man as incredibly careful as Twilight would ever in a million years marry a woman he has not done an absolute in-depth background check on, and you cannot convince me that said background check would not have discovered that Yor was not only an assassin but an infamous assassin immediately. It does not fit with Twilight's character at all.

But fine - I'll accept it as the cost of the manga existing at all.

Outside of that, the manga is just a gem. The premise is absolutely ingenious, and the Tatsuya Endo seems to have a really solid grasp of these characters, so watching them bounce in and out of the zany situations he concocts for them is a joy. My favorite is Anya, who is the only character who actually has a full picture of everything going on and who everybody else assumes has the smallest piece of the puzzle. What I like about Anya is that despite her superpowers and the bizarre situation she finds herself in, she still feels like an actual little girl. Anya feels real, which is a treat. The last time I can recall a character of a similar (though even younger) age feeling as realistic as Anya is Tsumugi in "Sweetness and Lightning".

The manga's story arcs don't reinvent the wheel, but the premise is so good that Endo doesn't really have to; he just has to not mess it up. The manga's premise also has this weird feeling where everything is simultaneously incredibly high stakes and incredibly low stakes at the same time. Things like "How will Anya do on her midterm exams?" have world-shaking implications, and we get drama out of "Anya needs to make nice with the jerk boy in her grade by winning at Old Maid, but not by too much".

The art is good, not great; the best artist in Shonen Jump right now is probably My Hero Academia's Horikoshi and Endo isn't there. But it has style and it's appealing. The action is fun. The gags are good.

YOR PANIC