Solo Leveling

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Every. Damn. Time.

I don't understand why this superficial manhwa is so hyped

Solo Leveling tells the story of a mary sue named Sung Jin-Woo who tries to mimic a random isekai plot in search of a hollow character development, it's a kpop version of the Arifureta, but Arifureta can be funny for involuntary moments, but here, the things are they're stupids in a raw way, it's the kind of manga a person would make just to satisfy fetish self insert of a cool edgy guy in another world.

This story has a terrible worldbuilding, I thought it would show you at the beginning of your journey how ... the world works, but it did not this it at some point (even later), just leaves it to the reader to understand in such a flawed way, and when it suits, it's done in an expository way over and over, it's just "only talk, dont show'', it doesn't fully justify how the world occurs or at least sets a time for readers to be more immersed in him, that's the proof. How lazy you have to be to make a story.

The protagonist is the most uninteresting being here, I imagined that in the first chapter there would be a construction of all your motivation, but then it ends up being foul so you don't care anymore. He thinks he has been betrayed, as people worry about their lives, they are afraid, they have a family to come back to, but no, he needs to contradict himself later with stupid thoughts, the same one who decided that someone else should flee. And when we have a development, everything about it is simply empty, there is no consequence (maybe one, but not enough) to his life, he is a wind head, who only uses a self head when in a dungeon, and only the the most predictable answers at all times, in fact all this adventure is predictable without guaranteeing a moment of real distress or difficulty for the reader.

The narrative is lazy, bad and highly expository in the action scenes, as I had said: monologues that only focus when the MC is in the dungeon, we never see that anymore, the dialogues are horrible, I seem to be reading a story where each the characters is deaf and needs to repeat the same thing all the time, when he doesn't, have it, the whole dialogues are empty that don't complement much on the journey, and the author has the audacity to insert a totally random Nietzsche text, that doesn't fit the situation was only played because the author thinks the phrase is cool, and many people consider it deep.

The characters are all bad that we can sum up in 2 words: uninteresting and unimportant, I think only 2 characters I could care about, one of them is dead because they performed properly, and their last scene was a moment of construction, the another was only shown in different environments, I doubt the author will use it again, the antagonists are bad, only 1 of them has a plausible motivation, the rest is just bad for being purely bad, the author only knows to do this idea because he needs to satisfy The fetish of seeing a cool edgy guy killing someone.

Not even the flashback moments here work for anything, it's always something expositive, and the only thing shown is the first dungeon the protagonist had, basically every conflict for MC, they insert this flashback, jesus this manga not only be without creativity but disrespectful to the reader himself, insisting on something we already understand, because this universe is so empty that he at least has no courage to show anything else, not even a memorable memory at least as interesting as possible, not even his mother dear, who is informed in the first chapter, which has become a lousy excuse for you (the reader) to care about him at the first point and then forget about her, seriously how badly written this it and often lazy again.

The development of the protagonist in the general context is acceptable, but scumbag and continuing with shallow labels, I have never hoped for a comic moment to appear in the midst of such a tense scene. I currently arrived midway through the work, the protagonist does not show an interesting image, he is totally one-dimensional that not even his relationships with secondary characters strengthen him, not even in a "melancholy or mental" situation the author can humanize the character, he repeats the same flashbacks, give the impression that this is not a story of someone who fights for the people around them, but of someone who needs to satisfy the faster leveling fetish, he seems more like a character for fujoshi to fall in love with because he's so hot and uhh so much badass.

The most positive thing I leave is cap55, the first chapter that made me laugh without being stupid about this narrative, but it's still a bad and foul story. And I don't think that can change enough, even if he does, his first part has rotted just like the protagonist's will, it's just an amateur story that doesn't even show courage in his actions, I feel like I'm seeing a bootleg of a Izumi Shinichi just repetitive, I wanted to talk more about this journey, but this empty story keeps me, that's why i don't classify this Manhwa as a good thing, and I don't think I'm just the only person thinking differently.

"Solo Leveling", what seemed like an underdog story has really left me disappointed. At first glance, the whole reason I started was to expect him to grow as a character slowly and PROVE himself. However, this is not what I got at all.

Forget the underdog story, forget the meaningful process of character growth and development, the story tries it's hardest to make the character look like he's "struggling", but it's pretty difficult when the MC has the same emotionless, edgy facial expression on every panel.

It's just extremely confusing and frustrating how this supposed "underdog" MC gets so strong so damn fast. He is literally flawless, ... he feels completely void of humor and emotion and is just a living, breathing, OP, issekai MC. These 3 paragraphs alone are all about my number 1 reason as to why I dislike this Manhwa so much. The main character just really sucks.

The only thing that doesn't give this a "1" for me is the art. Absolutely amazing art that made me stomach through the horrible MC writing and directionless plot that could've been finished if the MC just didn't hide his power. The art was literally eye-candy, filled with clean line-work, shading and colours.

Anyways, if you don't like edgy, power-fantasy MCs, don't read this. If you were expecting the slow-climb and rise of an underdog, go read "Hardcore Leveling Warrior" (technically a "re-rising" here), or read Tales of Demons and Gods instead. The MC might be OP in HCLW and ToDaG, but they have limitations and a bunch of situations where they can't just "clean up" the enemy as easy as Sung Jin-woo.

2/10

WARNING! THIS REVIEW CONTAINS MINOR SPOILERS!

Solo Leveling is a manhwa that always baffles me whenever I hear someone talk about it. They usually like to say nice sounding buzzwords whenever they praise it, but never bother to actually expand on it. It's always at the front page of whatever site or app you're using. But when I myself read it, it felt like I was reading a completely different manhwa than the one everyone was talking about. Let me break down the different aspects of the manhwa:

Art 8/10: Art is the one and only aspect I can praise Solo Leveling for. It's undeniable that it ... has fantastic art and I believe this is the second biggest factor for Solo Leveling's popularity (I'll get to the biggest factor later on). The shading and coloring is fantastic. The reason I have art at 8/10 instead of higher is because of the lack of details and background.

Story 3/10: Story...What story? The premise is that gates have appeared around the world with different levels of dangers within them. So they employ hunters to go into the gates and dispose of the danger within. We follow Sung Jin-Woo, a low ranking hunter who suddenly gains a power that allows him to grow stronger through quests and he quickly becomes a S-Rank hunter.

