Sidonia no Kishi

It started so good, I was really into the story and characters until the entire manga became two subplots: shipping and combat.

The artstyle is really unique, the scenery and the characters were so great drawn, the character design is a little confusing at the beginning, but after some chapters you get used to it. The jokes were really ok and the characters were interesting, until I got to the last arcs of the series...

Beware I made a whole rant and it contains spoilers.






The story started pretty good, presenting the cast with our main character being Nagate in his fight against the mysterious beings called Gauna. I really liked the interaction between the characters in the first arcs, it was fluent, you got to know them well, and there was also a very scientific background to everything that it was being added to Sidonia, the experiments they conducted on Gauna.

The part where the plot started to decrease was when the first chimera was introduced. Tsumugi was not a bad character since she was there to show that in some way a Gauna with human mind could be helpful to Sidonia.
Why didn't the story focus on that?, explaining what were the Gauna to begin with, what was their purpose, how did the Ochiai's mind work, why the Gauna were attracted to the Higgs particles! nothing was explained in the end! it was a whole mess!
The subplot of romance between Nagate and Tsumugi was so disgusting and horrible, she was a newborn child! and she was the child of Hoshijiro's mutated Gauna's placenta!! come on! it was extremely forced, if the Gauna ended up not being bad but beings trying to learn from humans or something, maybe the shipping could have worked; but it was not like that.

Nagate is such a horrible MC, I mean he felt in love with Hoshijiro and was sooo into her as to fell in love with the placenta that resembled her. When she was abducted I though he would react like a normal human being... but nope, he forgot about her and focused on Tsumugi. He was the best pilot of Sidonia and it was obvious, he never failed. Every reckless decision he made was considered ok and always ended up in victory. He was too perfect!

Ochiai was the bad guy just because! I mean I would have prefered to ended up with humans contacting the Gauna and learning more from them, understanding or even decided to leave the energy resource to stop them from coming. But no...

Suddenly the story became a harem where every single girl was fighting over Nagate's attention, even the AI robot. After episode 45 or something the series stopped being interesting, it became a chore to finish it. The pages were all explanations of how the weapons of Sidonia were made of, whole chapters focused on destroying a single Gauna (with too many shots from the information HQ received) and the ending was the worst of all. Nagate ended up with Tsumugi, who suddenly didn't die (not even by being totally incinerated by a star's energy) and ended up turning human. Izana (who became a women for Nagate) ended up with a Yuhata who decided to turn into a boy for some reason, I mean she was always showed to have interest in man.

Ughh it was horrible! wouldn't recommend the series at all, that ending was the worst. After it started being realistic and scientific, it ended up being like fantasy story where everything works, killing the villian saved everyone and even the imposible ship was made canon.

Well, Sidonia no Kishi, to be honest, I do not like the genre "mecha", even though Tegen Toppa and Code Geass are anime that I love a lot, I'm a complicated guy. Anyway, the plot of the work is very interesting at the same time as it is something "common", the humanity that takes refuge in space for x reason, ends up finding something that wants to eliminate there is the reason for it and aims to come back to live on a planet. First of all, Sidonia is a rather interesting and "different" manga, * spoiler *, I say that it is different because the author insists on having the protagonist have romantic cases with the most different types of heroin, dese a robot until a variation of the alien they face, which had breasts, but then becomes something like a male genitalia. But there are other interesting points in Sidonia, like some scenes that would be common among people, but are characterized by robots, how? Think of that scene where the protagonist is holding his beloved in his arms while fighting against his enemies, seriously, these scenes were very good. Ah, and you can go see an anime without fear, even being in CGI it is beautiful. (I apologize for my spelling mistakes)

(PT-Br) Bom, Sidonia no Kishi, para ser sincero, eu não gosto do gênero "mecha", mesmo que Tegen Toppa e Code Geass sejam animes que eu amo bastante, eu sou um cara complicado. Enfim, o plot da obra é bem interessante ao mesmo tempo que é algo "comum", a humanidade que se refugia no espaço por x motivo, acaba encontrando com algo que quer elemina-lá seja lá o rasão a disso e tem como objetivo voltar a viver em um planeta. Antes de qualquer coisa, Sidonia é um mangá bastante interessante e "diferente", *spoiler*, digo que ele é diferente porque o autor insiste em fazer a protagonista ter casos românticos com os tipos mais diferentes de heroína, dese um robô até uma variação do alien que eles enfrentam, que tinha peitos, mas depois se torna algo parecido com uma genitália masculina. Mas tem outros pontos interessantes em Sidonia, como algumas cenas que seriam comuns entre pessoas, mas são caracterizados por robôs, como? Pensa naquela cena em que a protagonista está segurando sua amada nos braços enquanto luta contra seus inimigos, sério, essas cenas ficaram muito boas. Ah, e você pode ir ver um anime sem medo, mesmo sendo em CGI ele é bonito.

