Back to totetwotechs's Profile totetwotechs's Profile

Its interesting and strange to me that people write reviews for unfinished or ongoing manga, but in the case for Aposimz - even its now "finished" status is actually forever unfinished due to a hasty cancellation. Nihei was forced to attempt to cliff note about 50 chapters worth of story into the last 4 because of that. I won't judge Aposmiz for the hilariously rushed ending, however I didn't find rest of the story or art to hold up regardless of that forced ending.

As per the Nihei Blame usual you have a rather stoic MC with a small gun that has the power ... to punch a hole through everything, travelling around a mechanical dystopia with a female sidekick (actually 2 this time), some Abara style transformations, and at times the lighthearted goofiness of Sidonia. The biggest change is probably how generic and "not-Nehei" the manga feels; things quickly devolve into shounen battles with tiered enemies, special superpowers, mascot animals, ass pull fights, explanation of said fight/abilities, etc. Technically Nihei always has moments almost like that, but not to the same degree and frequency that Aposmiz has. It is very much a watered down and shounen-y story overall. There are hints of the expert world building of Nihei, but it feels rehashed from his older works, except now straddled by this atmosphere killing shounen battle nonsense (along with some very obvious and clear "influence" from Nausicaa).

That being said nothing here is really new for him, besides his continuation/advancement of the Sidonia artstyle, which is something I personally think just looks rather boring and lifeless in comparison to his older heavy ink stuff. Its lacking in shading at times, being mostly empty white, a single grey tone, and then ink for hair and lines of objects. I appreciate trying a new artstyle; but it feels more simplified in its shading, more boring to look at, like less effort is being put in, and honestly sometimes hard to make out what things are exactly due to that lack of shading. A look at his coloured pages are obviously a huge step down from his previous efforts, not even in a different style, they are simply just flat out worse and look like he barely tried at all. Faces and people are also far more cutesy, utterly gone are the uncanny and strangely spaced faces from his older works which stood out from other artists.

The atmosphere too is very similar to Sidonia because of how much more playful characters are and how lighthearted things look. Silly jokes and even ecchi scenes coming up again and again through the story, but are mostly just generic and played out nonsense. Nothing like the ol naked girl walks into the bathroom and then hurts the MC for looking at her titddies, never seen enough of those epic gags, right guys....? Maybe I am no longer Nihei's target audience with things like this, but I never found these "jokes" very funny even when I was younger, and more importantly is that it's so overdone that I believe it's absolutely worthy of criticism.

Its a shame to say; but with this manga, Sidonia, and the Blame CGI movie - I think I have to say that modern day Nihei is completely washed up. He seems more interested in having cute girls, slapstick humor, shounen battles, and awful romance than creating the gritty, mysterious and dark worlds he was known for. Its fine to change your style, but if your new thing is just trying to make yourself more accessible and generic - then I'm not going to pretend its anything other than bad. I don't like having to say that, but I think its the truth at this point because he threw away his own unique style and then watered himself down to be more "accessible". Essentially he sold out, which was probably clear as day with Sidonia, but I was holding on hoping that maybe it was only a one time thing. That is not the case, and really I expect him to make an even more egregious attempt to commercialize himself in the next story he creates due to the failure of Aposmiz.

I'll note where there a spoilers in the review

Seeing as its a Yoshiaki Kawajiri movie (director of Wicked City, Ninja Scroll, Vampire D, etc), I came in expecting the usual fantastic art with a mediocre to even hilarious plot attached to it. Can't say I was disappointed in that regard. His films always have that distinct heavy shading style to them, with sharp jawbones that you could cut diamonds with. Which if you are like me and love watching anything with a cool artstyle, that's more than enough reason to give this a watch. The story and characters are probably even worse than Wicked City ... or Cyber City Oeda, so if you didn't like those then certainly don't bother with this.

