Terra Formars

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"I bury those cock-a-roaches"- Tony Montana

Terra Formars is a halfway decent Gantz knockoff that is interlaced with Japanese nationalism and general xenophobia as rabid as it is unsubtle, pushed to such a ridiculous extent that it's not even offensive anymore. Okay, it can get a bit offensive. Most of the time it's just eye-roll-worthy though. I won't even get into it...

The concept of Terra Formars is that cockroaches were used in the terraformation of Mars (bad-title origin hint) and within five hundred years they have evolved into savage and violent black humanoids who wear no clothes and use primitive weapons like some kind of African ... tribesmen. They sometimes are referred to as "those black shitstains," and they have nappy hair plus exaggeratedly broad facial features, but hey guys, hey, no racial. Squads of good bug people are sent to exterminate these filthy bad bug people once and for all. What's that? You think this premise sounds like that of a comedy? Mayhaps that of an old "so bad it's good" campy sci fi horror flick? Preposterous. Terra Formars is serious business, guys. Real serious. Or at the very least, it completely ignores the fact that it is fundamentally absurd in its scientific inaccuracy and physical impossibilities, squandering any potential it ever had along the way, and it then uselessly attempts to force the audience to take it seriously anyways. The plot would be better if the author didn't try to explain anything scientifically, but he unfortunately seems to be under the delusion that he is an intelligent and distinguished evolutionary biologist, or at least that he has the first clue what he is talking about. Just in case you were wondering, he actually does not have a single clue what he is talking about. A simple "just because" or "aliens" explanation like in Gantz would have served the plot far better.

The characters are all cliché and none of them are significant in the slightest. Terra Formars attempts to create tension by killing the vast majority of the characters off, but this tactic is rendered entirely ineffective when the audience simply does not have any reason to give a flying fuck about those characters in the first place. The dynamics between these characters are consistently recycled and this, among other things having to do with the manga's general lack of variety, makes Terra Formars feel incredibly repetitive, a problem that its oft proclaimed spiritual predecessor, Gantz, only came close to suffering from in the very end, and that was for far more forgivable reasons.

The artwork is laughable, in a literal sense. Character designs are repetitive along with being anatomically inaccurate; female characters are only there to provide poorly drawn fanservice and ryona. That said, the real issue with the art is the cockroaches, the "scary" antagonists. The facts that the antagonists are all identical and all possess the same recycled faces and expressions could be partially overlooked were they not so ridiculous in appearance. I have a large album of pictures of them saved on my computer, because they are just that hilarious. This manga would be far superior in quality and infinitely enjoyable was it a slice of life about the cockroach people forming a club at school, drinking tea, running in the street with toast in their mouth, and perhaps even engaging in a steamy and moderately comedic romance with the cutest misunderstood bad boy in school. That concept would properly play to the, admitted few, strengths of the artwork, which clearly do not include terrifying imagery or fluid action. Unfortunately, we instead get stuck with a half-assed plot and pointless fanservice.

This manga is filled with psuedo-depth and characters (plus the irritating word of god narrator who also spiels on about nets and insects and pretentiously quotes barely-relevant scripture) who muse, redundantly and at great length, about the fascinating (except not actually) relationship between cockroaches and humans. You see guys, it is simply so genius and profound that you probably completely missed the complexity and intricacies of it; the roles of the two species have been reversed. We used to kill them just because, and now they kill us......just because!!!! Dun dun dun. Right? Get it? Got it? If this concept is too difficult for you to understand then, don't worry your pretty little head over it, the cast of flat and often identical characters will spell it out for you over and over again, in the same exact way every single time, of course. Sound deep? Sound interesting? Insightful, perhaps? No? Good, because it actually isn't.

Gantz may have had a bad ending, and you might want more, but, for the love of god almighty, do not be tricked for one moment into thinking that Terra Formars ever comes anywhere close to being as good as Gantz was in its prime. It lacks the self-awareness, quality art, satirical nature, characterization, immediate general appeal, pervasive camp, creativity, variety, and sense of humor that made Gantz good. All of that being said, even if the humorous nature of the manga was completely unintentional, and the antagonists were lame, they did offer a bit of entertainment. Terra Formars does have something about it that moderately entertained me and kept me reading despite, or maybe even because of, it being extraordinarily bad in an objective sense; just for that, I will go ahead and slap on two extra points like the generous and forgiving critic that I am. I give this manga four offensive racial underto- points, I meant to say points, out of ten. Read chapter one of Death Face if you want a more enjoyable, touching, and profound story about cockroaches.

Additional comments:
Germans do not name their kids "Adolf" anymore. Just saying. I have a distinct feeling that “Nazis” is all the author knows of Germany and “Communists” is all they know of Russia.

Also, I have a hard time believing that geopolitical relations have barely changed over the course of five hundred years. The battle between Capitalism and Communism in real life progressed more in a decade than it did in five hundred years in this manga. In fact, nothing about the atmosphere of the series is futuristic in the slightest; that kind of advancement in time will have massive changes in culture, not just technology. The “futuristic” technology does not go much past space travel and gene splicing either. This all shows a huge lack of imagination, depth, and vision.

