Gantz

This was the first manga I've read. Overall I enjoyed it. I thought the length of each chapter was perfect, although I'm not sure if that's something that changes from manga to manga. Guess I'll find out!

I do have some gripes about the series. I can't totally discern if these stem from cultural differences, mistranslations, or just bad writing, but I guess that's the fun in expanding to a medium beyond your comfort zone. More below!

WHAT I LIKED:
-Futuristic elements: the Gantz technology, weapons, alien spaceships, fancy suits, mechs... all great and very imaginative.

-The art: beautifully drawn throughout. I enjoyed the artist's background information that surfaced every now and then during the early chapters.

-Overall story: Despite some plot holes and aspects that were never explained, I was totally into the mythology behind the Gantz balls and how its meaning/origin was (eventually) shared with the reader.


WHAT I DISLIKED:
-Vampires. What the hell? I didn't think they belonged in the series as I was reading it, and even after I've read all the chapters it still doesn't make any sense. They were never explained.

-Holes in the plot around how/why Gantz did things, and how the technology in the series operated.

-How all of the school bullies were voilence-loving heathens; multiple times they cheered on death and made comments that indicated they had no humanity. Quite unrealistic for a bunch of high schoolers.

-How all of the civilians/bystanders were ignorant and useless.

-The ongoing theme of ultimate romantic devotion. The whole deal with the main character and his girl was a groaner. I'm fine with romance, but the relationships lacked substance.

-The ending. It was quite abrupt and I felt as though more needed to be explained.

Gantz is a masterpiece in my opinion. Even though I love this manga, this manga is definite not for everyone. This manga contain sex scenes, blood, blood and more blood, naked girls/monsters with supernatural and technological twist to everything.
However if you can stand all of the above then, this manga is for you. The manga is about killing aliens with incredible suits, weapon, vehicles and with everything you can think of. The alien are not just standing there doing nothing, the monsters are strong and sometimes, they are way to strong, and makes you wonder if they can be killed or not. From human size alien that move an uses crazy fire or thunder power to dinasaurs with thousands of eyes to temple statues.
Gantz is about a ball that save randomly the memory of someone that dies in any particular way and transfer the memory and created a clone and used it to fight the monster. Its like giving you a second chance but with one mission in mind, Kill and Survive.
All the characters that stay long enough all they think is surviving. They all fight to survive not because they are afraid of dying, but because they still have something important to accomplish or they still have someone waiting for them every day or night.

I see Gantz as a test for survival. If you really really cant die now, then you fight, you fight like never before, like there may be no tomorrow for you. You will fight as a team or fight alone, its the same but you should just stay alive for just one more night.

This manga story is very complicated and even though it has +274 chapters, most of the facts around Gantz is still unknown. If you like all of the above, you should give it a try to this masterpiece =P
Oh btw, Gantz starts with a very unliked character but at the same time with a tremendous will to survive.

Death is NOT an end-Merely a new Beginning! (Unknown)


PLOT: -

The course of this series is full of bitterness and tragedy. Characters that have no control, no power and are inserted in a game that despite how well they play and the alliances they form, once they win, its back to the beginning. Imagine playing a high stake game, kill or be killed, meeting people who become allies, friends and even lovers but knowing that if you choose to collect your 100 points and leave the game, all the knowledge, personal growth and experiences will be blocked from your mind. It’s a tease. It’s harsh. And it’s a metaphor for the oft-times seeming futility of life itself. It’s an extreme case of human nature and the nature of the game, versus the individuals at play and their relations to one another.

Gantz is a complex, multi layered story, told in a stunning visual style, abundant in detail and interspersed with blood and sex. This blood and sex is used as both a tool and a metaphor exemplifying the high and lows of humanity itself as protector and defender, hunter and the hunted, hero and villain. Two sides of a coin, both sides in a game.

The story and the premise itself is interesting and thought provoking. Oku has captured a cross section of humanity within his pages, both in its glory and grotesque. His efforts while not always appreciated deserve to be applauded.

CHARACTERS: -

Gantz takes normal and everyday life characters and takes them to great heights with awesome character development.

Originally some characters such as the lead character Kurono appear as plain, shallow and self-centered personnel, they develop into shining examples of the human condition, baptized in the fire of war.