Now that being said, the art isn't as polished as Ninja Scroll or Vampire D, nor does it have that atmospheric aura that Wicked City or even Cyber City Oedo had. It also has some ugly CGI, that while not totally offensive, is still a big step down from those films.Highlanders's visuals are still top notch, especially faces are what Yoshiaki's works are so uniquely talented at. The second you see even a single screenshot of them, you know who made them. Its very rare to find anything similar to it, maybe Redline comes close, but even then its just not the same (thankfully, its good to be different).

Spoiler Territory:
You know I like the idea of an immortal dude who fights his eternal rival for thousands of years... at least as a shounen battle tv series anyways. This movie is sort-of based on the live action movie (also callled Highlander), which I haven't watched - but I don't think you really have to since the stories are different anyways. The entire of this film's plot is a bit of a mess overall though, the worst aspect of the story was trying to tie into the Scottish highlander thing, where almost nothing about the Scottish highlanders was shown, and originally the MC was fighting Romans in Britain near Stonehenge anyways. One can only assume they made an effort to make this connection because of the film name and the live action version, but its just so rushed and poorly done that it shouldn't even be there. I'll explain in the next paragraph.

So in this Scottish highlander section of the movie - a very small section might I add; you get a Scottish battle scene, a funeral because he died in that battle (Immortality brings him back always, but "death" knocks him out for unknown reasons.), he crawls out of his grave at night and is called a demon (A fair point, "zombie" would also do.), then suddenly his new love interest is there to defend him from his accusers - until they decide he has to leave because he just crawled out of his grave, and the show acts like we should really care that he is splitting up with his new relationship that we've seen on screen for roughly 30 seconds. Its not the worst thing I guess (for this film anyways), except that the entire reason of him fighting for the past MILLENNIA is because he was fighting to have his revenge for his first wife's death. So he spent over 1000 years fighting tooth and nail, dying over and over again, bearing physical pains and horrors over the memory of his first wife, and yet apparently also just takes another woman while continuing that fight anyways? Yes, technically the story tries to justify it by saying that this was is his first wife reincarnated (also happens again in the future), which is not only stupid, but fails anyway since he himself states he didn't believe that to be true. Its just a half-assed story honestly, even Wicked City felt more put together and that was also just basically an excuse for some action and sex scenes.

So yeah, a very long look into just one example of things not really being careful looked at in the story. There is a lot more to nitpick and dissect, but it's just that sort of story, its like porn stories - certainly its exists and could be looked at, but why waste your time when we all know what reason it really exists for? You get to watch a bunch of action scenes spanning different ages for shits and gigs, ignore it and just pay attention to the visuals since they really do stand up well.


Overall: I didn't hate the film, but I'll never recommend it to anyone - unless they watched everything else from Yoshiaki, and if they've done that then they probably don't need me to tell them to watch it.

Since there is no review for this manga (and unlikely to ever be), I shall share my quick thoughts. This story is a sort of sequel to "Natsu no Zenjitsu", but it's not required to read that in order to read this; honestly it's mostly its own thing but with some returning characters. My rating of 5 just means "average" rather than mal's typical "5=trash", and I won't include spoilers since I assume people who are here have not read such an obscure manga and just want to know if it's worth a read.

Firstly the most important thing to say is that this is ... a very character driven manga, with a focus on romantic relationships. If you expect a plot of some kind, well it never really bothers with one. Technically there is some movement and change, but really it could just as well not be there and not much would change. This is a manga showing a group of characters interacting and cross interacting with each other mostly; usually in the form of romantic dates and relationship building. Nothing unique and yet nothing overly boring either.

Now the one easily identifiable negative thing here is that the art isn't very good, If you don't mind that then this isn't really such a bad read. Normally I expect a 6~ on mal to be awful, but this is not the case here. There are a few genuine heart warming moments, and there are worthwhile jokes that gave me a chuckle or two. Since the length is so short, the few moments of entertainment are all it really needs to prevent boredom.

