Santa lilio sangre

“All good things must come to an end”.

About a year ago I created this blog, hoping that it could help me get some of my ideas out there, without having to deal with the bullcrap rules that you can find on forums. And tumblr has helped me do that, although I’m not really new to tumblr, and has been using it for quite a while before I created “Santa lilio Sangre”.

There’s so much stuff I wanted to share with you guys, aka those who follow me. Mainly my taste in arts, and who really is “Odile Kuronuma”. And of course do more manga analysis and reviews...But as it stands out the future is uncertain and it’s not clear how much time I can devote to this blog in the future.It’s also been maybe too much of a distraction, when I should be focusing on more important things.Not saying sharing my ideas isn’t important, but I have other real life priorities.

So for all those reasons I think it’s time to pull the trigger and finally end it here, I really had a blast sharing some of my loves, be it manga or art, with a bunch of bloggers. But again all good things must come to an end.

So while thinking about Magi, but also Castlevania, and the recent Japanese ranking of the 20 best mangaka artists, I got into thinking about my favourite series, manga related mostly.

I’m not a huge fan of rankings and I don’t pay much attention to them,but I thought it would be interesting to figure out which series I like better.So without further ado here’s my current ranking.

1- Berserk and Vagabond: they’re tied for me, I like both series equally even though they’re different and have little in common. I think Berserk might come off slightly on top sometimes because of how intense it can be, but looking at Vagabond I like how it doesn’t overuse some adult themes too much, and overall prefer its depiction of violence which doesn’t fall too much in the cliches we see in Berserk.

2-Priest: I know it’s a manhwa, but see the thing is I don’t read many manhwa, and I don’t see much difference between it and manga for example. It definitely has a more Western vibe to it, since the art is based on Hellboy, but the story and the main character’s quest are pretty similar to Guts’.

3-Sanctuary: it’s the perfect Yakuza story in my book. This is made by Buronson who you might know more for Fist of the North Star. It’s a very compelling story, and very touching too, about how two young men plans to change Japan. I don’t think many know of it tbh it’s definitely more old school.

4-Vinland Saga: I haven’t read all of it yet but it’s really damn good, for like the first 100 chapters I read. You’ll notice that all the titles at the top are seinens.

5-One Piece: I would prolly rank it a bit higher, especially the first part of the manga, same for the first 100 chapters of Magi. OP has become a staple in the manga industry, it is the most successful manga and while it might not be as fresh as it used to, it definitely still has some interesting stuff going on, mainly when it comes to the world building.

6-Magi: I feel that Magi’s quality is far too inconsistent to be above OP’s. OP can be uninteresting at times, but Magi has legit mindboggling developments and bad characterization right now, but you don’t have to agree with me on this one.The manga isn’t ranked lower because I still consider the first 100 chapters or so particularily good, and in fact I could easily place them above post time skip OP.

7- Nanatsu no Taizai: how fitting that this comes in 7. It really is one of the more niche series, and for the exception of some mishaps like the second Byzel tournament, the quality is rather consistent. The characters are also very interesting.

8-JJBA: I feel like JJBA should be in its own category, it’s so unique that I don’t even think it should be put in the same basket as other shounens or seinens apparently.Not to mention that I don’t like all parts equally, for me the first 3 parts worked better, part 5 and 6 are a bit too predictable. Part 7 is also pretty good. 

9-Shingeki no Kyojin: it used to be way higher, in fact very close to OP, but lately ever since the reveal about the basement it has been very meh to me.I guess I found the reveal to be underwhelming, since it’s so similar to the third Reich.  It’s really nothing special.

10- Bastard!!: ah good ol’ Bastard. I actually prefer the period before the angels appeared, and DS is such a fun MC, who also happens to be an anti-hero of sorts. 

Special mention to Otoyomegatari, which is prolly one of the more unique titles out there, and it just doesn’t get much recognition. I’ve enjoyed reading it quite a lot, and plan on catching up soon.And also Gensoumaden Saiyuki which holds a special place in my heart,but I really couldn’t include every shounen or manga I read over the years.

This list might change once I get around reading some new titles including Kongo Banchou, but also Kingdom, HxH (even though I’ve watched the first anime series), BNHA , Real and others. 

This is in the same vein as the Berserk post, but you’ll find that  it differs wildly from it, since 

A- the problems that Magi is facing are totally different from Berserk’s. 

and spoiler alert 

B- Berserk is still good. Whereas Magi isn’t.

No use beating around the bush. The quality of storytelling in the main manga at least has declined dramatically, to the point that i really don’t see the point in reading it anymore, not even for closure. It really feels like Ohtaka doesn’t try anymore, that she completely dropped the ball.

And I will try to give a justification to this claim. And as usual I’ll try to be as unbiased as possible.Also this might very well be my last Magi related post, because as I just said I don’t plan on catching up anymore, I really don’t care about the ending, which saddens me of course since I devoted a large amount of my time discussing it on various sites ad nauseum.

