Duranki

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English Language:

Duranki is the last work written by master Kentaro Miura.
The work has beautiful art, an intriguing premise and well-made characters.
The plot takes place in a fictional world where a baby was born with both sexes, and she was sent by the gods to be looked after by an elderly couple in a region where no one can enter because it is considered that whoever enters there will be cursed.

The story will revolve around Usul getting to know this new world that people live in, and showing their colleagues their inventions. The big problem is that I can't say more than that because the ... author passed away, and there were only 6 chapters that didn't even cover an entire volume of history.
I recommend reading it for anyone who is a fan of Miura, because if not, you will have an incomplete story with a lot of potential.

ART 10
STORY 10
MIURA 10
CONTINUED 0 ;-;

FINAL GRADE 7 (As it will never be completed)

Língua Portuguesa:

Duranki é a última obra escrita pelo mestre Kentaro Miura.
A obra tem uma bela arte, uma premissa intrigante e personagens bem feitos.
A trama se passa em um mundo fictício onde nasceu um bebê de ambos os sexos, e ela foi enviada pelos deuses para ser cuidada por um casal de idosos em uma região onde ninguém pode entrar porque se considera que quem lá entrar será amaldiçoado.

A história girará em torno de Usul conhecendo esse novo mundo em que as pessoas vivem e mostrando aos colegas suas invenções. O grande problema é que não posso dizer mais do que isso porque o autor faleceu, e foram apenas 6 capítulos que não cobriram nem um volume inteiro de história.
Recomendo a leitura para quem é fã de Miura, pois senão terá uma história incompleta e com muito potencial.

ARTE 10
HISTÓRIA 10
MIURA 10
CONTINUAÇÃO 0 ;-;

NOTA FINAL 7 (pois nunca será concluído)

I came and read Duranki in the wake of Kentaro Miura's passing far too early at the age of 54 because I wanted to go through his entire body of work, with the future of Berserk being up in the air. Overall, I enjoyed Duranki, but I feel like it's held back by its short length (at least thus far) and the fact that it's a side project and shows. I'll try my best not to spoil anything past Episode 1, but no guarantees.



Starting with the obvious, the art gets a perfect 10. As far as I know, this was done entirely by Miura's assistants ... at Studio Gaga with Miura himself only doing the storyboards, and they do a pretty good job of emulating his style. I particularly like the spread depicting the birth of Usumgallu, which immediately screams at you that this is the legacy of Miura, something I feel is far more impactful now that the man is gone.



The story follows the aforementioned Usumgallu, an androgyne being created from the genetic material of two gods of wisdom as the last God Seed. Their "father" (the gods of wisdom are only genetic templates) takes them down to Mount Nisir, where they're eventually adopted by a human family. The rest of the series follows them just living their life, helping their parents as an incredibly resourceful child alongside Pan, our comic relief humanoid for this series.

Put simply, if you were expecting something with the dark tone and nightmarish abominations of Berserk, you're gonna be disappointed. At least thus far, it's been fairly standard, which is fine, considering we're only a few episodes in, but I just think a number of people will approach this series expecting something closer to Miura's other works and be disappointed.

Onto my issues, of which I don't really have many, and mostly touched on those I do have in my overall section. Firstly, Duranki was made as a side-project, and it feels like it. While the art is amazing, the story itself isn't up to the admittedly incredibly high standards set by the previous work of its creator. It also struggles with its characters (which I'll elaborate on when we get there) and suffers from its short length. As far as I know, this isn't something I can necessarily fault it for, the latest chapter (which, as of the time I'm writing this, is Chapter 6) seems to have come out around the time that COVID began to become an issue, but I feel it's an issue I still have to talk about, since I was actually pretty interested to see where this was going and now the series' future is up in the air.



I feel like the characters suffer from the same issue as the story, they're decent but suffer massively from the expectations of its creator's older works. You could give me any named character in Berserk and I would be able to tell you what makes them so great, who they like and dislike, and their reasons for doing so, something I cannot do for any of the characters in Duranki. Usumgallu also suffers from feeling a bit like a "Sue" character (I don't know what the genderless equivalent is.) They're probably only around 5 years old, and (SPOILERS FOR CHAPTER 2) they come up with a crossbow for hunting and immediately know how to call for the help of spirits. I get that they're literally the sort-of child of two gods of wisdom, but explaining your sueyness doesn't make your character less of a sue.

Overall though, I still enjoyed my short trip through Duranki. Be prepared to walk into a side project, but definitely try and check this one out if you want to go through one of Miura's lighter works or want to see Studio Gaga working for themselves before whatever they do next in this post-Miura world.

Duranki – Spoiler Free – Mixed Feelings

TLDR
Story – 4/10 – 4 x 0.275 = 1,1
Art – 9/10 – 9 x 0.2 = 1,8
Characters – 4/10 – 4 x 0.225 = 0,9
Enjoyment – 5/10 – 5 x 0.3 = 1,5
Total: 5,3 -> 5

Story – 4/10
It is art to judge a story that is so clearly unfinished and only has a single volume. Duranki is about the birth and part of the infancy of Usumgallu – a new myth born out of the Serpent gods of Wisdom. It seems to be clearly inspired by ancient Mesopotamian mythology, as Usumgallu is an entity – and also related to ... horned snakes – in the Akkadian mythos.
Unfortunately, the story is highly unfinished, as Miura died before advancing on Duranki beyond the first volume. The story ends in a not-concluded fight scene, which once again only comes to show that it ought to have more development.
From what we have, the story is not brilliant, but it is rather dull and futile to judge a clearly larger project by its first volume alone. It will never make sense with the rest of the story, as the story isn’t like Giganto Makhia, which has a conclusion of its own.

Art – 9/10
Miura’s art is incredible, there is no doubt about it. Characters – or what would have been the characters – are design-rich and are easy to tell apart from each other. The work that Maura made on Usumgallu is nothing short of amazing: for an androgynous character, Usumgallu surely looks really androgynous. The scenarios and backgrounds are impeccable and it is filled with detail. However, it does not deserve a 10 (as a normal late-stage Miura usually would do): page composition is mismanaged, for it is stuffed with panels with little emphasis and ridden with dialogue with small fonts; there is also a proliferation of little panels and definitely not what we are used to in Berserk.
Usumgallu’s birth is an Miura-like panel: awe-inspiring and definitely sets a tone to what could have been a great manga. But it is hard to comment on the art of a one-volume long unfinished manga.

Characters – 4/10
Characters are barely presented, as—once again—this was supposed to be a larger manga that wasn’t concluded. As it happens in the story, it is really sterile to discuss the characters in their present form, for they would make no sense without context and further development.

Enjoyment – 5/10
One would gladly recommend Duranki to any die-hard fan of Kentauro Miura – as is my case. However, and for the sake of honesty, it must be said that this work pales in comparison with his other works – even Giganto Makhia, which is also one volume long. It is simply an unfinished work that only serves as the beginning (and not so great at it) of a more epic story. There is no doubt that it could have been great, but we simply don’t have any more material to work on. For all these reasons, it is more deserving of a mixed feelings stamp than a recommendation: it serves to satisfy the hunger for Miura’s work and the curiosity of all those who follow him, but not much else in its current state.
To what could have been: rest in Peace, Master Miura.