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A new addition to the Tokyo Tarareba Musume series, and a welcome one at that. Rather than relying on old tropes and character stories, it attempts to create something different with wildly unique and entertaining comedy and characters. While the goal of finding a husband remains the same, it involves surprisingly wacky and hilarious hijinks. The drama was dialed down to make it more of a classic romantic comedy. Personally, I enjoyed how the manga felt both concise and sequential. The manga covers, color pages and panels were gorgeous and well detailed and really enhanced some key moments in the story. Perfect for people who ... have read the previous manga or just want a really funny rom-com with an unique and interesting cast. Hope to see more from Higashimura Akiko Sensei.

Desert Punk is a pretty old manga, and the official English translation for the later volumes doesn't exist (yet). This is quite a shame, as I personally found the later volumes way more interesting than the first few, which have our protagonist Kanta roaming around the "Great Kanto Desert" as a mercenary/handyman for hire. Kanta is an extremely unlikeable protagonist who is greedy, selfish, evil (literally), and of course lecherous, but he also possesses great intelligence and adaptability to survive in the harsh desert environment, which requires full body suits, weapons, oxygen cylinders, coolers, among many other tools and garbs.

The environment and concepts of this ... world really shine in the manga. Unlike most manga that tend to over-explain anything out of the ordinary, Desert Punk allows the reader to piece together and figure out life in this world. It also does a good job introducing new and unique enemies and situations while ramping up the tension and suspense. This leads to amazing action scenes, which are complemented by some really good art. The author may not be the best at drawing people, but his eye for background details, weapons, and environments creates some amazing battles throughout the manga.

Initially, I found the manga "different" than most, but still plagued by unnecessary dialogue, character tropes, and a plot that leads nowhere. However, a little more than halfway through the manga, when the time-skip happens, we now follow Kanta's (former) apprentice Taiko Koizumi and Mitsuru as "Moles" trying to make the best of the ongoing war between the South and West governments. The fights become less plagued by stupid character immunity and dumb endings, and are really fleshed out, with the enemies being just as important. More of the plot is also slowly revealed, as well as character aspirations (for most characters). Unfortunately, this build-up was for nothing since the manga then swiftly managed to end within 2 chapters of something that had been building up for pretty much 50 chapters or more of the time-skip arc. All in all, Desert Punk has some really cool aspects that make it worth a read if you have the patience for it!

If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve already watched the movie—and this manga adaptation is essentially a shortened version of that, with the entire story into 1 volume. While it doesn't change anything from the movie, it’s still an enjoyable read, especially if you’re a fan of the original.
The art style is a major highlight. It’s adorable and does a great job of capturing key moments and emotions, with some particularly charming splash pages that enhance the impact of certain scenes.
Overall, this manga is a solid choice for those looking for a short and sweet retelling of the movie. While it might not offer ... much new for those already familiar with the story, the strong artwork and emotional moments make it worth a read.
Final Score: 7/10

Let me just start by saying I've never given a review on mal before. With Pluto however being a manga reader awaiting news on the anime for years finally coming to fruition really made my day.
Pluto like most of Naoki Urasawa's works have a mystery that makes up the central theme of the plot. The mysteries in the Pluto didn't fail to have that "shock factor" that he's known for and furthermore the manga and anime are both quite compact having only 8 volumes and 8 episodes respectively.

THE PLOT: Not surprisingly , it has quite a lot of generic sci-fi traits due to it ... being a re-telling of the Astro Boy: world's greatest robot arc. Yet as loose details like the fact that flying cars and robots being a reality, all the similarities between the plot ends right there. The 7 greatest robots have the same names yet each one has their characteristics as well as episodic one-shots tied into each episode for most of them. North no 2 in episode 1 was easily one of standouts having a complete beginning , middle and end and beautifully represents an important theme of how robots have emotions too. The anime too like the manga seems to have the potential to reward re-watching really shedding light on a lot of the 'core themes' as well 'ideals' that Naoki Urasawa holds towards this society of robots and humans. 10/10

THE ART AND MUSIC: The animation is good, like really good and made real good use of their cgi usage. The studio M2 having the same director who directed Monster as well as Master Keaton was obviously a huge benefit as the pacing and use of animation to such an amazing story was done perfectly. A few frames during episodes were a tiny bit shoddy, especially the beginning episode but it was short lived and we were gifted a lot of beautiful spectacles toward the end.

The music and sounds too were top notch, really amplifying the viewing experience and I couldn't have it any other way. Brau-1589's voice and Atom really stood out to me as it was exactly how I imagined them to sound. So yes the voice acting was top notch too. 9/10

Overall being a manga reader, I was not disappointed with all the waiting due to the end product. And I highly recommend checking out the manga as well as supporting Naoki Urasawa and the Studio M2 to produce more works such as Billy Bat.