Ranked #47

Shin Angyo Onshi (Manhwa)

Shin Angyo Onshi is a Seinen, Historical, Supernatural, Action, Adventure manhwa that takes a piece of Korean history and turns it into a superb journey for the characters and the readers to experience.

The story follows the adventures of Munsu, an Angyo Onshi, who were special envoys of the king of Jushin. However Jushin is all but destroyed, leaving Munsu on his journey to continue his duty of ridding corruption and bringing about his own form of justice. That’s the setting of this epic Korean manga and sure, in the beginning, there’s a very episodic nature to Munsu’s travelling that frequently pays homage to some of the great classic Korean literature. Yet as the story progresses and the number of involving characters increases, it becomes clear that Munsu’s travelling has a purpose.

Munsu is an interesting main character, who’s portrayed as an anti-hero with some very questionable methods to fulfilling his goal. Munsu isn’t overwhelmingly powerful or reliant on special power ups (unless you include his Mahai) but rather he is incredibly cunning and skilled in combat. He’s fairly complicated and can come across as cruel or ruthless, when it comes to deceiving people. However he is still entertaining and fun to read, depending on the situation. Later on he is joined by other characters (Chun Hyang & Bang Ja), allowing either the dialogue or the overall journey to become far more interesting than it already is. Not to forget the vast amount of remarkable characters that appears throughout the story; each with their own tale, purpose or goal.

The artwork can be described in one word “breathtaking”. Personally I think the artwork is the best aspect of this manga, with an immense amount of detail put into each panel. The environments are superbly drawn with no corners cut whatsoever and the character designs range from realistically defined features, to some very imaginative appearances.

Overall Shin Angyo Onshi is an epic manhwa, following the lengthy journey of some great characters. It’s able to portray some of the cruel ugliness of the corrupt world in such a manner that will get any reader to think. However the story is fairly incoherent and certain aspects of the story can be difficult to comprehend. The same goes for the extravagant fight scenes. Being such a mature, gory and gritty story I can only recommend this to fans of similar mature manga.

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Shin Angyo Onshi is a great manwha.
It took me a while to find this manwha. It is not the typical popular manga that will just pop out and attract your attention. I saw it in the top and give it a try. I remember reading the begining of this manwha, a couple of years ago but it was still in translation and in that time there was only a couple of chapters. Now that I can get a hold to all the chapters (with the extra pages in the forum).

Shin Angyo is about a long adventure of a our hero, Munsu. He is similar and at the same time very diferent from other main characters in other mangas. His past is full of glory, sadness, illusion and love. His mission is to bring "justice" to the land and to eventually end up fighting with his enemy, Aji Tae who destroyed everything he had fight for.

However, the word justice and the difference between right and wrong is one of the themes that keep me engage reading chapter after chapter till the end. Two different aspect of justice battle against each other. I personally like the ideology of Aji Tae but Munsu's ideology is the one that can set peace and order in a chaotic word.

The characters are something I really end up loving. Good or bad, everyone represent a twisted side of this word. Good people turning into bad, bad turning into good. I know that in many mangas, bad people sometimes turns out to be good ones but in this manga, it really fits the story and ideology behind it. "No matter how bad someone is, the truth never changes."
I really enjoyed reading this manwha. The art was pritty outstanding. I loved the way the story is told: the story of General Munsu.

I will always remember Munsu ideology with the words, "However much it is soiled by the earth, snow is still white." read more

Story: 5

Manwha are famous (or even infamous) for their action / adventure stories, which are most of the times about some imba warrior on a quest to find something or kill someone. You think this is any different? Heck no, it’s once again about a strong guy on a quest to avenge another strong guy. That’s it, plain and simple. The story is made up of 22 story arcs, most of which are defined by two characteristics. First, they don’t last much and second they are fillers. Yeah, as if the actual scenario wasn’t simple enough, more than half of it is plain aimless. So as far as story goes, don’t expect much. Side stories are pretty weak and most problems are resolved too conveniently. The main character has a hill of broken powers in his arsenal to choose how to beat the monster of the chapter. Handguns don’t work? Summon the demon army. Demon army does not work? Call in the half naked chick and her huge sword. That doesn’t work? Well, just pull something out of your ass.

