Rurouni Kenshin is an awesome story that started the late 90s trend of lovable goofs that turn out to be highly skilled legends.
The battles throughout were interesting. In my experience many action mangas have battles that are too long and drawn out. The fights in this manga were concise, made sense, and were entertaining. It was a much more fun read than when a manga will have a full ten chapters on one fight. Believe me, I read Samurai Deeper Kyo before this. I was expecting the same but was thankfully relieved. Rurouni Kenshin also balanced simultaneous fights very well, which I've seen is harder to do in manga. Separate battles were never too long that they became frustrating, in that perspectives switched between battles without staying on one for too long or jumping back and forth so frequently that both fights became boring.
But, if you're looking for realistic fighting, this is probably not for you as the battles are very shounen-esque in their fantasy elements. There are a lot of secret techniques and improbable moves. Like any non-realistic fighting manga the battles could get slightly silly in going a bid over the top, but Rurouni Kenshin by no means has 'Dragon Ball Z syndrome' in that the enemies don't have to ridiculously outmatch the one before them and not all battles are won with strength alone.
Transitioning from different arcs was a bit choppy in my opinion, as there was no be all end all plot at the beginning. But, this manga was not episodic or spontaneous, as many things were subtly hinted at earlier times. The end was also nicely wrapped up with an epilogue, so don't be worried about being left feeling like something was missing.
The art is certainly stylistically older, but it’s still very good in that it’s for the most part rather proportional and precise. I was a bit wary at first because many series with this late 90s style can turn out to be a nightmare, but this was the golden example of how to use it. You can tell what's going on in the fight scenes, you know what everything is supposed to be, and all the characters are distinguishable. I think the art also got more comfortable as the story progressed.
This manga brought some unique light touches of philosophy into it as well, not delving too psychologically deep into it but was certainly more thorough than typical shounen manga clichés. The struggles of the characters were taken seriously and explored to some extent throughout the whole story. Themes were definitely not soap opera like in that all emotional driven themes had a purpose and weren't used for cheap drama.
One element of Rurouni Kenshin that I found really disappointing was the way the lead female, Kaoru, was written. She is given strength and sword techniques, but rarely used them, and as the manga went on she was pushed back from a lead character to a support role. Though she has a disciple who she trains very well, and is shown to be very knowledgeable about swords and techniques, she has maybe two actual fights. Her personality also seems to just drastically change with no reason through the story. Though the lead, Kenshin, changes as well, for Kaoru there was hardly any character development behind it and almost felt like the author had changed his mind about her character entirely. It was so frustrating because she was given an assumption that her fighting in the battles was not even considered, even though her disciple, who was much less trained than her, often did. Even times when it seemed like it would be a perfect opportunity for her to take up a sword and defend herself, she didn't, and someone else bailed her out.
Despite my one character disappointment, the manga as a whole is good. It is interesting and has many character driven moments instead of being a cheap shounen that only progresses through kinda unnecessary fighting (Rurouni Kenshin by no means has less fighting though, it is a fighting manga don't get me wrong). All in all, it’s a good classic manga that inspired many others in the years following it, and I recommend checking it out.
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