Team play, heroic play, strategy play, climax after climax, nice drawing style, postive & clean. Nice shounen sports manga, filed under the "Giant Killing" subcategory. The balance between tension & fun is good.

... Last updated on November 6th, 2010, 5:41am

I don't know if it's realistic in its depiction of AF, I don't care - though I'm definately more interested in watching real football since having read ES21.

But a standard sports manga? I've only read Captain Tsubasa and a few Adachi's, but this was far from. It focused a lot more on the characters than the former, and a lot more on exciting battles [matches] than the latter, which made for an extremely entertaining read.

The stuff I enjoyed the most is the standard-shounen "Will trumphs all" that the japanese are so fond of (and are actually one of the few personality-traits of that country I thoroughly like). Thing is, its execution was extremely well-written. Hopes, ambitions, dreams, the desire to stand at the top - things that any self-respecting male has. The Devil Bats had them, but they were not alone. The opposing teams had them too, and whichever team's dreams were crushed, I felt it, both in the emotional script and the vibrant drawings. I usually prefer if a manga's author and artist are the same, but these were on the same page throughout.

Proper Bromance. Hopes, ambitions, dreams and desire to stand at the top are always more entertaining and Beautiful than "S/he loves me, s/he loves me not."

As a side-note, ES21 contained some of the more entertaining, albeit clichéd, characters I've seen. Again, it's not about originality, it's about EXECUTION.

I hate when people give out tens to everything. But for me, this was perfect. Maybe I will change my mind after reading more sports - I know more experience led me to conclude that Devil & Devil was not quite as good as I had remembered- but for now, for me, this is the ultimate sports-manga. One I enjoyed non-stop from beginning to end in more ways than two.

P.s. It was really fucking funny.

... Last updated on November 5th, 2010, 12:59am

If you've ever read a sports manga, you know pretty much what you're going to get here. There will be silly named special moves, every character will have. People challenging each other, its all about spirit, yadda, yadda, yadda. This is par for the course. It has all the silly little special moves, Rodeo Drive made me laugh too hard. Like most sports mangas, it focuses a little too much on the actual game, spending volumes on a single game. Eventually, I didn't bother to read them, just skipped to the next volume to see if the game was still going. Just watching the start and finish of the games. Doing so, I didn't feel like I had missed a single thing. Thats the weakness of the typical sports manga, a weakness this one has in spades. The first 100 - 150 chapters were good, after that it just went on too long.

The another problem I had with this, was how wrong the football references were, how poorly they played, how the author apparently misunderstood some of the basic concepts of the game. It is not a mano e mano place where you beat your opponent. Every single play you have a chance to beat your opponent, and he has a chance to beat you. That was missing from the manga. There were no shifting coverages, no real adjustments in blocking, or if there were, it was far from obvious. And finally there was not a single penalty I remember being called. I've never seen a single game without an offsides, or a holding call.

To sum up, its a good manga, with a lot of humor, but it dragged on way, way too long.

Great series but crappy final arc.

It's as good as all other Jump sport manga. Very entertaining, a lot of humor and non-stop game action and I gave it a credit as the first decent American Football manga. But it has a same problem as all other popular sport: the longer it drag, the worse and unrealistic it is. This is my calculation for all sport manga:
About 100 chapters: awesome - ~200 chapters: it's fine and a bit unrealistic - ~300 bad and ridiculous.
It sometimes is quite racist but I don't mind. Anyway, it's an interesting sport manga even if you know American football or not.

... Last updated on January 26th, 2010, 9:31pm

Great manga. Typical shounen where there is a weak main character that gradually becomes stronger and finds himself. But the plot and storyline of the story is great. I really wish the manga would have continued on, the ending was good, but it wasn't great - but it was still satisfactory, as you feel like it still is completed. I highly suggest this read - probably going down on your top favorite manga. I don't think I've ever read any other American Football manga, so this is probably the first. This is also my favorite sports manga I have ever read so far!

This was a great manga. It has themes of pride and racism so be prepared. If your a fan of comedies and football you will love this manga. It has a wide variety of characters with thier own personalities you will love and hate. There is alot of overexageration which some might find annnoying but it adds to the humor. A great manga with many twist and it's funny.

This was an amazing read. Even now i still go back just for the nostalgia of it. Just as a warning though, in the beginnning it was partially realistic (with added effects), but after a while it got to be super flashy and colorful. but its not like i started to like it.

There is a huge amount of characters and surprisingly, all of them have their own background and personality even with the people on opposing teams. Although threre is still a few things that i wanted to know about the end it is something every single person in the world who knows about manga should read.

Was it realistic? Absolutely not. Its more realistic than PoT but your insane if you thought you would find a realistic sports manga. If you want to read or watch football thats what the NFL is for.

That said, this is one of my all-time favorite mangas. I like underdog stories, and I really hope they do a sequel with Enma University.

But if i had to come up with one thing i hated about the series it would be the way they portray Americans. I don't know what's up with the author but he likes to make Americans cocky and racist as shit. Not saying there arent a few people like that somewhere, but he takes it over the top. They make it seem like Panther only has his skills cause hes black too.

It ws awesome until the last arc.
Is it just me or is this the last arc really racist? The stereotypes are crude and really exaggerated. You can't even laugh about it.
Personally, the last arc left a really bad impression. My suggestion would be to stop reading before the last arc.
The rest is brilliant!

... Last updated on July 16th, 2009, 12:52am