So if you came here because of Magi then I really am sorry, but I’ll try to make this one worthwhile. 

In order to figure out what went wrong, we have to ask ourselves what are the strengths of Magi. Magi’s strengths as a somewhat unconventional shounen were: the sense of adventure, the comedy, the politics, the plot which mostly made sense and of course the characterization.So let’s go over each one.

I- The adventure

The first 100 chapters of Magi were filled with adventure, which in Magi comes mainly in the form of dungeon diving. Even if the action scenes themselves aren’t perfect, and in general they’re not Ohtaka’s forte, it still is that the adventure was one of the main components of what made Magi so appealing. But quickly we saw Ohtaka moving away from that, and even the World exploration arc couldn’t save the sense of adventure, since dungeon diving was no longer a thing. Furthermore it managed to divide the main cast, and as such a good chunck of the interactions between them were lost, and back then a lot of focus was devoted to Magnostadt, so it doesn’t feel like the attention was divided equally between Aladdin, Alibaba and Mor.

Why is adventure so important? Well it is after all a shounen manga, many of them feature some sense of adventure, with series like OP being the prime example of that. And it’s not like Ohtaka simply ran out of ideas for adventure, she could have had any other real dungeon (Belial isn’t the norm for dungeons) or she could have explored some of the nations that were only mentioned briefly in the manga or the artbook, but nope. And I can attribute it partially to the fact that she got too focused on the politics.

II- The comedy

Not every shounen has to feature comedy, but most if not all of them do. Magi’s comedy was one of my favourites, but I do realize that it can be rather personal, and not two people will find the same joke funny. Nevertheless the comedy serves mostly to lighten the mood, which is very important when you’re having arcs after arcs of very dramatic stuff. 

Sadly while the first 100 chapters featured a good deal of it, the tone got much more serious, and a lot of the comedy was lost through the arcs starting from Magnostadt. And in recent years, at least in the main manga,the jokes all came at Alibaba’s expenses, and the running joke about him not having a girlfriend became old quickly.

But some might not find it necessary to have comedy at all in their manga, especially Japanese humour which isn’t always appreciated by everyone, to which I say it really is missing the point. The point is not to just feature random jokes, it’s more about finding the right tempo and the balance between serious and non serious moments. Once you do that you’ll find it’s easier to keep the readers interested.

III- The politics

Ah the meat of this whole post. The politics. Usually I see them as Magi’s forte, Magi is unconventional because of it, because you’ll find that everywhere else Ohtaka does follow the shounen tropes, sometimes to the letter. 

Magi is always regarded as different because of it, which sure is refreshing, because as it stands Magi isn’t so much about the fights, and more about the politics. And while Ohtaka has always had some degree of it ever since the beginning, there used to be more balance between the politics and the adventure and shouneny(is that even a word?) aspects.

But around halfway through the manga, the politics has started to overshadow everything else. The problem is not just the fact that the balance between action and politics was lost, but the fact that the politics themselves aren’t that good. A prime example of that is the Kou civil war and everything that lead to it. 

More than just the politics not being good, it even doesn’t pay off. Case in point with the latest arc in Magi. Alibaba and co going to the Sacred Palace and trying to argue with Sinbad, only for the latter to be fucked over by David. And we go from a situation where politics seem to get somewhere, to straight shounen mindless fighting,wtf.Can’t get someone to agree with you? Fight them.It happened in the Kou Civil war,  And that is literally what happened with Sinbad, but also now with David.

 So the politics don’t seem to pay off, because of that it doesn’t seem to me it warrants having so much focus given to it.All of that discussion and bringing arguments and trying to convince someone, usually the villain, don’t seem to work. So why devote so much time to it, when apparently you can just beat someone senseless?

I’m fine with having some degree of politics, but it shouldn’t overshadow the rest, and considering it’s not even some clever politics, but sometimes it literally feels like someone just talking out of their ass (literally each time with Aladdin) then you’re simply alienating it.

IV- The plot

With each manga or any work really, the plot needs to be somewhat consistent. Meaning that each plot twist would have to be somewhat logical, but with Ohtaka it has been rather nonsensical especially as of late.

The plot seems to be all over the place, and that Ohtaka changes her mind all the time, as much as she’s changing underwear maybe. There are various instances of the plot having twists just for the sake of having them, and I think it all started with Alma Torran and the Arba twist. Even if we argue that it was ambiguous, the fact that David was never so much as hinted at, and yet have this much importance, pretty much came out of nowhere.Now an author can always create a character if he wants to, but the mere fact that David has pretty much manipulated everyone, and for the longest time Al Thamen were thought to be the villains yet turned out to be pawns, is nothing short of being mindboggling.

