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Jul 29, 2021
Hitsuji no Uta provides a pretty good psychological drama about a cursed family and their struggles with a few key interpersonal relationships. Most of the main cast can be melodramatic (the painter being the most egregious) but the sister carries well enough by being the most interesting and complex character out of the bunch. The art isn't bad either, it suits the tone of the story very well and doesn't intrude on the experience.
The main issue is that the entirety of this manga becomes meaningless because the author decided to reset everything with the final chapter. Think of something akin to watching a movie
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and at the post credit scene the main character wakes up and realizes everything was a dream all along. All of the character development, growth, and emotions that were built up over the series were just thrown out the window.
If the final chapter didn't exist, I would say this manga is about a 6, with some interesting (albeit over the top) characters and developments. However, with the last chapter making everything that led up to it redundant, I would've rather never read this manga in the first place.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
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Mar 5, 2021
Yet another manga with a decent setup that ends up being plagued by more and more questionable direction as the story goes on. It feels like the author lost sight of what they wanted this to be halfway through writing it, and then just decided to milk the final conflict for 50+ chapters. If you are just looking for something with cool spectacle fights and badass characters, this is a pretty good choice. If you want a fulfilling story with developed characters, stay away.
Story (3):
This manga started with a mildly interesting story that took a while to get off the ground, but ran into some
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severe story and balance issues during the final "arc". That's in quotes because it's hard to even call it an arc, with it taking up what feels like the entire last half of the series. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. The initial premise of a bunch of badass female warriors fighting demons is interesting enough to carry the story for the beginning chapters. The first few arcs keep a good pace and don't overstay their welcome, with the author effectively fleshing out backstory in the Teresa arc while still delivering on the promise of badass women killing demons. This pace continues well into the midsection of the story, and the slowly unfolding plot of the organization's goals had me excited for each revelation from the main cast. The fight scenes also ramped up in intensity at a good pace, with multiple moments where I genuinely didn't know what the outcome of a fight would be.
All of this changed after the Pieta arc, as the main cast's plot armor grew exponentially, and so did the ridiculousness of the fights. Don't get me wrong, spectacle fights can be enjoyable given the right context and story. However, after building a gritty world where these warriors have to fight tooth and nail for the good of humanity (risking their own humanity in the process), the tension evaporates quickly when the fights devolve into deus ex machina-isms and countless times where the limits of the warriors powers are seemingly arbitrary. There are so many fights where someone hits the limit of their power out of nowhere after wiping the floor with the opponent whenever the author wants to switch up who is winning in the fight, or someone pulls out an unseen special move to win the fight because they hadn't reached their quota of badass moments. There is also the problem of over-explanation, where during every fight there is a convenient bystander that explains people's abilities and what happens during the fight in mind-numbing detail. Wasn't this published in Shonen Jump Advanced? Why does the author feel the need to explain every minute detail after showing it in the art just a few panels ago? This problem only grows as the series progresses, with the explanations actually becoming necessary to describe the ridiculous deus ex machina moments in a hand-wavy fashion. Needless to say, it became increasingly difficult to get immersed in the fights after the midsection of the story.
About the final conflict. By chapter 100, all of the pieces are in place for the conflict to climax and be resolved. A few times around this point I would look at what chapter I was on and think to myself "wow, there are so many chapters left, I wonder where the story will go after this arc?". The answer was, sadly, nowhere. This conflict starts, stops, starts again, runs around in circles a few times, and then ends after an arduous slog of adding more and more unnecessary characters and battles throughout. The actual final battle is a joke too, like it was one final "f*** you" on top of all the moments when a stupidly powerful person shows up and undermines the abilities/efforts of everyone else. Also, the last two pages of the last chapter... really?
Art (7):
The art is pretty hit or miss, especially in the beginning. Character's lose their nose from certain angles, and sometimes look like they just got punched in the mouth with how swollen their lip is. This mellows out as the series progresses, and wasn't a big issue for me as the main tour de force is the design of the Awoken. These beautiful monstrosities really carry the series towards the end, with the story getting boned just for an excuse to show more cool fights with them. There is a clear HR Giger influence that works really well with the tone of the series. Speaking of tone, the generic backdrops of medieval towns and random forests aren't interesting, but they do add to the desolate vibe given off by the rest of the art. The warrior design works alright, they all look pretty similar excluding hairstyles, but it makes sense given the plot. This limitation forces the author to use different means to differentiate warriors from one another, which we will get into later. The other humans are generic looking, but that's fine as they aren't the main focus. Actual fight scenes are good, not amazing, but they do their job. Sometimes it's hard to tell what's going on, but like I said in the Story section, there's always someone present to explain what's happening. As a side-note, I vividly remember the 2-page spread of Clare in chapter 39, with all the cuts going through the water... that was awesome and definitely a high-point. Overall, the standout here is the design direction of the Awoken, especially the Abyssal ones.
