Manga Review | Azumi
After completing one of the longest running manga series (Naruto) I started feeling some kind of emptiness. Maybe it’s similar to a childhood friend leaving and not knowing if you’ll ever see them again; who knows, all I knew is that I needed was some sort of a buffer. A manga that I can pick up and read that would help me cope with the coming weeks without it. As such I sort out to ask for some suggestions from a few anime/manga social groups that I belong too. One of which (Trinbago Anime lovers) I got the suggestion to try Azumi.
Ok I will admit that at first I didn’t like the art style or the era that the manga is set in. It all seemed so vintage, and not one of the romantic ones. i.e.: steam punk style.
However one thing that I’ve learned from reading manga like One Piece is to not judge the quality of a manga by the art style. As I’ve found it’s better to have a wonderful engaging plot with not so appealing art than the other way around, and to be honest the art style grew on me the more I read.
The story of Azumi starts with a young woman who is brought up to be an assassin. She, an orphan was taken in by an old man who she refers to as grandpa along with 9 orphan boys. The story see Azumi develop from a young playful, but deadly girl into a beautiful unmatched kunoichi. It carries a serious tone to it with the few moments of humour very short lived. Set in a fictional feudal Japan it is to be expected that the story would be a serious one, but this story goes the extra mile to give that authentic feeling. It’s a story of growth, and loss in the most realistic style. She, Azumi is thought the meaning of loss at a young age and in the most painful way possible. As she and her fellow Assassins that were raised like brothers and sister were told to pick their favourite person among themselves and then to kill that person in a duel. Thus only five of them remained. The five that live would be charged with carrying out secret assassination missions that as they were told, would end all wars. The progression of the story from that point is just amazing and so I’ll be very vague as to what happens next so as not to spoil it for any wishing to read it themselves. It introduces some interesting character. None of whom I’d actually call a villain, but rather people, people that fit in the grey category with no one actually being truly evil in the traditional sense. By writing the story in this way the author was able to create a much more believable plot. Every character including Azumi and her family of assassins live in an isolated part of the world and as such they are unable to truly understand each other as we the readers will. This also helped me as a reader to emote more too each and every character, and also to move along with that pain as Azumi does.
Azumi is a manga that I would recommend to anyone that likes great stories, like One Piece. It is the kind of manga that takes you in and submerges you into a world that you can believe in. one that you can emote to each character in some way or the other. Those that are into art and action like Bleach may become bored before the 3rd chapter, but if you stick it out you may find that the story grows on you, and there are some pretty amazing sword duels for you to gawk at too. It should also be noted that this story is rated 18+ because there are a few pages with nudity, men and women shagging and plain blatant killing of the rawest kind. As such I’d expect that only the most mature of our readers will be interested in giving this one a try.
The story so far (yes it’s on-going) is amazing and I eagerly await the release of the next chapter of this weekly release, so I’m gonna slot it in as my new Naruto and enjoy the ride. Maybe you should too. 😉
