azeriraz8

It sucks that this anime has a horrible reputation in America, thanks to Funimation or whatever the hell company. It must be the worst victim of dubbing and change.

Amazingly this anime is my second favorite ever. It's amazing how you can have such a kickass story line for sooo long..and it just keeps getting better and better.
The animation is colorful and optimistic along with the characters and story. I could read this anime until I was 100.

Go read this manga now. You are completely missing out on the fun if you haven't read it already.

YEAH YOU.

Pretty standard overpowered manga protagonist.

Character is of course dense and naive making it sometimes annoying to read.

Plot of course is as you would expect of a manga like this, hidden power suddenly becomes known to everyone except the protagonist. Due to his immense power he keeps on surprising those around him by accomplishing incredibly difficult tasks. Most of the characters the protagonist meets are women.

The art is not so bad but the manga is let down by its predictable cast of characters. They don't really stand out and are therefore not as memorable. If you have read a lot of manga like this than the characters personalities will be easy to recognize. Luckily the manga so far has yet to use the common story of a misunderstanding leading to plot progression.

Overall the manga has a light-hearted tone with a bit of drama, which is good if you are looking for something to pass the time or are not looking to get into some deep emotional story.

If you hate the cliche overpowered harem protagonist manga story then don't read otherwise enjoy.

Respecting the practice of a noble martial art, surpassing the limits of human being, glorifying your warrior ancestry and honoring your fiefdom, those were all values that the contestants to the toshiya trial at the Sanjusangendo temple had to respect, but what of them in reality? Even if one, by training day and night for years on managed to become “first under the heaven”, he would only gain a meager salary and a short termed glory, and if he didn’t, the only option out was seppuku. Why were so many lives destroyed by this practice and why was so much money wasted only for the self-satisfaction of a lonely chief?
Made by legendary gekiga author Hitoshi Hirata and based on real-life events, Kyudo Shikon recounts in vivid details the whole history of the Toshiya Matsuri.

Created in 1606, this trial consisted in shooting as much arrows as possible from one end to the other of the Sanjusangendo temple, 120 meters long, without touching the roof or the floor. It was considered an almost impossible task as you had to aim at a very precise point for them not to get stuck in the beams and still reach this distance.
The first samurai to take up this challenge was Heibe-Shigemasa Asaoka who, upon hearing that Hideyoshi Toyotomi himself tried but never succeeded in this task, decided to try his hand at it while passing by and, this day, managed to shoot 51 arrows across the hall. His feat was soon to be spread all across the country. Now victim of their pride, all the masters from the different fiefs decided they had the duty to hold the record to gain more dignity and respect.
What started as a personal challenge quickly became a race from the part of all these masters to gain this title, not hesitating a single second to impoverish their population and paying heavy taxes to organize the ceremony, planning murders and scheme to obtain an ephemeral glory.

That is how this bloody tradition began to be a huge phenomenon: countless different challengers would follow, the record got higher and higher everytime, it changed so fast that sometimes they would only hold the title of “first under the heaven” for a few days. All those who failed committed seppuku as to not regain their fief in dishonor, creating a whole graveyard dedicated to them. Thirty years later, the record had already reached 5444 arrows shot across the hall in a day. Deemed by professionals to be the ultimate limit that a human body could reach, this was supposed to be the end of it all, except it only really marks the beginning of this story as the overly proud master of the kii fiefdom decided to hold a grand operation to search for an ultimate warrior that could be able to beat this record. That is how, during a training camp held in the countryside, a stray arrow killed an innocent villager. His son, Kanza Hoshiemon, furious of this injustice, kills in turn the teacher of this training camp in order to avenge the death of his father. Liable for decapitation, he is eventually recruited as a candidate to be “first under the heaven” by showing his unwavering resolve to give meaning to his father’s death.

Kyudo Shikon takes upon itself to recounts the life of Kanza Hoshiemon from this point on up until his adulthood and the eventual abolition of this practice. Starting as a rather naïve teenager, he will be faced with many hardships, constantly questioning the intricate value of man and of this practice.
Hiroshi Hirata took a meticulous care to show every step of the way of this young man to become one of the best in archery, entirely devoted to this, he will start by burning his own house as if to burn his past life and to symbolize the end of his lineage of bushi, one of the lowest social status there is. Abused by his training masters that are still resentful of what he has done, he will suffer through every form of rigorous training, similar to tortures at time like getting dragged by a horse while being tied down or having his arms stretched with ropes, he also has more practical training like learning the different poses needed for the trial or even spiritual training like focusing his mind on a single point for a whole day which leads to metaphysical and out of body-experience. All these are very crucial as they reinforce the character as to make him a real man and make him learn the true notion of sacrifice, as well as make him realize the whole futility of this thing by the end of the manga. This is one thing that will also be reinforced by the jealousy and betrayal that are punctuated all around of it.

