Burning Hell: Kami no Kuni
The Kingdom of the Gods

Edit

What would you like to edit?

SynopsisBackgroundAlternative TitlesPictureChapters/VolumesPublishing DatesRelationsTypeExternal Links  

Youn In Wan and Yang Kyung Il, known for the masterpiece Shin Angyo Onshi, introduces us to a new manga called Burning Hell. This has somewhat of a historical reference, back during the time where the koreans and japanese were fighting. I found this manga to be pretty damn interesting.

Story
The story is about an island that harbors criminals and lawbreakers from japan and korea. Two people that stand out the most are Juu Juu (japanese), and Han Kim(korean). Juu was sent to the island because he was a monstrous murderer, and Han Kim was sent because he was a freakish doctor. As expected, the two ... try to kill each other.
Because the manga storyline was (somewhat) predictable, I have given it a 7 (Good)

Art
The art was FANTASTIC. Any manga with Yang Kyung Il is drawn beautifully. 10/10 (Outstanding)

Character
The only character development I saw was when they became "friends." Because this manga only has four chapters, it would've been very hard to incorporate how they develop themselves into a "better person." I give it a 5/10 (Mediocre)

Enjoyment
Read this manga if you have like 15 minutes to spare; this manga is very quick to read and is enjoyable. I got a kick out of this because of the art, but the story was also somewhat captivating. 7/10 (Good)

It happened so fast that my cynical mind had to pause to think for a fitting review. Burning Hell might be short, but it truly had somewhat of a thing going on there.

It tells a tale of an overpowered main character with a mental problem who's good with a sword with a taste for human flesh (uhuh...we need more characters like that) who us sent to a prison island and meets up with another overpowred main character with a mental problem with a fetish for skinning humans. Who is a female.

The story is alright and original in its own way although we have seen several ... mangas where the two protagonists try to mutilate each other and barbecue the loser over a spit. But it has its own personal flair to it and is also not complicated and fun to read if you like the whole, slicey-dicey thing.

A vast majority of the characters represent a cliché bunch of the usual psychotic and super strong main character, asshole bad guy with an ugly face, the asshole bad guy's
boss with an even uglier face and the sad little mother f*cker who dies in the beginning because of his stupidity. Its safe to say, the only unique character would be Kim Han, the other psychotic protaganist who's a female.

The artwork is alright and it gives the manga its violent and ruthless nature. And it does a pretty great job too (skinless human bodies never looked so artistic).

The enjoyment factor is there and the comedy factor is alright too, considering how strange there is a comedy factor in the first place. The gore count is a solid 9 on the listBur and the sexually explicit count is zero (so if you like blood and not boobs, you're in luck!).

In short Burning Hell is a fun read and its one of those mangas that make you curse the mangaka for not making it longer. 7/10

Major Spoilers

This work contains two short stories: Burning Hell and The Kingdom of the Gods. Burning Hell is by far the better work, but they both have compelling plots. The art throughout is easily the best part of the entire volume.

Starting with Burning Hell, it follows cannibal Juu and skin flayer Kim on the prison island Kyokudo. The two characters form an immediate rivalry being unable to kill each other upon first meeting unlike their previous victims. They have an interesting dynamic between each other going from not even understanding one another's language to fighting alongside each other with the hopes of using a 16 ... year old girl for their carnal desires. They are alone together on the island for a year until pirates arrive wanting to use it to sacrifice the girl. Being confronted by Juu and Kim in the second chapter, the rest is just one long fight. By the end it feels like a larger plot is being set up but will never be expanded upon. Every character is one note and all really suffer from the length of the story.

The Kingdom of the Gods suffers this same fate and I personally found it to be the weaker of the two. This one is a zombie story set during the Joseon Dynasty era in Korean history. Prince Yi Moon hired a former general Jae-Ha to escort him to the capital in order to restore the monarchy as the rightful prince and get to the bottom of the outbreak. Once again, there isn't enough time to form a connection to these characters. At least Juu and Kim joked with each other while simultaneously wanting to kill each other. Yi is a young prince trying to return to the throne while seeing the suffering his people are going through but i don't feel the weight of what he is witnessing. I want to feel his struggle as the prince of a war-torn nation facing a zombie outbreak because the citizenry were forced to turn to cannibalism as a result of said war. Elements of a deeper story exist but are never given enough time to truly fleshed out. The reason for the outbreak is the most important plot point in the story and mostly exists as a commentary on who the government should exist for (the author believing it's for the citizens).

The art in both of these stories is tremendous. It's gruesome yet beautiful when it needs to be. My single criticism with is that the battles are difficult to follow, though this is likely a personal issue and not the story's. My enjoyment of the story mostly came from the art.

Burning Hell and The Kingdom of the Gods were fine short stories. I picked the volume up on a whim and was only impressed by the quality of the art. There are enjoyable aspects to the stories but neither are given the time to develop making them feel like the incomplete beginnings to longer works.

Plot: 7/10
Characters: 6/10
Art: 9/10
Enjoyment: 6/10
Overall: 7.0/10