Alive

In my opinion this manga is amazing. I've often wondered how good a one shot can be, and Alive! is my answer. The story starts off innocently enough, but then we are dragged into an allegorical story about evil. Two death row convicts are drawn into a peculiar attempt to transfer this evil from a body of a seemingly innocent girl who has been infected with it by her father. Is this infection really a disease? Or is it something that lingers within every human being, waiting to be awakened? What kind of person can win against the black within? A pure-hearted one, or a person with nothing to lose? How far are people willing to go just to keep breathing? These are the questions this one shot ventures to ask. And it manages to answer them as far as it is possible to.

Story:
Not that great. A real mess of forgotten character traits, weak character relationships, and just weak characters overall. A waste of time. I found the first chapter to be a real cheat. It lays the foundation for a neat protagonist as a writer who's on death row. Then it's never mentioned again that he's a writer despite a fairly important scene taking place in regards to it, and it really doesn't matter that he was on death row either. It's kinda just dumb.

And that's a lot of what's going on. It's just a buncha dumb stuff. I'll give credit where credit is due: there are bits and pieces of potential strewn throughout this manga, but the problem is that almost ALL stories have bits and pieces of things that work. The problem is how a writer capitalizes on it, and this particular mangaka doesn't do that at all.

I can't really talk too much else. I suppose that's fitting.


Art:
The artwork is where Alive shines. It's pretty great, although some proportions were a bit of a mess. That said, I couldn't tell what was going on with a few panels (and even pages) so I the mangaka improved on his motions and separating the setting from the actors in later manga.


Character:
Just crap. Again, there's some foundation, but then water comes in and shows how weak it was. I can't give a 1/10 because there was an attempt, so I'll keep this at 2/10.


Enjoyment:
Once I realize the mangaka was leaving a ton of stuff empty and wasted, I kinda checked out. There wasn't much this manga could offer me at the halfway point other than the small chapter count. I suggest avoiding this one. Just boring.



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Alive! is one of my favorite mangas, and I usually reread it every couple of months (it's only 10 chapters long). Despite the shortness of the manga, there is enough of a plot to give you a good image of the kind of world each character is living in. It doesn't try to side-track you with useless bits of information and a bunch of explanatory dialogue to try and drag out the story. It tells you exactly what's going on through its fantastic art that flows from panel to panel. You'll be finished reading before you realize it.

There are three things i should mention before you read this though;
#1: The art is kind of sketchy and not as solid and contrasted as most mangas you see in magazines (still amazing though).
#2: It is for mature readers only, or readers who can handle R-rated content.
#3: The ending is very different than the beginning.

Otherwise, the main character, art, concept, and overall structure of the manga are awesome. The only thing wrong I can find with Alive! is that every time I finish reading it, I want to read it again.

Before reading this manga I read some reviews about it. So maybe my expectations were high especially since I like psychological manga but somehow I didn't feel satisfied.

The plot is strong but the manga is so short that it fails to make an impact. I feel that the characters could have been better developed. Still it was an average read.

It could have been a great manga but the story ends just when the reader starts getting engrossed in it. At the end I don't get a feeling of closure.

For me it was a worthwhile read. Read it and you may like it if you like stories that make you think.

"Misako...I'm coming over there"

"Alive!" is about a man named Yashiro Tenshuu who killed 5 people and is put on Death row but, is allowed to live if he becomes a test subject from a secret government. They put him and another man named Gondou into this isolated room where they can have anything they ask for but are not allowed to come out of the room. The girl on the other side (Saegusa Yurika) of the room tells them if you want to get over here on my side of the room you have to kill each other. So whoever makes it out "alive" gets to be with her. Who will stay alive? You have to keep reading to find out.

There faces...are..so..intense. Haha that's the most remembered thing about the manga to me is that all the characters were always drawn intense and sweating. Overall the art was great and perfectly fitted a horror manga.

The characters however don't really make a bond with the reader which is why I gave it a 6. Nothing special but its fun to see what's going to happen to them next.

If you want to read something quick and also have a good time reading it Alive! is a must read.

As soon as I saw the synopsis and the length of this manga, I wanted to read it. And that's what I did. So, I'll just get right to the review part now...

Anyway, the story of the manga is pretty good. It's short but it made me attempt to figure out some things. But, when they started to explain certain things, I was honestly just confused. No, it wasn't hard to follow... It was actually kinda straightforward. The explanation as to what a certain thing originated from...surprised me but not in a bad way.

The art's really interesting. It's bit messy but in a way that makes you want to see more of it. The characters can look freaking cool at times and the scenes with more action look nice. But, I will admit that in some panels the drawing makes it a little difficult to understand what's going on. This doesn't matter too much though since it's easy to figure it out afterwards.

The characters aren't too developed...but that's what happens when you make such a short manga series. The main character, Yashiro, is kinda interesting though because of his situation. But, yeah, like I said...it lacks character development. But, even though it lacks, they all have at least a bit of personality to them.

Story: 9
Art: 8
Character: 7
Enjoyment: 7

Alive is an interesting manga despite it being short. It's good if you're looking for a quick read. Overall, it earns a 7.

Horror and manga. I never knew that combination excisted. And I have to say: I'm glad it does excists. I was looking aroudn for some manga and I found this. Only ten chapters, why not read it?

I finished it in about half an hour. The story kept me reading and guessing what would happen untill the very end. Why did I give the story a six then? It was fine, but there was no moral or whatever behind it. The maincharacter is a son of a bitch and I just wanted him to die. Perhaps not everyone agrees with me on that, but that's my opinion.

It is quite a typical horror story. Two fellows in a room, they can have something they want if they kill eachother. I was suprised when I found out there was a whole lot more behind it. Without spoiling: there is a form of evil wich can consume people. And it can jump onto whoever wants to kill. The one with the biggest intention of killing, will be consumed by it.

The graphics were fine. Although it pissed me off when I mentioned that almost everyone has drops of water on their faces. Always. Sometimes it is sweat, then it is rain water. But what the fuck? It was unnecessary and just fucked up. I mean, someone can sweat if he feels fear, but he doesn't get wet by just sweating.

Well, that was a minor thing I didn't like. The story wasn't very sadistic, I got that impression at first, it's quite good. Not fantasic, because there isn't any bonding with the main character. It's a bit short, but that's not a real issue for me. This story shouldn't be long. It was a typical horror. Not really good, not really scary, but worth your time!