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Having pretty much read all the other top manga in the Seinen category, I can confidently say that Oyasumi Punpun is the BEST story I have read since BERSERK. This is not something I say lightly, so let me explain.

Firstly, I should preface that I am a person who heavily favors character-driven stories (as opposed to plot driven stories), and because Oyasumi Punpun is a character-driven story, there is a personal bias to this. However, this isn’t all just personal thoughts, because Oyasumi Punpun has demonstrated the best character writing performance in all pieces of fiction that I have consumed thus far, and I’ll ... show you how. This review will go over all elements of this story as well as provide criticism.

MAIN BODY REVIEW ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

* CHARACTER WRITING: The reason I praise this series so often as I do is because of how much unique value it offers. Most of this value comes from character writing. Oyasumi Punpun does not write black and white characters, but it’s not just your typical “morally” gray characters either. Rather, each character represents a different shade of gray within the infinite spectrum between black and white. Some characters are closer to “white” while some are closer to “black”. I’ll go over the elements of character writing that this story has to offer.

1. Oyasumi Punpun never fully “villainizes” any characters. Rather, the story is able to showcase all characters' positive and negative actions/attributes are all just 𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯. One of the core components of this unique value comes from this story’s ability to write “shitty” characters by incorporating the relationship between their actions and their flaws. Oyasumi Punpun is able to use this to show that people with a good heart can do shitty things, and that people that do shitty things can still have a good heart (Yin and Yang). There are two characters that each perfectly embody one of these two archetypes (and many other characters that fit as well), but I won’t specify for the sake of spoilers.
– I will mention, however, that the mother is one of these archetypes, and by GOD the way that this story writes and demonstrates her character and her flaws is done so flawlessly.

2. No manga I’ve read has shown to be better at writing depth and complexity of characters than Oyasumi Punpun. No characters could ever be described in a simple sentence or phrase. This is because the characters are constantly evolving: some change little, some change a lot; some are temporary, some are permanent; some for the better, some for the worse. In other words, they’re all complex characters that actually feel 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥.
- Not only do every important character demonstrate these attributes, but also 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 single one of their actions – down to all the small, subtle details – can be dissected and explained using its character’s entire historical past. It doesn’t require a super analytical viewpoint to capture and understand all of this either. Rather (and this feels contradictory to say) the story brilliantly displays the nuance in a clear and understandable way. Furthermore, this makes the usage of foreshadowing much more potent than any other manga. This level of writing for depth as well as the consistency of its usage is very few and far between.

3. Toxic actions and behaviors can never be truly justified, but the inherent disposition of characters that create these actions and behaviors can certainly have justification. Most fiction would simply villainize characters that exhibit excessive toxicity, but Oyasumi Punpun takes the step to actually acknowledge and showcase where this toxicity comes from. The main character, Punpun, is used to fully demonstrate this step. You can truly see that while a person can possess a toxic disposition, it’s not as if such a disposition came out of nowhere. This level of humanization is rare to see in typical writing, and understandably so because of how difficult it must be to create and build up the history that leads to such a disposition.

* PLOT: Oyasumi Punpun follows three main plots: you have the main character Punpun plot, the Seki plot, and then the Pegasus plot. There isn’t much to cover in the overall main plot, but there really isn’t a central plot at all. Remember, this is a character driven story, so the plot mainly revolves around the characters, and boy does it do fantastically at that. It supplements and builds the characters perfectly, and the plot never really feels boring as the final payoff for each plotline, whether big or small, is MASSIVE (besides the Pegasus one, but I’ll get to that later.)

However, if I were to describe the overall plot, it would go something like:

Everything is “fine”‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎WE’RE BACK!!!!‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤNVM WE'RE SO FUCKING BACK!!!
‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ\‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ/‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎\‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ /‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ \‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤㅤㅤ (rinse and repeat)
‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤNO IT’S OVER!!!‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤFUCK IT'S ACTUALLY SO OVER!!!!‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤ‎‎‎‎‎‎‎‎ㅤFUUUUUUUCCKKKK

- Now the Seki side plot doesn’t intersect much with the main plot, but it doesn’t need to. It serves as an amazing dichotomy of what a “normal” way to mature from a fucked up past should look like, and it does so amazingly. Seki shares many of the same struggles as Punpun, but he is much less insecure of himself because he at least has someone that truly believes in him. I believe that such a side plot really adds much to the themes of the story, as it demonstrates what can be the main difference for a person to have strength in themselves. I believe that Punpun’s development in the last arc of the story really hammers this details in, as one of the fundamental differences of his change is that he found someone who can truly believe in him.
– P.S. It's very difficult to talk about the plot without delving into the characters, but it’s what I mean by how the plot revolves around the characters.

