first manga i've read entirely after FMA. dwarves fullmetal on art, background and characters (close tie on the characters, Kaneda is just as badass as Ed) loses on storyline.

i like Otomo's work, because his graphic content is unrivaled (well, unless you take the heavy artillery, like Jiro Matsumoto, Kentaro Miura, Tsutomu Nihei, Masamune Shirow, Hiroki Endo and Hayashida Q)

it's a turntable in the graphical works, with european incluences and techniques, like Mother Sarah does.

highly endorsed, especially since it's now a classic manga.

only background and design artwork is best!!

story is very good...

I would give 10/10, why it's best manga in '80 years

I love Akira and strongly recommend it to anyone with any interest in sci-fi.
The characters aren't initially likable, but things quickly pick up and you begin to see that the children are a product of their environment. Otomo's ability to give such a large cast of characters distinct personalities is impressive.

The start just as the rest of the story is very slow paced. As someone said before me I couldn't identify with any of the characters. They're pretty dull and it's almost coincidental how everything "went well" (with that I mean the world didn't blow up completely/become inhabitable)

The main flaw I see is the story itself I just don't see how the main cast influenced the story. As I see it if any random guy had obtained the powers there would be almost no difference in the results. I get that the political aspect really resonated with Japan at the time, but the characters and story are very lacking. It feels like an indiana jones film, even though he takes part in the action ,his absence would lead to almost the same results,making the message the story gives meaningless. It's as if a natural disaster happened and then you used that to give a weird nationalist political message.

I can only praise the art, even though the faces really creep me out and the body proportions are a bit weird (legs occupy a portion of the abdomen or viceversa in most characters and they use other weird proportions,such as changing: shoulder width, arm length... to give the sensation of heterogeneity between the characters).

The art is beautiful, but not really my tastes, but the story is nice. I didn't really get too pulled into this manga, but a good read nonetheless. I'm still giving it a high score though because...it just feels like it deserves it. I don't know, I'm not too exact on my rating system but I know what I like Anyways, read it.

... Last updated on November 26th, 2006, 5:27am

With today's flood of mangas (especially on the scanlation scene) the story's greatness may have lost some shine. However I think it's one of those works that need to be read at least once.

Simply great! Like the friggin holy bible of Manga!
The drawing is excellent and for a change not everything's black and white ( in terms of character personality and view of the world )
The plot jus rocks the world and the ending oh that ending...

... Last updated on March 27th, 2007, 4:09pm

Stupid juvenile delinquents make a big mess fighting obviously villainous government stooges--not my idea of a story I want to pursue. After reading the first chapter of this thing, there is NO-ONE I can like or identify with. No matter how good the drawing is, or the reputation of the piece either, a story can't work with such a gaping lack at its beginning.

I understand, of course, that some or all of the motorcycle kids are supposed to be the characters we like -- but I'm too old to even be able to stand them and their posturing, let alone like any of them. I honestly think that lots of grown-ups younger than me would have the same problem; so for that minority of you who are in the grown-up age group, be warned.

IMHO, this manga doesn't really deserve to be seinen.

... Last updated on May 6th, 2014, 1:54pm