And his prophetic writing doesn’t help, it gave some exposition about certain plot points that weren’t even hinted at at that moment. Basically it feels like Ohtaka decided to make a new villain out of scratch, perhaps because Al Thamen’s motivation just doesn’t seem to have been that strong. Because even if we argue that they had some legitimate reason to be pissed at Solomon, it certainly doesn’t explain why they were dead set on destroying the new world. So their position there is less legitimate, and as such they come off as weak, cliche villains. And David is also as cliche as they can get.

And the last arc features a good amount of plot twists just for the kicks of it. Oh Sinbad is dead, nope he’s not. David became Sinbad’s bitch, nope it isn’t and David has been manipulating him all the time. See what I mean?

V- The characterization

While Magi offers a good deal of characters you can sympathize with, and they all have some colourful personalities, it really is that the characterization isn’t always top notch, especially in the last arc. I always had reservations about characters like Alibaba or Kouen, because for the former he seemed for the longest time to not have grown as much, and basically he did nothing. And the for the latter, just all around being a hypocrite who denied Hakuryuu, even though he himself didn’t want to be a king.The Alma Torran folks especially were pretty immature, so someone like Solomon really came off as a brat who thought he could fix things, but just made them worse. And while he realized his mistake, it was too late and we haven’t seen or heard of him much since, to really understand where he came from and what he learned from that experience.

And the prime example of the poor handling of the characterization is Sinbad himself. Yes, while it was predictable he’d want to make himself God at one point (and it’s not sure he succeeded) it still is that his visit to the Sacred Palace, and even before that saw his character being handled in the most horrible way. Instead of giving him more reasons to become God, and his experiences as a human having a bearing on the situation, Ohtaka simply chalked it up to him just being “greedy”. Even afterwards when he seems to have finally come to an understanding with Alibaba and co, he seems to side with David instead, out of the blue, just because they share the same fate? It looks like Sinbad can’t make up his mind, or even that he’s a jerk.

And let’s not even talk about the fact that he legitimately wanted to orchestrate a genocide, which if you read SnB would be very difficult to swallow, considering how Sinbad reacted to the villagers getting slaughtered on Barbarossa’s orders, and also how deeply he was touched by the destruction of Sindria 1.0 which is nothing short of being a genocide.

So yes the characterization has been especially disappointing.

Conclusion

So Magi’s main issues have to do with the story itself, the nonsensical characterization, and the fact that Ohtaka uses plot twists as often as possible to try to garner some interest, but it just feels like she’s going  with whatever she likes atm, and changing her mind all the time.

Other issues pertain to the lack of balance  between various aspects of the manga that made its appeal, or even scrapping them off completely. And I’m sure there’s other issues I haven’t talked about.

There is also too much focus on the pairings and the romance, which not only is divisive, but it just doesn’t seem to be happening at the right time-coughAlimorcough.While shounens aren’t exactly known for featuring romance, sometimes it just doesn’t seem warranted, and it is downright happening at the wrong time, which as I previously pointed out greatly divided the fandom. And trust me the last thing you’d want to see if a forum blowing up due to Alibaba and Mor getting together too early, or even hinting at the possibility of Aladdin and Kougyoku having something going on, which it did.

So based on all these facts, I’m tempted to say that Magi is NOT what it used to be, it is NOT in any way shape or form good, that Magi greatness we experienced in the first half of the manga is mostly gone. I can chalk it up to a few things, including the fact that Ohtaka could be pressured by her editor to change plot points which she has done in the past and is prolly still doing. But mainly I think Ohtaka simply gave up, and can’t wait to finish her story, which as you know might end prematurely, since I think she could have explored way more things since she hasn’t shown all of the countries in the NW or most of them. And with the possibility of parallel universes she could still have the story go on for longer than that, but instead the manga is ending. 

And it sure feels like she has stopped trying overall. Of course this is my opinion and you might not agree with it, but that doesn’t invalidate it.

So it seems people are still under the assumption that owning something , especially merchandise, means you can do anything with it. If you haven’t figured it out already, that is not the case.

And I’ll take the case of the manga industry in particular, and why you shouldn’t be tempted for example to scan whole volumes or artbooks and share them online.

A lot of the issues that arise on tumblr in particular is the fact that some material will get shared elsewhere, even if it’s just fanart. Now some people will get all high and mighty and tell you that you can’t share their stuff, even when you credit them. What they don’t know is that they’re doing the same thing by sharing unauthorized scans of manga, because owning a volume doesn’t mean you own the intellectual property. That one belongs usually to the author, but also to the publisher. You only own the right to use it for review purposes, and that’s where fair use comes in.

Scanning whole volumes, or whole issues of Jump doesn’t fall under fair use, in fact it is considered Piracy in Japan and elsewhere. And that’s what the bird brained people of tumblr fail  to understand miserably, they don’t understand that when they’re sharing the intellectual property of a manga artist it IS art theft,even if you own a copy of it. Just like in their mind sharing the art of some half assed “artist” on here is art theft .