Additionally, the mere assumption that an insect's strength and abilities in proportion to its size would be retained were they scaled up to humanoid dimensions ranks among the dumbest things I've ever heard. A bit smarter than "people die if they are killed" and "I will be hokage ninja master believe it," and yet a little bit dumber than "fun things are fun."

omg this manga. this manga is just... wow... talk about despair-inducing.

in a nutshell, the manga is about human-sized cockroaches who were sent to live on mars so that humans could colonize it in 500 years but the humans definitely didn't plan for them to be human-sized and... evolve to be intelligent as well. so, if you dislike cockroaches, insects, bugs, anything like that in general -- AND THE GORE -- well, i recommend that you should not read the manga because lord, there's so many references to bugs.

the suspense is so great and i love how the art is so action-oriented -- it just ... keeps you reading and reading, and there's never a moment to stop for a rest (except in flashbacks) so it really highlights the action drama of this manga. since i'm reading just four volumes (about thirty-six chapters out so far), i really want the manga to delve more deeply into the story rather than just action.

there IS some story, mainly characterization and the secret behind the project. there are definitely women in this manga, which is great, but also not so great because they're usually the ones to be killed first (save for a few). however, there's not much character development that extend beyond just a few chapters because (almost) EVERYONE DIES. it's a type of human survival manga, except it's in an environment that is not the earth.

art is pretty good, extremely macho if i do say myself (maybe it's inspired by rob liefeld's artworks?) and the drawings of the cockroaches are very uniform yet unique, at least distinguished from the humans. character design is done really well.

tbqh i just want this manga to reveal the answers to the mysteries and to maybe slow down with a respite from the violence that's going on and I WANT EVERYONE TO HAVE HAPPY ENDINGS (except cockroaches) but most of all i just want this manga to go at least /somewhere/ that's not just fighting.

While I do'nt find this series to be a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination,i do'nt feel it entirely deserves it's bad rep either

story 6/10
the story itself is lame.....but creative nonetheless i do'nt recommend going in with too high of expectation cuz the premise on its own is'nt anything special but come on we've seen much worse...though i gotta admit they do push the bug philosophies a bit too far

The story itself is divided into 2 parts (3 if you include the 1-shot)

The Bugs 2 arc (Which covers the first volume) follows the bugs-2 ship and it's crew of rejects/outcasts that recieved the BUGS ... surgery,where they're merged with insect DNA giving them the abilities of said insects going to Mars and coming in contact with the Roaches

The Annex-1 arc (which starts in the 2nd volume) follows another group being assigned to Mars this time to acquire Roach samples to find a cure for a virus that is believed to have originated from Mars

This time however,there seems to be a bunch of conspiracies and backstage politics as well as the unsolved mystery of the Roaches extreme evolution.Due to this,unlike the previous arc,the characters are'nt primarilly rejects and outcasts and consists of 3 types of people

-Outcasts who have nothing left and joined to earn money (or something along those lines)

-Characters whose loved ones were infected and ended up throwing everything away to assist in finding the cure

-Characters (sometimes military) who joined in service of their country to carry out certain missions

setting 5/10
it's setting is pretty weak,it's 500 years in the futureand not much has changed.though after a few chapters the setting shifts to mars anyway so theres that

art 9/10

The Art for the most part is well detailed and (for lack of a better word) cool as most of the chicks are hot (though not in the annoying Harem or moe kinda way),and all the guys mostly looks like muscular Body-builders (Not as exaggerated as something like Hokuto or Jojo,but along the lines of Guts from Berserk),though I'm rather hesitant to call it realistic.

The action scenes as well as the charater's many base organimsms well drawn and Detailed and let's not forget the explicit gore which depending on your views can be a plus or a minus

Also,Ignore anyone who rambles on to you about how racist the roaches supposedly are,as they are based off of the Homo-Erectus....Though admittedly the design can be hard to take seriously by some,while at the same time can also add to the weird/creepy factor

characters 6/10
well nothing we have'nt seen before but the writer tries hard to flesh out the personalies and some backstory before they meet their eventual gruesome demise some characters are pretty cliche.though they fortunately did'nt include the overused annoying stereotypes and unless you're someone who enjoys nitpicking stupidly i believe you'll find characters that u like even if they do use racial stereotypes

overall the characters are'nt anything special (except Adolph and Asimov.....those guys are awesome),but at the same time they're nothing too annoying or harmful (unless you take the supposed RACISM too seriously)

enjoyment 9/10
overall i really enjoyed it and would love to see it animated

i'd reccomend it if you're an action fan,as it mostly plays out likes some cheesy 80s anime or action flick and it's for the most part a fun series to read through

But if you for some Drama or complex plot,you'll really just end up dissapointed,so do'nt bother yourself

oh yeah and try not to think too much while reading this

I don't know what's going on here, but every other person that is reviewing this manga is full of bullsh*t(except Yakub).

Terra Formars is a gore-intense manga set in the distance future of year 2577. 500 years ago in the 21th century, scientists came up with the plan of mass-dumping cockroaches and moss onto Mars in order to increase the overall temperature of planet Mars, so that it would be suitable for human inhabitation.

However, when the ship Bugs 1 lands, something unexpected happens. They discover that the supposed cockroaches were replaced by giant 2 meters(7 foot) tall muscular humanoid creatures with incredible strength, thus the ... communication from Earth and Bugs 1 were lost. Learning from this lesson, genetic engineers worked to increase the potential of human by implanting insect genes into the bodies of humans that were to aboard Bugs 2, the second attempt to colonize on Mars.

