Deadman Wonderland

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I was a big fan of the Deadman Wonderland anime and really did crave more since finishing the short season. I decided to give the manga a go and if you are in the same boat, I would recommend reading from chapter 1. The anime leaves out a lot (including one of the most important details) and doesn't introduce you to all the characters. This is absolutely an instance where I would say the manga is superior to the anime adaptation.
The manga is split into three arcs. The anime covers the first. I enjoyed all three of them as much as I did initially watching ... the anime. It's very exciting, has fine pacing and is a very enjoyable although somewhat depressing experience to read!

Teenaged angst in full form. Deadman Wonderland is a manga fueled through its unashamed edge and absurd premise. I personally really like its ideas however its flaws really contribute to it being just an ok series overall.

Story:
The basic plot is the most interesting thing about Deadman Wonderland. It stars Ganta, a 14 year old boy, getting sent off to a fantastically grim prison/theme park where all prisoners must compete in sadistic games and combat to stay alive. Along the way, Ganta meets friends, gains a superpower, uncovers the secrets of the prison, and plots to get revenge on the mysterious "Red Man" who is responsible ... for his imprisonment. [[Essentially it's a battle shonen with a psychotic energy to it.]]

My problems with the story mainly stem from the inconsistent amount of wackiness throughout it. The first volumes tease you with how unhinged its setting can get with a big carnival themed death race, explosions, inmates wearing mascot uniforms, antidote "candies"..... It was so cool! But then the setting becomes underground hallways and we leave this fantastical prison for relatively generic battles in narrow hallways and blank arenas. The conflicts and mysteries are cool enough to sort of carry these sections with plot, but I did feel like we shifted whimsically grim to grim/dour.

My second issue is that the pacing becomes weird. It starts really feeling rushed passed a certain point, with the protagonists and villains crashing into each other every other scene. Also some character backstories happen waaaay too late for me to care about them. I had to speed read one character's backstory in particular because it felt like a distraction more than anything else.

Lastly, like a lot of others have been saying, the story often leans into cliches of shonen. Now, there ARE some unexpected twists here, but they ultimately lead to a predictable outcome. This shouldn't be a dealbreaker though if you're a fan of the genre.


Art:
Art is cool as long as it's not an action scene. It's hard to tell sometimes how characters are moving (or even what their powers do sometimes) outside of finishing blows, which is an issue for an action series. Despite this, expressions and important panels are drawn very well. And character designs are fairly distinct from one another making them shine in the panels they're in.


Character:
Probably the weakest part of this manga for me. A lot of characters are introduced, but are never really given the screen time for you to properly care about them before their fights. I think this manga definitely would've benefitted from more down time and simple character moments. Sometimes it just feels like action figures bashing into each other because of how little shine some characters get. .

The villains are also pretty one note, evil people that lack the depth to make them work. Minor villains especially are underserved and quickly discarded.

But most disappointingly of all, Ganta is just too cliche of a protagonist. There was potential to turn his crybaby personality into a more outgoing delinquent and the plot has glimmers of it but the story sidelines it in favor of a more 'too pure for this world, serious protagonist.' It's just the less interesting option. However, I do really enjoy when Ganta does introspection. I like hearing his thoughts because there's always conflict there. Unfortunately, the cliche story kind of undermines this because I always wanted these inner thoughts to lead to somewhere new, but often they don't.

In contrast to Ganta, I really like how the story handles Shiro. Her fate is what really kept me going throughout the series because she's such an anomaly to everyone else. Playful, dangerous, with clearly hidden darkness, she exemplifies what I wanted more of in this series.


Overall:
Yeah, it's a 5 for me. I think there's really a lot of missed potential here which is frustrating because I want to wholeheartedly recommend it. I enjoyed it, but I'd be lying if I said I was emotionally invested for most of it.

Definitely read the first volume if you like shonen, gore, and crazy people, but if the premise doesn't grab you this isn't a must-read.

Deadman Wonderland is a manga with some good ideas. Not incredible ideas, but good ideas nonetheless. The problem is, as good as these ideas potentially were, the quality of storytelling and characters is so bad that all potential is rendered useless.
The cast of characters must be one of the most uninspired I've seen in any manga: made up almost exclusively of underdeveloped, shallow, edgy anime character tropes that we've already seen a thousand times, frequently changing their personalities on a whim or having a huge development in a ridiculously short amount of time only to accomodate the new story direction that the author wants to ... take. A story that is always going way too fast, constantly prioritizing cheap shock value or dumb plot twists over a more careful, thoughtful approach. A narrative littered with constant flashbacks seemingly to distract readers from the lack of any interesting developments in the present storyline. The only thing saving DeadMan Wonderland from a lower score are the previously mentioned good ideas and the fact that, just like a good bad movie with friends, the writing often gets so outlandishly bad that it's greatly entertaining and enjoyable to laugh at.