BLAME! 1

I 100% disagree with the following "critical" review... ""The amazing thing about BLAME! is that it's such a good read even though it has almost no story or characters. It's all about the art and the experience of being there, of not knowing what will happen next, of the contrast between landscapes of endless sameness and bloody eruptions of chaos and gore." - Jason Thompson, Manga Encyclopedia " wrong, wrong wrong... no. this is a story told through visual media. There is very little dialog, but it is RICH in story and characters. Kiri is unbelievably memorable. He has a history, a goal that is clear, a personality, and an obvious method to which he will stop at nothing to accomplish what he set out to do. There is mystery, adventure, romance (yes, romance), and a moral tale... The most amazing thing about this series is the scope of time and space that it involves... SPOILERS If you pay close attention, you will realize that the setting is a "city" that is really a dyson sphere from a type 2 civilization that has harnessed the complete energy output of our sun. This is made clear in a number of ways but most obviously in an an encounter between Kiri and one of the synthetics (the watcher/observer) who makes a comment about how they are visually watching a settlement of humans at a distance equal to the distance 88,000 ,miles (and all INSIDE a single room within the city). The city itself is implied to stretch from the lowest level (the level facing the sun) all the way out to the Ort Cloud (thousands of AU from the sun...). It is MIND BLOWING. The story is primarily told through a visual lens with only the occasional dialogue to drop major pieces of information. It is subtle and intentional story telling (and Jason misses the mark so bad I question how they ever became a "critic"). If you love story telling, pondering the nature of everything, imaging the vastness of space and time (as the adventure of Kiri spans hundreds of thousands of years)... than this is a MUST HAVE manga. The art is amazing, the story is incredible, the characters are so memorable you will not forget their names... it is a master work of true science fiction and worth your time. 100% recommend... 100% disagree with Jason's take... shame... he got paid for that...

I am not a huge manga fan (is this manga? That's how much I know, lol) I used to collect Lone wolf and cub comics way back in the day and thought them amazing. These comics were recommended to me by a friend for it's deep cyberpunk themes and epic settings. I'm about three chapters in and I am struggling with my feelings on this book. Are the settings epic? Most definitely! The author has an architecture drafting background and you can really tell. The setting of some kind of massively expansive automated world/ecosystem are very well drawn. The scale is great! Are the ideas novel? So far, I would say yes. The characters are interesting, and from what's been revealed so far the story is intriguing. Without too much given away, there seems to me a time when humans had a gene that allowed them to communicate with a computer system, but due to a mutation that ability has been lost. Again, I'm only into the third chapter, so more has yet to be revealed. Here's where I take a star off, and it's going to play my hand with what a western novice I am. I don't like the flipped format of these manga comics. I am used to reading the left page first, top left to bottom right, then the right page second in the same way. I keep getting tripped up with the sequencing, but I'm getting more and more used to it. My only real quibbles would perhaps be the paper and it's quality. I feel that something with this amount of detail and scale deserves a really quality bright white paper and possibly even a slightly larger format. The format IS large, and the quality of the paper is normal, I just think the scale and detail of some of the drawings warrant a slightly larger format. But I am pleased with how large this is, and again, the paper is quality. I am betting that the paper and print quality is what keeps the price down, though. So it's understandable. My second small quibble is that sometimes the action scenes get a little busy and it's hard to understand what's going on. It's a small thing, and I need to reiterate just how well this comic IS drawn. The epic scale, the look of the differing types of people and whatnot ... visually, it's very interesting. With all that being said, I would recommend this book. The characters are revealing themselves, the setting is being developed, and the story line intrigues me. I'm excited to see where this leads to. I would recommend this book to any cyberpunk or sci fi fan for the images alone. Just a cool book, overall! UPDATE Finished the first book, and I'm about to purchase the next two. It's an interesting story with lots to look at, and for the price, it's kind of a no brainer! I'd fully recommend.

So this journey began with me watching the movie on Netflix. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and decided that I wanted to explore the source material. From watching reviews of the movie, I learned that it's story was compiled from different arcs in the comic, so that had me even more interested in seeing how things were orginally structured. The first thing I noticed about Tsutomu Nihei's first story is that it's told through imagery; most of the time things are left up through the reader to try and piece together. Sometimes the reader can't put the pieces together. You're left with questions while working you're way through the story, but their good questions. For me it added to the mysticism of the world. Without trying to give away too much of the first volume, I quickly realized that this world is unforgiving and that one false move will lead people in this world to a quick demise. There is a huge sense of despair and hopelessness in this world, but with a hint of perserverance, tenacity, and unconquerable will that comes from the main character, Kyrii (aka Killy). I loved the rough grittiness of the artwork. The reader is presented with unique character designs that helps give this world a sort of fantasy-cyberpunk feel. But the real star of the artwork in the panels is the architectual design of everything. The expanding "city" that this world takes place in is amazingly detailed and drawn with given a real sense of grandness. At other times it's also presented in a way that portrays a claustrophobic feeling. It's just a despairingly beautiful world, if that makes sense. If you're hesitant about jumping from the movie to the books, then don't be. With a sequel already announced, reading the series should help you appreciate everything more. BLAME! is a gold mine for those who are clamouring for more cyberpunk in their world.

The environments in the manga showcasing these massive towering buildings and structures are the true star. With a minimal story every panel is rich with amazing art. There is colored panel in the middle that looked incredible. Only con is that the print of the pages stains your fingers like a newspaper and the spine was crinkled and some mild creases but overall in good shape.

The story follows protagonist Kyrii, in search of something called the net terminal gene. The story at this point is somewhat episodic, in a way. Kyrii will encounter different people, groups and factions as he wanders through the ruins of a vast planet sized city structure. The story definitely has me curious and the incredible art direction and designs are truly unique, mixing cyberpunk, brutalist architecture and rad bIomechanical creature designs.

Fire

The book has very large pages, about double the size of your average shonen jump release. Despite its size, it's a paperback, making it rather flimsy which hurts the reading experience(albeit only a slight amount). The art is amazing, and the added page size reveals the deep intricacies of each panel. Blame! has little dialogue, instead opting for beautifully drawn expansive scenery. It's an adventure through a futuristic dystopia where much is left up to the reader's interpretation. I think that may be my favorite part about Blame!, you can read it many times over and still feel like you're seeing something new. Would Recommend.

I love the art style, and I find the whole thing intriguing, but it could really use a wee bit more dialogue or some basic information. I'll see what the next volume holds I suppose.