As the story progresses further characters add more humanity to the story, knowing that they have no place in the game, they still embrace a role placed upon them for the benefit of another or simply chose to overlook a horrifying and baser act of depravity in order to do what they must. Many characters are contradictory to each other. Some individuals play the game at the expense of other players and their own humanity while others develop bonds similar to those of team/family to support each other. Others are burnt beyond recognition, and display violent, extreme anti-social tendencies that place them squarely as villains and the aliens they hunt as victims.

ART: -

Art is a big selling point of this manga. The character art and backgrounds are top notch (some might say that they are close to or even better than Berserk). Everything about art is amazing. The gory and hardcore action, sexy babes at cover pages, the horrifying aliens and monsters, in short everything shows the greatness of Oku's artwork and imagination.

TARGET AUDIENCE: -

People say that Gantz is just for those who enjoy excessive and needless gore and don’t care about the story. However, I would recommend this manga to anyone who wants a visually engaging story, combined with some harsh lessons on human nature.

TIPS: -

* Read it at night, lights off and metal songs on (I enjoyed it more that way).
* Read at least 10 to 15 chapters in one sitting.
* Don't read it if you hate gore

Great story, first manga I've been addict too. Good thing about it, is that you cannot predict anything. Some caracter will die, new will come... I always asked myself what else will happen next page. If you want a gore, bloody, nasty manga, this is the one.

Fight, Monster, Sc-Fi, Sex, Blood... and many dead, many many many !!

I start reading after I saw the anime. If you have seen it, the Anime is just a small part of the story, the plot is going much farter. Anime story stop near #5-6... If I remember correctly.

I'm just going to do this thing.

I remember this manga. When I put it on hold, I was at chapter 380. another 3 chapters and it would be finished.

if I have to summ all of it up, I'd say that... nope. Can't summarize this since there are a lot of things going on in this.

One thing though I would like to point out, this series underlines the human's negative side. This was dark, bloody, and is probably made for demons (hehe).

A lot of characters points out the flaws and the main characters still have one or two but they sometimes overcome them or not or they'd be tested or not. One of the strong point of this series is that it is unpredictable.

== Story ==

The story is not all about one character, but is deceptively all about him, being a flawed human being, with problems possessed by the usual teenage dudes. He will be tested. He will change as he and his teammates, or those people that died and was transferred to this round black ball where they are ordered to kill aliens.

There are romance in this and a lot of perverseness. The hero seems cured with that too. He will be cured with a lot of things.

But there is little exposure to the life of aliens here. Aside from being attacked by "Gantz's Team", their lives weren't focused. Probably to avoid accidentally spraying some sympathy of its readers.

== Art ==

Well, what can I say? It's as real as it can be. Buildings, flowers, and even a pebble with dusts around it. Nothing was left behind. detailed pictures and all. And the expression of them characters as guts fly out from their stomach when a huge alien swung his ginormous fists. People scrambling for their lives and debris falling, some big enough for anyone that can, be avoided.

== Sound ==

The sounds, what can I say? Probably nothing (hehe). But in my imagination, usually I hear people screaming, and crying.

== Character ==

The hero is a teenage dude with hormones and all. As a kid, he was adventurous, active and alive, really. This was all witnessed by his childhood friend, the long haired dude. But now? He changed. He caught a sickness that is rampant on every problematic kids this days. He caught problems (hehe).

Anyway, the leading lady. Now, she was great. Simple, honest, and true. She won't betray and her partner is as loyal as a dog. They are sweet together and fun to read.

There are a lot of interesting characters here. Many had flaws that are eventually cured. I did hear (read) once, that interesting dudes/duddetes have flaws, or something like that.


== Enjoyment ==

People die here, a lot, just so to make it clear if you haven't guessed from my meaning before. A lot of guts, blood. Lots of death defying stunts. Fatal wounds and all.

This manga is sad. That is the major emotion I got from this series. The characters I learned to like suffered and died. A lot of them.

But you can just settle for "at least". At least he/she survived. At least he was gone and completed his objective and was satisfied.

But still, it's sad.

And the idea here, that humans are dusts, that characters I like was made like a toy, those too, made me sad. Sadly, a sudden end for my writing of this sad review. Are you sad? (hehe, probably glad. This review seems weird, even to me).

I've been reading Gantz for the past 2.5-3 years and finally on aug 9 2013, a week after my birthday, I've completed reading this amazing series. I've at least read the first 200 chapters three times over and I still love it just as much as the first time going through.

