Ranked #994

Gon (Manga)

"What I set out to do with Gon was to draw something that was more interesting than anything you could say in words. Manga still has great potential that does not exist in other media. I plan to continue developing the art of expression." - Masashi Tanaka

Gon follows the daily adventures of a little dinosaur with attitude (with the same name as the title), who was able to survive the catastrophic extinction that wiped out all of the other dinosaurs many years ago. This manga is one in a million, seeing as how it has absolutely no dialogue, no human characters, and is set entirely in the wild, millions of years ago. The story is told entirely through the art, which is possibly the greatest challenge for a manga artist, seeing as how they are unable to rely on dialogue to advance the story or to convey drama, emotions or character motivation. Masashi Tanaka succeeds in doing just this and more, however, which has earned him recognition as a storytelling genius.

The lack of words in Gon is made up entirely in the art. The amount of effort Masashi Tanaka puts into his art is clear at one glace. Every panel is extremely detailed, bursting with life and full of realism. Gon displays the very best art in any manga I have personally come across. Perhaps only rivaled by the likes of Takehiko Inoue and Kentarou Miura, Masashi Tanaka's art is unbeaten.

The only characters that appear in this manga are Gon and a wide variety of animals. Gon appears in every chapter, but most of the animals are not recurring characters. Given its setting, however, its best that this particular manga only has one main character. Gon is the last of his kind after all, which is brilliantly portrayed in the series. Gon himself is surprisingly well developed and he was also quite an iconic character back in the day, even appearing in Tekken 3.

Though it might not seem it at first glance - Gon is a masterpiece. It's heartwarming, silent, storytelling, greatly detailed art and surface simplicity that hides the true complexity of it's execution are all proof of this. Gon, once experienced, is definitely a series you won't forget in a long time. read more

Not meant for people my age, I presume.

But Gon's a highly enjoyable manga, Gon itself is a strong, fierce, smart and yet sometimes stupid dinosaur. He has a big attitude and he travels through forests, jungle's, rivers and plenty more various scenery's.

The art of Gon is the first thing I noticed, very realistic, and with very I mean, very very very realistic. Most animals are just as they are in real life, sometimes even better (? lol). Even Gon looks like what a ...dinosaur would've looked like if it existed.

Furthermore the story's, these are just basic little adventures that Gon goes through, these are exciting, humorous, dangerous and highly enjoyable, doesn't matter what age or race, you'll enjoy it. Gon himself, and other various creatures are really cool too, Gon is like most of our heroes, stubborn, thickheaded, and amazingly strong, the other creatures are like they supposed to be. read more