Houseki no Kuni
Land of the Lustrous

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it's over. it's finally over.

what started out as a charming, albeit slightly unsettling, story of cute rock humans fighting fluffy moon aliens quickly became one of the wildest, strangest and most provocative plots i've read yet in manga. seriously, this manga gets really weird. not too incomprehensible, nor pretentiously abstract, but if you want a simple action mystery story Land of the Lustrous probably isn't for you.

PLOT:
plot is good. it's not what i'd say is the selling point of LotL, but it's definitely paced well enough to never feel like a scene drags too long. the plot gets really weird halfway through, and some might ... complain that the second half feels extremely disjointed but i dont know, it works for me.

i will say, there's a portion in the middle of the manga where it does get a bit repetitive and it starts to drag a little. this is due to the setting that the manga confines itself in, which does start to get stale after awhile. thankfully there's a change in setting soon enough, and that's when things start to progress again.

CHARACTERS:
the protagonist (phos) is handedly one of the best ive seen. many amazing protagonists in manga are unlikable or not particularly interesting in the begin compared to the path they will later undertake (i.e. eren, thorfinn) but phos is immediately charming and interesting from the start. there's a sense of incompleteness in phos, which makes their development one of the most fascinating ive seen done in manga.

the other characters are pretty solid too. most of the Gems are dysfunctional in their own way, which makes for an interesting character study on each of them. they get ample page time to establish themselves, and overall i have no issues with them. they do feel set up to flesh out phos further at times, but i really have no issue with that in a manga that is laser focused on its protagonist's development as LotL.

ART:
there are two kinds of amazing art in manga. on one hand, you have the berserks, the vagabonds. those are meticulously drawn to perfection, trying to capture the human anatomy as accurately and as realistically as possible with the pen. on the other, you have LotL.

ichikawa excels at creating evocative, beautiful art while achieving a sense of minimalism in her art. there's no intricate shading, no miura-esque every-pixel-must-be-perfect philosophy behind her art style, but her impressive use of negative space, symmetry in her page compositions and panels are simply incredible. every panel flows seamlessly to the next, and it makes for a great reading experience.

only nitpick is that it can be quite tough to differentiate the Gems, especially at first.

TONE:
i love how bleak this manga can get. i also how love how hilarious it is.

the humour is a constant in the series. unlike many manga out there, where humour is often highly exaggerated and slapstick, LotL's humour is often more quippy, and even in many occasions, pretty damn dark. it's never too frequent to become grating, and the jokes tend to land well.

THEMES:
existentialism and a whole lot of buddhist motifs. sounds pretentious i know, but don't worry, ichikawa does not shove it down your throat to the point where it affects the plot. ive never read a manga with themes that get as existential and abstract as LotL, and as someone who does believe somewhat in Buddhism it is handled in a really interesting manner without getting preachy.

OVERALL:
also the ending's good. it's not anything mindblowing, but it's a fitting, beautiful ending for our protagonist.

a must-read if you're someone looking to read all the classics in the medium. i can promise that you will find NOTHING like LotL, love it or hate it. an imperfect masterpiece.

9/10

One of the most recently published manga I have read. Calling it unique is an understatement, as I'm not even sure who this appeals to. It has strong shoujo manga tropes, as well as an all-girl lesbian fantasy feel to it, but somehow mixes a religious and psychological backdrop to it all. In fact, the character cast feels like a japanese version of Steven Universe, the setting is very unique and the art is also very refreshing. These are obviously all very good things, but these pros quickly became cons the longer the manga went on for.

- The character cast is too unstable (as ... in characters disappearing, appearing, and changing way too frequently, especially the MC).
- The art quality for this manga is very fucking exhausting, as you get the 1 every 10 chapters fight scene, with admittedly great character design, that is unfortunately very unintelligible (due to the soft shading style that the mangaka went for, together with pure white / pure black backgrounds that make it even more of a mess to decypher). I feel like the art and feel the author was going for would've been way better as an anime original, as the combination of colourful gem characters and paradise-like scenery would make for some insanely lively scenes that just can't be appreciated in black and white.
- Most of the chapters have a very happy go lucky feel to it, with cheery characters and constant :P moments, that take away all the seriousness that the plot was going for.
- About the plot, this felt like an inferior version of Eden: It's an Endless World, and as magical as that manga was to me, this one felt like a lackluster cousin.
- The actual story and big answer to the plot is given halfway throughout the manga as a simple, serious, lore dump conversation, which completely kills all of the mistery and made the idea behind the plot feel unimportant.
- Related to the last point, the Manga is too long for its own good. Most of the stuff that happens is drawn out for way too long. For example, what felt like the "final arc" of the manga, ends up being literally 50% of the length.


Overall, the lack of a real MC, the constant transformation of the entire cast (as well as some characters that only impact the story negatively from the reader point of view), the inconsistent art quality, as well as the ending hiding such a strong niche buddhism lore dump, ended up mortally wounding what could've been one of the most unique mangas of the decade.

[Spoilers]

Seriously, seriously, don't read this. It starts off strong, with an intriguing setting and a loveable main character (Phos). The character interactions are fantastic and there is a sense of mystery and melancholy to the whole story. There are various relationships Phos makes that are set up such for future development in different directions. However... (massive spoilers below)

At a certain point within the story, the author decides that Phos needs to suffer and that everyone should turn on them, and makes no effort to make this happening believable. Every single character who Phos has interacted with, befriended, had fun with, fought with, bonded over lost ... comrades with, tried to help, just completely gives zero fucks about Phos within a matter of days. For no reason. Just to get some dumb plot point across. And none of them ever care again. All the relationships, just poof, gone permanently, because the author had a stupid plotline they wanted. Which itself, was really just an excuse to make Phos suffer to begin with. It completely belies the narrative up to that point, just to make you feel bad. Horrible writing, I sincerely regret reading it.