So everyone to a degree is committing art theft, they’re just too ignorant to know it. The only instance where you can use a manga volume for example is if like I said you use it for review purposes, and definitely not scanning the whole volume and putting it online and claiming it belongs to everyone, or some shit.Because it doesn’t.

In fact you’ll find that this applies to pretty much everything, whether it’s books, music, movies etc. Why do you think Youtubers are getting strikes for copyright infringement left and right? The law isn’t on the side of the customers, it is on the side of the corporations, that much is clear.

So do keep that in mind next time you feel you’re entitled to post or repost the official manga, it doesn’t belong to you even if you bought it, and it certainly doesn’t belong to everyone to see. Unless you want to be labeled a pirate.

                                       Wallpaper found on Reddit.

Better late than never I suppose.

Let me just preface this by saying that I’m a HUGE Castlevania fan, I’ve played most of the games, even the old school ones. And this blog is originally dedicated to Castlevania, and its artist Ayami Kojima. In fact my username is a direct reference to her and her pen name, as well as “Santa lilio Sangre” which is the title of her artbook, that I highly recommand checking out .

Also this review will contain spoilers so be warned.I don’t think I can talk about the story and the characterization without mentioning spoilers, so read at your own risk.

With that out of the way, it wouldn’t come as a surprise that I’d have an interest in this series. Actually this came out of nowhere, there was talk of an adaptation years ago, but it came to nothing. And with the whole Konami debacle, all hope of seeing anything Castlevania related vanished....until Netflix came in.

The story is based on Castlevania III Dracula’s curse, which I’ll have you know is one of my favourite games in the franchise.It’s also partly inspired by Symphony of the night, which is by far my favorite game of all times.  I gotta say that I’m really impressed about how the showrunners expanded on the lore of the game and the franchise as a whole. There’s a clear effort made into fleshing out the characters, and expanding on the lore and the story. The games were never really heavy on the story, but here we get to know more about the context  of those times, and how the Church for example played a huge role, not just in regulating the religious life of the believers.

The  story follows Trevor Belmont, of the clan Belmont, whose main occupation is hunting vampires and all kinds of otherwordly creatures, on his quest to defeat Dracula.  One year prior to the current timeline, Dracula is legitimately pissed off at humanity for having burned his wife on a stake after wrongly accusing her of being a witch.

I gotta say I love how the showrunners fleshed the relationship between Dracula and Lisa. It’s short but it’s to the point.It’s better than any crappy Vampire romance we’ve seen in the past 10 years. It starts with Lisa from Lupu village showing up at Drac’s castle, to learn science. She wants to be a doctor to help her fellow humans. She’s portrayed as being quite witty, and in fact most of the main cast are portrayed as such (not counting the priests since they’re dumb as fuck).

She manages to convince Dracula to teach her science, and here there’s somewhat of a deviation from the usual lore. While in the games it’s not unusual to encounter objects that are futuristic, or even the Creature which by all means is the result of science, Dracula’s powers are deeply rooted in magic, or even alchemy. A recurrent area in Dracula’s castle or “Castlevania” is the Alchemy Laboratory. Either way in exchange of him teaching her all there is to know about science, she in turn will teach him how to enjoy life as a human, since so far it appears that Dracula has never walked or travelled as a man. He originally starts by hating humanity and not having much faith in them, and this beautiful woman comes along and changes his views entirely.

Years later while Dracula is away, travelling as a human which shows that he followed Lisa, aka his wife’s advice, the Church does a really dick move by burning her at the stake....Yeah that’s bound to backfire horribly. Lisa on the stake begs Dracula not to be mad at humans, but all the harm has been done. After he learns of her demise, he transforms into a fiery pillar and goes to face the Archbishop and all the assholes responsible of her death. He gives the people of Targoviste a year to make peace with their God. And then he’ll unleash hell on humans.

I gotta say Dracula’s wrath is justified, you decided to piss off the guy who didn’t like humans to begin with, and took away from him the thing that made him become a better person. So there’s bound to be some retribution. However as Alucard, his son from Lisa points out, he should direct his wrath on those who are directly responsible for her death, and not all of humanity and people who are innocent. But Dracula won’t have any of that, so he attacks his son to prevent him from meddling with his plan to raise an undead army in a year.

So that’s pretty much the context of the story, and what lead to the current events, where Trevor our reluctant hero is currently embarked in. I gotta say the characterization is top notch, and it doesn’t end with Dracula.Our hero’s motivations and journey are also fleshed out, because as it turns out Trevor doesn’t initially want to do anything with it. He’s first shown to be a drunk mess, despite the fact that he comes from a noble house, the Belmonts. But that is due to once again the interference of the Church, who after relying on the Belmonts for years to protect them from monsters and creatures like Dracula, decided to excommunicate them on ground they dabbled in magic pretty much...Which is as dumb as pissing off Dracula. So with his house in ruins, Trevor pretty much sunk into alcoholism, which is a pretty interesting take on his character. He’s all around very different from his character in Curse of Darkness, who is overall very serious.