A quick note: should you be interested in picking up this manga after viewing the 2014 anime adaptation, you can expect the same general story with a few very noticeable differences. The adaptation has streamlined and condensed the events depicted in chapters 1 – 26 or so, leaving out several events that are key to the manga. You may be confused if you don't start right at the beginning, which I greatly recommend. Both do certain things better than the other. The manga does include a “chapter 0” that was not adapted; make sure to look out for it!

Tsutomu Nihei's “Knights of Sidonia” is an ongoing space odyssey manga with mecha elements, set in a bleak yet hauntingly beautiful vision of the future. It's an exciting story with a slightly formulaic but overall unpredictable narrative crafted with the utmost attention to small details that make the world feel alive. It is, however, not without its flaws.

Humanity's enemy, the Gauna, are mysterious alien creatures composed of “true bodies” encased in regenerating placenta. A Gauna can shape its placenta into anything it desires, frequently doing so to resemble human beings. Should the placenta be breached and the true body be pierced with a mysterious material called “kabi,” the Gauna will immediately disintegrate. Simple enough.

The titular spacefaring megastructure, Sidonia, at approximately five kilometers wide and 29 kilometers long, has too much bulk to directly combat the Gauna. Instead, it relies on a battalion of humanoid robots that require the manual control of pilots (Sidonia's "knights"). These robots, known as Guardians, engage the Gauna while the ship provides support with an arsenal of doomsday weapons such as energy cannons, mass drivers, anti-planet warheads, and a 28 kilometer railgun that would make Mikoto Misaka proud. The latter are so incredibly destructive that the crew needs to assess the repercussions before firing. When Sidonia does fire, you brace yourself and hold on tight.

To keep the formula fresh, new technology is constantly introduced on the human side while each Gauna the ship encounters is unique in some way. Even fights against hordes of your standard disposable Gauna grunt are made interesting by new weaponry or a drastic change in terrain.

The previously mentioned technological breakthroughs are occasionally the answer to a problem, resulting in several instances of deus ex machina. While Tsutomu still manages to make these situations exciting, I would have much rather seen the obstacle overcome with simple ingenuity. This does, however, positively affect the overall story, as Sidonia gradually transitions from prey to predator. Even then, some tech simply blew me away with how cool it was (one word: Mizuki).

Battles are cleverly depicted from two alternating perspectives: the battlefront itself and Sidonia's bridge. Tsutomu uses the bridge, which is dominated by a massive digital display that monitors ongoing activities, to help us better understand the current situation as well as the tactics and maneuvers (which, might I say, are very interesting) that are being employed by the crew. I've found it to be a very effective system.

Perhaps what I love most about Knights of Sidonia is Tsutomu's vision of the future, where the continued survival of the human race has been put above all else. Humanity has resorted to cloning and genetic modification, creating people that can photosynthesize in order to save food rations and a third gender capable of mating with either sex or asexually. It's dark, it's clever, and it's all firmly rooted in real science. Higgs particles - a form of energy utilized by Sidonia - for example, were discovered by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in 2012.

Tsutomu adds another layer of depth by depicting advanced technology being juxtaposed with slightly more contemporary instruments. Higgs-based weapons, for example, are used in conjunction with both kabi-based weapons and standard, seemingly powder-based munitions reminiscent of our own time. The technology is not perfect, either; Sidonia is not capable of faster than light travel and must make good use of its limited resources.

As the war effort devours the vast majority of these resources, the ship's residential sector has developed into one of the most imaginative places I've seen in fiction: an intricate patchwork city of suspended lodgings, piping, twisting stairwells, and a variety of colorful OSHA violations - all curving around the ship's railgun barrel. I fell in love at first sight.

Prefacing nearly every chapter are full-page images excerpted from the “100 Sights of Sidonia,” a photographic guidebook of the ship mentioned on occasion throughout the story. One of my favorite entries depicts Izana pressing himself/herself against the oldest “converter pipe” on the ship – a massive industrial pipeline designated as sacred by shimenawa (traditional Shinto rice ropes). Other entries include wind tunnels, fish farms, factories, and bathhouses, all of which secure the vastness and diversity of the ship while simultaneously painting a picture of its culture. It's a subtle addition but it adds a lot.

