While it is told non-chronologically, it's actually not that confusing. Gotta get that out of the way first as it's a big scare for stories of this kind. While there are events that are basically taking place in the future near the start of the story, and some that take place in the past, these serve more as character introductions. If you're planning on reading it just keep things flexible and don't try to look for ties between chapters until the end of the first arc or you will get confused. Things will make sense as you go along.

As for what kind of story it is, from the first chapter I find it to be something of a mix between "To Your Eternity" and "Fire Punch". It's not as emotional as the former but also nowhere near as bleak as the latter. Death will happen to a lot of characters and while it's not going to be as cheap as FP's deaths, they're also not quite as hard hitting as TYE's. This isn't to say that the story rips the other two off, it's just the general feeling I got from them.

An 8 from me up until chapter 14. Really want to see where it goes though I'm a bit worried about how far you can take the concept of the "Albino" monsters as it is right now. Though the reveal of their origin was pretty dark, the reveal of what they actually are was rather meh. Either way, we'll see how it goes.

I actually really enjoy this story so far, but as noted, it's a) non-chronological and b) follows different people all wearing the same name, so it's EXTREMELY confusing.

So yeah, after a few chapters in, (9 for now) i'm indefinitely delaying this. I can be sure that in like... 2 years or whatever, I will marathon this, and it will all come together, and it will be one of my favorite manga of all time... but not now. Now it's too much.

Frankly, props to the Japanese public who OK'd this mess consistently long enough for it to be fully published. I've heard many times over the years on how brutal those magazines can get about axing things on very short notice, if their popularity isn't high enough, so the fact this survived for 10 volumes impresses me.

Will come back, 100%. But it must be finished first!

There's an overarching conflict about Humanity against the "White Skin" creatures, and one the most prominent figures leading it is a heroic figure best known as "Ryuma". The story basically follows a bunch of people at different points in time who impersonated this historic figure, and each in their own way gave hope for humanity to continue fighting.

This is a story told in non-chronological order about the various people who took on the name / title of of Ryuuma. As of chapter 7, most chapters seem to have few connections with one another; I can't say how that will change. In any case, this makes for a rather confused reading experience.

So for now, if you want to read a story that does non-chronological storytelling well, I think 20th Century Boys is a superior choice.

... Last updated on February 8th, 2016, 10:34am