Continuing on from Samidare into the catalog of Satoshi Mizukami, next I came along Sengoku Youko. Despite being Mizukami’s longest work and a shounen action manga, it was a name I’d heard little about. However what I did hear about was quite interesting, OPT threads posting ambitious spreads, and some classy-taste friends of mine listing it as their favorite battle shounen ever. So I began my delve into the 2007-2016 series, Sengoku Youko. Let’s Rock.

PLOT: Two people roam the land. We have the fox demon, Youko Tama, and her stepbrother, Yamato Jinka. Together they’re on a quest to reform the evils of the land and bring a better peace to the world. Along their way they meet the young samurai Hyoudo Shinsuke, who’s the first to join their party in their quest for peace. If this doesn’t sound interesting to you, don’t worry. This is just the initial set-up. Sengoku Youko is broken up into some clearly defined parts, each building on the events of the last and, in my honest opinion, increasing in intrigue. The first part has a pretty standard set-up and does drag for the first while, but what it ends up doing and being built from there is quite the mastercraft. Sadly this means it’s the type of piece where I have to hold my tongue on why it’s good because the twists and surprises are best left unspoiled. Once part 2 kicks it, it becomes a tightly woven tale that carries a lot of emotional punch. Despite the simple set up, some quite amazing and surprising things do happen down the road, the manga will shift the status quo quite a bit and time will pass, but all of this is done quite meaningfully and with a lot of skill. There’s also a lot of thematic and emotional weight, as the series goes into humans, demons, fate, and what it means to fight. It’s full of exciting fights backed by powerful ideals and heart-wrenching deaths. It manages to fantastically blend an intense action plot with a lot of character moments and development. As with my last Mizukami series, I will say the plot falls under the characters but that’s by no means a bad thing. Ending wise the series ties up nicely, even if the epilogue lacked in some ways.

7/10, the first part is a 6 with the second part beyond being an 8.

CHARACTERS: Mizukami is one hell of a character writer and this doesn’t change. The initial cast are all quite memorable. Tama herself I find to be the weakest character as while she’s likeable and cute I found her development quite lacking in comparison to everyone else. Her initial ideal of peace stays throughout with little questioning, but she does over time come to discover her motivations for what’s more important to her. Jinka on the other hand is quite strong development-wise. When we meet him he’s a human on a quest to become a demon, after being exiled and living with demons he watched humans kill all the demons he lived with and has developed a hatred for them. Through the events of the series (and especially through his relation with Shinsuke) he comes down off of his hatred horse and begins to develop into the main hero we want him to be. Shinsuke himself is quite the case, starting off as a coward and a wannabe we see an AMAZING amount of development with him. His development is rough, but as all human development is, and by the end he’s even rather inspirational. I can’t say his name, but the other character to go through quite as complex and satisfying a development is one who becomes a lead character in the second part. I imagine any fans of the series will know who I’m talking about and there’ll be little dissent on the development of this boy. There’s also a lot of great side characters. The character of Teru was a particular highlight for being both incredibly funny and endearing despite overall playing a rather minor role in the series. Some other characters such as Raidou and Nau were also quite nice. I never found any of the characters to be unpleasant, with the “worst” being fun but static. As far as villains go there’s a good amount to talk about here. Some of the recurring villains are quite nice, especially Douren who falls into the old trope of “Genuinely Great Guy who’s just on the Other Side.” The character of Mudo falls into the villain turned rival role and has some of the best character development in the series. I also want to give a shout out to Jinun but can’t say why for spoiler sakes. Lastly the series villains, who’s reveal itself is a twist, were rather interesting. They were built up in a mysterious and exciting manner over the early parts of the series, and come to pay off towards the end. Despite being villains they fall into the nice category of not only relatable, but arguably more right than the main characters and have a fantastic backstory even if they’re lacking as individual characters. All in all Mizukami outdid himself by creating a loveable cast that grows well and ends up becoming powerful and memorable characters.

9/10, epitomic of good battle shounen character writing.

VISUALS: I’d honestly say this is a mixed bag. Mizukami’s art isn’t the strongest but he pulled out all of the stops here. While the individual panel to panel can be alright, the action scenes (especially later in the series) are top notch. While it may not be the most anatomic or realistic, the art is really expressive and can flow well. Character faces convey a lot of emotion and the designs are unique and memorable. Most memorable of all are the spreads, which on their own might be 10/10. Whether it be epic attacks conveyed in gripping detail with powerful emotion, back to back spreads conveying a mix of scale and flow, or (most surprisingly) spreads of larger than 4 pages to convey the size and scale of a scene in intriguing ways, Sengoku Youko I feel is one of the best examples of how to utilize and make multi-page spreads in an action series. I can still picture some of them with their intense action and raw emotions. It’s ambitious for the medium with having even a 6-page spread at one point. The average page isn’t as good as these spreads, but the series looks fine on average. I also think some of the demon design is particularly fantastic, a personal favorite of mine is Banshou’ou’s combat form.

8/10, some amazing spreads put in what’s otherwise a pretty decent piece.

FINAL SCORE: 8/10

While not perfect (with a slow first act) Sengoku Youko does some amazing stuff and in my opinion is well worth the read, while not becoming my favorite battle shounen I think it’s a pretty good contender for one of the best ever. I’d recommend it for most manga fans and is a must-read for any battle shounen manga fan.