The overall manga is characterized by a complete, uncut, and explicit gore that the manga provides. With the massive cast it has, many of the characters die off ususally in violent and cruel ways.

With that being said, lets get to the reviewing of its elements.

Art: 8/10
The artwork is rather realistic in the shading and drawing of the characters. Though the faces of the characters can't be said to be 100% realistic, they are most certainly not exagerrated such as in many moe-based manga are.
The designs of the Cockroaches are very athletic bodies of human, as well as detailed drawings of the spaceships earns an "8" for this manga

Plot/Story: 5/10
This is where the scores starts to drop. While an overall premise exists, the plot and the characters that are piloting it are generally ignored throughout the course of the story as it turns into more of a battle manga than anything, the story can still be enjoyed, though it is to keep a note that the plot isn't as prominent as the seemingly mindless fighting.

Also, many plot points broughht up earlier in the manga are almost never touched.

Setting: 3/10
The setting is the worst part about the show. To enjoy this manga you would need A LOT of suspension of disbelief. As this show is set in 500 years in the future, how could Cockroaches evolve into gigantic sizes in such a short time? Is it even necessary? Since they are the only form of life on the planet, all they have to do is adapt to the environment and then feed off of the mosses. And what about the countries? Its hard to imagine that the political situation isn't much different from today. Hell, one of the characters even called the Russian guy(who got a bit of cameo) a "born communist", you are telling me that communism vs capitalism is still alive and well, 500 years in the future?
And what about monitoring? With such a huge project, surly the world is anticipating it, probably even more than we would have anticipated the moon landings, I mean, a premise of the series is that "Earth grew unhealthly overpopulated", so Mars is suppose to be our next hope right? Even now, we can see Mars from our Telescopes, its hard to imagine, FIVE HUNDRED YEARS INTO THE FUTURE, we are still not able to spot countless giant man-like creature on the closest planet to us.

Characters: 6/10
Most of the characters are given a back story, but that's it. Many characters do no survive into the story, so they are somewhat irrelevant. But what is bad is the modern-day stereotype in the series. The German is named Adolf, and the Chinese barely have any screen time, as well as the Russia being a "born communist". Many of them sound the same on manga, its almost difficult to distinguish between the characters.
And of course, a disproportional amount of the main cast are Japanese, which is somewhat unrealistic considering there were basically 1 character to represent each MAJOR country otherwise.
However, it is still interesting to watch the cliched speechs and the problems they overcome.

Style: 7/10
The style of telling the story is confusing to say at the least with multiple view in many different characters, the flow between them almost seem to not exist. The story is based on battle and battle, as well as genetic engineering. Early on in the manga, there would be info-dumps about some kind of insect, or some obscure animal that the main characters have underwent surgery for.
The style of art is brutal and realistic, making no qualms to show the inside of the human bodies, as well as a person's spine when his head is pulled out of his body.

Overall: 6/10
Should I read this Manga?(TL;DR)
If you enjoy gory depictions of humans facing against a seemingly superior being, as well as the premise of space travel, you should definitely pick this one up. Though if you are looking for deep character development, or a light-hearted romcom slice of life series, avoid this at all costs. Beware also if you do not enjoy oddly paced story telling.
You should also watchout for the info dump in the series on the various animals of our planet, that is one of the most interesting points in the stories and you may learn a lot more.

In essence, Terra Formars is a good manga, but not as much as the other reviewers praise it to be. it has obvious flaws but can be considered a rare series where intense battles can be seen with lots of gore, if you are willing to suspense your disbelief.

This manga could have been better. Aside from the pretty good art, it's bugged down by the story and characters.

I find it quite hard to keep track of the characters. Maybe it's because of the pace of how fast characters are introduced and killed off, or perhaps it's got something to do with the similar looking characters. It's like a new character is introduced every few pages who you'll think is cool and important, but get killed off after a few pages (but not before showing a melodramatic flashback). This is like Gantz, albeit in much much faster pace.

This manga is simply... amazing.

10/10
The story is really good, it has depth and complexity.
For you that read and liked Gantz , you are going to love Terra Formars.
Just wish the info about bugs would be getting a little less attention in the story telling, but well its important to understand the powers characters have so i guess it's fine.

10/10
The artwork in this manga is outstanding, it might be the best drawn manga i have read up to now.

... 9/10
Character development is also pretty good, but its to bad characters that you get to like keeps dying...

10/10
Overall, definitely worth reading. Give it a shot, i promise you that you wont regret it.

Truly a terrible series, but boy does it have a wonderful idea. The concept is excellent. Cockroaches used to establish Mars as a place for humans to move to in order to deal with overpopulation, but things go wrong and the roaches somehow evolve into hostile sentient creatures. In this way it boils down to a war between humans and cockroaches, but now the roaches are the dominant being.

It sounds so great on paper, but the execution is among the absolute worst I have ever encountered in a manga. In the end of the day it is your typical battle shounen, except quite a deal ... worse than even that. It is a poor man's Gantz. A poor man's last portion of Gantz in fact; that's just how bad it is.