So is this worth a read? Well if you actually managed to find this page, you are probably someone who is scrapping the bottom of the manga barrel, so for you it probably is. You can count on this manga not being an absolute chore to read, hell you may even love it if it's your thing. If you still have "classics" and other better recommendations to read, then I would focus on those instead.

It leaves as quickly as it comes. For a quick summary spoiler free; it's worth a read as it's a very quick 28 chapters, decent art, and the start is very strong.

Spoilers below:

28 chapters sure flies by quick, especially when it pulls you in so well at the start. I was excited since the beginning truly shows what raw anxiety, stagnation, and a bit of depression can do to a person. A spiral of insanity as we peered into the mind of someone at the edge of humanity in SOL format is what I was hoping for. Instead we are given a rather lovey-dovey ... feel good ending, where the light is shown at the end of the tunnel within a mere 28 chapters! The artstyle is cute, light, while also being dreary (a good thing!) sometimes. Eyes are what set characters apart alot of times.

My biggest gripe is the coincidences that act as saviors for the MC. Oh a coworker wants to be friends, oh shes extremely nice, oh shes desperate to be friends, oh she's also lonely and thinks the same as the MC, oh every time a misunderstanding could happen its cleared up through eavesdropping, oh the manager is also kind, ETC ETC. It stops the story from having any real meaning. In real life these are extraordinary situations, usually those who fall down in the way the MC does do not get free rides like this. In some ways it reminds me of Welcome to the NHK,in which a depressed and lonely MC meets friends and encounters wild situations. A key exception with that comparison is that the unrealistic friends and situations in NHK turned out to be just as broken or awful as the MC of NHK himself. This tranforms the friends from being a savior, into a more nuanced look at how broken people generally meet and befriend other broken people.

The characters of this manga (only two worth mentioning really) themselves are well done, especially the MC who carries the manga start to finish. Certainly the author must have some first hand experience in the kind of troubles that come to those with anxiety. The friend is fine in her personality, but her circumstance and relationship (story related really) to the MC are questionable.

It's cute, its quick, its depressing, its lighthearted. You get alot for28 chapters. 6/10: slightly above average, if the story was tad stronger then a 7/10 for sure.

Its another gambling story from Nobuyuki Fukumoto, what else can you say really. If you have read anything from Nobuyuki you already know what to expect, this one is just a worse version. This review covers Part one and two of Zero.

Tabaku Haouden Zero is a mix of Kaiji/Akagi; in that it takes the plot/characters of Kaiji, while the MC is closer to Akagi. Yet it sacrifices the best aspects of either story it takes from. No longer is Kaiji the worthless trash determined to reinvent himself anew, instead he is already a genius and wishes to save the world... or something. No longer is ... Akagi the complex and daring man who tows the line from absolute genius, to complete and utter madness. Instead you have this washy nothing MC with pre-existing talent, and no real motivations or character at all.

Really I cannot comprehend why this manga was even made, unless Nobuyuki has simply ran out of any interesting ideas. Maybe he just wants some easy money since this is what he's known for, who knows. The plot is either seemingly directly ripped from his older creations, or 88 chapters of filler as in the case of part two. To give a brief idea, just take a look at what actually happens in this manga:
(skip this paragraph if you don't want spoilers)
Part one Is very "Kaiji esque": Rich man hosts tournament that risks life or death->MC enters tournament->MC has pathetic and worthless "friends"->MC takes them along for the ride->friends too pathetic, so moves on without them->round two begins->Mc falls off cliff for "epic" cliffhanger->?????.
Part Two is different, and by different I mean nothing happens really: Time skip(why?)->Tensai MC mysteriously lost tournament->is still famous yet has no money->looks to make cash from "bad guys"->??????->nothing else actually happens in 88 god damn chapters->wut?

It's boring, plain and simple. Even the puzzles/games are boring which are normally a highlight with Nobuyuki. It felt like he literally just ran out of ideas during the first part and said "Fuck it we are going to do a jeopardy game show section.". Save yourself your time, and don't bother reading it. If you haven't already then watch/read Kaiji/Akagi instead.