Beat & Motion

Edit

What would you like to edit?

SynopsisBackgroundAlternative TitlesPictureChapters/VolumesPublishing DatesRelationsTypeExternal Links  

Now that more than two chapters have been released from my initial review, more than enough time has passed to make a fuller evaluation of for Beat & Motion. While promising from its start, the series has continued its trajectory of being a stand-out series worth reading.

The author continues to have a remarkable grasp of using visual metaphor to capture the up-and-down experiences of the characters. Additionally, while the over-arcing narrative has been mostly linear in terms of success for the main characters, there's a potent sense of anxiety in their day-to-day pursuit of those goals that aims to draw the reader into the ... shoes of the main characters. This structure can really speak to anyone who has pursued any performance-based, risky field like art, music, or even sports.

The leads also have a charming, easy-to-root-for relationship that continues to come together quite satisfyingly.

It will be interesting to see where the manga goes moving forward since it has been characterized by mostly good vibes peppered with anxiety. An honest critique could be that the characters have experienced significant success within the first 40 chapters. Though they are still little fish in a small pond, it does seem as though they're moving on a relatively fast track towards their end goals. Yet, there is still plenty of time for the author to set up some heartbreaking situations, which would only benefit the overall message of the story.

I would highly recommend if you're a fan of slice-of-life and romance and if you're interested in the psychological world of artists (I would personally extend this out to athletes as well though this is not a sports manga).

6.9/10


Whenever I review a story, I directly try to find reasons to love or hate the story, but this has left me perplexed — this does absolutely nothing detrimentally wrong, but it doesn’t do any of the later arcs in a fascinating way, rather, everything becomes predictable and drawn-out for the sake of filling out chapters.

Let me be clear: The introduction of the this manga was well done, and it has a rather unique setup of events/backstory for the plot and characters; however, this was also done in a “convenien, too convenient way,” which foreshadows this manga’s storyline.

To be blunt, the storyline/plot is all ... too convenient — it is so convenient that it becomes rather hard to be engaged to the story, since everything is either A) Predictable or B) Underwhelming. Because of this, there’s a lot of disinterest in the manga from the downtime it has between each chapter, since as the chapters go by, I lose the passion and urge I once had to click on the next chapter.

You know, I would love to say the characters are well-explored and meaningful, adding a drastic amount to the story’s intrigue and interest; however, their backstory and introductions to the plot sort of cause an opposite effect. Since the story utilizes so many meaningful characters to drive the plot, the plot has to revolve around them for the story to continue being interesting — now, this is hard to explain but I’ll try to explain it in a direct, forward way to understand: The plot has numerous of arcs, and each arc focuses on a select few of characters, leaving out the other well-developed and interesting characters, which causes a sense of dissatisfaction within the manga’s focus/plot/arc.

Regarding the characters and plot as a whole, there’s a lot of unnecessary details, flashbacks, events, and tropes that this manga employs within them to “buff” up the chapter length and story which does the exact opposite effect, since it’s mostly uninteresting due to its forced nature.

I really wanted to find a reason to continue loving this manga from its setup up to the 11-12 chapter point, but it failed to maintain that pace by introducing random tropes and events that are unnecessary and too convenient to find enjoyable.

You guys know this is just my opinion, right?

Reading Rankings (Portnoy inspired + A Huang-Teizan Original)
10 - God’s penmanship
9 - Must-read. Drop everything else.
8 - Instant bookmark
7 - Entertaining
6 - Good to pass time
5 - Why are you reading this?
4 - Bad.
3 - Typical garbage.
2 - My head hurts.
1 - Retirement is a thought.
0 - “Did they even give you a story?!”

Sorry but this series is just bad. Beat & Motion is something I came into after looking for more manga about artists after finishing and loving Time Paradox Ghost Writer, and the first chapter starts extremely promising, but it soon shows itself to just be nothing but a boring romcom with no identity.

Our MC had an interesting story at the start - he was a kid who always dreamed of directing anime, and was constantly drawing, but eventually phased that out to start a rock band that, no matter the many years he and his friends poured into it, never caught up - but the ... series soon loses all sense of realism when he recovers his passion and makes an extremely short, extremely simple 3 minutes long animation on a random Twitter account... and it goes viral overnight and he has the idol he had a crush on since middle school suddenly wanting him????? Romcoms aren't exactly the pinnacle of writing, but suspension of disbelief is a thing, and when I'm not even done with the first chapter of the series they already break it, there's an issue.

From there the series just becomes about him going out with the idol of his dreams, who clearly appreciates him immensely and loves everything he does, and I'm just bored. This is the millionth romcom about the perfect girl suddenly falling on top of the lap of some loser and acting as his manic pixie dream girl, the interesting themes about lost passion from the first part of chapter 1 gone, all replaced by the most insipid and done to death romcom plot imaginable. I don't even want to know how this series goes going forward, because I've read a lot of romcom, so I know this will just slowly degrade into nothing but waifu pandering and never again try anything interesting with its characters or story.

Thank you for reading.