I'm gonna be honest, the first like 15 chapters were actually entertaining. And I thought it was gonna turn out to be a really good manhwa. The gate we entered in the prologue was so different than how they are presented in the rest of the manhwa. There were rules to be followed and if not followed it would mean death. This is not at all present in later gates, in later gates its basically just different monsters in different environments. Which means the gates themselves are not at all interesting after the prologue which is a shame cause you had this sense of dread and mystique surrounding the gate when they entered it for the first time.

Now I've only really touched on the prologue and gates. So how does the story develop after the prologue? Well...It doesn't really. We simply follow Sung Jin-Woo as he goes into different gates and strengthen himself at an insane speed. It just uses the same formula over and over again. He goes into a gate, something unexpected happens, for instance the gate was more dangerous than it seemed. He handles it with ease despite the difficulty change. And then rinse and repeat. It was very disappointing to have him become so extremely strong so quickly. There was no real sense of progress. One second he's the weakest and another second there is literally no threat in existence that can phase him.

Also a lack of overarching story makes it hard to be motivated to continue. There's no real goal Sung Jin-Woo set for himself. They did slightly touch on his mother being ill and he needing to heal her. But they barely explored his relationship with his mother or anything like that. It was more just a dumb reason for him to enter a gate. And it was resolved with ease.

Character 1/10: Now we get into the absolute worst part of Solo Leveling. The characters. Mainly Sung Jin-Woo himself. I mentioned earlier about the biggest factor for Solo Leveling's popularity, and this is it. That might sound like a praise, but it's definitely not. Sung Jin-Woo was made to be as bland as humanly possible so that people can insert themselves into him and live out a power fantasy. We barely know anything about Sung Jin-Woo. He doesn't have any real motivation that drives him. He doesn't have any clear morals. In fact, he doesn't really have any emotions at all. Almost every single panel he is in he will make the same generic emotionless edgy expression. He almost never smiles, laughs, look scared, nervous or anything like that. His expression is always like he's watching a mediocre movie cause his girlfriend wanted to see it.

He has no development at all either. He goes from being the generic weak main character that's surprisingly brave when the situation calls for it into the generic edgy overpowered main character. There's no transition. And even after he has become overpowered nothing still develops him. And besides, there's nothing to push him into development since the arcs never presents him with a dilemma that forces character change.

As for other characters, there aren't really any notable ones. They introduce some new characters each arc but then they just kinda forget about their existence and you never see them again. At this point I've stopped remembering the name of the characters because they've proven time and time again that there's no point to it. I also have a problem with how much they're pandering and using certain characters (mainly female characters) as tools for this. What I mean by this is that Sung Jin-Woo is made to be the ultimate edgy overpowered main character that you can self insert yourself into for a power fantasy. And they also uses characters as a tool to reinforce this, like him needing to rescue every female character as soon as they are about to get hurt (all the while the male characters gets slaughtered left and right).

Pretty much every female character he meets will at some point be rescued by him and/or fall for him. For instance there is one female character that is a bit obsessed with him cause he "smells" different than other people. And at another point where he's murdering monsters suddenly the last monster surrenders out of fear. And what do you know, that monster turns out to be a super hot monster babe that falls for him. All characters are just tools used to put Sung Jin-Woo himself up on a pedestal or as a measuring stick to see how overpowered he is.

Enjoyment 3/10: As you may already have figured out, my enjoyment for this manhwa is not really high. None of the characters are memorable, the arcs are uninspired and had no real purpose except to make the main character stronger. The main character himself was dull. Except early on in the story where it was actually interesting and he had emotions and there was a sense of overall dread.

Overall 3/10: I really can't give this any higher. Remove the art which is its only praiseworthy point and all you will be left with is the same generic self insert edgy overpowered main character power fantasy that has all the ladies fall for him. There's nothing memorable at all about this manhwa.

This my first time writing review so go easy on me.

Solo leveling has great start we have MC that is weakest hunter but still explores dungeons in order to pay medical bills for his sick mother and to help his sister become doctor however after a incident he gains mysterious power that helps him level up his rank and become strongest.
So let's start with good points of solo leveling
(1).Good start
Start of Solo leveling is good like I said earlier story has relatable MC in the beginning but after that it's down hill
(2).Art
Solo leveling has great art it's fully colored and it's easy to read ... it's clean, plus characters are good looking.
Now for what's bad
(1).Story
After the good start of story solo leveling gets predictable and boring
Every time over mc enters dungeon we know that he will defeat the monster and than say his catchphrase "Arise" and add that monster to his shadow army this is same process over and over.
(2).characters
Worst thing about solo leveling is characters,characters of solo leveling are like NPC. They are here for only two reasons either admire the mc or to hate him no in between. Every time new character is introduced they either praise the mc or hate him. New character are disposed after mc's business is finished with them. No character are relevant they only exist to make us feel how great MC is.
(3). Main character
Main character of story is sung jin-woo, like I said earlier he is relatable in beginning but than after gaining his powers he becomes self insert,Overpowered,emotionless. If I have to describe sung jin-wooin one word that is Korean Kirito.

My prediction for this manhwa is that people will know how bad this is in my opinion this series is going age like milk.

I would not recommend this series to anyone with good taste in anime and manga.
If you like power fantasy than read One punch man. It's sad to see this manhwa is ranked higher than manga like OPM

Solo leveling is just a Good looking trash but trash is still trash.

Oh no, where do I fucking begin. Despite what many of the manwha legion will claim, this story is not one that is good and has no real meaning that leaves you feeling bored after the official ending. This shit must have been written by an angsty 15 year old because it is every bit of power fantasy that you would expect from a something written by them. The main character has a heroic moment at the beginning, but after that his personality does a complete 180 and is easily one of the most powerful characters nearly 30 chapters in. A lot of stories seem ... to miss the slow progression of the hero and it is very saddening to see a bunch of the hero's development and charm nearly disappear.

Before explaining the rest of the story, a fatal flaw about the manwha must be discussed. The simple fact that no other character in the show (except for one other character that is promptly killed) takes all of the interesting progression out of the story. I do not understand why the author thought that it was a good idea to lock everyone else's power level and only have him scale up. Later on, this becomes a massive problem later on, but this is even important near the beginning.

The art is pretty good, especially for a webtoon. Panels can be boring and the backgrounds can be lacking. Overall, it's fine and there's nothing that can be too criticized, other than the fact that the character designs can be uninspired.