Instead here Trevor is portrayed as being sarcastic and witty, and there’s a good amount of comedy involving him, mainly due to the fact that he’s a drunk and out of practice. So his initial motivations aren’t anything grand, and overall he just doesn’t want to get involved with the Dracula drama. He just wants some booze and something to eat. But soon he starts to care, after his encounter with the speakers.

After making it to a town that is plagued by raids of  Dracula’s minions he meets the Speakers, a band of nomadic story tellers who pass their wisdom orally. Because he’s a Belmont, he had previous knowledge of such a group, and unfortunately for them, the Church (again) plans to pin down the onslaught by Dracula’s forces on them, because they happen to use magic...sigh. The Church are even bigger villains than Dracula himself, they fucked over pretty much everyone. Trevor bides them to leave town, but they can’t, not until they retrieve the body of one of theirs, the grand daughter of their leader in the catacombs. As to why she ventured in the catacombs, it is to find the “Sleeping warrior” who is according to a prophecy, the one who will defeat Dracula.

So Trevor ventures in the catacombs to find her, and he saves Sypha from the Cyclops, yay. While she’s grateful, she doesn’t think too highly of Trevor, and who could blame her, since at this point he won’t do anything about this situation. But with Sypha’s and the speakers help, who won’t abandon the city despite the fact that the mob lead by the Church is after them, he comes to realize that it is his duty as a Belmont to stop Dracula. 

After that they both end up in the catacombs again after trying to run from the mob and confronting Dracula’s minions in one of the best action scenes of the season. While they keep falling in the catacombs they end up encountering the “Sleeping warrior” who turns out to be a vampire, and none other than Alucard, Dracula’s son. Of course Trevor and him would come to fight since for the former it is likely Alucard is Dracula and is a vampire and thus can’t be trusted, and for the latter it is more of a test to see if Trevor is worthy.Trevor manages to kick Alucard’s sweet ass on more than one occasion thanks to his consecrated whip and weapon of choice, the Vampire Killer which is very effective against vampires. But Alucard manages to come on top thanks to his superior swordsmanship . In the end both of them stop fighting after Trevor managed to stab Alucard a few times, and Sypha threatens to burn Alucard’s precious little head if he tries to bite Trevor.

Either way they all agree to stop fighting, and Alucard announces that the other 2 passed the test, that is supposed to show if they’re worthy to be his companions and aid him in killing his own father Dracula....

So through 4 episodes, the length of the first season,  we get Trevor’s character arc, who starts as a reluctant hero but slowly comes around to realize that it is his mission to protect humans from people like Dracula. And characters like Sypha played a big role in it.Alucard comes along to gather all of them and aid them in defeating his own father. So in terms of characterization I have no complaint whatsoever, the showrunners really did flesh them out well. 

Another reason for me to like Trevor as a character is the fact that he’s voiced by Richard Armitage, who is a great actor (if you haven’t watched the Crucible go watch it now) and has an amazing voice...and I have a crush on him, but what’s new? I have a crush on 90% of Hollywood actors XD. In fact the original english dub (so weird to say that) has an amazing cast, even though I find it a bit odd that characters from Wallachia would have a British accent....But that’s how things are, and Sypha and the speakers have a Spanish accent, which I guess means they’re from Spain (Sypha Belnades) and are the equivalent of Romani people. Yeah I guess that makes sense.

So the story is very well written, they managed to also portray the characters in a realistic light. The voice acting is also great. But what about the actual animation? I’ll let you judge by yourself.

It is surprisingly good. In fact it’s better than fucking Berserk 2016/17. That one barely qualifies as animation. To me this series is a homage to 2D and during the very important scenes, mainly action scenes, it literally has some of the best animation I’ve seen in a while. The art style is also rather manga-ish and to me a bit reminiscent of Ayami Kojima’s style which is very feminine and graceful.

The action is top notch, and the Trevor vs Alucard fight really lived to the hype. It wasn’t as one sided as I thought it would be, since Alucard is supposed to be overpowered, and while he is portrayed as such with him being able to teleport thanks to the hidden ability of the Alucard sword, he still has the basic weakness of vampires to the Vampire Killer. Dracula is also overpowered since he’s able to appear in fire pretty much everywhere at will.And the action scenes are carried by the quality animation and choregraphy.

My only complaint is that the music is forgettable, it has none of the classic feel of the video game franchise. It uses a lot of synth tunes, which makes it really generic. The endings do feature a song that somewhat feels gothic, with all the choir singing, but it’s nowhere close to the quality of the music from the games. I personally pictured the music to be like the score from Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust. It could be a mix of classic instruments and more synthetic sounds, but alas none of that here. So that’s my main gripe with it, and it is somewhat important since CV is known mainly for its music.