Character (7):
Like the story, this starts off on a good foot, but gets shaky as the story progresses. As stated earlier, the same-y warrior design forced the author to give the characters personality and backstory, which he did effectively until a little past the half-way point. Before that point there were some interesting interactions between the feared Claymores and the normal humans, and Clare was slowly but surely developing and understanding herself. The other characters and their motivations were touched on enough to satisfy and build out the cast. After that point there were so many different warriors that it devolved into the new characters just being "female with the XXXX ability". The main 7 were fleshed out and stayed prominent enough to suffice though, so it wasn't a big deal. They shined the most when interacting with each other. This was something that was done well, but sadly not often enough, as by this point the majority of the scenes were just one fight after another. Everyone besides Clare and Raki don't develop much, but they start out distinct enough for it to work. Clare's development is fine, with her understanding more and more about herself through her fights. Raki changes the most, but he is still one of the more shallow characters with him developing from generic person to different generic person. The "romance" between two of the characters felt forced and kind of weird, I think it would have been better if it stayed more like the familial relationship it was in the beginning... but this is just personal taste. I also want to point out that I appreciate the author not over-sexualizing the characters and not falling into the trap of making this a r*** fantasy. The villains are kind of meh, with the most interesting one getting killed off in the most unceremonious way pretty early on. That was a very disappointing moment.
Enjoyment (4):
I was enjoying this more like a 7 in the beginning, sometimes peaking like an 8, but this nose-dived pretty hard after the midsection. As stated in the Story review, it became more and more difficult to get into the fight scenes, which heavily impacted my enjoyment overall as the fight scenes make up the bulk of the last half of the series. All of the random fights injected in the last half also slowed the story waaay down, making me dread the inevitable moment when the bad guys pull out the 5th ace up their sleeve. Again, if you don't mind a weak story and can appreciate cool fights, you'll enjoy this a lot more than I did.
Overall (5):
Claymore was disappointing, not awful, just disappointing. I really wanted to like it, Clare and the Awoken are so cool, but it just dragged on for so long... much like this review (lol).
If you read this far, thank you :) I'm not sure what compelled me to write this, but what's done is done. Feel free to add me as a friend or message me if you want to talk about this, criticism and disagreement welcome.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Oct 29, 2020
Wasted potential. Not terrible, but it could have been SO much more.
Credit where credit is due, this has top notch art and character design, a gruesome and dark tone that I find to be lacking in the shounen genre, and some very interesting concepts. This solid base and some of the exciting action moments are the only reasons why I rated this anything more than a 5. If you don't care about plot, this is a fun read with cool moments.
That being said, the story and half-assed characters completely spoil this manga. After the first few plot developments, it nosedives into random events and ass-pulls
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that try so hard to be cool and engaging, but end up jarring and ruining the flow (the first bout in hell with Darkness is a prime example). It's clear now that the story has devolved into endless plot twists, I could hardly bring myself to continue reading. If you have read Dorohedoro to its end, you know what I mean. All of this amounts to a read that feels like a waste of time, as opposed to something rewarding. If the reader puts in any effort to pay attention to the small details and rules of the world, plot holes appear one after another.
The characters are nothing special, and while they have cool designs in terms of looks, they are just your basic one-dimensional shounen tropes. Another MC who's main motivation is to fondle boobs. Nice. The edgy supporting character who saw his family get killed and is now out for revenge. Cool. I would hardly call Makima a character, the author just uses her to move the plot along whenever convenient. To top it off, the lives of the characters are so devalued by random deaths, while others are seemingly immortal. This makes it very difficult to get attached or invested in the characters.
Now that I got that out there, I just want to re-emphasize that the art and character design is REALLY good, and the fight scenes are interesting. However, the story has gotten so bad that I want to believe it's some intelligent satire of the shounen genre, but I know that's just my desire to think I didn't waste my time reading this.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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