Here comes the issue. Spoilers ahead. The story revolves around leveling up, so it goes without saying that the enemies would need to be more and more powerful over time. Giving the main character a necromancer ability that allows him to use very strong monsters from past fights was a big mistake. It completely removes any weakness that he may have and effectively kills all the tension that may arise in fights. Having the main character lose builds character and increases stakes for later fights, but after so many fights with 0 losses I know that he can't lose. Power creep gets very bad after he clears the hard demon dungeon, and that's when I lost almost all interest. Every other character is sucking his dick and he has near infinite power. His edge is also through the roof as he kills without mercy but is still kind-hearted? I just didn't understand his character. When he single-handedly defeats an enemy that none of the other top hunters in the nation could do combined and rose him from the dead, I understood that the manwha could not go on and that it's problems could only get worse.

How could the character even lose at this point? He is unbeatable and untouchable. This is as generic and bland as it gets, saved only by the art.

Tl;dr I would avoid this one.

Story- 3
The MC is crazy overpowered, and there's absolutely no tension left in the story because of that. There's not a single point past the first 50 chapters of the series where I could at least kind of imagine that he could've died because he NEVER loses. The most he'll get out of a fight is losing a handful of his soldier minions- meaningless when he has a million of them- and maybe a scratch on his cheek- which he can heal with a single thought.
The plot is super formulaic. Weak dude suddenly gets blessed with amazing powers and becomes an awesome hero who shows ... up all the lazy corrupt muscleheads who think they're strong. It's just a power fantasy.

Art- 8
The story might suck, but the art is amazing. The artist's constant use of glow and blur effects for action scenes really adds to the sleek aesthetic of Solo Leveling.

Character- 6
The protagonist, Sung Jin-Woo, had some minor character growth in the first 20 or so chapters but since then he's devolved into an edgy edgelord with zero character depth. (Who happens to be incapable of wearing clothes colored anything BUT midnight black.)
He's a Mary Sue through and through. In Solo Leveling, the entire world revolves around this guy. Everyone wants to get close to him and use him, or wants to worship him as their savior, or is scared of his power and wants to kill him. A lot of characters want to do all three. He isn't just a healer or a summoner or a mage- he's every Hunter type *and more.* He's overpowered, infamously famous, dark but not evil, intelligent and never conflicted, perfect in every way... how are we supposed to related to this guy again?

The writer even misses out on a key opportunity for giving him character growth. Since he's killed so many people and monsters, and since both people and monsters are shown in the story to be sometimes good and sometimes bad, there's plenty of room for a moral conflict there- should he stop killing everyone so mercilessly and give them a chance to change? Or is he in a kill-or-be-killed world where compassion becomes weakness?
The writer completely ignores this opportunity for giving the story some depth and instead goes with a story revolving around our protagonist, a necromancer mage summoner supreme overlord of dark energy and death and flashy attacks, clashing with big angry demons in big fancy smashfests, each one more grand and explosive than the next.
No one else besides the MC even gets any development. There are some interestingly conflicted characters who were around at the start of the series, but since then they've been quietly shuffled into the background of the story. By the midpoint of the manhwa, there's little to no character depth in the series at all.

[Side rant- The manhwa doesn't even hesitate to take a dump on the one actually well-written scene from the light novel, where we get to see Sung Jin-Woo from the point of view of ordinary citizens, as people react to his fierce battle watching from their TVs at home, as his heroic actions restore an old man's faith in the strength of Hunters. From that scene in the light novel, readers got to see Sung Jin-Woo as not just a monster-slaying warrior, but a symbol of hope for humanity. The manhwa downplays and shortens this whole sequence so much it might as well not have been included.]

Enjoyment- 2
Solo Leveling was an immensely disappointing experience for me. The story and characters are flavorless and boring and the writing is downright lazy.
All this manhwa has going for it are the action scenes but even flashy fights don't mean anything if they lack all forms of emotional weight and tension.
At the end of the day, there's not much I can say I enjoyed about this series. All I can say is that if mindless action is your thing... by all means, give Solo Leveling a shot. But if you're turned off by bad writing and a boring cast of characters, please stay as far away from this series as possible, because it is not worth the read.

Let's start with the positives. Out of all the aspects of Solo Leveling, the art is definitely the best. The artwork is visually appealing and the most enjoyable part of the reading experience.

Unfortunately, the rest of manwha leaves much to be desired for the reader. The worst part of the manwha is easily the characters. Any character besides Jin-Woo is pointless and simply serves to further the point that Jin-Woo is the strongest character. They are very one-dimensional and hard to get attached to or feel anything for the characters. Jin-Woo is not much better. He is your stereotypical manwha badass that defeats every villain ... and attracts people towards him romantically or platonically. He doesn't have any redeeming qualities besides being a badass that the readers desire to be like.

The story is also very uninspiring. It is a very repetitive manwha where Jin-Woo enters a dungeon, clears it, gets an upgrade, and becomes even more overpowered. Besides the beginning where there was at least some struggle, there are very few obstacles for Jin-Woo to overcome as he is way too overpowered to beat. There is no tension and no suspense as everyone knows the outcome. Jin-Woo will beat whatever big antagonist the author throws at him and saves the day. This formula creates a very mediocre story that becomes more and more uninteresting as the story continues. It is just your regular boring power fantasy that serves a specific audience that enjoys reading someone absolutely owns and destroys everything in their path.

Overall, Solo Leveling is not this spectacular game-changing manwha that promises something amazing for new readers. It provides the same thing that many other manwha provide. A mindless power fantasy that fails to present anything of real substance to the reader to take away besides the badass MC will win because he is the MC. If that is something you enjoy then that's perfectly fine, but I can't help but feel disappointed after reading.