What makes this manga even more interesting is that it is not only the story of Kanza, the story is also told through the perspective of many different characters such as the previous contestants, getting in a few pages to show their hopes, their motivation, the errors and sacrifices they have committed. Having to end all relationship with your family and your lover, killing your opponent to increase your chances of winning, ever being so close to succeed but having all your training be worth nothing only because of the bad weather, those are all things that happen to these side character who becomes each very sympathetic and strong figures the moment they are introduced.
Being very wordy and having plenty of side characters introduced, it would be easy to be lost by this vast amount of informations but it never really feels that way. Yes, it can be very dense especially when recounting the historical events but it isn’t any worse than any manga published around that time and it’s pace easily make up for it as it knows how to switch subtly between the different parts of narrations which makes it flow very naturally.

As for the art, anyone that has ever read a samurai gekiga will be instantly familiar with the artstyle: it offers an important degree of realism as well as an impressive amount of details, be it in the wide shots used to show the different buildings, the shooting of the arrows and the few fight scenes that are reinforced by a near perfect composition, the wide variety of traditional or ceremonial clothes, or even the godly apparitions that come to test the will of our protagonist. Every bit of kyudo shikon is gripping and is mesmerizing, it gives off this strong raw power and still holds up very well to the test the time even 50 years later.

All in all, I genuinely think Kyudo Shikon is on par with the greatest samurai stories like lone wolf or kamui den and holds itself as one of the few masterpieces of Hiroshi Hirata.

Pumpkin Night is a story about a girl that use a pumpkin mask and kill the people who bullied with her in the past. At first I was excited and found it very interesting, but a little later I lost interest and just continued to see how far Naoko would go.

I expected the story to be something like Ring: Naoko would follow some of her classmates on Twitter and terrify them to death. It also seemed to follow a tense suspense, that the main characters would always be afraid of Kirino's return and what she could do, but the story gets boring when the character of the "main suspense" appears at all times, always killing someone and totally disappointing in the suspense.

The characters are all stupid and dumb, especially the main character. The villain is an interesting character, but still very stupid. The characters take stupid ideas and do stupid things like in every American Serial Killer movie.

So far the only positive point I have given, was in relation to the art that is well done (and every manga gore must have a good art).

Anyway, if you want to see a cool story with a lot of suspense, I'm sorry to say that you will be disappointed (just like me), but if you just want to see a gore manga, with a lot of shocking scenes and a lot of blood, you'll enjoy it.

Kuroki just graduated from highschool, and his parents confessed that he's adopted, upon learning his biological parents' death, Kuroki discovers it might not be an accident, but a planned murder.
Seeking answers, he applies to the company his father used to work at...

Story:
Chapters are too damn short, but I like the pace and development, by chapter 50, it gets better, I wonder how long this manga will go on.
Art:
It's clean and detailed, no complaints here.
Character:
Dense at first, but gets badass when the thing happened.

there's a little romance and sex scenes, enjoying it but would recommend reading it in the future when it's done.

UPDATE: Now that it's completed...man, what a waste, it got axed

What an interesting manga.

I’ve read a lot of manga that deals with revenge and bullying. Needless to say, suicide is a frequently discussed topic within those manga. However, it’s rare to see a manga that delves into the effects of a suicide on a victim’s surroundings.

Rengoku no Karma does exactly that. It actually shows a suicide, but then it goes on to show the unexpected consequences of that suicide in relation to those around the victim.

The manga deals with the subject decently enough, though at times it doesn’t explain things thoroughly. For example, why does the manga specifically say six people are affected? I had assumed it relates to the ‘6 degrees of separation’ concept, but it’s not something the manga confirms.

Still, in spite of the less than stellar handling of the story, the sheer subject matter alone is enough to drive the manga along. What really adds to this is that the story utilizes the ‘time loop’ concept – that is every time the character fails, time restarts and he has to try again. Each attempt results in different reactions and different consequences.

Each of these concept alone would make for a very engaging manga. So the fact that the manga uses them in tandem makes for a highly engaging read.

Overall, it’s still early in the manga’s life at this point in time so it’s hard to see where it goes, but so far, it has proven to be something worth checking out, so I highly recommend this manga.

There are people that will hate this series by default because they don't agree with the brother-sister genre entirely but I have to say this manga does an amazing job showing everything the genre has to offer. The point isn't that she's his sister, the point is that she is the closest person in the world to him. He falls in love with her because they share all the same interests and look out for each other and because he can't imagine being with anyone else.

It isn't something you have to want a relationship with your own sister to enjoy, it is simply a love story between two incredibly close people and the whole forbidden aspect of the relationship just adds some tension to spice things up.