My biggest take from the manga is the character development. I feel like I grew onto the characters. Each character, good or bad, has their own distinct features that make a lasting impression and make me feel like I'm reading an original masterpiece. As soon as you cling on to a character and you appreciate who they are, suddenly they die or another plot twist takes you down the roller-coaster, taking you up and down, rising climax after one another almost like a rush. I want more, to the point that I catch myself reading consecutive chapters until I become too tired to go on. THAT is what I rate as a 10 manga.

The only downside to such a long series, like many other long series, is consistency. The story has multiple arcs, each with its own lil theme but the arcs don't tie into each other very well. It's not like One Piece where it's well thought out from the beginning and EVERYTHING is meticulously placed giving you hints from the beginning to future events. It's barely a complaint in my opinion, no series is perfectly great. Even One Piece has its flaws considering it's a benchmark of story-line lineage.

Gantz is a truly polarizing series: some hail it as an uncompromising, exploitative classic, others deem it bloated, campy, misogynistic, among other unfavourable descriptors. While one's tolerance of Gantz's seemingly relentless smut will depend entirely on the reader, there's no denying that Gantz is a fun, wild ride--as well as an important entry in the seinen genre.

Across 37 volumes and nearly 400 chapters, Gantz's foremost flaw is inconsistent storytelling. It starts slow (as most titles do), relying almost entirely on shock value to keep itself afloat. Many will find the cast, particularly the centerpiece, Kei, to be unbearable early on. Gantz picks up significantly towards the middle of the story, adding several clever twists to its established formula, on top of some much-needed character development--before stumbling to a conclusion that lazily neglects the series' most important questions nor earns its own spectacle. Gantz is loaded with great ideas, but executes them in decent-to-dreadful fashion.

Plain and simple, Hiroya Oku's fantastic artwork single-handedly saves this series from certain mediocrity. Oku's abilities as a writer can be rightly met with skepticism, but when it comes to slick, overtly erotic sci-fi, presented in striking detail--Gantz ranks among the best of the best. Alien designs are unsettlingly imaginative (as well as subtly humorous), the increasingly powerful gear and weaponry make for terrific set pieces, and the gore--rolling heads and all--delights in presenting each physical nuance in gruesomely over-the-top detail. The heavy use of digital processing also gives the world of Gantz an undeniably singular feel, though it probably won't be for everyone (I loved it).

If you're the type of reader that won't let Gantz's more...questionable facets bother you (the infamous Shibuya chapter comes to mind), you'll probably finish it having had a good time. If not, it's very possible that you'll drop it after the first few volumes. Overall, Gantz is well-worth a try for fans of seinen and adult sci-fi--even it relies heavily on style over substance.

Spoilers warning!!!!!!
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Story - 8
In my opinion, it had a great story build-up towards 'near' the end where I felt very disappointed. Why? Honestly, it's because of Reika and Suzuki's death after the alien(s) in the room of truth resurrected them. Like, why though? I know that they're trying to prove their point (humans are just 'things), but I was really hoping that Kato would've won the argument.

I don't mind Kei's clone dying and yes I understand that he killed Reika to build up Kei's clone's death, but they don't have to kill off Reika and Suzuki at all. Kinda disappointed to be honest. Especially about Reika's death as Suzuki's death is quite acceptable because he wanted to be with his wife.. This series has had tons of fan services, nudity and all kinds of things. Maybe it should've ended with Kei having a harem of 2 girls (Tae and Reika). Plus, I don't like the idea of Reika being born as an American woman later in 20 years and giving birth to Kei. That's not right at all, leaves a bad taste for me.

Art - 10
The art is very decent! Polished, strong and quite layered. The gore and horror of the story were drawn perfectly and yes... The fan service was great too. Nothing much I can say here. Nothing wrong with the art at all.

Characters - 7
Some of the characters were a pain in the a**, but I totally understand why. This is how it should be. Yes, I'm still mad about the alien(s) in the room of truth.

Many of the characters are lovable as well, such as Tae, Anzu, Sakurai/Cherry, Reika and well, maybe Kato.

The character development of Kei is very likable too. The way he went from being a complete selfish-dipsh*t and a 24/7 pervert to being cool character full of courage to save people and the fact that Kato isn't afraid of using a weapon and being a complete pussy (with a good personal reason of course) are why I gave this character category a 7/10. Without their character development, i would've probably given this a lower score.

Enjoyment - 9
I really enjoy the action of Gantz, the concept and the progression throughout the chapters/volumes (except ch. 371) of course.