I can't emphasize enough just how well Tsutomu incorporates these subtle details. One particular supporting character, a Guardian pilot by the name of Norio Kunato, is named after edible seaweed (known as “nori” in Japanese, which is notable for its use as a wrap for onigiri and sushi). During Sidonia's millennium adrift, seaweed has “fallen out of production” and has become a precious commodity, rendering the name culturally acceptable. I absolutely love it.

The people who occupy this world sound interesting enough; Knights of Sidonia delivers a cast of mole men, human/bear hybrids, hermaphrodites, clones, androids, immortals, aliens - you name it. Unfortunately, for characters with such interesting backgrounds, the majority seem to fall flat. It's not that they're unlikable - they are and can prove to be quite fun - it's just that their actions have a habit of seeming... two-dimensional. Perhaps the most prominent example is our beloved hero, Nagate Tanikaze.

Throughout the story we might hear that Nagate vocalized his opinions on an important matter, such as demanding the reinforcement of the armor on certain Guardian models, but we never explicitly witness it. What we do see is a young man who likes to eat and is just about as submissive as he is stereotypical and oblivious to his harem, which slowly but surely grows stronger. Again, he never manages to be unlikable per se, yet he can prove to be boring and undergoes practically no character development after the opening chapters, which is a shame.

The other recurring characters manage to be somewhat more lively and, well, more feminine (this includes the hermaphrodite). I find the most interesting ones to be those operating the bridge, especially Yuhata Midorikawa and the mysterious masked captain, Kobayashi. While the horrors of the Gauna and the reality of death almost never act as a catalyst for character development, these characters are noteworthy exceptions.

Ultimately, the strongest character is Sidonia itself.

Sidonia is alive. It's a living, breathing place. It's familiarity and safety. It becomes home; for not just the characters but the reader, and I eagerly await the next chapter that will bring me back.



Tsutomu Nihei's “Knights of Sidonia”

UPDATE 1: July 1st, 2014 (revised for clarity and grammatical errors)
UPDATE 2: July 2nd, 2014 (paranoia)
This review will continue to be revised as more chapters are published.

Story
+ Incredible attention to detail
+ Unpredictable narrative
+ Alternating perspectives during battle
- Deus ex machina

Art
+ A vast, beautiful, and everchanging world to explore
+ Sidonia's 100 Sights

Character
+ Interesting backgrounds
- Two-dimensional mannerisms/idiosyncrasies
- Lack of character development

Enjoyment
+ Incredible world
+ An exciting narrative
- Deadpan hero

Story: 9 | Art: 8 | Character: 7 | Enjoyment: 8
Overall: 8 (very good)

I only hope that you enjoy the manga as much as I have ~

You might look at this and say wow, it looks pretty good not to mention the artwork looks amazing!
But holy Christ I can write a paper on why I hated the story (and how the ending completely ruined everything for me).
I'll save that for the last part because I can rant on that forever.

Art:
It looks great, down to earth and rather realistic in some cases. The detail goes down hill a bit for me as it continues on but overall it's rather great. Not the best as it tends to get sloppier in fights or even towards the final few chapters. It isn't the most beautiful, but it isn't horrendous either. Bonus points since I like Mecha.

Characters:
They have good flow and interaction with each other as time goes on, and the impacts they have on each other is very great. The MC with his first love interest was great, and throughout the entire story made sense why he was so focused on here. Even if it was obsessive at one point. The characters feel somewhat alive with the doings and personality. Later on, towards the ending, the MC's obsession with his first love interest in my opinion goes way too far. I'll touch up on this in the story section of the review, but overall most of the characters don't seem too bland or awful.

Enjoyment/story
"Why did you give enjoyment a 10 outa 10 if you rate it so poorly? Then give the story a 1/10, what's up with that?"
This ending of Sidonia no Kishi is the biggest joke I have ever seen. I remember being excited to continue the story, wondering where it was going. Then, it started to take a turn for the worse. Where my enjoyment started dying out because the story WAS a gritty story, those who are dead remained dead etc etc. There was no dues ex machina like anything I've seen in this ending. All the love that the MC puts into the secondary love interest and all their interactions and the secondary character's eventually decision to love him is COMPLETELY THROWN OUT IN BASICALLY ONE CHAPTER. Not only that, but a person who was (and by all regards should be) dead comes back to life for the MC to screw and have kids with. Which, as stated in the story, was biologically impossible. Did I mention that the thing he screws is basically his daughter?
Yeah, I'm not screwing with you.