The important thing to remember is that fantasy is by definition not reality and the inability to distinguish between the two means you are literally insane. So if you can't enjoy a heartfelt story about two people that fall in love and have to sneak around because you are projecting yourself and your own sister onto them then you actually have a mental problem. If you dislike this story because of the characters themselves and not the genre that is fine but I'm sick of people having an instant "oh that makes me want to puke" reaction to everything that comes out of a specific genre because they want to show off what a mature and healthy person they are (that can't differentiate a fictional manga from reality).

Anyways onto the story itself: I don't want to spoil anything so I won't touch on specifics but it is full of moments that made me laugh, warmed my heart, and was just a fantastic read so far. I'm a sucker for love stories but this is one of the best I've seen. Also unlike a hundred billion other romance series this relationship actually has seen some progress in the 17 chapters that are currently available so it doesn't look like a complete waste of time for readers that might want to pick it up and see something actually progress and not just the same recycled jokes for hundreds of chapters.

You know I started this Manhwa after reading the awesome summary, and I was like 'yeah! Let the fun begin!' but as the story continued, I started thinking ‘is this really why I came to read Girl in Heels?’ For a crazy obsessed sister, cheesy delinquent-turned-misunderstood-saint and the forever-gorgeous girl?

Where is the action?
Are there even any twists?
Why isn't there any suspense?

Goh, Kyung-Hee is our diva protagonist who is mistaken for a model (ofcourse) and people literally stop on the streets to stare at her (What world are we living in? Brake your cars, people, forget about those traffic lights; let’s stop and stare at Goh, Kyung-Hee. Because we have nothing better to do apparently. {I'm not happy, author}). So she goes and buys herself a pair of high heels from a shop called: no, go on, guess!

Girl in Heels!

Oh, the creativity!
But the creative flow of wonder doesn't stop there, no sirree, Bob. Meet protagonist #2, Yang, Ookil; he's a rich (surprise, surprise) bad boy (and the creativity keeps flowin') who's got ISSUES (where have we heard that before? Oh right, every OTHER story that has absolutely anything to do with gangs), he's heard of Miss Universe and wants to nab her for himself.

I have to talk about the art because... It's just disturbs mine eyes! (Who said Medieval English is dead?) The 3D effect is a no-go for all you illustrators out there. I was never really a fan but this just gets the cake. It didn't even make sense, she had THORNS for eyelashes. Hello! Creature from a different planet!
Details? In your thorny dreams, and add proportion to that list of things that aren't included when you buy/read this story.

This a definite shallow read, you get no new boundaries explored, no new topics introduced not much logic either. To all you angry fans who will no doubt dislike my review, I don't TRY to pick on the story, honestly, this is just what comes to mind.

For those people who want to give their brains, logic and any other kind of mental equipment a break (which I don't encourage); tread carefully.

But you can find better reads for that even.

OFFICIALLY LABELLED: Overrated
Bonus lesson of the day: BEWARE of too-good-to-be-true summaries; they’ll be the death of you.

Since I noticed a lack of reviews for this series I will be writing one, but a short one, nevertheless.

En passant is a chess move which can occur "immediately after a player moves a pawn two squares forward from its starting position, and an enemy pawn could have captured it had it moved only one square forward. The opponent captures the just-moved pawn as if taking it "as it passes" through the first square" (Wikipedia). It makes sense for a series with Chess as the plot theme.

I had no high expectations at first and I was just expecting a nice read. But I was disappointed soon and it took no longer than a few chapters, sadly. En passant is an example of bad pacing and wasted potential filled with poorly developed clichéd characters. At the end of the last chapter I was asking myself "why did I kept reading?" for I could have seen the ending being as insipid as the water inside my glass.

What was supposed to be the last arc of the story felt bland and rushed and full of deus ex machina. The side characters had no background information and little to no development. Nothing much was said about Verde (also known as Valde, I think) and the war between dark square and withe square. The formation of En Passant felt forced and the character relationships aren't fully explored in those 20 chapters. Twenty chapters aren't a lot, I know, but as the author you can manage somehow a fair development of events, interactions and a memorable finale. Unfortunately, this is not the case here.

I don't have much to say about the art, "not good enough" would be the right expression. But I will stick to "average, ordinary" and that's it.

In short what I mean to say through this review is: En Passant has nothing to make it a memorable series and it could be a lot more than just a generic chess-themed "battle shounen" if the author (a) had the time (b) had the means (c) made it longer (d) had put more effort into it.

Cutest manga I have ever read and is one of the best spin offs from Kamichama Karin! Those who can read Chinese should check out some of the Rae's I found on a website after searching Doki Doki Tama tan Raw.