Overall - 9
If I could somehow change that on chapter and the ending. I'd be very grateful, but I can't sadly. At the end of the day, I did enjoy the anime, despite the disappointing ending and the deaths of some characters. 9/10 for me.

I definitely recommend this series, if you're fine with gore and nudity! To end it off, thanks for reading/listening to my opinion. Have a good day!

First off, let me start by saying that I believe the manga should have two reviews: A review for the story up to about chapter 280, and a review for the rest up to 383.

Up to between chapters 280 and 300, I'd give the manga a fantastic rating. The art is good, the plot is good, character development is good. It keeps me entertained and wanting more. Then it falls off a cliff. Between chapter 280-300, or maybe even the start of the final (3rd) phase, it feels like the author just wanted it to end. He also seemed to force the romance between the main character, Kurono, and his girlfriend Tae, even though the vast majority of fans (including myself) despised this as it detracted from the plot. In fact, the entire final phase (the final invasion) is simply to get Tae back - forget his missions, the Earth, and all of the other people he loves, he just has to save Tae!

But the worst part, which is what utterly ruins the grade of this manga, is the ending. The final chapter (named The Final Chapter) is a short than normal chapter, and answers few if any questions. For those that have seen the anime, I would compare it to to the anime's ending if not worse. The author goes from the final battle to the end of the manga in half of a chapter, a quarter of which is simply crowds cheering and Tae crying.

Overall, if you're ok with an absolutely abysmal ending then this is a great manga. I would argue it should have ended after the Osaka arc, which would have been a great ending albeit still with questions unanswered.

Gantz

- A story about a horny teenager.


Upon reading the first pages of this manga, many people would consider Gantz's story, to be a simple and straightforward one. A tale about Kurono Kei, a horny teenager, that is selfish, self centered and obsessed with sex, and big breasted women.
That is until he dies, gets revived, and forced to partake in a alien killing death match, with futuristic suits and weapons. From that point on the reader starts to understand that Gantz story is nothing but straightforward.


Story: 9

One of the things that i like the most in manga, it's how a story is focused on it's key elements, but still offers something for everyone. And Gantz does just that, while you could read just for the action scenes, which are great, Gantz is much more than mindless fights.
In fact if someone were to ask what exactly is Gantz, a complete answer would be something like : it's a Psychological, survival-horror, action/gore, seinen, etchi, drama, slice of life, Sci-Fi, Supernatural, romance story. And Gantz really is all that
While might be confusing at first, Hiroya Oku does a great job at putting more and more elements to the story, at a comfortable pace, giving you a feeling that it's continually growing, but without breaking immersion.

That growth means that you keep getting more and more hooked into the story and the fate of it's many characters.
In fact if there's a "but" to Gantz story, it's how it normally gives you a question and answers with another question, almost like watching a episode of "Lost".By the end of several volumes, you still won't know what exactly is Gantz, who's that guy inside it, why it can revive people, why does it make people fight aliens, where the hell those aliens came from and why are they in Tokyo.

In the end, Gantz, is about survival. How people behave and react in extreme situations, and their ability to continue to live their lives and build "normal" relationships, despite all the death and destruction they have to endure in every hunt.


Characters: 8

One of the things that set's Gantz apart from other manga, it's how almost every single characters dies, and that no one is safe in the world of Gantz not even the main characters.

This element means that you never know who's going to die, so having good characters that will not easily be forgotten, becomes very important. And in that aspect Oku delivers, while not perfect, every character have completely different personalities, and personal dramas behind them, always giving them a sense of purpose and importance.
While some characters are just despicable, other are simply psychopaths, while some live only to fight, other live only to rape, and so on. Of course there is the good and pure characters, but Oku's specialty really is with extreme deviant behavior.

In general the cast of characters, is complex and diverse, which is great, the main problem is that some secondary characters that get sent to Gantz, always come from the same formula of psychopaths, sadists and rapists. In fact most of the people in the world of Gantz are very negative, cruel and evil. While it does show how many people really are in reality, sometimes it seems Oku does it simply as a gimmick.
Another minor thing that bothered me, it's how some characters almost look the same, similar faces with only slightly different hair, while others look completely different, which can make for confusing scenes.


Art: 9

The art in Gantz is very detailed, with great action scenes, while it might not compete with, berserk or kuroshia ichi, it's still very good.

