Blue Lock

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If you were to compile Ego's words into a book, slap a penguin black classics cover onto it with a picture of a jacked Greek statue and titled it 'On Ego' by Jinpacheus, it would be studied and had theses written on it for millennia. Egotism would no longer be a negative attribute, but rather a revered philosophical school of thought.

Its a shame that this manga will never get the recognition it deserves for its revolutionary ideas because its trapped in the genre of 'shonen'. Blue Lock isn't about a new attitude towards football, nor is it a new attitude towards sport, it is an ... attitude that can be applied to the way we live our lives as a whole.

The reason why I'm making this review is because I love this manga and I don't want people to go through what I did, so read this attentively.

First, I would like to say that this manga is not for "anime-manga nerds" only. I know plenty of people who like football and/or play football (and I don't mean with their friends, I mean fr), who like this manga, as much as people who don't. I think the issue is that many people took what Ego said too literally and weren't bothered to see how what the manga would progress, so they missed out on what the ... manga can actually offer. So please, give it a chance if you want to read it and don't stop just because of the first few chapters.

With this out of the way, I'd like to start talking now about the manga itself rather than the "drama"/claims that people make by only reading the start. Why's this manga good? The manga presents itself pretty well and the football matches are crazy good. It makes us readers feel like we are supporting a team and cheering on them. The first arcs are very interesting and different, the players clearly weren't ready for what came to them and it's cool to see how strategies and emotions they're going through. You feel the stakes and, honestly, even though some plays might be crazy, the manga can be pretty grounded.

The art is also a big complementary role to that and honestly it makes the goals pretty badass. I will talk about this later, as it'll become important, but as of now it's all happiness. The characters are also super enjoyable and honestly they're very diverse, I'm sure most people can find at least one character they like. What's neat is that they also don't feel closed in a box, even though some are stereotypes or have super defining characteristics, they're not limited by that and go through pretty good development.

I'd say that until around half of the manga, this was truly a 10. Maybe a bit over the half, I don't recall 100% which chapter specifically I started feeling like this manga was going downhill, but the arc that is around the middle of when I'm currently reviewing (ch. 150 should be around the middle) was probably one of the best things I've ever seen.

Now, the arc after the aforementioned one is the sole reason why my grade got this low and I love-hate the manga.

The first reason why I'd say it ruins the manga is the pacing. Even though the other arcs were shorter, they felt greatly paced and it was as if they had the perfect amount of seasoning. This one arc has basically the same amount of chapters as all of the other ones together. It's crazy how slow the pacing is and it's so bothersome. Every day I was wishing it would end.

The second reason I'd say this manga gets super bad is because the "weapons" (which is a concept of what the player excels at, explained at the very start) become crazy, it just doesn't become like Inazuma Eleven because it doesn't want to. It took out everything that was good on the matches, like the emotions, threats and stakes, and lost it.

The last reason is the art. The manga stopped flowing through matches properly and every chapter the author tries to make an "aura farming phonk edit" art on the very last page, so tiktok and youtube shorts kids and editors go full dopamine mode. It becomes obnoxious. That is not to say that there aren't moments deserving of it, it's just that every chapter is not worth of having a badass art.

Edgy, but with no substance.
Blue Lock makes me feel like I'm watching a middle school play full of band kids who all think they're Light Yagami.

Everything from the eyes, the expressions and the corny lines spewed from these walking stereotypes are the agglomeration of aspects and elements someone who has read 2 Shonen manga think manga as a whole is.

Characters are stupid, the art style is alright, the story is predictable and the dialog is eye-rolling bad.

This is barely a sports manga, it's slop material for bad phonk TikTok edits aimed at 13 year olds with a main character complex.