Elhanburg no Tenshi
The Angel of Elhamburg

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THIS REVIEW CONTAINS MINOR SPOILERS.

Elhanburg no Tenshi is a prime example of a manga with potential that wasted it along the way. We've got a medieval setting with a king, Madeth, and his loyal knight Lalvan. There is a mysterious angel that is said to be able to bless the king with fortune and loyal people. Sounds promising right? So where did it go wrong?

Storywise, we enter at a point where the two main characters seem to know each other for a long time and the retainer sees an angel floating above the king. From the synopsis, it is clear that only some people can ... see the angel of the castle. If the king is able to see him, he is usually blessed with fortune and a rich empire. However, only his retainer Lalvan can see the angel. So whenever he is alone with him, he asks why he chose the king, rather than him, even though he is smarter, better at swordplay, yet still feels inferior and jealous of the king. But because the angel doesn't speak, it feels more like complaining. This complaining and bickering with the king over his possible spouse leave him distraught. And eventually, he leaves the castle to live in some rundown village, days away from his liege. There is a little more to it, but this is the basic outline. The king also has some disagreements with his now wife, not wanting to admit that he wants what Lalvan has.
Then there are about three timeskips, completely unannounced and one might miss them when reading too quickly. Ths king has a son who looks just like him, he can see the angel too and he wants Lalvan to come back to the castle, but he refuses. Years later, when the son has become the king, there is a civil war. This seems like a good moment for Lalvan to attack the castle to see the king, but he actually walks right in. Madeth and Lalvan have a disagreement and yet he becomes the new ruler. Since then, he could not see the angel anymore.

When I was reading this manga, I was seriously wondering what the angel has to do with any of this. It is supposed to be the main plot device, but he hardly had screentime and didn't speak a word. It wasn't even exactly his fault that Lalvan and Madeth broke up, because they were jealous of each other before. He was probably the final straw that breaks the camel's back. Even so, his relevance to the story is so minor, he might as well have been replaced by an object and the result would be the same.

The artwork seems pretty promising from the cover and the chapter pages, but the rest pales in comparison to the attention to detail there. The angel looks drawn with sketch lines, giving a vibe of loose feathers and it's hard to tell if it's a male or female. Lalvan doesn't look older despite the timeskips, the son of the king and the king himself look so much alike that it was hard to tell who was on the horse after the first timeskip. And the biggest flaw in my opinion is the flower arrangement on the pages. This is customary for shoujo and some josei manga, but it feels so out of place in a serious setting here. The entire tension during a quarrel is ruined by placing some glitters and flowers over the page. Seriously? What was the author trying to achieve with this? It would be easier to draw backgrounds or extra panels.

The worldbuilding is also pretty much non-existent. We only hear some of the people's thoughts when Lalvan lives with them, but there is no clear depiction of the general world, no drawing of the castle the king lives in. Not even a note of a village anywhere. For a one-shot, this could be acceptable, but in multiple chapters, it feels like a lack of attention from the author. Or perhaps she wanted to focus on the characters. In that case, a second volume would have been better to improve on both of these points.

Conclusion: a promising cover that couldn't live up to its own expectations. This manga might have been better off as a one-shot, so the author wouldn't have had to drag out some discussions between characters. The angel is almost irrelevant to the story, so why make him the theme of the manga? And the serious tone of the discussions is lost from the floral theme over the pages. It feels so out of place that it raises questions why the author bothered to draw them. Such wasted potential.

Elhanburg's Angel is a short manga, depicting mostly the relationships between two friends, on of them being the new king, the other being his loyal advisor.The story jumps between being goofy or serious quite often, which is something that will definately be offputting for certain people, which is worth being of note, but I still consider it fine in this regard, even tho I usually don't.


The story by itself is nothing special, and the worldbuilding and it's setting might be the worst part of this manga, since it didn't developed at all, and all that leaves in the reader is wanting ... more as quanitity and depth.


Artwise, this work is beautiful, the character design is very appealing , the main duo's clothing is always very detailed and intricate, and fitting. The character's expressions and their facial movement and implications is also very fine, which is very appreciated. Special mention is needed for the angel in the story, the design concept is simple, but the execution is perfect. The figure of the being is enigmatic and mysterious, the beautiful but emotionless face never states any of it's intentions, and his veiled androgenous figure, enveloped by the countless amounts of wings, like flower petals, really can take your breath away and be an inspiration.


Character wise, the few characters we do got development turned out interestingly, mainly this is the main duo, but the few support cast that was presented were sadly used more of a vehicles for the plot, but still they were brimming with potential to be explained upon and be developed.


I do think this manga can easily be entertaining, if you are not looking for action-oriented manga. which feels like the majority, but still it's a nice, breezy ride with not much of an investment required, the short count of the chapters can literally invite you on a small adventure, before shortly taking farewells with you. This experience left me with nice and refreshed aftertaste, for which I believe can work the same for the others as well.


I personally believe that the simple story and the implications, but never the clear statements of what the characters had done, as well as the angel's symbolical and always ominous nature was a plus for the work, even tho this can be considered as a minus by some. The symbolism and the flawed, yet compelling cast of this work did made my time enjoyable, this manga is not a masterpiece by any objective factor, but then again it is not required to be in the first place, it's a fast, nice read, with a few things that you can ponder on after finishing it.