Blame is the story about Killy a man who is on a mission to find net terminal thing. Throughout his mission he will meet other people like him, Humans, Administrators and Silicon. All that are trying to kill him all that are trying to stop him. This is a story of a man on a mission to do something thats only kind of explained. There really isn't anything else about this series. Its actually surprisngly straightforward. They don't explain why he needs this but his mission is pretty clear. Find a human with a net terminal gene. The series doesn't have a lot of dialogue but the author is able to compensate this by making random stuff happen to confuse us further.

Now to say that i dislike blame would be an overstatement. Blame by no means is bad. It has some of the most detailed spreads I've seen in quite some a while. The art here is sometimes so breath taking its like you are reading a different manga altogether. However this is not without its issues. The characters faces are most bland I've seen in comparison. Loads of creatures and other sci fi stuff has an incredibly detailed unique design but you are stuck with an clean face MC with fish eyes. Its a bit disappointing considering the large amount of unique designs. This is however a relatively minor issue when you consider the series as a whole however the art definitely has some issues for certain panels. The art is fantastic and detailed for most of the time but there are certain panels where it seems like the author forgot to draw entirely? its just half finished sketches and it really pulls you out from the series. The difference in detail is astonishing. At one point it looks like something Yusuke Murata (One punch man) would draw other (but rarely) times it looks like someone's 5 year old drew it with crayon. Maybe that was the idea because these bad panels are almost always followed by these breathtaking single page panels or spreads. So maybe it was on purpose.

I really enjoyed the action of this series. In fact i was surprised by the large amount of action in the first place. I thought their would be more calmness and melancholy but then this series goes Boom. There is a surprising amount explosions and destruction. However there is also a considerable lack of hype. Almost every character has fantastic design but there is no real buildup. Things just happen and it feels somewhat uninspired. Like we know everything is trying to kill the MC but it feels like the author doesn't actually wanna draw the fight scenes. It would've been better if the author implied that these things happen. Don't get me wrong though some of the fight scenes are absolutely insane. the 2nd half of Omnibus 1 is by far the most entertaining part of the series. Sadly the series never reaches those levels though there are some insane moments near the end of the series. Especially with the character designs.

If it feels like im taking too much of what i saw rather than what it is thats supposed to be how the author potrayed the manga. The series is told through art rather than dialogue. In fact a lot of series character designs, setting, story, personality is told through art. However i believe this is double edged sword, as the art maybe have exemplified the designs but the author was incapable of expressing story and characters through his art. Not to say it was weak but underwhelming.

TLDR: Overall the series was basically that. Underwhelming. Some great scenes however far too in between. but it was able to carry itself through its art but art alone isn't enough to make a series good. You require actual substance not purely style to carry yourself forward. With an addition to my high expectations of this series thats considered a cult classic i just wasn't incredibly impressed like most of its audience was. 6/10

Story: 6/10
Art: 10/10
Characters: 6/10
Quality Polish Edition: 10/10
Enjoyment: 6/10
Overall: 7.6/10

I have read a fair share of weird and chaotic manga. Blame! definitely belongs to both categories and I can't decide if it's for good or worse. Although the following phrase makes me cringe (mainly because of its definite overuse in many reviews), I do have to say that liking this manga is highly dependent on taste and past reading experience.

Read a lot of Seinen before taking on Blame!? Then you are going to be pretty familiar with its ambience. Are you a Shounen reader that wanted something beyond the cliché? Then you are probably going to be confused and hate Blame!'s incomprehensibility, consistent plot holes and of lack of aim with the story.

On one hand, I liked Blame!'s unpredictability because not knowing how a story could end was new for me. On the other hand, it also made me bored and at times frustrated. Not a big fan of repetitive fights that doesn't progress the story.

To conclude my ramblings, Blame! is memorable, it's unpredictable and it has an abundance of originality, but it's also lacking in too many areas for me to call it a masterpiece.

... Last updated on April 25th, 2020, 9:57am

I didn't get it any any anything, story telling was disastrous plot as well, only good point is art.

This manga focuses on and succeeds in giving itself the feel of a wired world of meat and cybernetics living in the wake of a much greater past. It's massive and hostile architecture dominates scenes and creates a sense of scale that makes the City seem truly unending.