In fact if there's a problem with Gantz art is that Oku uses CGI, in almost everything, from characters to scenarios, to the weapons, the suits, and the special abilities of the aliens. All of this is made with or with the help of CGI, so Gantz art really is a double edge sword, for the most part i like it, and it doesn't bother me. But for some other elements, i would have preferred a more "classical" approach, since some times it's just to much CGI in just one scene.




Fan Service: 9

Even thou Gantz is mainly more drama, than exactly comedy, it does have comic reliefs, normaly in simple and dry dark comedy, involving either sadistic killings or as in most of the time sex. That's right, Gantz has a lot of fan service, and when i say a lot, i mean that almost every chapter comes with some hot, nude, big breasted young woman, doing sexy poses.
Which normally is fun and serves, to lighten the more chaotic and violent scenes, the problem is that sometimes is just too much and can get silly.

To give you an idea, 9 out of every 10 women in Gantz not also are hot, they all share the huge breasts gene, and sooner or later you will see them naked and having sex with someone.
So you might think that, hot women and sex is great Fan-service . There is, until you see a guy having sex with an alien in a middle of a battlefield while his friends are getting killed.

And finally ,to show you that Oku really takes his Fan-service seriously,as he realized he was upsetting the lolicon's , Oku made a lolita as a main character, and of course she will appear naked and have her very own sex scenes.
XD (lol)

Enjoyment: 9

In a word, "addictive", not many manga kept me , devouring every chapter and volume, until there was no more to read. Having read 31 volumes in 2 days, not also means that a have a lot of free time, it also means that Gantz became one of my favorite maga in just two days.
If there's one thing that made my enjoyment a 9 instead of a 10, was that Oku's along with other seinen,/gore manga authors overuses certain elements, like extreme violence/gore, sex and rape just for shock value, or silly fan-service, which after awhile can becomes almost routine,
Apart from that, Gantz is overall a great experience, that delivers in almost every aspect.

Overall: 9

Having watched the anime, I felt that the Gantz story had so much potential, and of course, I had to read the manga.

And what I found about Gantz was ...

A tale about people, violence, sex, war, death, a lot of blood, existence and god. A overwhelming story about the struggle to survive. And the most important, a story to let us know that the best thing we can do are for, and with love. The only thing I can criticize was the jump between some arcs and events and some minor plotholes.

Gantz show us aesthetically beautiful drawn scenarios from tokyo and some other places around and out the world. A unique and realistic drawn I haven't seen in any other manga. The expressions of people, realistic scenerios; even the aliens and monsters are extremely well created. I could feel the motion and the impact in each page. An art that in more than 6.500 pages shows almost no flaws, making it perfect for us to feel what the characters feel; to feel the death of any Gantz member; to see how they grow as a person and as a member of the team.

The Gantz members change all the time as people die all the time. With some minor mistakes I can count, like the feelings and emotional exageration or injustified cruelty from many characters, can be easily forgotten when we see how each member has their own charisma and how we feel about the death (expected or unexpected) of any person at any given time. Some other flaws (very few) can't be explained without having to explain the scene and therefore giving spoiler.

The manga never decay. In all moment something is happening in the world of Gantz and we need to know what is about to show up. Having read the manga in 3 days, I can really say this is something I enjoyed very much.

I will forget the anime, that thing doesn't make any justice to the manga. The first arcs have the exact same story and same characters and almost same dialogues, but are completely different. I will just think that the anime studio said : "Hey this manga is really good, let's go and fuck it because lol".

I would like to explain a lot more why you should read Gantz, but I rather will say: Just read it.

Seeing as most reviews praise Gantz wholeheartedly i find it worthwhile to express my opinion which is different .My review will contain some minor spoilers as i ll need them to make a point for my opinions .

Gantz up to chapter 280 seems like an entirely different manga when compared with what came next .That will be my main point .
Let's take it from the beginning :
The story is a story of horror,mystery,survival and - above all- character development .
And as every story it is mostly dependent on the charm of the characters to be successful-if the characters are unnatural or boring even the best story cant make up for it , and in contrast if they are believable and enchanting and fresh even a classical and otherwise overused story becomes equally enchanting .

So !