So overall really impressed with this series and I totally recommand watching it. . It’s short, only 4 episodes though which I guess is made on purpose.Perhaps Netflix wanted to test the waters first and see how this series does. But fear not my Crestfallen children, a second season has been greenlit that should come out in 2018 and it will feature double the amount of episodes. And I’m more than willing to wait till 2018 as long as they can keep the same quality of storytelling and animation. And maybe they can also improve on the music while they’re at it.Also I’d be interested in seeing them doing a third season, and maybe also feature the events of Curse of darkness, even though the characters are less memorable and iconic compared to the CV III trio (since Grant isn’t here apparently). And maybe even beyond.

 Art by Kinzoshi.

Hello again, it’s a me.

If you haven’t guessed it by the title, this post will try to address some issues that Berserk supposedly suffers from. Because even though it is generally viewed as a masterpiece, some will find some recurring issue with it, whether it’s the pace, or the tone that has changed etc.And in light of the last chapters it seems relevant now more than ever to make such a post.

But how dare you criticize Berserk? It’s perfect!!

Hold your pitchforks, while I don’t think  Berserk suffers too much from the same woes that are common to “lesser” titles, especially shounens, there are definitely some issues with it.My aim with this post is to address the most common complaints about Berserk (the manga not the anime,there’s no point talking about that tbh, it’s just bad) , and what imo are the challenges that face Miura now and in the future.

This post isn’t aimed to be a rant either, since I’ll try to be as unbiased as possible while adressing the issues that are brought up in this post.

I-The pace

So first thing first, we have to address the giant elephant in the room. The most common complaint about Berserk is the frequent and endless breaks. Though we could argue that ever since the announcement about the Berserk anime, we saw the manga resuming publication after it went through its longest hiatus period. 

But Miura, knowing how he is, always takes a break, which is pretty much standard at this point, even when he commits to a schedule. So while that itself might be bad, the fans eventually got used to it, and don’t expect him to go for very long before he takes a break.

But that might have a much more significant impact on the manga itself. Namely the pace. And here I’m taking the last 4 chapters as an example.

While I don’t expect the Caska issue to be dealt with in one chapter, it definitely is that it felt a bit dragged out, and the break doesn’t help. Had there not been any break, we’d prolly would have been able to get to the heart of this matter, instead of having to wait till Winter to finally see the resolution to the Caska dilemma.

II- The tone

Many Berserk fans argue that the tone is much lighter now, ever since Guts decided to let go momentarily of his revenge to look for Caska. Some place the shift in tone much further down the road, around the time he acquired new companions, some of which are kids. In fact many outright blame the kids and Miura’s supposed wish to make the manga more kid friendly.

While it’s true that the tone is a bit more lighter now, due to the fact that Guts isn’t a raging lone wolf only obsessed with killing apostles as part of his revenge...I don’t actually think that the kids are to blame, or Miura is trying to make this into a kid friendly manga (as if), not even one bit.

Because there’s still some pretty gruesome things happening, even as Schierke and co got introduced. In fact quite a few of them witnessed those horrors, with the trolls and whatnot. And the tone was definitely darker on Ganishka’s side, who used women for his experiments on the daka and the man made behelit. There’s still a good amount of violence in the manga, especially towards women, but somehow we also saw the introduction of strong female characters (Schierke, Flora, Farnese after reformation,Sonia etc) who counterbalance that, and they definitely act less like damsels in distress.

And on top of that, the tone can get quite dark, as seen in the latest chapter. While it is to be expected since it’s Caska’s dream, Miura didn’t shy away from representing her anxieties in their full glory, and he went even the extra mile to portray them without the usual shading that pretty much censored genitalia in the past.

So all the dark and edgy stuff is just around the corner, and if the tone feels lighter it’s just because Guts isn’t acting like a beast anymore, and actually has companions he cares for and relies on. And even he is aware that it might not last forever.

III- The quality of storytelling

This one will be short, because it’s tied to the previous point. Basically some argue that the storytelling isn’t as great, because the tone has changed. I absolutely cannot agree. Miura is still a great storyteller, and if you believe that violence and gore are what make a good story, or just Berserk, then you prolly shouldn’t be reading it in the first place. Imo that is completely missing the point, Berserk is great because of the characters and the story that is carefully crafted, and Miura is a genius since he can make all the loose ends meet. Which is more than I can say for other authors.

Even if we take a scene as average as a bunch of men drinking alcohol while watching the cherry blossoms, Miura manages to make such a scene super interesting, by giving us access to the characters inner thoughts.

My only gripe with the story is when it becomes too big in scale, and when it’s not centered on the characters themselves. That is particularily true for Griffith’s side, not so much Guts. Guts’ journey is closely related to his own personal struggle, whereas I feel that with Griffith there’s some grand scheme that he plays a role in. It’s not just about his own wish, but what fate has dictated for him. 

