Sidonia no Kishi

A thousand years into the future, Earth has been destroyed by powerful aliens known as Gauna. Although mankind has fled into space, the giant spaceships they now call home are still constantly being targeted by the strange creatures. Piloting mobile weapon units called "Gardes," humanity is able to take a stand against their adversaries by destroying their cores, preventing the monsters from regenerating their protective shell of placenta.

Within the vessel Sidonia, a boy named Nagate Tanikaze surfaces from its depths for the very first time in his life. With an incredible amount of time clocked into pilot simulators during his isolation deep within the ship, he quickly proves to be an indispensable asset to humanity's defense force. With the opportunity to pilot the legendary Garde Tsugumori, he fights to protect Sidonia from a grim demise.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Sidonia no Kishi won the 39th Kodansha Manga Award in the general category in 2015. It also won the 47th Seiun Award for Best Comic in 2016.

The series was published in English as Knights of Sidonia by Vertical, Inc. from February 5, 2013, to April 26, 2016. It was also released in Italian by Panini Comics under the Planet Manga imprint from October 22, 2011, to April 28, 2016; in Polish by Kotori from April 8, 2016, to March 19, 2019; in Brazilian Portuguese by Editora JBC from April 9, 2016, to March 21, 2018; in Spanish by Panini Comics from November 2, 2017, to August 27, 2020; and in Russian by XL Media from December 22, 2017, to December 2023.

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Characters

Shinatose, Izana

Main

Shiraui, Tsumugi

Main

Hoshijiro, Shizuka

Main

Tanikaze, Nagate

Main

Benisuzume

Supporting

Kobayashi

Supporting

Hiyama, Lala

Supporting

Midorikawa, Yuhata

Supporting

Placenta Hoshijiro

Supporting

Honoka, Ren

Supporting

Reviews

Nov 30, 2023

Biisoo

Recommended

This manga definitely belongs in the underappreciated category. While it got an anime, There's something about the manga's artwork that cannot be replicated in anime. Especially since the author of this is Nihei Tsutomu who is an accomplished mangaka most famously known for creating Blame!. My main reason for reading this was because Nihei's artwork left me dazzled in awe while I was reading Blame! So I endes up picking this and boy did it not disappoint at all.
Let's start with the story, Basically without spoiling much, Its about humanity living in space. Like a post apocalyptic setting which has been done so many times ...

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Feb 18, 2025

bergars

Mixed Feelings

I'll be honest, man, I don't think the manga earned its ending.

You have the incredible world, the fascinating characters, their context, their dynamics, and whatever surrounds them. You add in that precious mix, an enemy, as enigmatic as it is terrifying. Creatures which are truly impossible to understand at the beginning, but they have certain aspects that make them so… weird to deal with.

Gauna. They can mimic voices, human biology, even a strange attempt at communication. They, as well, could destroy all of humanity if deployed at the wrong time, and the wrong place.

As the story went on, the focus on the ... Gauna falters, as the colony gets so good at dispatching them, that it isn't all that threatening for the characters anymore. It feels like filler, like we need another action scene to interrupt whatever the characters are going through. Romance, love triangles, to a love square, it gets calm, it stops being exciting, but it equally gets pretty interesting from a romantic standpoint until a certain character enters the frame.

If the story leaves the action to make room for the romance, then, at least, don't make it as strange.

Tsumugi, a contentious character, is: *SPOILER*, the daughter, of the monster clone, of the main character's crush, and as the people in the story call it, “a sort of reincarnation”. Our main character, romances the idea of his crush, born from a clone of his crush. Right, okay.

I might be crazy to feel weirded out about that, but it does ruin the dynamic for me. The character's stop evolving, and the story feels more like a slice of life, with killing monsters as a job. Some jobs are more dangerous, some things are harder to do, but it's never impossible, even if the characters call it so.

Maybe that was the point all along. It isn't about the Gauna, and realizing how they work, or what they might do. This is just a war, one which will be fought until the end, and whatever sacrifices must be made, will be done to come back home, and the soldiers will enjoy their lives. I guess, the manga slightly failed at that. The antics were fun, and the use of the future as a backdrop on what might be a romance in those times is pretty good, but the story built a mystery from the beginning.

We realize how things work at one point, but at that stage, it doesn't truly matter. It feels like there are great characters here, with complete lives, and tough things in them, yet, nothing's done with it. They continue living with those times, with tough things in their pasts, and that's it.

A flawed use of a great foundation. If the intent was the mystery, it couldn't deliver, if it was the romance, it's pretty weird, and incomplete, if the slice of life was, the rest conflicts with that. It's got “good” elements all over, but not a glue to hold it together.

I'm disappointed, but not entirely angry. Could've been better, but I'm glad I read it, since it doesn't astronomically fail, it just didn't earn its ending all that well.

6.4/10.

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Jan 4, 2021

Oldlike

Not Recommended

From chapter 1 to 78 a 4/10.

Wow! that was very disappointing.
Especially the final arc. Characters were thrown in the trash along with their developments. Only for a horrible romance to happen, then die, then came back again to life. The plot is all over the place in the final half. The worst plot point and holes (little robot killer?). The first arcs had some very bad artistic decisions, that made the art descriptions and scenes very blurry and hard to understand, everything was always in a dark tone. But that was just the first half of the manga. After that someone must have called ...

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Poll: Sidonia no Kishi Chapter 78 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Stark700 - Sep 27, 2015	67 replies	by INoLuv »» Oct 27, 2024 12:34 AM
Poll: Sidonia no Kishi Chapter 45 Discussion Zhou - Oct 7, 2013	4 replies	by Danish »» Jun 12, 2024 8:59 AM
Poll: Vote for your favourite 'girl' of the harem! (end of manga chap 78 spoilers) Hyunckel - Jan 16, 2016	3 replies	by Ssilver »» Dec 18, 2022 10:02 AM
Poll: Knights of Sidonia Chapter 9 Discussion skualninja - Aug 26, 2012	4 replies	by Trap_Traps_Traps »» Mar 16, 2022 5:47 AM
Poll: Sidonia no Kishi Chapter 55 Discussion Stark700 - May 31, 2014	3 replies	by FMmatron »» Nov 12, 2021 6:14 PM

Sidonia no Kishi
Knights of Sidonia
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