Yuukoku no Moriarty
Moriarty the Patriot

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Alright to start this off I enjoy Sherlock Holmes and his stories quite a bit. This may or may not affect how much enjoyment you get out of this manga series. Now that the short disclaimer is out of the way lets get into this. First off this series follows Moriarty for the most part. Instead of a traditional Sherlock Holmes story, this manga explains Moriarty's life and motivations as the villain of the story and it works realllllly well. Sequences with Sherlock in them have never been so interesting in my opinion and I only wish there was more out there for me to ... enjoy. The art is beautiful and each page is a gift for my eyes and the story even without Moriarty in a chapter is compelling enough to keep reading. The side characters make you feel genuine feelings for them and make the chapters all the more flavorful. Plus for a series more focused on seriousness there is surprising humor that has made me laugh out loud and come back to pages in order to reread the gold.

Overall it's a series that isn't super long yet so it's worth a read and the chapters keep getting better. If it had an english release I'll be the first to buy the books! Still crossing my fingers for an anime to come out of it. Thanks for reading and hope you enjoy!

What do you get when you mix poor man's Death Note with a watered down version of BBC's Sherlock, and a dash of Akame ga Kill?

Answer: you get Yuukoku no Moriarty.

This manga is a re-imagining of the classic story, with Sherlock Holmes's arch-nemesis, the titular Moriarty, as the protagonist. For better or worse, the author didn't have the courage to go all out and keep him a self-serving master of crime. In this version, Moriarty is an underdog who goes from rags to riches, and grows up to become a merciless vigilante on a crusade against corrupt nobles.

Incredibly cheesy, right? Yes, of course, but ... not without potential for some nice, juicy moral ambiguity. Does the story deliver on that front? Well... yes and no. Kinda.

You see, Yuukoku no Moriarty can be split into two distinct parts: the fun one, and the NOT fun one. The manga is at its best when it focuses on Moriarty vs Sherlock mind games, and at its absolute worst when it focuses on our protagonist fighting evil nobles. And they are eeeeeevil, all right. Evil with a capital E. But, first things first, lets start with the good part.

Moriarty and Holmes are both compelling characters. One is a ruthless and brilliant killer, but driven largely by compassion for the oppressed. The other is a likable and eccentric genius detective, who sees solving crimes as the best source of entertainment. The two are good foils for each other, and their budding antagonistic relationship is the manga's strongest point, even at this early stage. It's far from perfect, though, as the manga has an unfortunate tendency to dumb Sherlock down to make our borderline Gary Stu protagonist look smarter.

Other reocurring characters can also be interesting; from Moriarty's cold hearted brother who idolizes him, to Sherlock's upright friend Watson, we have a decent variety of personalities.

So... let's get to the “not fun” part now, shall we?

The chapters that don't deal with Moriarty vs Holmes, follow the monster-of-the-week formula. It usually goes like this:

1. William (Moriarty) learns about some acts of cartoonish villainy committed by an evil noble.

2. He investigates.

3. He and his sidekicks easily kill the evil noble.

4. Rinse, repeat.

Those minor antagonists have exactly three roles to play in the story: being cruel to commoners, gloating evilly, and getting their asses handed to them by our anti-hero. They're completely one-dimensional, they're pathetically weak, and they NEVER pose any threat to the protagonist. Most of the time, they don't even put up a fight before he finishes them off! As a result, the chapters that focus on them have no dramatic tension and no thrill whatsoever. They're about as boring and predictable as it gets, and they're the vast majority.

When you read Yuukoku no Moriarty, you can tell at once if the chapter will be entertaining or not by checking if Sherlock graces it with his presence. If he doesn't, you're in for a snore-fest of the worst kind.

Keep in mind that this is a rather new manga and only 16 chapters are available for the moment, so there's probably a lot of time left to iron out the kinks. But, so far, is it worth the read? Well, if you're bored, have high tolerance for cheese, and don't mind doing a fair bit of skipping to get to the good part... why not? There is some entertainment value to be found here, though definitely diluted by the flaws.

An astounding waste of potential.

I was rooting for this manga to work, really. I started with the first anime season (that I watched three times in a row), then read the manga because everyone was hyping it up... and everything went downhill from there.
Don't believe people who tell you that it's an "eat the rich" story, because it's not.


The good:
- the art (it's pretty much carrying the manga at this point)
- the first three volumes

...
The bad:
- our protagonists are hypocritical criminals who protect and contribute to colonialism despite claiming to destroy social injustice in the British empire.
- no characters of colour (despite the story taking place mostly in London, and having a whole arc in India).
- sooooo much retconning.
- there is no chemistry between the characters. At all. They completely loose any facial expressions after a few volumes too, so their interactions feel even more flat.
- the author apparently never heard of the common writing advice of "show, don't tell" because he keeps making his characters *say* things instead of showing them more subtly through the story. It's not because a genius like Mycroft is saying things that we are going to believe it.
- conflicts are avoided at all costs. No, seriously. Characters never really disagree. Everyone can be talked out of their bad beliefs (unless they're a mustache twirling villain without any redeeming quality who is just here to get killed off).
- the "main villain" of the series is a complete idiot, which completely ruins any tension the manga had left for its climax arc.
- absurdly unrealistic despite being a crime/mystery story. The number of things you have to ignore to have the plot "make sense" is incredible. And plot holes. So many plot holes.
- The way the female characters are written is just sad. The ACD novels were more progressive towards women than this.
- Incredibly ableist towards all of its disabled characters.
- Queerbaiting lol
- The entirety of the Final Problem arc.

It's so bad that both the stage/musical adaptations *and* the anime adaptations had to change things for them to make more sense (at least on an emotional level, because the plot is screwed no matter how you look at it).

If you want a psychological thriller actually dealing with the complex failures of the system and its violence towards marginalized people (especially in a system as brutal as the Victorian British empire's), then go read something else.