This Manhwa is only on top manga board because it was doing all the cliche, plot point of all the other shounen, OP main character trope from all the trend Sao, One punch man, Overlord,Moon light sculpture very well and all the new reader who was not feed up or familiar with the older would not understand how much this Manhwa suck dick. This Manhwa is just stalling time bomb, the MC keep getting stronger with little to no risk or stake, and the MC is just a cookie cutter guy with no trait worth noting, it just to make us feel like the ... MC so we can live out the fantasy of getting stronger easily and all the women just wet seeing us for no decent reason. It has biggest problem of shounen battle manga of just keep upping the scale (lazy writing) plus all the character all just foils for the MC and the setting wasnt entirely Inspiring or even felt real at all, like how can the government control all the volatile of power human running around, why haven't power human take control of the world, because Country paid them money to be law abiding citizen? because they will overlook their crime, bitch, the government was clearly demonstrated to not even compare to all the private own Groups? Why the government even allow private group to use the portal for grinding xp and item for levels and money anyway, China would fuck them all to death or nuke the whole country before it allow non regulated group to control them and tip the power scale, so i imagine, US, Korea should do their best to control all the gate and take all the power it can to compete. Like it so stupid to even allow a group to even have the opportunity, the chance to have the even more power than the government, not the people but private own group.
Overall Solo leveling is just copying all the trend without adding any unique twist, charm or even character to the genres, it just do all the old thing really well, that why the story is Pathetic, the character is poor but the art is very good lift up the whole Manhwa, the only reason it not getting 9,10 from art is because it's Manhwa, wasting paper POS format plus the design most of the time is only decent. It's still enjoyable cause the formula work but the OP power scaling Formal clearly have Aged A LOT especially if you are as generic as Solo Leveling so i'm not in good conscious give this anymore than a 5.

***contains spoilers***

This series is straight-up offensively bad. Normally I wouldn't care and just move on with my life, but from the high ratings, the comparisons to much better series (such as To Your Eternity), and the constant front-page status on various manga sites, I just want to say: shame on the manga/manhwa/webtoon reading community.

As others have mentioned, this goes beyond basic wish fulfillment. It manages to be a masturbatory, fetishistic parody of something that was already indulgent to begin with.


Characters 1/10: There is only one character that 'matters', that being Sung Jin Woo. Every single other character is window-dressing meant to ... frame SJW in the best light possible, either by being in awe of him or being comically evil/arrogant in order to justify his psychopathic behavior.

Manhwa, I have noticed, seems to struggle with restraint. They are not content with merely having the main character stand out, that character must dominate every single aspect of life, and effortlessly rub it in the faces of every other male character. From women to money, to strength, to appearance, to fame, to rare valuables, to potential, and even regarding more intangible ideas like being the most mysterious, or being the most aloof and cool-headed. They are at once designed to be the superficially indulgent male suitor in a harlequin romance novel and OP protagonist of a Wuxia novel.

What's more, the edgy nature of these MCs goes beyond simple brooding to appeal to the typical hoodie weeb, it is also *heavily* sexualized. Dangerous yet loyal, charming yet curt, socially domineering yet understated, casually psychopathic yet protective, sly yet straightforward, and somewhere between arrogant and confident. These traits have heavily psychosexual implications and are nauseating to read when played straight because they are clearly not designed to create consistent characterization or an interesting person, they are meant to walk the razor-thin edge of "f*ckably dangerous". This is all very directly reflected in how unobtainable women submit to the overwhelming raw sexual energy of the MC despite *minimal* interactions, with this series even going so far as to bring smell into it. Idk if this is meant to appeal to readers who are potentially attracted to the MC or simply be another layer for readers to project themselves onto, but either way it's insufferable even by power fantasy standards when the main character is OP Christian Grey.

As a result of the above, there is absolutely nothing to humanize Sung Jin Woo. There is no room to create depth when any flaws or complexities must be spent building a carefully crafted dark-triad fantasy archetype. The superficial struggles the story presents (emotional or literal) only serves to highlight how poorly fleshed out our MC actually is. Any inner turmoil or kind act depicted is lip-service meant to pull SJW's character back from literal monster to Sigma Chad. Any mistake he makes or reckless action he takes is merely designed to build tension, as he never loses anything or faces real consequences. You can't even root for him from the perspective of zero to hero because after his reawakening he becomes literally and figuratively unrecognizable as the same character. The plot will also bend over backward to justify SJW's irresponsible actions via information he couldn't have possibly known, leaving people to die simply because of some convoluted logic he came up with at the moment. This is often done in service of preserving SJW's mystery and the "big reveal" where SJW whips out his huuuuge powers to the shock and awe of all the characters. Plot contrivances are also worked in to justify SJW's edgier moments

Speaking of kind acts, with the notable exception of saving a wealthy D ranker, most heroics result in SJW garnering the affection of women, with men in the story being treated like cannon fodder. The only people treated worse than men are non-Koreans. This story manages to surpass even Baki in its xenophobia, which is a bit funny considering SK is rarely even mentioned in other types of comics. One-sided media rivalries like this reek of an inferiority complex, which is perfect for the target demo of this series, I guess.

The foulest example I can think of to summarize many of these complaints is during the Jeju island arc, where the MC decides to hold off from helping to wipe out the poorly ripped-off chimera ants thanks to weak plot contrivances, only to have a bunch of Japanese people die horribly. It's okay though, because their boss was *evil* anyway, so SJW only shows up at the last second to save all the Koreans and unnecessarily proceeds to make sure he proves himself stronger than his opponent in every single aspect of combat before obliterating it (instead of doing the safer thing and bringing out his shadows from the beginning). Then, another male character who he previously snubbed makes a request of him, which he only acquiesces to after a bit of posturing because the other male character was respectful to SJW this time.

I will give a nod to SJW's shadows, which will often have genuinely cute moments that are elevated by the art.

Finally, our MC's motivations are not clear, which brings me to the plot.

Plot 2/10: There is obviously a broader plot being alluded to. with the gates obviously being manipulated by some interdimensional godlike figure who is forcing all of these battles to happen (gives off some Gantz vibes), but SJW seems cooly detached from it, only vaguely pursuing the goal of obtaining strength or overcoming some obstacle that is directly in front of him, from saving his mom, to saving his friend, to avoiding detection, to making some money, to starting a guild, to overcoming whatever task the system gives him. Each arc usually culminates in some tensionless boss fight.

The first chapters are boring, the first dungeon is moderately engaging, the rest of the story is terrible and feels like a mindless hack and slash video game with occasional creative flourishes. MC's shadow powers are kinda neat but are largely meaningless when it's obvious he will prevail every time regardless of his power set. There are occasionally developments, characters, and plot threads that seem interesting but go nowhere. The fact that SJW is the only character who can "grow" and has unlimited potential deflates any sense of tension or rivalry. The story has massive, gaping plot-holes all over the place, but will spend exorbitant amounts of time on trivial details or explaining an item/world/system mechanic, which all lack any sense of weight because they feel arbitrarily manufactured and poorly integrated into any other aspect of the story or the world in which these characters exist. Everything feels hollow, partially because of how flimsy the world-building is, and partially because it feels like the story exists inside a Korean fashion magazine with a coat of fantasy paint on top of it (sometimes the paint is even invisible since SJW can make his armor disappear so as not to diminish from his cool-guy persona). There is zero subtlety in the foreshadowing, and most of it revolves around random system mechanics that are used for plot convenience.