In my opinion, this manga is great until the introduction of the "daughter-like" character and the final "dues ex machina" like character in the final chapter (I believe, I had to legitimately purge this story from my mind it angered me so much.) It was great, and semi-realistic while being entertaining. The ending however, ruined what I had loved about the story so much. It had killed all enjoyment I had in the story because of it, and two characters who clearly were dead had suddenly come back to life marked the final disappointment for me. It felt as though the Author needed to come up with this to please the Shipclubs or something, because it came so out of left field and awfully compared to every other part of the story.

To sum it up, read about all the chapters until the final battle. At that point, imagine your own ending because it is almost guaranteed better than what I read.

The ending is that bad, I am not kidding you. It was great until the horrible cop-out ending that was not only DRAWN with very little effort, but also dialogue with very little effort. It's like an M Night Shyamalan movie, another man who cannot end a story to save his life.

Years. For years I had an idyllic vision of how Knights of Sidonia would end. Heroic sacrifices, ruminations on loss, heartbreak, and the futility of a never ending battle, an epic, possibly tear-jerking conclusion to Sidonia's story.

But no.

Knights of Sidonia might have the most disappointing ending in all of manga. Characters arcs are thrown in the trash; plot lines come crashing down in flames. Carefully cultivated motifs that run throughout the entirety of the first 2/3rds of the manga are jettisoned in favor of a long, hard to follow action scene and a generic boss battle. Then, tragedy. We're subjected to the most sugary, cop-out, series ruining ending ever. The last 10 chapters reduce Knights of Sidonia to a mediocre manga. The last 10 pages reduce it to a dumpster fire. I...didn't understand. Did Nihei lose interest in the series as time went on? Was he told he had 6 days to complete the last 30 chapters? WHAT HAPPENED?

I usually loath reviews that try to utilize some sort of math or algorithm for the score, but I just can't resist it this time: Knights of Sidonia Chapters 1 through to whenever that dumb robot randomly shows up for no reason - 9 out of 10. Knights of Sidonia dumb robot through to opaque, tensionless action scene - 6 out of 10. Knights of Sidonia ending - 1 out of 10.

16/30=0.533X10=5.33.

For nostalgia's sake I think this is a fair score. I see now that my dreams of a 3rd season were woefully misguided.

This manga is insane and amazing.

Story - The story is strange and will not go exactly where you expect. When I first started reading, I thought he was just doing a mecha for fun but now I realize that he is trolling us really hard. This series has all the standard mecha features, but everything is twisted and insane and delightful.

Art - The art is great, even if it's a little different from his other works.

Character - The characters are really fun. I can't say that there is lot of what I would call actual character development, but they are all interesting and weird. And the love triangle between the boy, the girl, and the boygirl that transforms, somehow, into a love triangle between a boy, a boygirl, and a gigantic monster made of space goo is just....I don't even know. I don't even know.

Enjoyment - There are plenty of epic space mecha battles for action, and then also details of the really strange sci-fi setting, not to mention the mysterious past. It's very enjoyable to read.

Overall - If you already like Tsutomu Nihei stories I'm sure you'd like this one as well. And if you like something really weird and different, that includes a gigantic monster made of goo who behaves like teenage girl, then seriously take a look. Really I don't even know what to say about Shiranui. Like I really thought I knew what he was doing with this story and then she showed up and I didn't know anymore. Anyway go read it, it's pretty great.

Our favourite cyberpunk artist has finally gone mainstream, dumbed his latest work down to a level that we mere mortals can consume & digest without difficulties.

Nihei Tsuomu's works are very unique. 'Blame!' was a manga you had to re-read a few times to actually realize the plot. The magaka refused to narrate even the most critical things. Compare that to the typical manga/anime with text-bubbles, notes & what-nots... you were left with your own devices(imagination, wit & interest) to parse the story. Yet the story was complex, layered and you were free to come up with your own interpretations. But, whatever your impression was based on his previous works, you had to admit one thing:

That his works were utterly, massively, absolutely cool.

One definite improvement is the artwork. There's now a unprecedented clarity, unseen on Nihei's previous mangas. Now the human are drawn with equal grace & fluency as he did with the cyborgs, monsters & robots before. Although there's the issue with generic human faces. But seeing the author's depiction of conflict on a grand-scale & mind boggling mega structures, there aren't many manga with better artworks than this. Characters in this manga are designed & developed in a traditional way. Now there are conversations, multiple panels are dedicated on clarifying a character's intentions or actions. Not many things are left to imagination. Some of the fight scenes are a bit confusing maybe, but the anime will help you up on that. Multiple readings are not required to finally get to the bottom of the story.

If you were expecting a gritty, dark story without any emotional fat & shallow story-telling.... you might be disappointed. Although "Mecha" is not a genre that can naturally produce anime/manga with actual depth in the story-line. The basic idea of human shaped fighting machines doesn't scream 'grown-up' in the first place. Yes this is tagged as "seinen", but not for the right reasons.

