Gokutei Higuma
Hell Warden Higuma

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This is/was a manga that did not deserve to get axed. Everything about it was enjoyable, especially the characters and the way the story was going, but alas, it will never reach it's full potential.

Gokutei Higuma is one of those manga that seems like it should've gone for awhile, not too long, perhaps a good 200 or so chapters. The story, while mostly in it's infantile form, was shaping up to be good, something people could get invested in, to watch as the backstories of the Villains, Protagonists, and Side Characters were all revealed and developed. Not to mention how fascinating the idea of Hell ... Wardens is within the context of the universe.

The action scenes are easy to follow, offering a clean, well polished artstyle, cute designs, wonderfully drawn backgrounds, and a cutesy-vibe that somehow fits the mood of the story very well. I especially love how the eyes and teeth are drawn. Very expressive!

The exploration of characters was nice, considering that the female lead, Ayaha, was more fleshed out than most Shounen Heroines, and was going to be a big contender for my all-time favourite characters. She actually had *powers* and could defend herself, wasn't tsundere despite her rancorous personality, and refusal to back down, and she really had a capable aura about her. This is a rarity, and in all honesty, it shouldn't be.

Ayaha is an incredible heroine in an industry that prefers their female characters defenseless, useless, and one-dimensionally in love with the main male lead. If I were to compare her to a character, it'd always be a Male Lead, as she embodies a lot of Shounen Hero Cliches in her character. She exists in her Protagonist Learning phase, before she could develop her power and become a ridiculously overpowered protag, basically.

I love Ayaha, if it wasn't obvious.

Higuma was a bit more bland comparatively, but he ended up more interesting as the story went on, and within these short few chapters, I was able to become attached to him enough that I could overlook my dislike for his character trope.

The other characters that appeared were also very fun and interesting, and brought a lot to the table. The villains were very much shaping up to be fascinating in their own ways.

Honestly, a lot of what I enjoyed about this title was how, despite having the shounen aura there, it went against a lot of pre-established character conventions oh, so prominent in a lot of other titles. It really could have been something special, I think.

Perhaps I'm biased, perhaps not, who knows.

Read it for yourself if you want to, and come to your own conclusions.

Note: A 4 does not mean it was bad, just disappointing.

Hell Warden Higuma is an interesting series. On the surface, it seems very generic. Higuma's clan has been tasked with being wardens of hell as they send escaped convicts that prey on the living back to their fiery afterlife. But after a few chapters, you start to notice how un-generic this series is. For one thing, there is no sexualization of women. Usually, a heroine falls in love with the male protagonist or is at least looked at in sexual situations, but none of those annoying cliches are here. Instead, we have Ayaha who is ... a fairly competent character where she almost stands as equals to the overpowered main protagonist.

Then there's Higuma. When it comes to Shonen Jump protagonists you'll expect loud, obnoxious, dumb, goal-oriented teen, but Higuma is not that. In fact, he's the opposite. He's very quiet, quite calculating, and actually hates what he does. And yet, I also feel like what makes him stand out is also what makes being invested in this series so hard in the beginning.

The first few chapters are okay. You're getting to know the world and the characters, but there seems to be something missing. There's no spark to make you go "oh, I gotta check out the next chapter." After thinking about it for a while, I think it's because of how closed off Higuma is. You don't really get to know him until much later, near the end of this series, when you start going through his families' backstory do you truly finally understand him as a character. And because he's fairly mysterious, you start to question why he's the main character early on. You ask why is he interesting and worth following.

The antagonists are alright. For a SJ series, it's fairly dark. There is a lot of innocent death being hacked between panels. The one that stands out the most is the Kitsune storyline. That was fucked up and the way the story transitions from fairly mundane action to holy shit that spirit just killed a child is sometimes very clashing.

I think this was where the story was going to go, but from what we got it felt like Higuma worked better with not only an ensemble cast, but a cast made up of his family. This is easily a story about familial sin and how they need to stick together to get out of the pits of hell, but so much of the series, in the beginning, was about Higuma being closed off that you, the reader, feel closed off to the story as well with only hints of Ayaha to guide you through it all.

Overall, it had potential, and I wouldn't have minded seeing where it went, but as it is I felt like it struggled to find its footing and it didn't reveal enough interesting information soon enough to keep readers invested. This series is just a step below average for that.

Story: 4/10
Art: 5/10
Character: 4/10
Enjoyment: 4/10
Overall: 4/10