You can tell pretty early on that every organization, character, etc. introduced largely exists just to JO the main character, his own special powers being the only thing that really matters (something CONSTANTLY reinforced by the author)

Most of all, I'm just insulted by how much this series wastes your time. It will spend many chapters building up and introducing characters and plot elements, just to drop them or burn through them in one chapter for a single badass moment for SJW.

Art: 9/10

The art is good. In the beginning, the anatomy is rough, but it cleans up over time and goes from feeling like a talented amateur to Korean Joe Madureira. Where it shines is the use of color and many graphic elements. Some panels are truly beautiful to look at, with flame effects, shadow effects, laser eyes, etc. They're all very well done and extremely polished. The panoramic shots in general tend to be exceptionally done.

It even manages to utilize the single panel format better than a lot of others, with some creativity in panel placement.
Enjoyment 2/10

Art is the one major redeeming quality. The shadows can be cute.

Overall 2/10

If you want to read a Manhwa that is very similar to this, but I would say is worth reading through, Skeleton Soldier Couldn't Protect the Dungeon manages to work in a lot of the same elements, but in a much more satisfying and carefully crafted way, with characters that have genuine depth. It absolutely has some weirdly dissonant moments that seem to be common in Manhwa, but it improves on this general "edgy OP MC" formula in every way possible.

Otherwise, if you're just looking for a power fantasy fix, read something written by a competent author like Overlord or Mushoku Tensei.

If this manhwa had to be described in one word, it would be 'overhyped'. With how much the manhwa had been lauded as the best series of its kind, and even a must-read, the reality falls disappointingly short of its expectations. Solo Levelling is mainly enjoyable for its art, with the plot and characters suffering from a lack of development and a general disinterest.

Sung Jinwoo is known to be the weakest hunter alive, but still desperately attends dungeon clears in order to pay his mother's hospital bills. Unfortunately, abilities in this world are stagnant, meaning that it is impossible for him or any other hunter ... to grow stronger. But after a near-death experience, he is granted the opportunity to 'level up', gain new abilities and increased strength, but he also has to complete quests to avoid punishment.

This premise, while not outstandingly novel, is still a fairly interesting one. Most notably would be his original weakness, as well as the possibility of incurring punishments. However, these plot points are immediately flipped upon its head, and never mentioned again. Despite the title of this manhwa being 'Solo Levelling', which would suggest the main character's quest to grow stronger as the major development in the story, Jinwoo becomes way too strong much too quickly. There is barely any struggle in his quest for strength as well, making the whole story lack any tension at all. The punishment quests only show up twice throughout the entire story, and he faces little to no consequences for anything. The story quickly becomes a power fantasy with the same formula repeating itself over and over: a new enemy which is more powerful than before shows up, which defeats every other character, but Jinwoo arrives to save the day.

The concept of overpowered characters can be found all across media, each to varying levels of success. In Solo Levelling, the overpowered status of Jinwoo simply makes every other character redundant. His necromancy abilities give him enough summons that obey his every command which replaces other hunters in the story, who are simply too weak to do anything relevant. The other characters which begin to appear in Jinwoo's peripheral, pointed out to be the stronger of the bunch, end up useless as a whole. His shadow summons do not have an interesting personality either, with them being basically shadow puppets that are occasionally playful or slightly more angry than the next. Because the entire premise is that only Jinwoo is capable of growing stronger, the other characters show no development, neither in strength nor personality. They lack depth and exist only to make Jinwoo look better. And yet, Jinwoo himself does not have much more depth than the others. Throughout the manhwa, it seems that his personality is replaced with 'strong' and nothing else. He fights because he has to. His protection of humanity never appears to be a desire of his.

Character relationships are another disappointment, mainly because they are utterly unemotional. Other than at the beginning of the story, there was no point which was convincing that Jinwoo would develop close relations with any other character. One of his biggest motivators before he grew stronger was to provide financial support for his family, but soon after he seems to forget them, or rather interactions between Jinwoo and his family are barely shown. The romantic beats end up unexpected, and not in a good way.

The art is perhaps one of the only good points of the manhwa, but it does not really reach exceptional standards. And yet, it is still one of the better qualities.

The popularity of Solo Levelling is what drew me to read it, but my experience with it was mediocre at best.

I wanted to like Solo Leveling. I'm Korean; I genuinely want to see manhwas succeed and stamp their place within the Animanga industry, but I finished reading and regretfully my first and only thought about Solo Leveling, without pulling punches, was that it was utter garbage. It's completely devoid of creativity, it's painfully predictable, the characters all suck (not that anybody other than the MC mattered in the first place), and because of these numerous faults it made for a very boring and unengaging reading experience.

When I think of how one could still manage to write an interesting story in which the protagonist is ... dumb overpowered, I look to One Punch Man and how well Murata managed such a difficult task with Saitama. Saitama is untouchable in the OPM world, every reader knows this, we know Saitama can never lose yet OPM is still so special because it does everything else so well. The side cast is excellent, characters like King, Genos, Garou, and others each exhibit their own charm and display a belonging within the story. Of course, whenever Saitama is in action the outcome is an obvious victory for our MC, but this never feels like a problem because we as readers are cognizant of this fact; it's because Saitama's opponent is always presented as the challenger rather than the other way around that makes for such an interesting element, like a Souls game, except in this instance our protagonist is the seemingly impossible boss fight. This is why such a heavy emphasis is placed on the side cast, as One Punch Man is ultimately a story about our stupidly overpowered protagonist in search of his equal, and therefore to make such a thing happen the side characters must be more important than even the main character.

On the contrary, Solo Leveling failed to compensate for its overpowered MC in every possible fashion. Sung Jin Woo begins the story in the abyss of powerlessness, just but an ant at the very bottom of the food chain. Jin Woo then receives a massive power-up, as expected from any story like this, and gradually scales his way up the food chain but at a certain point in what was still the infancy stage of the story he gains quick access to completely busted monsters that eventually work under him as slaves. From this point on it really was a cake-walk for Jin Woo, as nobody and nothing stood a chance to him. None of the side characters are worth a single penny within Solo Leveling; all of them are utterly powerless and rendered useless before Jin Woo and it certainly does not help their case when not one of them possesses any traits that make for a good character. Instead of using the side cast to augment and give some more depth to the overall story like any good writer would, the creator of Solo Leveling would rather treat these side characters as throwaways to further increase the gap in power between Jin Woo and everybody else. What is the point of a ranking system when nobody other than Jin Woo is worth a damn? Almost like Naruto and how everything in between Genin and Jonin ultimately meant nothing. The story is disgustingly unoriginal which goes without saying: the typical zero to hero. There is no depth whatsoever, just a linear path without any obstacles from one enemy to the next until we finally arrive at the last one. Whatever type of half-assed effort of world-building was immediately vanquished when Jin Woo went from the strongest hunter in South Korea to immediately the strongest in the world. Just an absolute sh*t show.