Where things really get shaky is the setting. Despite taking place in 2600, the environment, the "politics", the dialogue, and the characters are all straight out of a dated and stereotypical 1940s racist depiction of the world. There is no logic behind anything that happens. It really boils down to just random fun facts the author acquires probably on his spare time and then he throws it into the series however he can see fit. Despite taking place well into the future, there really is nothing futuristic about it. It's as though the author wanted to write a science fiction without putting in the effort. Instead we get highly stereotypical depictions of characters based on their race at a point in time where such things would hardly matter.

All it boils down to is Japanese supremacy in everything. The Japanese characters are the masters, Japan is the most important country, etc... It's fine to do something like this, but when the writing is so nonsensically bad and so ill-fit for the occasion, it becomes straight up unforgivable. I have very high tolerance, but within ten chapters I straight up hated the manga and I tried giving it another seventy more chapters before killing over in defeat. I cannot recommend this to anyone on the planet, no matter what period in time or what country they come from. I think even a small child is too intelligent to enjoy this. Just stick to Attack on Titan, Gantz, or both.

This manga is one of the worst I have ever read.

Ok, let's start with characters. You get detailed information and background stories to every f*cking single one. The story is usually the same. Some drama in their childhood and some pathos about being a 'survivor'. They're all terribly generic.

In all instances, that backstory is told during a action-packed fight in a misplaced flashback which is in no way necessary for the plot or the action happening. There are a bunch of characters who LITERALLY have less screen time than their back story. They appear for the first time, life for like 5 minutes before ... behind violently torn apart, but between those 8 pages on which they actually do something, there'll be 14 pages telling your their life's story. After they are then FINALLY dead, you are expected to remember their names for the rest of whole frickin manga.

Which brings us to art. In addition to having no depth, no development, no 'character', a great many of the characters look alike. The author draws like 5 hairstyles for men and 3 for women. The cast of characters is somewhere around 50 btw.
Apart from that, the characters are drawn anatomically correct, which is nice. The landscape is really boring (mars, duh).

The story. The story is mostly non-existent. It serves as a stage to showcase the different powers of all the characters, which is usually done by the narrator and much like typically shonen style. "Beaten to a pulp - but hey wait my insect has an even crazier superpower so haha, jokes on you!".
That would be somewhat interesting, if the ratio of narrating and actual dialogue wasn't like 9:1. SERIOUSLY! If anything is said in dialogue, it WILL EVEN BE REPEATED BY THE NARRATOR. It makes me wanna kill myself!

And those powers. In one hand, the narrator explains painfully dry and technical how all those powers work, everything in this manga is based on biology or science or evolution - EXCEPT ITS NOT.
It's so incredibly stupid. After leaving some cockroaches alone for 500 years they're black humans. They also have a magical organ which can morph you into a giant hornet.
But all that stuff doesn't really matter. Because if anyone would actually give a sh't about the plausibility of the story.. well, after three testruns, they already accomplished immortality, mass-murder-capabilities, and cloning. Which essentially renders the whole operation obsolete. But no, send them to fricking mars against 200 million cockroaches with a single frickin ship which has no weapons, even though you have dozens of warships with crazy lasers and shit which.. well, you send there one week later after everything went to shit.

Terra Formars is your typical apocalyptic kind of manga.There is a constant sense of danger,death and despair in this manga however to achieve this character development is often sacrificed.While i don't like the ever present killing of characters that didn't have sufficient time to develop i however still enjoy reading this mostly because of the detail it always goes into about the different types of animal powers the characters possess and the amazing detailed art which is often gory.Don't expect an amazing story or complex characters because you wont find them here but do expect to be entertained.

Story:7 If you know what the definition of ... terra forming is then you can probably guess what terra formars is about.The story of terra formars goes like this,500 years ago humans sent cockroaches and mold to mars in an attempt to warm up the planet basically terra form it into a planet that's warm enough for humans to live in.And what happens next you ask well lets just say it didn't go exactly as planned,evolution is a bitch.They indeed achieved their objective of terra forming the planet but they also got unwanted inhabitants.The cockroaches they sent to mars evolved and are now intelligent proving to be be quite an adversary to mankind.

Art:9 The art in this manga is probably the best thing about it.The art is so detailed when people are being killed.Yea its that kind of manga if you don't like gore don't read this.

Characters:7 The characters are good but kinda weak.The author tends to only give massive development to characters when or before they dies.Their backstories are laid out along with what the power they gained from animals allow them to do.None of the characters on the mission to mars had a good life.Most of them went on the mission for the money so they can start new lives.I honestly don't really care for a lot of the characters that much expect for those we follow the most throughout the story.What i do like a lot are the cockroaches ,yea they are disgusting creatures but their level of intellect and ingenuity is shocking.These guys just never stop evolving.

Enjoyment:8 Despite its flaws i still enjoy reading this.I mostly enjoy the details that are given about the insects the characters use.I learned a lot about insects that i didn't know before.Did you know there is an animal that inhabits the japanese archipelago called the planaria that if cut in half will become two because of its regenerative abilities?You may have or may not know this but this is just one of the many things i learned about because of this manga.