The main characters are actually rather good for the genre. They are not supremely emotional, but they convey what they need to and have their own wants, desires, and feelings which are brought to bear with their actions. Though there is some explanation given, most of the setting and the past is shown through action as opposed to monologue, which enhances the mystery of the world.

... Last updated on September 20th, 2015, 8:40pm

Just a few pointers:
- Overleveled scans can be a very bad experience to read, so, buy the volumes, they are translated to many many languages.
- If the only thing you usually read is something neatly draw, you have get accustomed to the art (more than a minute to read a page would be needed xD)
- Don't expect to know everything in just a chapter, nor a volume. This is supposed to be read slowly.
- Don't expect to know every detail at the end of the manga (like the origin of every character).
- Have some imagination.
- If the latter is missing, reading many books usually helps xd.

Many people complains that they didn't really know what the story was about, some even dare to say it has no story at all -_-' It happens simply because pacing can be so slow, small pieces of data comes bit by bit and you have to arrange them by yourself to know what was really going on. Once you straighten all of those pieces in your mind, this is a really simple, straightforward story.

Personally I always hated all those shonen mangas that explained everything to you in a panel like you were some kind of dork, they didn't care of making the story interesting, they didn't left anything to the imagination, didn't put any effort to create art and just used panels to prostrate words. Blame! was the best it could have happened to me on my early days reading manga, it set a standard that i consider it to be the one in which every other manga should be measured to, in terms of letting the art do some of the storytelling, i think manga must be all about that, otherwise there would only be light novels around.

The lack of natural object in this manga is what makes BLAME! a good read.To really describe how cool this style is, words can approximate but you want to read BLAME!

Apart from visual arts, the world of BLAME! is so depressing and chaotic. It also shows how small and how low humans are. Like most reviewers, we have read it for the first time a few years ago and the flashback of this chaotic world remains in our memories. Pick it up again and love it, then write a review.

The plot is *not* ambiguous. Nihei is always like this, he left all the hints or details just about necessary, readers have to read it slowly and thoroughly to understand what is going on, it is intentional. The biggest challenge is on the cryptic or technical words, I don't like it either but it is arguably part of theme though

... Last updated on April 19th, 2014, 9:23am

Read this a few years ago. The art is amazing (well, since then I have been humbled by Kaoru Mori, Etorouji Shiono, In-Wan Youn, and more) mostly in term of a "cybernized" world. The story, while being almost devoid of dialogue, generated a heavy atmosphere of devastation and ruin with scattered semiconscious beings driven by instincts or obsolete eon old commands.

Well, as I recall, the whole story was - about or ended up being - the sowing of an embryo of hope into this world overtaken by death and darkness.

Truthfully, apart from the art and somewhat slowish pace, it was not as memorable as I thought. Nonetheless, still a great post "Ghost in the Shell" work.

I love it, I'm annoyed by it, I can't stop reading, I get bored of it.
Blame is a cyberpunk manga that relies heavily on its visuals and detailed environments and not on dialogue, text, or facial expressions. The places and creatures are very beautiful but it's frustrating to not know what's going on.
Either way, I think blame is worth the time to check out.
Other details:

First and still the best Nihei's manga. Blame! depicts a seemingly endless journey of Killy. But who is this Killy and what is the purpose of his travel? Does the author knows?

A border between cyberpunk and biopunk isn't clear. And right from the beginning some explanation may come in handy, Blame is cyber/biopunk in its pure form or it's close to that form. Before reading Blame! try to forget the modern (and wrong) "feel" of cyber/biopunk presented by various creators mostly of American nationality (you definitely know what exactly I am talking about). Cyberpunk is supposed to be confusing, ambiguous, somewhat inconclusive, with morally questionable protagonist. Nihei got every single damn thing right.

What's more expect great almost soundless atmosphere accompanied by excellent drawings. If possible I would like to take a little trip to the Megastructure.

And please, let Oshii Mamoru direct some movie adaptation of Blame!. Nihei plus Oshii would be the best possible combination. Come on, we're waiting for something like that to happen for years now!

... Last updated on October 15th, 2012, 4:20am