I'm just not understanding where this Solo Leveling hype stems from. Is it because it's in color and you all view it as a novelty? Or is it because you enjoy a story even an average 3rd grader is capable of writing? I'm not a fan and wouldn't recommend to anyone with any type of standards.

One-punch man without the self-awareness. ONE had at least the understanding to move away from the self-insert protgaonist to the setting to keep the story interesting. Solo Leveling does not do this, so it gets boring. But maybe that's the point? Maybe the author just wants to a create self-insert wish fulfilment story, and that's fine. The problem that arises when you set your ambitions so low is that you lose any emotional core. So for all the good stuff I could say about this, I can't score it very highly. At least God of Highschool tries to have some semblance of an emotional throughline ... with character arcs from the main cast of characters and villains. Meanwhile in Solo Levelling, the MC's mom's illness is established as a narrative hook and it's brought up again until 80 chapters deep into the story.

Nothing shows the shallow writing of Solo Levelling than the cheap knock-off of the HxH Chimera Ant arc.

I should mention a problem I personally have with the fights is that they fall down to classic trope of anime fights: Spamming the entire fight with light trails, so my eyes have more reason to glaze over all of it.

(CONTAINS MINOR SPOILERS)

So I've binged this in 2 days. I thought this was reeeeeally good and then I took a moment to think about it... I heard many good things and have seen it everywhere, so I decided to read it. The name popped in my head, and I'm like, "Yeah let's read that. I'm bored." I'd say the only reason I've made it as far in as I did was bc I binged it.

This is my first review so my apologies for bad formatting, etc.

Story 3/10: We follow Sung Jin-Woo, basic main character, in a fantasy world of dungeon conquering, loot-gaining MMORP goodness. ... Pretty basic. Kinda like SAO but better in... no it's actually very similar to SAO. The beginning is really good. The arc where they're in that dungeon is awesome (more on that in the next paragraph). It seems every arc is the same formula, with NO differences (more on that later).

Prologue 8/10: In a similar way to SAO, the first arc is actually pretty good in many ways. Not ground-breaking or fantastic, but actually not bad. They get trapped in a super dangerous room, there's rules they have to follow, lest certain death fall upon them. Stakes are reasonably high. Things are chaotic, and the read is intriguing. There's this mystery and dread behind it that drew me in. The creepy smile from the king statue brought back memories of the fish king dude from One Punch Man. That's a good thing. Again, the rules in this double room thing were awesome. Then, the useless MC was actually reliable and used his experience with near-death situations to be useful. I enjoyed it. The set up to the MC and to what I thought was the main female character were good. I'll go more into that later.

However, the prologue and the impact it has are scarcely developed. Early on after that, the fear he felt during the prologue cause him to not have fear during the other dungeons. Compared to what he felt during that, nothing is bad in comparison. But. that's it.

The rest of the stories are so repetitive. you know the formula. He goes into a gate, something unexpected happens, for instance the gate was more dangerous than it seemed. He handles it with ease despite the difficulty change. And then rinse and repeat. That's it.

Art 10/10: The art is really good. It's outstanding. I have no idea how they are able to draw this amazing stuff AND COLOR IT in time. Anyone who's read it knows.

Character 1/10: Oh boy here we go. MC is a Mary Sue. Basic self insert character for the insecure weebs who are unhappy with their life and want an escapist fantasy to delve into. I say this from personal experience. MC is edgy, bland, emotionless. There is nothing to say bc there is no character. There was a sub plot with his mom that was never developed.

He was fighting so help pay for his mom's medical bills (she's comatose) and pay for his sister's way thru highschool and college. So that's about as much detail into those two things as we're given. There's no development or relation shown between him and his mom, no flashbacks. I could sufficiently describe his mother as this: his mom. There's no character there. She has a scar on her neck that he caused due to trying to... wash her hair with really hot water I think..? It wasn't exactly clear, but that's the closest to development we've seen there and that was about 70-80 chapters in at least. I have no reason to care for this woman because the author hasn't given me one. The sister is bland to. Thankfully, I don't recall any incest implications with the sister falling for MC, but maybe I'd prefer that to the pure nothingness we got. We get clue that she was smart and thought to be a nerd at school, but nope she's just a regular relatable girl at home. She's doing something medical, which is cool ig. Probably related to the comatose mother, but again, no development into that.

One thing I thought would be super cool that was briefly touched on was him losing his emotions. It seemed like when he used the full status recovery when he was in a bind, that he'd lose more of his emotion. Or it was as he grew in level. I think they mentioned anger was one he couldn't feel anymore. I thought that was cool, but it was never mentioned again and he's shown kinda having emotion later in the sense that he saves all the female characters when they're in distress... which they always are, only to be rescued by our hero.

As well, his power progression is ridiculous, he gets overpowered so quickly. I thought there'd be development and progression, watching him climb thru hard work. I thought it'd be a struggle. A couple of the first arcs were a struggle, but of course he overcame it after a sudden boost (status recovery reward).

Then probably my favorite character was the B rank healer girl. She had an interesting character set up at the beginning. She was a B rank, but only went on E and D rank missions due to the fear she got from seeing those monsters, the deaths, etc. THAT WAS INTRIGUING. I was interested in how she'd struggle thru it, overcome it, and how the MC would help her. Things were looking good. Oh wait where'd she go? After the prologue she was just gone for awhile. It was mentioned she had worse trauma after the prologue and the events that transpired there, but no development. The MC never came to her to talk, help, anything. Never do we see her struggle. SHE GETS NO DEVELOPMENT. That made me sad. Instead, everything gets pushed aside to put the focus on MC getting stronger That's a common theme.

Then we see her again, alongside one-armed dude. He was also kinda cool, but I could tell he'd get no development, so I didn't bother getting invested. If only I did that for every character. Then she doesn't face her trauma. She retires... Then there's a little exchange with her and MC, and he says he'll ask her on a date next time he visits her, which he never does.