IV- The art

Ouch now that’s gonna hurt.As much as I don’t agree that the quality of storytelling has decreased, I can’t help but find that the art has been affected quite significantly.

Now to be fair Miura’s art is always changing and evolving. Miura seems to like to experiment with his art, and we saw the art go from a not so great place in the early volumes up to volume 13-14, then become really good if not amazing in the volumes 16-17 which are my favorite period of Miura’s art. Miura even tried to be draw his characters in a more realistic fashion, around Griffith’s rebirth, and the art just got even better and bigger in scale, to the point that it becomes hard to believe it’s just a drawing, and not one of Gustave Doré’s prints..

At any rate, Berserk features some of the best art in the manga industry, and beyond imo. However there is a clear downside to that, it is time consuming, and prolly even tiring. And as Miura gets older, that task won’t get easier. So simplifying his art is inevitable, and I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner.

But more than just simplifying his art, Miura made a gamble of sorts, by switching to digital. Many still try to argue that he hasn’t, but if you compare his illustrations in the Grunbeld novel, to the last chapter for example, it becomes clear that Miura uses digital techniques to add some effects to his lineart. Mainly atmospheric effects (fog, light etc).

Credits to Ryu Osaka on Facebook

So there’s some clear difference between Miura’s traditional ink and pen art, and the more recent art featured on the manga that also uses digital techniques to do the backgrounds mostly. And while that’s not bad in itself, you can tell that Miura hasn’t quite mastered digital art. So he has a long way to go before seeing the same quality as his traditional art, if not ever.

I’ll admit I’m a bit biased towards that, because traditional art is more challenging, and time consuming, while digital art and the different softwares it uses are much more practical, and allow you to easily edit your drawing and not worry too much about the placement of the lines or colors for example.So I pretty much hold traditional art in a pedestal, and Miura’s traditional art is simply one of the best I witnessed, period.

So I definitely do see the change in the art direction if you will, and I’m not too happy about it. But I chalk it up to Miura or his assistants not being too familiarized or good at it yet.Things might improve once they get the hang of it, and learn how to make the traditional and digital art blend well together.

Conclusion

So to conclude, I would say that Berserk has overall a few challenges, mainly the pace and the art. The manga would greatly benefit from having a much more consistent release schedule as well as a better pace. The art is still a work in progress I guess, and either way it wouldn’t prevent me or others from  reading the manga. We just invested so much time in it, but as someone who has an artistic background it definitely is something that catches my eye and it’s interesting to see where Miura’s art goes from here.

But I definitely think that the manga is doing good overall, there hasn’t been a significant decline in quality, especially when it comes to storytelling. The tone might have changed a bit, but I definitely see it as something that isn’t written in stone, and things could get dark again. And either way Miura still has a boner for drawing dick monsters.So it’s still as edgy as it used to be, just not as much as in your face as in the past.

And we’re getting the continuation to Farnese and Schierke’s adventures in the dream world. All my feelings about the hiatus aside, this is a very significant chapter, despite the fact that the pace has been rather slow up till now.

As Schierke, Farnese, Doggo Guts and Chibi Caska delve deeper into real Caska’s dream, they are met with a forest of dead corpses and needling pines, which happens to be the name of this episode. This can only be a reflection of Caska’s shattered psyche due to the Eclipse.And unsurprisingly they are met with dreadful creatures that all share a common feature: they are shaped into a phallus. The feeling of revulsion is even greater, and this can only be seen as a consequence of Caska’s rape.

There can be no doubt that the creatures we’ve witnessed are an allusion to Caska’s rape, not just at the hands of Femto but at the hands of the Apostles too. This is particularily hard to read, and there should be no doubt now that Caska has been affected in the worst way possible by her experience at the Eclipse. I hope that the people who joked about Caska enjoying getting raped by Femto are regretting their words now (yes because some horrible people do joke about this stuff shrug), because it’s pretty clear she’s disgusted by anything that looks remotely like a phallus. 

Schierke and Farnese continue to advance but they soon find themselves out of charms. Luckily Farnese still had on the Mozgus stone from her dream, and I gotta say that this is pure genius from Miura’s part. The way he used the Mozgus Stone to actually come to Farnese’s help, and even the fact that it kept most of the real Mozgus mannerism is just great. Lastly I would say that despite everything, Mozgus seems to have played a big role in shaping up the person that is Farnese . And as proof of that the fact that Mozgus appears in her dream, alongside Guts (his armor).