Truth is, this manga(and anime adaption) is & will continue to be a bigger success in Nihei's career compared to 'Blame!' or 'Biomega'. If you are a mecha/space-odessy fan, you must give it a go. There aren't many better ones than this.

From chapter 1 to 78 a 4/10.

Wow! that was very disappointing.
Especially the final arc. Characters were thrown in the trash along with their developments. Only for a horrible romance to happen, then die, then came back again to life. The plot is all over the place in the final half. The worst plot point and holes (little robot killer?). The first arcs had some very bad artistic decisions, that made the art descriptions and scenes very blurry and hard to understand, everything was always in a dark tone. But that was just the first half of the manga. After that someone must have called the author in the back and said "I don't understand these arts at all, bro", couse they all look bright and clearer and more easy to understand/appreciate at the final arc.
in short, the art is good, especially the backgrounds and objects in the background.

Plot is messy, the end is horrible (and bizarre).
What a shame for a manga with such a good start (plot). The romance created between the chimera and tanikaze is bizarre, forced and often disgusting. It is just... strange.

To summarize everything in the phrase of a great sage:
"My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined"
Bad manga 4/10.
Waste time with it.

[Spoiler Alert]

Sidonia no Kishi (2009-2015)

Knights of Sidonia the manga is a fabulous series. Although no one may read this review if you do I really hope it encourages you to read the full set of the manga.

Importantly first we need to know about who is the best girl. Shizuka Hoshijiro is the best girl with 100%. Her character is the perfect girl in my eyes since although flawed they are recognized but also she cares greatly for her actions. She is deeply connected throughout the story.
The Honoka sisters all come second as they are for obvious reasons the same and very unique. Their differing personalities make for a great laugh.
Other than that third place goes to the residential clerk her time may be shortly shown but once you see her you remember noticing her in the background around many other times.

In terms of the world setting in what is essentially a long-range colony ship running and fighting that which destroyed earth. You get a really unusual but smart setting for the people. In this, I mean the ability to survive in space by using photosynthesis to maintain a huge population. The idea of that alone is just incredible world-building and justifies many things that occur. The photosynthesis is also explained in detail during the series.

The art is great and is really consistent. By keeping many of the complicated things like the ships very simple it allowed it to look futuristic and sleek. The guardians are very well done throughout also. During the latter part when newly designed ships come along they are sophisticated but also very simple.

Characters develop extremely well during the whole series. You get to know many characters on very deep levels and the interactions of their relationships. You get a nice love thing going on with the main lead Nagate Tanikaze which is great but not overpowering in the story.

The storyline is smooth, the art is superb and the characters are well done. The ending could have done maybe a slightly longer run with maybe one more chapter for it. The ending is really well done and allows for it to continue but end at the same time.

This for me is my favourite mecha style manga and will go down for me as overall a 10. I would recommend this to be read by anyone who can. It is well worth the time.

Knights of Cydonia will intially come as a surprise to long time Tsutomu fans, deviating from his recently established stylised realism and grim isolation for a more standard anime caricature approach and deceivingly lighter tone to go with it.

The series is a take on the 'real mech' genre [similar to Gundam and other space based mech series] in the way only Tsutomu can do it: mega structures and scale that boggles the mind. Ready to challenge conventional sci fi tropes at every turn this is a series that takes its context to heart.

Artistically it could be described as 'pruned back', relying on less hatching then previously. Characters are drawn rather plainly, even by modern shonen standards, though there are red herrings that rationalise this and the series does a sufficient job differentiating the main ones. The attention to detail and patchwork world he creates coupled with an uncanny ability to depict speed and impact while also introducing uniform and fixed robot designs make the final result unique and completely fitting.

But more significant is the inclusion of clever and slightly bent deconstructions of harem and slapstick comedy that will take you off guard. This is juxta-positioned against a now disturbingly real sense of danger and impending doom... death is not unusual in Tsutomu universes but this time it is framed to be more of an impact.

It's in that which this series marks a strange deviation for his style. It is more conventional in the sense that it is more approachable and considerably less incoherent but it is exactly in that which it manages to be the strangest and arguably the most compelling series he creates yet: for once you actually care about the characters and want to see where it all culminates.

The plot plods ever onwards and as of writing this it can only be guessed where it will go, but looking back after 10 volumes you marvel at just how far you've come... not in the same dizzying and aimless way you did with Blame! and his other works, but how far you've come with the crew and the ever looming threat of a universe that you start to understand is a lot bigger and more mysterious than we are normally able to believe.