Characters: 7

If there are two elements that save this from complete mediocrity, those would be the political incorrect characters and the strong ending. For you see all characters in the story are pretty much sons of bitches who have performed the most atrocious acts. Main characters included. They are all a bunch of selfish, self-centered, horny, violent, self-destructive misfits who have no chance to live in a peaceful world. Well, thank goodness they aren’t as the setting of the story is a world ruled by monsters, anarchy and lots of insanity. In fact it’s all the petty emotions and desires of Man that generate most problems, so at least there is SOME realism present. It’s not a fairy tale land invaded by bad monsters where a noble hero sets forth to save the day. Nope, it’s bastards versus bastards all the way and the story never misses the chance to make fun of ideals. None of them will be that memorable or original to you or not many of them actually develop throughout the story. Well, there is lots of that in the ending but it’s way too rushed to feel right.

Art: 10

As you can imagine, there is a ton of blood, gore and death present in this work, which definitely provides lots of shock effect and crazed up situations where people must fight to the death. All of which is not dragged out to last dozens of chapters and challenge your patience. It’s all fast, direct and bloody awesome as far as action goes.
The artwork is frakking eye popping and gets a perfect mark without any doubt. You rarely find such emotion and movement present, with easily defined choreography, beautiful or nightmarish sceneries and ultra sexy men and gals. It all still feels generic to the most part but for such sort of a story, I must say it rocks the world. Hard!

Enjoyment and Overall: 7

Although I am pretty much fed up with simple stories and brain dead action, I still got to enjoy this one to the most part. Despite its generic scenario and cast, it still manages to keep you interested thanks to its superb artwork and fast pacing. Just don’t try to reason it too much or you’ll end up hating it. It’s true that everything happens in convenient ways and it’s just cheap shock effect that makes it feel like it’s more than that. Which it ain’t. read more

My first review about a manga, and in fact, rather about a manhwa. In my opinion, a very well drawn and written one.

This was pretty much my first real look into some korean history. I'm not very much into history or literature though so I may be the wrong person to say how wonderful it was, but I still enjoyed it.

The story revolves around a wandering Angyo Onshi, called Munsu, roaming the lands to execute his own justice, after his homeland, Jushin, was destroyed.
At the start, the story picks up several korean tales, bringing korean culture nearer to the reader and later starts to get deeper into the real story, building it up steadily to a nice climax and calming end.

The art changes throughout the work from rough to soft. In other words, at the beginning the art was not as good as later on, but still good. Speaking from where the art was nearly perfect, it could be considered one of the main reasons I actually read it. It is detailed, beautiful and still can be called realistic, with some exceptions.

Munsu, a main character which is not your average hero from your average fairy tales, but could rather be considered an "anti-hero", who acts not always like you probably wish he would, but you can't help but like him. At least that would be my experience. I think Munsu is a character you have only two, and I repeat myself here, only two options. Either you like him or you hate him.
Every main character though, is destined to encounter several companions throughout the series, mostly two. Which are in this case, a strong girl called Chun Hyang or nicknamed Sando and the loyal Bang Ja. Both, having their individual past stories, join Munsu on his journey and make the group complete. They will encounter several other interesting characters who all have their own role to fulfill. If those characters are good or bad may actually lay in each persons judgement. Personally, I often thought a character was the worst and later came to understand their reasons better and end up not hating him/her.
Munsu actually was one of those, but no matter what he did, I couldn't start disliking him. Staying strong to his believes is a main trait of Munsu and is very remarkable.

When I read a manga, if don't feel like simply reading it, I enjoyed it the most. Shin Angyo Onshi was one of those. I laughed, cried, was angry at times or felt sorry. It was exciting and entertaining, almost breathtaking. May it be about the brutality or the beauty. While I tend to not understand history or literature related elements very well, I still enjoyed the work in it's enterity.

It was a great read. A work that teaches you many things. To stay strong to my believes isn't what I learned in this piece, but it encouraged me to stay true to this, no matter what difficulty I may face. read more