Overall:8 While not having the best story or characters terra formars still piques my interest because of the detail of its art and the powers used by the characters.This is a pretty enjoyable series just don't think too hard about it.If you want a manga with apocalyptic setting and interesting powers then you should check this out.

a story of evolved roach. (and a wasted moss)

Story -6/10
The story is, ahh... how i must put it. it's not that bad, but it's not good either, why? i mean, how can, a roach evolve in only 500 years? and also, why the politics situation still the same after 500 years? that's illogical, isn't it? for me, the story is what terra formars lack of. (and, did you know? that the moss doesn't make any affect in the story? )

Art -9/10
The art, is really good, the detail when someone torn apart by a roach, is really detailed.

Character -7/10
Nah, Character is also what terra formars lack ... of. There are so many character that only make a short appearance in the manga. and as you already know, it seems japan character are the most powerful here instead of other countrys.

Enjoyment -8/10
This manga is really fun if you only read for the gore, action, and humanity.

Overall -7/10
If you need a manga, that only shows gore, action and humanity (like AoT as example) i think you'll like this manga.

This review covers until chapter 118. I'll submit another review perhaps when this manga is finished.

Story: 7/10

Terra Formars's Story isn't the strong point of the series, as it follows a simple sci-fi setting of "Send soldiers to another planet to kill monsters" , but, while the setting isn't that amazing, It's worth to say that it is nicely done, and it can attract both casual and more selective readers. As the series progress, some misteries start appearing, and currently there are a lot of elements without a proper answer. But, Still keeps the manga interesting enought.

Art: 10/10
One of the strongest points for Terra Formars, ... is that the art is simply superb, weapons, vehicles, the landscape, explosions, the fights, the characters, even animals are well-drawn, not only it's artistically good, but it feels as if the combat was happening in front of your eyes.

Character: 9/10
Where it may not have the most well developed characters or with profound motifs, it delivers a pack of Charismatic people from everywhere in the globe. Not only Japanese characters, but Americans, Germans, Chinese, even Mexicans are part of the crew. And they're pretty tought too, but even if they have more power than the average human, this manga doesn't go easy, a lot of characters die, quickly, if you think someone is going to die, well, it's probably going to die on the next page.

Enjoyment: 10/10
This manga is incredibly enjoyable, from having quotes from the Bible, to provifing scientifical information about rare animals on earth, and even scientific explanations to answers, all of that mixed with overflowing action and superb art.

Overall: 10/10
it's not your everyday shounen manga, you'll see people dying gruesome deaths here, a lot of action, the enemies are fearsome, characters from the bottom of the society that went to mars to trying to fix their lives. And you'll end up digging enciclopedias for more information about the stuff going on here.

___
As an aditional coment, some people say that Terra Formars is Racist and Sexist. That's FALSE.

The Terra Formar Roach design is based on the Homo Erectus, if you google pictures of the Homo Erectus and compare them with the Terra Formar; they have the same face, hair and skin color. Also, there are no displays of racism by the author, as it included characters from a lot of nationalities, and they pretty much work together as equals...to overcome the fearsome roaches.

Others say Terra Formars is sexist, that's FALSE too, maybe a lot of women die in terra formars...but a lot more men died, actually, pretty much every human dies, the roaches kill anyone despite their sex or nationallity. Plus, there are women like Michelle, Eva, Yaeko, Kanako and Xi Chun-Li who can put up a fight with anyone.

Terra Formars is a manga that is rather off the worn and well-beaten path of shounen manga. It’s a lot grittier – favouring the stylistic approaches to action like those of Gantz or Shingeki no Kyojin. And it starts off on a pretty interesting, albeit peculiar, premise. Mars has finally become habitable in the year 2577, and the nations of the world are working together to cultivate this new space. But while this sounds like a great idea for the poor, overcrowded denizens of Earth, it turns out that the uninhabited planet isn’t so uninhabited after all. Cockroaches are the dominant species, evolving into buff, ... caveman like creatures with incredible intelligence and adaptability. Their solution? Sending a spaceship full of scientifically altered bug-people to combat the giant pests.

Yes. You heard it here - buff cockroaches versus bug people.

Sounds weird? You better believe it is! But hey – it’s actually a half-decent series if you’re willing to stick it through all the weirdness.

Story: 5/10

As you’ve probably realized, the plot of Terra Formars isn’t exactly a conventional one. ‘Buff cockroaches versus bug people’ is not a defined storyline - it’s only an idea, but Sasuga Yu really seems to think he can get away with just that. As a result, the plot tends to drag on around a monotonous process of rinse-and-repeat – particularly before the death of the character in question. There’s a 90% guarantee that when the character gets a quaint little flashback, they’re next on the hit list. So it burns down to waiting to see which minor characters make it (the main cast is, of course, untouchable) and what sort of new roach will show up.

It isn’t entirely the fault of the author – the desolate environment the story is set in contributes significantly. And although the story bounces back and forth between the survivors on Mars and the political struggles on Earth, it’s all bogged down without any interest in the world around them. Earth appears to be a little more crowded, a little more advanced, but otherwise the same. Mars is a near wasteland filled with cockroach people. But nothing really happens, if you get me? Sure, the plot progresses with a certain level of intrigue, and this can be pretty interesting at times. But there really isn’t any meat to the plot, and thus it scores pretty low in the grand scheme of things.

