Jul 24, 2025
TL;DR: An incredibly good, tight piece of cyberpunk fiction that I would recommend to anyone. Top-tier dialouge and characterization for its main leads, and very natural and well-paced worldbuilding. Also, do not watch the anime version lmao.
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[This review will avoid explaining anything about its story or premise, so dont worry about spoilers]
Your Forma is incredibly good manga. From the first chapter, it will naturally blend and flow, showing off its cyberpunk worldbuiliding and premises pretty effortlessly. The series makes an active effort to have all the world building always come up in a natural capacity from scene to scene, as Hieda and Harold work together
...
solving there case.
What makes this manga such a high score for me is its two main leads. Every single chapter for the tight 16 chapter duration of the series is incredibly well done, especially so in regards to dialogue. Each conversation serves to deepen the characterization into how they think, there ethics, there stories, the world and there relationships. And your insight into them litterally grows every single chapter of its 16 chapter run, making it a engrossing read.
Your Forma explores a lot of different facets of the human experience, our senses, ethics in technology, the difference of man/machine and a lot more. Its not going to necessarily have mindblowingly new things to say about all of these things, but it ties it all together so well within its neat 3 volume run, I cant help but say its a must-read for science fiction fans.
The art is also quite great, and maintains a rather brooding atmosphere while not being overbearing with it. Harold brings a lot of lighthearted expressiveness that also balances out the rather stoic vibe hieda brings to scenes, and this is reflected in how they are drawn. When Hieda is leading the conversation, the art and expressions are rather grim, wheras when Harold can get under her skin and joke around, characters can have more expressive, animesque art. Its a nice dichotomy of the two leads thats subliminally hammered in through the characters expressions and art.
I also love the way the art handles Hieda diving into memories. Its all very readable while still being abstracted. Overall, the art is excellent in this manga.
Essentially, I would say this is a incredibly overrlooked manga I would recommend anyone read. 10/10.
P.S: On the anime adaptation..... it doesnt actually start from the beginning of the story. This manga does. The anime seemingly starts adapting from like the middle of the source light novels (not sure what actual volume / chapter) and its incredibly baffling because your missing all the worldbuiliding, lore, characterization and character relationship dynamics that actually make the plot make sense. If you want to watch the anime.... at least make sure you have read this manga first.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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