As they press on towards the top of the mountain, the scenery becomes even wilder, and the path starts to close. As if Caska herself wants to prevent them from going further and uncovering the truth. Or as Schierke would have it, because Caska herself doesn’t want to wake up,which could further hint that she doesn’t want to be healed. The symbolism of the thorns and needles can be seen as related to Christ who wore a crown of thorns,or it’s a reference to the Sleeping beauty, whose castle is blocked by you guessed it thorns. If we take Schierke’s comment into account, then it could be a reference to sleeping beauty. But I like to think it’s also related to the Bible, because Berserk has so many biblical references. And Caska herself can be seen as a martyr.

So they finally make it to the top which houses a cocoon like structure, similar to Femto’s cocoon during the Eclipse. And I really dread what will come out of it, and I’m really worried about Schierke’s and Farnese’s ability to repel any creature that could come of it, but not only. They will most likely witness the events that lead to Caska’s mental breakdown, which is pretty dreadful in itself.

Sadly we’ll have to wait an entire season or more to finally find out. I have so many feelings about that, but I prefer to cover that in a separate post.

Tumblerites sure be pissy about their art.

I made a rant before about reddit, but I think a few of the things you hear about tumblr are actually true. Mainly that people on here get so touchy about others reposting their stuff... even when you credit them

I’m not really that social on tumblr, and I usually stay away from controversial subjects....Man it’s sad to consider this a “controversial” subject.

I get it that there is art theft online, but I draw myself and I don’t really get that attitude.Maybe because I haven’t experienced art theft, or just the fact that I see art as a hobby, and not actually something too serious. I definitely don’t take myself and my “art” seriously. But even then, I don’t get why people get so butthurt, even if you do credit them.

It doesn’t seem very logical for me. And from my perspective you have everything to win by allowing reposts when you get credited. Because people might hear from you on other platforms, and they might end up following you here. I know that’s the case for most artists  that I follow on here and on deviantart for example.And who knows maybe they’ll feel like buying your art?

Aaaaaaand I was right, Berserk will go on hiatus again till Winter, before Caska gets healed, or even getting to the heart of this matter.

Why, why am I always right?

Also this chapter has a lot of phallic imagery....haven’t had that in a while.

Bwahahaha classic Oda.

He just made things 100 times more interesting. The so called BM assassination plan failed miserably, and what’s worse is that they have no way of escaping. I guess they really angered BM too much, her cry was more powerful than expected. Luffy really shouldn’t have destroyed that cake.

It is somewhat unexpected since while I didn’t expect the plan to succeed and BM to die, I didn’t expect them to lose their escape route either. So that’s good,I always like it when things aren’t too predictable.

Looks like the SH and Bege’s forces have no other choice but to fight. Thankfully Bege transforms into a fortress so his allies can take shelter. But I doubt he’ll be a match for BM. I’m expecting to see a Kaiju fight next chapter between Big Mom and Big Father Bege.

From “Sleeping Beauty and the Vampire”. Illustrations by Ayami Kojima

I forgot to make a post about it . Just when I started to lose interest in BM and her past, after seeing the first part which was really predictable, Oda completely flips the tables. Most of my predictions about Mother Caramel and BM turned out to be true. BM indeed lived in Elbaf for a while, but she’s not a giant herself. I guess she’s just an abnomaly large human, and her parents are normal sized too. She is abandoned on Elbaf and taken in by Mother Caramel, whom I predicted in a previous post that she’s a nun of sort who runs an orphanage, and was a foster parent to BM.

So far nothing too surprising. And I initially found that the explanation to BM’s feud with Elbaf and that incident that started it all was rather too simplistic. But Oda is a savage, and not only did Mother Caramel turn out to be a child slaver who sold giants children to the WG, but the source of BM’s power is even revealed.

In case you haven’t noticed it, the Soul Soul no mi seems to have been used previously by Mother Caramel herself...Yep, it is heavily implied that BM ended up eating Mother Caramel and the rest of the kids without realizing it, because she was so absorbed in eating the croquenbouche and the warm feelings she felt from having a birthday party thrown for her.

Wow. It was speculated that BM was a cannibal, ever since her introduction during or after the FI arc I believe, when she seemingly ate her crew members...But this chapter just confirmed that theory.

Also I gotta feel sorry for her a bit, especially when she unleashes her cry. That was one of the most heartbreaking scenes in this arc. It’s just a child crying for his mother, albeit a very monstruous child. And despite all she’s done, it does make me uncomfortable a bit to see her weakness being exploited like that. Especially when we learn the truth behind it. It’s one of the most morally grey things Luffy has done so far....

I’m usually one of the first to want the SHs to be more opportunistic, but after knowing the context behind it, it certainly puts things into perspective and it’s just not as easy to swallow. 

Also because Mother Caramel turned out to be a rotten human being who is very much after money, I’m convinced that her and Miss Bakkin are related. Physically they look quite similar, and they share their love for money. I used to think they were one and the same, but it looks like Caramel kicked the bucket...Unless we’re mistaken, and she’s revealed to be fine, and it would certainly explain why Chiffon iirc said that she used to live with them but she left one day. That bit was confusing.