Then there's the little sister's friend. I thought there'd be development there. She was a highschooler who stopped going, bc she wanted to be a hunter. She was an E rank. The principal called MC in, bc he was a hunter and everyone loves him, to ask for advice and stuff. He then didn't talk to her much, but brought her to a dungeon with the White Tiger guild. She was gonna get some experience, but then nope. We don't see any interaction with her after they enter the dungeon. There's no conclusion to that sub plot they started. We don't see what she decided. Is she a hunter now? Is she gonna finish highschool at least like the teacher advised her to? No idea. Everything gets pushed aside to focus on MC getting stronger.

Then there's the rich kid. He was kinda cool ig. Wish there was more development with him. Again, a common theme. Near the end of when I last saw him (idk if he's mentioned again after chapter 107) his father kicked him out, bc the kid wanted to be independent and join MC's guild (thought MC would make a guild. So far he hasn't). So he goes to MC asking to stay, MC says no, and we find out the kid slept in a hotel. He drops MC at the demon tower dungeon, and we never see him again. Did he find a home? Did he progress with the guild thing? What happened to him? No idea. All got pushed aside to focus on the MC getting stronger.

Then there's that one s rank who could smell a difference in him. She fell for him bc: he's strong, he's the Mary Sue MC, and he was different. He has never had a legitimate conversation with her. I think there was brief interaction between the two in a group setting. That's about it. She was a damsel in distress that seemed cool but did nothing.

Then there's the demon girl. Again, she had no character. I had my last hope for development in a female MC in her, even tho it was already like 90 chapters in. Course there wasn't any. It got pushed aside to focus on the MC getting stronger. She was just there to be another character for weebs to lust after.

All females are cute, clumsy, damsels in distress. They all seem strong at first, but are brought to their knees in helpless powerlessness before our MC once the two of them interact.

Men in the story are usually so unappealing for various reasons. I mean duh. We don't want there to be any potential that MC isn't the BC (best character).

Enjoyment 6/10: This will probably get lowered the further I go on in my life. I enjoyed it kinda. It is NOTHING groundbreaking. It's a bad self insert shounen. Like a really bad one. But it looked AMAZING. Fights were REALLY cool. Seeing just how strong he got to be was cool. Just simply seeing the army come out and go ham on the enemy was REALLY fun to read. Usually the focus is ONLY on the one guy, but it slightly dispersed to the shadows when they were brought into action. Course only slightly tho. Don't want to distract from the MC. That'd be preposterous...

Overall 3/10: This manga is bad. If you want something pretty to look at, and something INCREDIBLY HYPE and only that, then this is FANTASTIC at that. I heard ppl being like "Yeah ToG had a bad anime adaptation, yeah GoH had a bad anime adaptation, but wait until Solo Leveling gets an adaptation. It'll be WAY better." I don't see it happening at all. It's gonna be rushed. It's gonna be bad, too. In this case, third time will not be the charm bc this isn't a good manga to work with.

Admittedly, the prologue is like a 7/10 imo, so if they don't at least rush that then it'll maybe be decent. But seeing the other two adaptations, I have no reason to have high hopes for it.

If you want the premise of this story read the description on MAL because there's really nothing for me to add to that.

To start with Solo Levelling sets itself up to be a series where we watch our protagonist Jin-Woo grow stronger by using his 'level up' ability. It's clear that it's just going to be a power fantasy, which is fine. The fundamental problem is that the story, world and characters are totally bland and uncompelling which is why I dropped this series after around 100 chapters. I don't care how powerful Jin-Woo is because cool fights don't make me want to read hundreds ... of chapters of a series. Cool fights get old really fast when you know what the outcome is always going to be and there's nothing else interesting about them.

Before we get into that, I'll note the only good things about this series. It's got good art. You can't deny that so I won't try. People overemphasize how good it is, but it's definitely good. The premise itself is also interesting and reminds me of another isekai 'So I'm a Spider, So What?', where in that series we would watch our protagonist using their unique videogame abilities to analyse the world and carefully plan every move so that they can defeat enemies and grow stronger.

Solo levelling isn't about these kind of interesting tactical fights because our main character goes from underdog to god very quickly. It felt like the series blew it's load super quickly because every character they introduced as being super strong became irrelevant compared to Jin-Woo by chapter 100. Regardless, our protagonist also changes his personality at some point from this nice but weak guy to edgy loner that everyone wants to fuck. It's confusing because it's not like he watches someone he loves die, he just becomes like this because he's strong. Maybe it makes some sense that he'd become detached given that he's a god however that really isn't fun to read because he's just boring now. What's his goal? He's already strong, so I guess become stronger.

The fact that Jin-Woo doesn't have an interesting goal is a big problem because fights are usually meant to be a clash of viewpoints between two characters. When all our character desires is to be stronger then the fights lose any potential emotional weight. The villains he's fighting most of the time are also basically robots (it's implied that the enemies in gates are being controlled by someone, so they have no real reason to kill people other than that they are being forced to), so it's not interesting on that front either.

The series eludes to the interesting point about how these god-like S tier hunters get to exist above the law and how maintaining order requires one guild to have a larger amount of S tiers. This gets forgotten about because Jin-Woo is stronger than S tiers so now we start seeing national level hunters talked about instead. There's an opportunity to explore the interesting politics of this world but instead we get to see chad thundercock Jin-Woo beat things up in different ways.

So we have a boring protagonist and a boring world for him fight in. There's an overarching plotline forming throughout which is going to explain what gates are or whatever, but I just don't see any reason it would be interesting. And I guess that's about it. There are some stupid plots to talk about maybe, though mostly I just don't like Jin-Woo. He's an edge lord but without an interesting reason to be one. We find out about his ill mum like 60 chapters in I think and he fixes that almost immediately. Overall, just a terrible manhwa.

NOTE THIS IS ONLY FOR THE 180 chapters

(This has been pasted since my old account has been deleted)

Solo Leveling is by far MAL's favorite manhwa or Korean Manga, yet there are sides to saying its peak fiction to saying it's absolute trash. Quite frankly, I dug into the hype of this manhwa, and it didn't take me long for solo leveling to show its true colors. Thus, it became of the worst things and biggest time-wasters in fiction I have ever read.