- (CRITICISMS): Now the main criticisms for this story falls within the Pegasus plotline. I don’t think that this plotline is bad by any means, but rather that it’s constantly overshadowed by the other two plotlines, and its payoff feels weak, not only in comparison to the other two, but also because it feels like its buildup felt like it promised so much more.
- However, that’s not to say that it’s completely useless. I do think that the Pegasus plotline still enhances the overall story because it contributes in a few ways: firstly, in a narrative sense, it works well as a “transitory” break after the climax of a different plotline. Secondly, it provides an interesting contrasting dichotomy to Punpun; whereas Punpun struggles to believe in himself and others, Pegasus is the opposite. As someone else puts it, “Pegasus symbolizes adults who still didn’t give up on their childhood dreams.” I think this representation does well in showcasing the interesting contrast between himself and the main character.
- However, while this side plot does have some qualms and is interesting to an extent, the main issue is its execution. This side plot just feels like it should've been a lot more important and meaningful than it actually is, so it makes sense as for why the payoff felt disappointing. Nevertheless, I wouldn’t say that it’s a useless side plot; rather, I would just advise against putting much importance on it.

* THEMES: Oyasumi Punpun has many themes, but the one core aspect of all these themes that I want to emphasize the most is the story’s brutal realism. Through its themes of dysfunctional family, to existentialism, to toxic relationships, Oyasumi Punpun is able to realistically portray all of their intricacies down to their brutal details. It is common to see this story portray such details that you’ve never even been aware of before.
- Furthermore, it is able to show these themes without resorting to any shock value. It can fully rely on pure storytelling to convey such details.

FINAL THOUGHTS —----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There are two main types of fictional stories: one that offers escapism into a different reality and one that grounds itself in reality (the rest are in-between). Oyasumi Punpun positions itself unconformably far into the latter type. But only by doing so, does it create unique values and perspectives that many other stories don’t.

I find that many people like to classify Oyasumi Punpun with words such as “dark”, “sad”, “disturbing”, “tragic”, or “depressing”, but I find such descriptors really reductive to what this story really is. If I were to describe this story in one phrase, I would describe it as 𝑭𝑼𝑪𝑲𝑰𝑵𝑮 𝑹𝑬𝑨𝑳, down to all of its dark, sad, disturbing, tragic, and depressing features.

Overall, I rate this story a 9.5/10 (Rounding to a 10). To me, it is a truly special story that changed my perspective on life. I can’t recommend this story enough.

Throughout all the other 10/10 reviews on this site, it appears that I’ll be the first to provide actual criticism for this story.

This review will have 2 parts: the first section will focus on the positives of the novel, while the second will be used to explain the negatives. I’ll try to maintain the foundational logic of my critiques to be as objective as possible.

POSITIVES————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

1. Overall plot writing:

- For the most part, ORV retains a healthy consistent pacing throughout itself; it rarely feels dragged out, nor does it ever feel rushed.

- The novel’s story-telling makes great use of many narrative plot techniques, such as ... Chekov’s Guns, callbacks, framing devices, time paradoxes, foreshadowing, twists, etc. This creates a strong and immersive experience, and it makes the reading much more memorable.

- To me, the strongest aspect in this field would be its overall plot setup/development: never in the story does the plot feel lackluster or redundant. The writers know how to introduce novel twists and developments to keep the plot constantly feeling fresh and intriguing. ORV impressively ends VERY strongly using this aspect to its fullest.

- There are still some weaknesses in the plot that I’ll cover later on, but overall, I would say that it maintains integrity. Just from its uses of narrative applications, one can tell that the authors are very talented and experienced in writing.

2. Narrative themes

- ORV hinges a lot on its metafictional themes and executes them brilliantly (for the most part). This is especially beautiful with how themes are linked to and supports the character writings of the main cast.