Enter Gantz
At the first chapters we are introduced to the presumes of the story and the characters that will unravel it.Our protagonist is like nothing you ve ever seen before : he is not a total loser and yet he is a misanthropist-he oozes with contempt for humans in general with a way that is more emotional than logical : he doesn't support misanthropy for the sake of an ideology , he feels it and one could say that even himself isn't entirely conscious of the fact .
He is human , he is one of us , he knows how to love but living in a real world he knows better how to hate and how to become disappointed . He is truly a teenager in a rebellious phase with the true meaning - he is disappointed, alone , conflicted and with a rampaging libido that as is natural to real rebellious teenagers , ignores restrains and ethics if given the chance .
He is a real person and a one of a kind protagonist .
He is jealous of many things and his heroic self-titled friend seems to be like an open wound for him : something that reminds him of himself and of the lofty ideals of childhood .He lusts for a girl that clearly is yet another real person-conflicted,good and evil,painful and harmful and still beautiful .

I have just described the protagonist as he is for at least the first arc , let's take a look on the rest of the cast :
We have the aforementioned girl , who is a great character but unfortunately doesn't stay in the story for long as a main character .The two main characters besides our anti-hero protagonist is his heroic friend and yet another anti-hero , a cool expert on Gatnz warfare and above all a survivor that has experienced Gantz from before the protagonist get's thrown into it .

One quickly learns to identify and love almost every character of the cast and by doing that , experiencing a truly humane experience : the love is human and the good and heroic ideals and morals are human but so is rage,despair,sadness,disappointment and lust and evil .Life is humane but Death is too , even if we would like it otherwise .
And as the story progresses their emotions constantly renew themselves - they outgrow themselves sometimes to overcome challenges while other times they retreat to their fears because of them .
They learn to appreciate life and truly despair about death , they learn their limits and they learn the pleasure of breaking through them .

And then the setting slowly changes along with the characters .I may not be an expert but either the character of the author and his ideals changed with time or some marketing advisers had their say .

Enter Arc Two-Allien Invasion

The story loses much of it's mystery as many things are revealed . The horror continues but on a much grander scale , as whole countries get wiped off the map .The secret survival story turns now to open warfare and battle with the invaders .
Much of the original cast besides the main characters has died and new people have filled the gaps time and time again .

But here is when things went sour : the characters are not themselves anymore .
Up until chapter 380 we will see our anti-social hero becoming yet another knight in shining armor , ready to save his newly acquired damsel in distress , always winning heroically after overcoming huge difficulties .Where did the inner conflicts go , where did the contempt and the rejection of the world ended up to ?I have no idea and obviously neither the characters do .
The only thing that happened in our beloved's anti-hero protagonist life that may have changed him was that he acquired a girlfriend .Now,now a first girlfriend may be a major event in every mans life but what we see isnt actually the protagonist we knew effected by his girlfriend : it is someone of the much overused characters from industrial Anime-not even manga- that is overpowered , deeply troubled and saddened by the world yet eager to serve and protect everyone , cool and dressed in black , faithful beyond comparison to his love and unbeatable ( except when it gives a chance for his damsel to save him , thus proving once more her love to him )
And what about the other main characters of the cast you say ?Well as i already told you the most interesting girl that appeared since the beginning , the one that preferred the protagonist friend instead of him , is out long ago .
The cool and expert warrior/survivalist is shown to be completely stupid and week , revealing his characters in his last moments as a truly lame and powerless child - a change of character that really surprised me since he was build as the cold and cautious murderer type for all the past story .And it was a bad surprise .
Finally the only one to remain somewhat faithful to himself is the heroic friend of the protagonist that still appears as a hero - only this time he is more of a sidekick or the hero of a minor plot line if compared to the truly epic feats of the incredible and godly reborn protagonist .

And finally - the author makes some very sad attempts to fill the gap caused by the lack of character consistency with some pseudo-philosophical touches that literally would have maked the original protagonist beat himself ( and probably the author) up if he could .
Plus there was a plot line about the brother of the protagonist being a vampire or something that gets completely forgotten for the time being - he doesn't appear EVER again , something that makes him look like he was from some filler chapter/episode that an assistant came up with because the author was sick in a hospital in the meantime .
The only thing that improved in the second arc of the manga was the background art , with grand scenes of carnage and technological sci-fi environments.But i suspect that could mainly attributed to the money spent on assistants and not on the author or anyone else .



To sum it up i ve got to say that Gantz is a truly unique manga and it is worth reading .It is good and that is a fact .
The reason i am disappointed is because it started out (and continued for quite some time ) as a masterpiece .
There are really few manga that can compete with the first arc of it and even if you take the second arc as a given , it still remains a good manga .Just be prepared for the second arc - who knows depending on what you like you may even like it more than the first .
But that was surely not the case for me .

