that i really appreciate. i reccommend it to anyone who likes seinen.

if i had to describe it, I'd say it's a twisted (and gory) take on an underdog story.

i personally find these stories to be a huge cliche but this manga definitely takes the genre in a different direction.

Redeption? What are you talking about? I didn't see anything like that. Ryo is still going down. Where the hell did you stop reading?
And about "superpowers", I admit that part in China was meabe little off (stoping hearts, kung-fu-movies-like training) but still not impossible.

This had alot of potential in the beginning. I lost faith in the mangaka when he gave Ryo a path to redemption. I was excited... for one chapter. Then, the story degenerates into ridiculous superpower fights. So dumb.

It's pretty serious and violent. And I dunno if I've been reading too much yaoi or something, but it strikes me as REALLY GAY.

As I am one of the fairer sex, I feel like I should complain about the fact that all the female characters are sex objects except for this reporter chick who's kind of a cold, calculating bitch. But somehow it kind of works.

There's one last thing I'd like to point out -- almost every major character has hallucinations. I don't know if this is just a martial arts thing, but whenever they do something athletic, all of a sudden they're floating in galaxies, or talking to imaginary versions of people. I dunno, if this kind of crap happened to me while I was boxing, I'd probably just get KO'd right then and there.

... Last updated on January 9th, 2009, 1:38pm

Shamo was quite good in the beginning, but
it lost its touch when it went too supernatural with
all that levitation bullshit and stuff.

Read up to chapter 164, look at the last page - nice isn't it ? Memorize it cause you won't see it again. After that chapter the manga goes on a slippery slope (to quote the main (anti)hero),

8/10 till aforementioned chapter (deduct 4 after that)

one of the best i ever read
great story, no bullshiting and very realistic
plot is deep and can leave a big impresion on a kid who only knows the bright side of life
i recommend this series to everyone who likes a lot of violence in mangas
10/10

Meh, it had a fairly interesting start and wasn't too shabby at all. However, the story started to fizzle out along the way and it started to have endless fights: sorry but even many series with fighting scenes at least attempt to have some resemblance of plot/story.

After a while, I'd absolutely no idea what was going on anymore and dumped the manga.

This series started out with about being able to survive but now it is like a baki style martial arts manga. The story goes up and down. Is Ryo buff or weak? This is a confusing manga that doesn't seem like the story has a real goal.

People will never be completely satisfied. First people compain about stories being to unrealistic. Now they complain about a character that's too human.

Shamo does something that few manga have tried and even fewer have made remotely interesting; and that thing is displaying a realistic world portraying the ugly side of humanity. This manga isn't about growth or overcoming odds. If you want that, go pick up some generic shonen or Naruto (which is great in its own right ). There is "good guy" there is no "bad guy" only people. And that's what makes Shamo unique.



... Last updated on March 28th, 2008, 2:49pm