- The story themes also feel very unique and original with how it ties in escapism with the philosophy of the reader, writer, and character. All of this is to say that it makes the novel much more memorable and influential.

3. The worldbuilding:

- For me, this story’s worldbuilding is probably the strongest aspect of the story. The way it weaves together many different tales and epics throughout history and integrates them throughout the story is nothing short of impressive. I especially love how it references and pays homage to Lovecraftian Mythos.

- I would say that the novel does use a pretty basic power system, being the typical gamer level-up system, but it still integrates decently throughout the story. Overall, its worldbuilding aspect is what I am the most impressed with within this novel.

NEGATIVES———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

1. Other areas of plot writing:

- HOOK: The story starts off with a pretty weak hook. This is mainly because the main character, KDJ, acts as Gary Stu in the beginning who’s almost always in control of the situation. The beginning of this story can’t help but feel like an intellectual power fantasy self-insert, which kills the reader’s investment into the main character, and this also kills the tension. Past the Beast King arc, this Gary Stuism does stop, but its issues with tension still persist.

- TENSION: To me, the biggest narrative issue with this story is the lack of tension. The Gary Stuism of the beginning creates the start of the tension deficit issues, but this issue never gets resolved because there’s always a persistent feeling that nothing permanent will ever go wrong with the main cast. The story does try to build tension by adding stakes and putting characters in precarious positions/situations, but doing so only creates temporary tension. The lack of actual payoff for permanent consequences always nerfs the *overall* tension, which also kills the reading investment into this story. And even when there is an actual consequence, it would be towards a character that has little relevance in the story or has lost their relevance in the current story. While the plot itself may be interesting, the overall reading experience becomes much more dull as a result. However, the ending/epilogue of the story does a decent job of restoring the lost tension to an extent.

- PLOT WEAKNESSES: While there aren’t many plot weaknesses or plot holes in the story, and most of them are minor, there is one significant one that has strongly and negatively altered my entire perception of this story. For the sake of spoilers, I won't go into the specific details of the plot, but there is one incident that does need to be addressed. I am talking about an event that occurs after a certain battle in a certain arc.
— The event was essentially a poorly-written revelation incident that occurred after the most *peak* battle in the novel, where, for the first time, the tensions and stakes felt real. That shit was perfect, until the revelation happened, and then all my faith about the story tensions completely tanked. It was so disappointing that I pretty much had to force myself to finish the novel after this.
— Furthermore, the execution of this revelation was terrible. There was absolutely no buildup or foreshadowing in this reveal; the revelation was made out of the blue in such a trivial manner. That was a textbook example of deus ex machina (which is ironic because ORV criticized this plot device a few times). As a reader, I feel tricked into even caring about that battle in the first place.

2. Character writing: Let me first preface this by saying that I am a seinen reader, so my standards for character writing are pretty high, which may come off as overly strict in this regard (EDIT: What I mean is, I emphasize character writing a LOT more than the average person, and given that ORV is a plot-driven story rather than a character-driven story, it's possible that many readers won't care as much for this section as I do.) I still believe that ORV’s character writing is better than your average story, but it’s far from peak or perfect.

- SIDE CHARACTERS: Firstly, the side characters are pretty shallow and two-dimensional. Their personalities and actions are very predictable for the most part (in the sense that they follow the standard fictional character tropes, and they don't really change/devlopment beyond one moment in the entire story), and half of them just insufferably glaze the hell out of KDJ. Like, there are literally three characters whose entire *surface* personality is just about competing who can glaze KDJ more. However, most of this *is* personal bias, and I don't really have a BIG issue with not all side characters being super developed, but there is one actual and objective issue I have with the side characters.

- Oftentimes, ORV tries to add what I call “fake character development/depth” to these side characters. One example is a character who supposedly develops by overcoming their “fear of facing the outside world”. Now this “fear” is reflective of their surface personality trait, but it is not at all reflexive of any of their significant actions. Like, despite their “fears”, this character has always been “facing the outside world” head-on throughout all the significant plot. Hell, even in their character introduction, they voluntarily tried to take control of a massive panic situation. Additionally, none of their actions at all had a noticeable change from before and after this development. This “fake character development/depth” is pretty much applicable to the rest of the side cast to varying degrees of application, and even some to KDJ himself to an extent. However, he does have some redeemable character writing to where I can overlook those aspects.