A Japanese teenager waits at a train station, reading a trashy magazine featuring an idol enticing the reader with her big boobs. An elderly lady approaches the teenager, asking for directions. The teenager quickly mumbles a non-informative reply while thinking to himself what an annoyance the lady is, why should he give a shit about her? Oh look, a drunken tramp just fell onto the tracks and no one is going to help. Why should they? It’s none of their business, just look away and pretend you didn’t see it happen.

This is Gantz. Hiroya Oku's exploitative, violent and cynical depiction of the Japanese and their behaviour when confronted with moralistic situations. There's also a bunch of ever-increasingly ludicrous battle royales with aliens and vampires that destroy various parts of Tokyo and other cities, but that all comes later.

Back to that train station and that teenager: Kei Kurono. Instantly unlikeable, but oh so real. You either know kids like him, or you recognise your own traits in his character. You'll probably be lying to yourself if you don’t see yourself in some of these characters, its human nature to recoil from awkward situations. Gantz seems to gain great pleasure from thrusting its many random characters into awkward situations, sometimes involving nudity, usually violence, usually spontaneously.

Gantz is about a room somewhere with a black ball and a very infantile presence who gives out childish nicknames to unfortunately-recently-dead and usually unwilling participants in a 'game' that requires them to kill aliens in a kind of real-life recreation of a First Person Shooter. The brilliance is in the mystery and its ridiculousness.

People die and are transported to the room to pick up their suits and weapons, and if they survive the subsequent battle they're free to wander off and return to their lives...until they're transported back to the room for another battle, and so on until either they reach 100 points and are released from the game, or they die for real. Author Oku continually ups the stakes, regularly throwing bigger obstacles in characters' paths, and it becomes a case of “can he top this?” The answer is always: "yes he bloody well can!”

There is a massacre in Shinjuku, Tokyo that beggar’s belief in its astounding ambition to shock the reader with its scope, creativity and viciousness. Once I read this sequence, I knew any anime adaptation would either fail completely at bringing to motion what this manga gets away with, or it would follow it faithfully and probably be banned/censored. Obviously at the time of writing this review, the answer is the former, there aren’t many anime studios in the world that are as crazy as Oku.

This is Gantz's best asset, its secret weapon, the reason for why it's so memorable. It's outrageous. Because it's happening in such a familiar world. Oku's attention to detail, the way people behave and react, either as individuals or as a collective, or even on the internet, is spot on. Whether it's a massacre on a street or in a school, or a small squabble in an apartment or a train, the tension is reminiscent of real life, because the dialogue and body language is grounded in reality, no matter how out there the action and sci-fi ideas are.

The art of the manga is economical and precise; computer aided graphics help keep the locales detailed. The costumes, props and weapons design is a nice deviation from the typical 'dress the characters in black leather' trend that The Matrix seemingly rejuvenated in entertainment media. Kudos to Oku for using his imagination and not dragging the manga down with anything generic. It’s one of his many traits, taking existing ideas that are ripe for generic rip-off but putting his own spin on them. In this case the battle suits are humiliatingly tight, and regularly attract scorn and mockery from bystanders.

The action sequences in this manga are some of the best I've ever read. Oku has a real eye for framing the action from the right angles and positions. His action pay-offs always bring a smile to the face, the audacity and enormity of what occurs on the page, is a sight to behold. The destruction to urban property gets exponentially bigger throughout the manga, no structure or vehicle is left spared. My review is intentionally vague to save the surprises for the reader, but if you like guns, swords, urban environments chopped, sliced and blown up to bits, then you're going to have a blast with Gantz.

The ideas in Gantz are to do with the narcissistic state of 21st century living, the materialism of the masses, human relations in the face of ever disturbing circumstances. There is almost a Hitchcockian vibe in the way ordinary people are pushed into extraordinary situations and thrash around desperately trying to get out of them. The great mystery of Gantz is a sci-fi conspiracy that is always just bubbling under the surface. In the forefront of the story is the cast of lowlifes and nobodies. School kids, street punks, idols, yakuza, tourists, businessmen, random passersbys, random aliens and vampires.

Would you jump onto the tracks and drag the drunken tramp back onto the platform? Oku's humorous retort to that is a train decapitating your head for your troubles. Welcome to Gantz.