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Tsuyoshi is not what it promises to be. It promises to be seinen; instead it's a standard shonen battle manga. It promises to be about a wimpy-looking strong man; instead it's about a revolving cast of martial artists. It promises for Tsuyoshi to be the main character… instead, he's not.

❧ What kind of story is it really?

Though filed under “seinen”, the seinen elements primarily amount to window dressing. Occasional cleavage; characters who take sexual pleasure in being beaten; innumerable strikes to the family jewels. There are also some truly uncomfortable Sniper Elite-style internal views of bones being crushed or organs being damaged. But those are ... accoutrements: the nature of the story, rather, is that of a shonen battle manga: Rather than focusing on what Tsuyoshi brings to the table, the story revolves around fighters who come from across the world, duel each other, and pit various countries' martial arts against one another. Though the title translates to “Tsuyoshi: No One Stands a Chance… Not Against HIM”, only a fraction of fights involves Tsuyoshi himself – perhaps precisely because no one stands a chance, and thus, any fight with him has a foregone conclusion. It's a shame, though: fights between increasingly strong combatants is something we've all seen a million times – and they're awfully drawn out, comprising the lion's share of the story – whereas Tsuyoshi's fights have a refreshing air of creativity and humor.

The tropes the story engages in also fall decidedly under the shonen umbrella. Defeated villains repent and become allies. Characters' big moments are invariably preceded by a flashback to a tragic backstory. Every human emits a “threat aura”, which can be felt and seen. As the story goes on, the fighting becomes more and more outlandish, with “chi blasts” funnily enough being introduced as a technique – this becomes somewhat less amusing when the author insists in an afterword that the series is still realistic, because “chi is real, can be seen with the naked eye, and can heal otherwise incurable illnesses”.

This isn't to say that there aren't moments of greatness! There are laughs to be had, especially for someone who enjoys slapstick or silly visual gags. One thing I found particularly notable was that in a spectacularly rare move, the story occasionally treads where other manga dare not, and touches on controversial political topics – Vladimir Putin; Tiananmen Square; the 1% – which lends some heft that impressed and engaged me. The moments where the title character is front and center are offbeat and gratifying – though those moments are oddly rare…

❧ So who is the main character, if not Tsuyoshi?

The story's perspective shifts between a number of challengers – whoever's closest to Tsuyoshi at the moment; a kind of audience proxy; and in the variation that offers, it lends novelty. For someone whose trope tolerance is higher than mine, the characters might be enjoyable. Regrettably, every female character is a walking trope – although they certainly have agency, they're simultaneously objectified and dripping with gender roles. The majority of the cast are either gratingly condescending or villainous – most everyone is a terrible person (played for laughs; your mileage may vary), including the eponymous Tsuyoshi. Though in his case, that turns out to be an entertaining, subversive trait!

In the story's generic swaths, which unfortunately comprise most of it, Tsuyoshi is relegated to the sidelines. When it's good, though… Tsuyoshi is an inexorable force of nature; a John Wick-like existence. Far from the meek youngling one might expect, Tsuyoshi is a revenge-driven, nigh-homicidal maniac when his “switch” is flipped: all “yan”; no “dere”. He's often – and hilariously – depicted as if it were a horror manga – less likely to say “please, I don't want to fight…”, and more likely to say “you lookin' to have your ears ripped off, huh?” One of the story's best parts, many volumes in, is told from the villains' perspective as Tsuyoshi enters an unbridled Alien vs. Predator mode – and he's both Alien and Predator. He's the Alien, stalking through corridors and incapacitating anyone in his way, and the Predator, using his supernatural chi sight to see people through walls and home in on weak spots. It takes circa 10 volumes, but eventually, these Tsuyoshi-focused moments grow in frequency as the focus shifts to revolve more around him personally, making the experience somewhat more unique.

❧ In a nutshell…

Tsuyoshi is a manga with a captivating premise that it largely fails to execute on. It's peppered with laughs and glints of glory here and there – and for someone who enjoys a run-of-the-mill shonen story it would certainly be a different beast – but I found myself impatiently flipping through chapter after chapter to “get back to the good parts”. Condensed into a single phrase, I would describe this manga as “more average than it lets on”.

Zom 100 has one of the best first volumes that I have ever read. I laughed out loud many times, and those laughs were interspersed with bursting out into tears – no exaggeration – as many as three times in the span of four chapters.

The first volume sets up a zombie apocalypse story like no other: it's unbridledly optimistic. Faced with the end of the world, our main character is overjoyed that he doesn't have to work anymore. With people scared and dying around him, he goes on foolhardy excursions with an unbreakable smile on his face. He's content with life as long as he ... can have a beer. He encourages his best friend to pursue his dream now that he's out of a job. The mix of overwhelming adversity, and then silly irreverence, cheerful optimism and the romance of the little things in life… It's truly special. I've never experienced a story quite like it – by eschewing zombie drama in favor of extolling the joy of life, it brings a refreshing, uplifting perspective that really resonated with me.