- OTHERS: There are about three characters in ORV that are relatively well-written, which are the protagonist (KDJ), the deuteragonist, and the tritagonist. They all have something about them that makes them memorable, and they all have character flaws that they overcome — at least in a way that I can consider “actual” character development because it reflects their choices and actions where it’s significant to the plot. However, the character writing itself is still flawed: only two of these characters have actual depth (KDJ and deuteragonist), and only another two have actual uniqueness (deuteragonist and tritagonist).

- KDJ does have depth as a character, but the dude’s personality is just boring. And it’s not an “interesting” bland like Saitama from OPM is, where the blandness is much more nuanced within the context of his personality; no, he’s just not an interesting MC. This is even canon to the story because it quite literally states in his backstory that he's an uninteresting person. You could describe him as being witty or clever in certain situations, but such traits aren’t even expressed in a unique or interesting way like Joseph Joestar, for example. This makes the process of investing into his character a lot more difficult.
— Furthermore, the execution of KDJ’s character is flawed. During the beginning of the novel when he was a Gary Stu, his backstory just felt hamfisted. When his backstory suddenly popped up, it was hard to understand the relevance of it towards the current plot beyond "oh, he just LOVES stories", which isn't sufficient to create depth. Therefore, it was hard to even care about it. The significance was revealed much much later in the story, but I have to disagree with this being an effective method in conveying KDJ’s character. This is because had I known about the significance earlier, I would have been more invested in KDJ early on and thus would’ve enjoyed the story more. It just feels like a waste that this was only revealed much later on.

- Next, is the deuteragonist. To me, he’s the most well-written of the bunch overall, but there is one nitpick I have on him. The novel just falls flat in expressing his emotions, specifically his anger. He just gets violent whenever he’s angry, but beyond that, he just usually expresses it by glaring at what he’s angry about or just saying the flattest “I’ll kill you.” Now this is fine during low-stakes moments or when it’s just banter, but during super emotional or supposedly tense moments of the story, his expression of anger just feels dull and unrelatable. This is also applicable to KDJ, though to a lesser extent. It’s possible this could be an error in translation, but it’s an issue regardless.

- Last, the tritagonist, who has an aspect of uniqueness to their character, but they really have no depth. Depth is defined as the complex internal logic of a character that can be attributed to their actions and thoughts. The protagonist’s internal logic would be how he loves a story, and the deuteragonist's depth would be his unyielding resolve and his tragic fate. The tritagonist, however, just doesn’t have any of that. Many questions relating to “why” they commit a certain action just can’t be explained in the same level of depth as the other two characters. Nevertheless, they are still a rather interesting character that has other redeemable aspects.

- I’ll also add that SP is also a pretty well-written character on their tier as well, but they don’t have the same level of impact as the other three.

- VILLAINS: The villains for the most part are pretty dogshit and uninteresting. There are about 2 exceptions; One's a spoiler and the other's in the Dark Castle Arc (although this one's a bit mid in comparison, but they're better than the other villains in the novel), and that’s about it. Plus, one of them are overarching villains. However, I suppose the story is more orientated on the man vs nature/fate conflict (the nature/fate being the star stream itself) than man vs man. But it’s still a weakness that could’ve been improved regardless, because it's not as if improving villain writing would've impacted any other part of the story's integrity.

3. Fights: Now this is more of a nitpicky section, but it’s worth mentioning. Oftentimes during the fights in ORV, the positions of the characters aren’t described well, especially when there’s complex terrain/geography of the fight scene setting. This could also be a translational error, but it really makes the high-stakes moments of the story a lot more confusing to read. Half of the time, I don’t know where the hell a character is at in a given moment, so I make an assumption and keep reading until I see an event that contradicts the character’s position, and then reread the section. This just makes the overall reading experience a lot more shaky and annoying.

FINAL STATEMENTS——————————————————————————————————————————————————————

ORV has some tough moments here and there for me, but there are some truly special moments that can make up for it somewhat. Overall, the novel is a pretty enjoyable read, but I don’t see myself ever rereading this novel ever again. Based on my review, I’ll give the story an overall rating of 6.5/10, rounding up a 7, which I feel is a generous score. Personally, I can’t find myself recommending this story, but it can still be worth checking out for some.