There’s also the weird omnipresent voice of the narrator that loves to cut in, even for the most minute of things. Like, you know you’ve got a problem with your narrator when they cut in to give you a monologue about a net. A net. It’s almost like there’s this smug little voice walking you step-by-step through the whole story. The roach-men do not know what lightning is! The roach-men have advanced very quickly! The roach-men are attacking in groups! Amazing. The author really tries to stress how much humanity is similar to the roaches, but it honestly just comes off as patronizing and repetitive. Plus the tendency to drop in Old Testament references which are, absolutely, out of place in regards to the rest of the series. (Did somebody say something about a Rahab?)

Art: 7/10

Yeah, the art is pretty good. Sometimes even above and beyond, but it maintains a fairly average level. Character designs are actually quite interesting, and varied enough that there’s no confusion as to who is who, but there does tend to be a bit of stiffness in the character’s physique. Like strange, paneling side-shots where the characters have enormous necks and shoulders, whereas in others they are shown to be a little more slender. The variance can be amusing, and I found it especially so when Akari just whips off his jacket and his muscles grow twice the size (that is one slimming jacket!). But overall the art is reasonable, and the action is both dynamic and enjoyable.

Characters: 8/10

What the series does well is in capturing the individual feelings and personalities of even minor characters. Starting strong with a false protagonist, the series draws the reader close to all of the experiences correlated with each demise. Yes, the constant use of flashbacks before death can get pretty tiresome, and it basically is just a summary of their reasons for joining the mission to Mars. But although I have qualms with the method, the backstories are done very well. It colours in each person in a very individualistic way, and avoids stepping into stock types with a diverse cast of ambitions and desires.

Diversity is also something which Terra Formers both excels and fails at. A few strong female characters who aren’t used to feed the plot with their deaths, and most of the males keep from falling into the typical shounen roles. There’s also a pleasing incorporation of characters from different backgrounds and different cultures, and this gives the series a breath of fresh air. The author, however, also seems to have a peculiar sense of stereotypes in mind. There are a few things said or done that border on racism. The Chinese really get the short stick in this, portrayed as villainous and conniving. But it isn’t just them – there are a number of little things passed around in dialogue that imply no short amount of intolerance and poor research. It’s also a little short on comedy, which is actually unfortunate because the character dynamics really shine in those brief interactions.

At the end of the day, though, the characters are really what shape Terra Formers as a whole. Without an engaging cast, it wouldn’t be what it is.

Enjoyment: 6/10

Fighting cockroaches with eight-packs really only goes so far. Seriously. In the process of waiting to see the next muscular bug, there’s more than time for a yawn. The action itself is fast paced and enjoyable, but tends to drag out till the point of weighing down the series. The gang defeats a roach, but is ambushed by a new one! They defeat this new one, and another appears! Repeat x2 and then something or someone comes in to move the story along.

I know I’ll be sticking around until the end, though, for despite it’s many flaws, there are actually a few interesting elements. A few things curious enough to keep the readers waiting.

Overall: 7/10

Terra Formers really isn’t bad. Sure, it sounds pretty weird and yes, it really can be, but it’s actually worth reading for the characters themselves. Plus the Reinhardt arc was awesome.

Yikes. I wish I had trusted the negative reviews here more - but so often in the past I've seen negative reviews and they do not play out. This is one of those times that it would have benefited me to have trusted them!

The first important thing - the first 2-3 books in this series don't set the readers expectations properly. For longer series like this I tend to read the first two volumes before I jump in and the first two to three volumes of this are the best ones. The manga has its ups and downs from there in so far as being ... okay and being terrible.

ART
I will start on the art side of things. It is interesting but with two major problems. The mangaka cannot draw enough different unique faces for how many characters are in the story. They are great at general work but feel more like they need to be a primary assistant rather than the main artist. It becomes very hard to tell people apart as every guy and every girl kind of look similar outside of hair colors.

Worse though is a lot of the art is "implication". Whereas you would have 5 panels in other works explaining events, this will jump from panel 1->5 and expect you to fill in the rest. Not only does this make you sometimes pause and go "what?", it also leaves a significant number of events feeling unfulfilling. This isn't just fights, but character randomly showing up or people losing limbs where you have to just "assuming" it got cut off mid fight or something.

As the series goes on, I think the impact of computer assistance in the art style becomes more of an issue and makes the art feel boring. By about book 10 I felt no appreciation for it anymore and it was just a sprint to get to the end of the meager story.

STORY
Yep, it is edgy. Edgy isn't necessarily bad though, but this often is groan inducing. The book seems like it will have consequences due to how the first 2-3 books are written - but nope. Everyone of any consequence who dies will come back somehow through some introduced rule that seems to contradict all the other established lore. Everyone will have new abilities from nowhere (enemies and allies) without it being built atop something previously laid out. Just out of nowhere, the story will pull something from its pocket. This can sometimes a be a fun literary element if done in moderation and at the right time - but every book has something like this.

For how much backstory is dedicated to people, it often does nothing to really make you understand their motivations for often irrational behavior. Everyone gets a backstory page, and often they are boring and suck. Couple that with the aforementioned lack of impact to their predictive actions and the story really is a slog.

There are many threads going on at once - too many. It negatively impacts the story. It would be like hearing a song where the artist thought that more notes makes a better sound and just crammed as many of them together as possible without any real thought for how they should meld together.

