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Reviewed by Craig Johnson As Rin frets over her bodyguard Manji's disappearance, she is surprised by the arrival of two traveling warriors, the feisty, headstrong Doa Yoshino and her huge, brutish companion, Isaku Yasono-okami. Rin quickly regrets her decision to let this strange couple stay with her, but her detective work takes priority when she returns to the stronghold of Habaki Kagamura to search for Manji. Meanwhile, Kagimura's medical examiners begin to test the seemingly immortal Manji, who is imprisoned, chained and a very unwilling toy in their merciless hands! This book does just two things wrong. Firstly, although the art in the action scenes is loaded with energy and movement, the downside of this is that it becomes quite confused, and it's sometimes tricky to work out just what went on. For extended sequences, therefore, it's almost like you have a bunch of skip pages and go straight to the fight's resolution. The upside is that there's not many of these in this volume, so it's easily bearable. Secondly, the synopsis on the back of the book is not the story so far, but basically a spoiler for the plot - the tension of whether Rin will allow the roaming pair to stay with her after their initial encounter - well, that just doesn't exist. Their actions aren't a real surprise, as you've been forewarned of them. What happens to Manji is no surprise either, you're expecting it. Having said that, everything is is nigh-on perfect. A group of baddies are trying to get to the bottom of Manji's immortality via various means - including a stunning scene where we think he's actually had it suspended (and therefore could be killed!). There's a really nasty sequence which follows on from this (you'll know it when you see it), which I've never seen in comics before. And then it's topped by a second doctor trying something which should've happened to Marvel's Wolverine years ago. It's very creative and imaginative, and it leaves you right on the edge of your seat for the next volume to see how it pans out. For a book to hit volume sixteen and still leave you eager for more...well, it's clearly something special. The Rin-searching-for-Manji subplot slows this down a little and feels somewhat drawn-out, but that's because it's in direct comparison to the Manji storyline and nothing compares to that. Superb. Comment on this review of Blade of the Immortal v16: Shortcut on the Manga Life Forums. |
6 October 2009
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