r/graphicnovels • u/Locohenry • 1d ago
Manga My review of Dororo
I've always had trouble getting into manga, but a friend gave me this collected edition of Dororo and I'd recently watched Matttt's video about Carl Barks, in which he speaks about his influence on Tezuka, so I figured that was a good way in for me since I've been reading a lot of Barks lately. The premise is as follows: during Japan's Sengoku era, an ambitious samurai sacrifices his unborn son to 48 yokai in order to obtain political power, and so when the child is born, he is missing 48 body parts. The child is abandoned and is found by a charitable doctor, who equips him with prostheses as the child, Hyakkimaru, embarks on a quest to slay the 48 yokai and recover his body parts. During his quest he meets Dororo, a thief, who is also the titular character.
The first thing that comes to mind when I think about this series is the masterful use of black and white. Tezuka uses different kinds of crosshatching, puntillism and pattern designs to create contrasting textures that allow the reader's eyes to understand everything at a glance. This readability is also present in the characters and their actions, with clear movements and expressive faces. This made the reading experience super comfortable even for me, someone who's not used to reading comics from right to left.
However, as smooth and enjoyable as the reading experience was, the story itself left a lot to be desired. I mean that in a literal sense, as a reader you feel like the story never ended up fulfilling its narrative promise. The first few chapters present a premise of monster hunting, with each yokai being defeated within 1 to 3 chapters. These initial chapters in the first half of the series are great, they're engaging and a super enjoyable read. However, it's clear that the author lost motivation as the story went along, since the story suddenly shifts to a treasure hunt that also lacks a satisfying conclusion. By this point there are a handful of chapters left and it's clear that Tezuka was just doing by-the-numbers yokai tales that repeated a lot of the same beats as the initial portion of the series.
This all comes to a head in the ending, which is by far the worst part of the book. Tezuka explains in the epilogue that the magazine editorial had asked him to finish the story, and it shows, it's a just a race to the finish that doesn't offer any closure or narrative insight into the whole thing.
Weirdly enough, the art gets better as the story gets worse, and I think this is the first time I've seen this happen. Usually both story and art suffer when a creator loses motivation. Another interesting aspect of Dororo is its depiction of Sengoku-era Japan, which paints the whole samurai social class as the villains. This was the first time I'd seen this subject tackled like this and it made a lot of sense, and if anything, managed to condemn war throughout the entire series, this being the only consistent element that is there in the entire collection.
In the end, I enjoyed the art and graphic storytelling on display, but was disappointed with the overall direction of the entire collection. It's disappointing when a book shows promise at the start and then squanders it.
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u/Marksman1977 1d ago
That’s a shame. I was interested in this book.