CONCLUSION
Somewhere in here was a good manga. Book 1-2 had a good grove, and the story needed to be distilled and strengthened. Interestingly enough, Book 12-14 are also great as these books for whatever reason are both far more flesh out (both story and art wise) as well as being somewhat comical. The whole book is absurd but it struggles to hit a level of balanced between "seriousness and comedy" outside of these 12-14 books which works for it. If the author and mangaka had been able to take the fun that is in 14-15 and back it up with the story of 1-2 we'd have something worthwhile.

This is not though. Avoid it.

The essential balance that decides if an action oriented manga/anime is good or trash is essentially the ratio between how much you "buy" into the actions and plot, and thus how much triumph and adulation you feel with the characters, and how much the the stretching and bloating (of the characters and plot) that's required to bring about said highs make your eyes roll.

Terra Formars manages this parity pretty well, with a few exceptions, and this is coming from someone who likes their manga/anime as "realistic" as possible. All the essentials are there: good, sometimes great art, a productive premise, and a good clip ... to the pacing. What weighs it down is the drastic case of same-face, entirely too many characters ('cause this is a VIOLENT manga, and characters DIE, usually just characters we don't know or care about), and a lot of solutions coming down to deus ex machina, the plot saying so, or the infamous power surge through yelling. The last (current) part is a real slog, and I don't have a huge interest in continuing.

But enough about the bad stuff! I enjoyed the plots attempts, even if not always successful, to branch out into geopolitics and greater themes of our place in the universe and the uniqueness of humanity. On a personal note, the score is probably a bit inflated because I love all the taxonomical and biological information and art that is central to the idea of the manga. Also watching roaches, dressed like 60's gangsters, doing kamikaze air plane assaults.

Final score: 6.5 out of 10.

This manga was...something. Definitely something

The premise of the manga is extremely interesting, but due to some fundamental issues it falls short in multiple areas. I believe that in order to be able to criticize something you must also have a reference point that would make your criticism "valid." In other words, I must be able to praise it for what it does right in order to criticize what it does poorly.

Firstly, I think the art is good at what it does, to convey a dark, gritty, and bleak world the art style is drawn strongly. The storyline also holds up together fairly well in the ... early to middle parts of the manga, having a simple enough premise with a relatively simple objective to leave us expecting "how are they going to go about completing it?"

Unfortunately, many issues hold the story back from becoming a potential "gritty shounen" a-la Berserk, etc.. Mainly, is how the story is extremely linear, to the point where even the "surprising moments" of the story feel predictable. The flow goes like this: The main crew needs to complete an objective after a hard-fought battle vs. mutated cockroaches, crew heads to location for the objective, surprise! Cockroaches have holed up an ambush in the millions with new weapons and mutations and our crew now needs to fight more cockroaches against innumerable odds (add in a few character deaths here and there.) This formula works the first few times but quickly loses momentum the more it is used. Characters also feel very one-note and boring, constantly using the "I fight for my friends!" power-up, it also doesn't help that the story also never really uses these characters or uses them in very linear ways (a side character is used either to stall time for the main characters, provide a "clutch comeback" for a fight using their power, or to showcase their powers only to then promptly die instantly.)

I did not mention the later parts of the story (I believe it starts around chapter 140?) in my positives. That is because at that point the story becomes extremely convoluted, and one of the main driving forces of the characters (exterminate the roaches) simply becomes lost in translation in the new threat that the story is trying to hand over to us (this is a very vague spoiler, but the moment a certain character is introduced, the threat instantly warps and becomes cockroach-human eugenics)

Unfortunately, the manga is currently on hiatus so nobody knows how/when the story will end, but as of right now, I think there is not much reason keep caring about it. It has a ridiculous and over-the-top premise but the author writes a serious story with it, resulting in a manga that feels directionless and is only read because of shock value and does not leave a lasting impression.

So this is my first ever review for MAL, so boundless error's are probably going to appear. But without further a due lets get dug in. My first major issue is the review's and there dates, the 4 highest rated are around 2 years ago and not a single one has been updated. These continue to be some of the more popular opinions and I feel that isn't right, but lets get onto the main topic the review of Terra formars, first off the Story.

The story of Terra formars at the beginning was weak, it lacked any real depth and actual knowledge of what was ... going on in the universe as a whole and was just confusing to me. But as everything started revealing itself such as tensions between nations, back stories of characters and as well those effected by the mission in itself not just on mars but back on earth. It really can catch you on the edge of your seat and while I won't discuss any particular arc or event, the sacrifices that our made seem out of desperate human emotion and it really drives the story to be just as good.

Now onto the Artwork, particularly not one of the greatest feats of Terra formars espically during the Chinese arc (from my memory) and it can be hard to understand what is actually happening, but these where very rare and I had to dock at least 1 point for it, except for that it has some great artistic direction. Recent chapters that have subtitled have looked great, and some of favourite pages are from Terra formars such as Adolf's character design. His broken, shattered and re-modified body look's on point for him.

(For the sake of this section it's again a general look at the characters and not an in-depth look at each one, otherwise you will be sitting here for days)

Let's have a look at the characters and there powers that accompany them. So personally for me I can't find a character that I hate. Even though there might a be few that are on the mediocre line the main cast have proven themselves to be some of my most favourite characters. Although they have the stereotypical Russian names and some have some very Japanese "Foreigners = Blonde's" it still doesn't make me really care, there interactions are really cut and clean and there personalities drive the series to be even better.