Alas, it wasn't meant to last. In volume 2 and on, the story turns into oil and water: it toggles back and forth between being a straight-laced B-movie-style zombie drama – angst, action, and astonishingly ludicrous villains – and having the main characters doing sundry activities with nary a zombie in sight. No longer are the two elements mixed and contrasted, but rather separate. Neither element is particularly interesting on its own.

After straying from its winning recipe, cracks start to show elsewhere. The characters' motivations turn to the more stereotypical “save the world”-type fare, robbing the story of its uniqueness. The manga is considerably “trashy” throughout – licentious and fanservicey – and with as low a tolerance for tastelessness as I have, the fact that I loved volume 1 despite this says quite a bit… but having lost that je ne sais quois, that starts to grate as well. Moments that focus on the bucket list are still occasional bright points, but by and large, the manga quickly loses its spark, loses its indomitable joie de vivre, and loses my enthusiasm.

Zom 100 won't stick with me as an incredible story, but I will keep volume 1 on my shelf as a token of the time I was reminded that even in a tired genre, there is always potential for a fresh, beautiful perspective.

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As an aside, the translation (by Nova Skipper; edited by Karla Clark) is absolutely stellar. I was taking notes; that's how good it is – absolutely buy volume 1, half because it's fantastic, and half to raise your bar for how natural and funny a translation can be while still maintaining accuracy.

This is the kind of manga to… add to “favorites” and recommend to no one.

Again!! is a story that doesn't progress. It's ostensibly a lovely story of some highly dysfunctional people who learn to be better together – except nothing sticks. Though I enjoyed myself most of the way, I'd occasionally look back and realize that nothing had changed; that none of the exciting moments had any lasting impact on the plot nor the characters. Events that seem big and cathartic do nothing – as soon as a character or relationship has developed, it promptly un-develops again. Then, with fifteen plot threads hanging loose, the ... manga ends suddenly and abruptly… and thus left me feeling confused and regretful that I got invested in these characters.

And that's why it hurts: I did get invested in the characters. Despite having no idea how these characters think, or why they do the things they do, I cared.

Is the art why I cared? It's incredible – possibly the most powerful art I've ever seen in a manga. Kubo puts so much passion into every brush stroke – like the ouendan's brusque cheering style, you feel the sheer spirit she pours into each forceful, ink-splattered brush stroke. Or are the characters themselves why I cared? Despite a few despicable apples, and despite a lack of intelligible character development, they're written in such a way that I couldn't help but feel like a part of their found family.

Whatever the case is, I did care… and now here I am, at the bottom of the steep decline that started after 9½ volumes, feeling robbed of a resolution to… anything, really.

Again!! is and will always be special to me. I poured a lot of my feelings into reading it. I know, though, that I'll wish I hadn't.

Who needs time travel when the solution to everything is gang fights?

Tokyo Revengers is a story with a spectacular premise… that is promptly squandered. That's what makes it so frustrating to read: it entices you with aspects that are truly unique; aspects that give you a glimpse of tremendous potential – and then devolves into run-of-the-mill shonen schlock.

The time-travel mechanic, detailed in the first few chapters, works in a novel way: Takemichi, the protagonist, can only travel exactly 12 years back in time, and from there only exactly 12 years forward again. While he's in the past, time keeps progressing in the present (with him ... in a comatose state), and while he's in the present time keeps progressing in the past. This means that if, say, someone dies in the present (or sometime in the last 12 years, for that matter), he can travel back and set things right – but if someone dies in the past? Well, then there's no traveling back before that and fixing it. This is a fantastic way to ensure that there still are stakes – something most other time travel stories could learn from. And indeed, a lot of the intrigue comes from there! Sadly, though, that's about the extent to which Tokyo Revengers explores its premise.

Though the manga hits a high point in around volume 3-4, with Takemichi following the central conceit of retroactively saving his girlfriend, going back in time to diagnose and tangibly solve problems – I truly felt that it was great for a few brilliant chapters there – it loses its footing afterward, and becomes an entirely different story. A palpable loop emerges: go back to the present, see that things went wrong in a different way this time, go back to the past, and… oh! There's a new rival gang, the existence of which has never been mentioned before, and conveniently enough, they're the source of all the problems this time! I guess the only thing to do is fight them. Even when the present offers an interesting plot hook – “this character grows up to be a psychopath; you need to make sure he has a better youth” – the result is invariably the same: “actually, that was all because of this new rival gang.” In this way, Tokyo Revengers deftly nullifies its own premise to become a bog-standard shonen manga where fighting the villain of the week is always the answer.

It's a terrible shame that a manga with such a stellar premise, such fantastic art, and such undeniably heart-tugging moments should falter so utterly, but falter it does. Coupled with an motley crew of other sizable blemishes – new characters keep being introduced at far too rapid a pace for you to care about them, the deuteragonists are forgotten about; barely appear through large swaths of the story and receive little to no character development, the manga's view of women is on the further end of “iffy”, and its morals are out of whack (“sure, he's a psychopath who indiscriminately beats people bloody, but he's not a bad guy!”) – Tokyo Revengers ends up being largely an exasperating, unenjoyable read.