Additionally a few more point's

The characters powers, one of the coolest aspects of this series as a whole and gives it that amazing SCI-FI element to me and I have had a number of discussions with friend's on what creature they would want. (Pistol shrimp) Some people question the reality of it all and I tend to disregard it. People who usually tend to question it won't like the series just out right either because questioning everything is in there nature or having to nit pick till it's the size of a black hole. These people won't enjoy the series and there people like that out there.

Secondly on this never ending review has to be a short review of Johj. There one of the coolest villain's, filled with absolute mystery and leaves the reader in suspense every time a new Johj approaches. For example in the latest chapter of 146 it was amazing, "a new challenger appeared" and just leaves destruction in his path, an immense and an awesome character.

Lastly, sexism and xenophobia by the author, fuck off.

Except for that thanks to the following subbers;

Pearse Hillock
Imperial Subs

You guys keep the dream alive.

As my esteemed colleague Vegeta20 has said there are some racial "miscues" that are sprinkled in here, but to be honest Japan doesn't care, I don't care. I may be white as frosty the snowman but this is the first i heard of it being racist. Not only that there was only one time during an end of a chapter well into ch.150+ that it was even there. But like I mentioned until right now i didn't connect the two and who cares it's a great story with pretty brutal(good) fights. Again as I've mentioned in other reviews i'm a fan of ranking systems and ... this has plenty of that.

I don't want to put down other reviewers but Vegeta20 is childish to think that not reading it or endorsing it will make all the wrongs right and he's punishing the publisher with his loss of sale. They don't care. Racist or not, honest or not they will continue until the story gets stale. I have not idea where Vegeta20 left off nor do i care if he can't see before his rose tinted glasses and read things that may clash with his morals or views. Not only that he didn't even rate it(nor any other manga), other than his biased review "I put the manga down and didn't pick it back up again out of disgust but apparently from what I've read online is goes even deeper," so not even your own opinion but those of others. There was an Adolf and Eva who were German but no mention of Hitler as far as i can recall. No there is no "savior" who blonde hair blue eyed, read the manga and you'll find who that is and what his purpose may be. Btw, there are a few blacks in the manga who show aptitude and skill, but let's overlook that and point at all the bad.

Overall: Racist-Maybe, Readable: Definitely, Better than most. I like it don't be swayed by Japan's xenophobia which permeates a lot of their stuff. You think this guy may be racist against blacks the creator of Bleach hates Hispanics, every Hollow has some Spanish thing going on with its name, even Chad.

The tl;dr of this is 3/10, it's bad, don't waste your time, I have no idea how this ever got the score it has, unless this was A Lot of people's first manga.

If you've read just about any other manga you'll be able to tell that this is not good. The character building is third rate at best, the plot is barely extant, the antagonists are laughable and the protagonists are cardboard cutouts of tropes. There are constant hamfisted twists that make M. Night Shyamalan's recent works look like he's back in his prime.

The concept is decent, and the art in some of the ... fight scenes works. If you're solely here to watch bugs killing people and people killing bugs and don't care about caring about the outcome, then this is for you. Otherwise, don't read this. It doesn't deserve it.

terra formars is a comic that you know you should hate but can't help loving. it's like a cheesy romcom or some stupid 90s action film. it's really not good but you can't help but smile and have a good time.

insect based zoomorphism might seem like a completely ludicrous idea at first but it works somehow. not that you're gonna pay a lot of attention to all the various insects. what really makes this a fun reas is the battles. whether against the roaches or among humans, the fights are exciting.

it does have it's faults. a flashback every 10 pages isn't helping anybody and ... it could stand to flesh out characters a bit more, among many various problems. but it is a pretty fun read and i think that's what it's meant to be.

Terra Formars's quality drops massively after the first major arc: the Mars arc for a single reason.
It's no longer a survival manga. Terra Formars devolves to a pure action/shounen sort of fighting manga rather than a survivalistic horror. There's no tension anymore. I just feel like I'm reading DBZ or something.
It's true. Terra Formars does make me want to kill all cockroaches, but to what end does this result get achieved? It's simple. BS story telling elements. I looked passed the glaring plot holes in the earlier arcs and in the anime because the focus was more on the survival and action rather than the ... scientific jargon. It did not dive too deep into the political aspects: just enough for the viewer to understand that a proxy war was happening, and what happens on Mars would shape the future of mankind, whether it be politically, scientifically, or medically speaking.
However, the further you progress through the story, the garbage world building and scientific jargan the manga throws at you to try to salvage the plot.
That's not the worst part. The worst part is the story itself. Seriously. The manga tries really hard to convey a two front war: the political, and the actual cockroach threat, yet fails to do it in a meaningful manner. Japan, one of the leading superpowers in the story, only sends four members on a covert mission...why? Yeah, so there can be a feeling of tension and danger for the main cast of characters. There's really no rhyme or reason to the story: whatever makes Akari and his gang the most vulnerable, or whatever makes the fights the most evenly balanced, the story is going to make that happen, no matter how ridiculous it seems.