Art 7/10

The art is the high point of this manhwa, where the character designs are well done, and the monsters and fight scenes are ... well drawn and colored. Nothing more to say. It's just amazing; sadly, the illustrator died because he could’ve used his talent to be one of the best illustrators of Manwha History if he was still alive.

Story 2/10

The art only carries this manhwa, but here we enter the lousy part of the Manhwa, the story; the story revolves around these so-called “Gates” that appear, which brings a link between the everyday world and the magical world filled with magic and monsters. Then ordinary people go into said dungeons to mHunterquick buck. Enter Jin Woo, who initially is the weakest Hunter in the story and makes a living being a hunter to pay for his Mom’s hospital bills. After one failed mission, he finds himself in a hospital three days later with a questHunteraking him train hard, which in turn causes him the best hunter.

This plot is very generic since we have seen this million times in Isai or power fantasy anime. Still, at least it sounds interesting to develop it to make it enjoyable, right?

Sadly that isn't the case for this manhwa.

The story is severely made to see the main character progressively go from weakling to the most powerful. It's like playing any browser game like a cookie-clicker or just wasting time grinding on one thing to be overpowered, like killing monsters.

Worldbuilding elements are not there since we don't know how the gates appeared in the first place, and the author was pretty lazy about how they came in the first place.

It goes like MC enters a dungeon, kills the monsters/boss, gets more powers afterward, rinses, and repeats that about 7-8 times. It's all fighting which, apparently, is to entertain the reader and not add any value to the already generic story.

The ending is also VERY unsatisfying because it ends the most bullshit way possible of just undoing all your work, making this read be NOTHING worth it. Jin Woo just decided to make all his hard work go away to bring back every character, which was a wtf moment, and I just read this for NOTHING.


Character 1/10

Speaking of which, Here we go; the worst part of the whole thing is the characters; Jin Woo is an ABHORRENT character. He is bland like baby food and is a Gary Stu type, battling the gate creatures and becoming mighty. He has no clear morals or emotions and just gets hugely overpowered. The only part other than the ending part that makes him at least somewhat interesting is the whole Hospital scene with his mother showing some emotion, but that is quickly forgotten about or brought back. He is just an overpowered, edgy character with no apparent motives who hacks and slashes toward any danger he is in. No depth whatsoever!

As for the side characters, the Males ones are just there for some reason since, well, you won’t care about them nor remember their existence after each arc because they aren’t even developed at all. They are just there to be a measuring tool to see how powerful our beloved MC is and help him tackle all the beasts he fights in each arc.

The Female side characters only exist to serve to fall for him because all of them have no or just forced character development and have emotions for him to make him more like a “chad.”

Enjoyment 0/10

Unfortunately, I have to give this a 0/10, but this manga didn't start with no entertainment since the first 26 chapters promised that this story could expand more, which is a solid 5/10 start. But as said in the Story and Character Section, it drops to 0.5/10, which rounds up to a 0 because appreciating the art is the only good part, and me going through rubbish writing is not fun at all. Me finishing it was a chore, to be honest, and I would've have dropped this around chapter 103

Overall 1/10

This manhwa is entirely wretched. I can't understand why this is hyped, with people saying, “It’s a masterpiece.” Every damn time the art and fights carry the whole manhwa while trapping the average reader, making them ignore all the wrong things with this. The author was highly incompetent in writing a good story that was par with the art. I understand why people like this because of the powering-up fantasy, but I can recommend this who like battle shonen just carried by the fights if you are like me that got duped thinking this is a compelling story, then I would recommend skipping this one since if you want to finish this, you would be treating that like a chore or pretty much dropping it after the 3rd arc.

Or here’s a TL: DR

Good parts:
Fantastic artwork, some traces of serious potential

Bad parts:
Unlikable mc, very generic plot, non-existent world-building, and useless side characters

My biggest disappointment in 2019. Visuals won't be the problem but the story. The characters are thrown in the story without depth/development. Many of them (especially the antagonists) were killed instantly without leaving an impact on the readers. Likewise, the supporting characters were not given any color but fawners of the main character.

You can see the disregard for important characters in the family of the MC. The father arrived in action, then died without giving us any backstory. The sister just became a tool for the MC to show off his enraged side. While the mother was just a lame excuse for the ... MC to level up that did not even allow the readers to sympathize with because we are more interested in his fighting. Overall, the family that should be the drive of the MC is superficial. No love, care, or attachment in these characters.

Solo leveling is the antithesis of One Punch Man or Mob Psycho (Or even the classic Dragon Ball) on how it treats overpowered MCs in developing stories. He is just a plain "Gary Stu" (I cringe when I used this pretentious term).

I read the manga because it was promising with the visuals and good pacing of the story, but the impression didn't last long. I tried to redeem it by going to the source novel; however, it was faithful to the material so my disappointment lived up. Hahaha, it was wishful thinking.

Whoever denies that Solo Leveling is far from a masterpiece, seriously hasn't noticed how repetitive, simple and linear the story really is.

The MC, Sung Jinwoo is a typical generic person in modern day South Korea who happens to have awakened as a "hunter" 4 years before the story's beginning. A hunter is a human with enhanced capabilities in fields ranging from agility and strength to the power of using magic and occasionally additional special skills, however, unlike basically everyone, he only gets a miniscule stat boost in strength and regen so useless, people dub him the "world's weakest hunter". Why doesn't he just get ... a regular job instead of constanly venturing into dungeons to risk his life? Because it pays well.

Now, the MC has plot armor so thick, not even a god could pierce it and that's essentially what happens at the beginning of the story. A monster so powerful not even the strongest of hunters could take it down appears in a supposed low-level dungeon and will serve as the main driving factor for our MC to become stronger until... that motivation is lost in the story and forgotten. He manages to miraculously "solve" the monster's attack patterns with pure gut feeling despite having no significant wisdom or intelligence to speak of and sacrifices himself to save the rest of his party, but mysteriously survives, regrows a limb and disintegrates all the monsters inside the dungeon after seeing some strange menu bar while dying and accepting the conditions of becoming a player. When he awakes, he can level up and become stronger which makes him automatically better than everyone else because everyone else just has a set number of stats after awakening.

The rest of the story is just the repetition of the first boss battle honestly. Raiding a dungeon, running into a problem like the dungeon being unexpectedly stronger than expected or locking the MC inside of it and the MC fighting an overwhelmingly strong boss to somehow survive and get an upgrade all interlaced with unspeakably thick layers of plot armor, so the MC wouldn't get absolutely obliterated each time he entered a dungeon by the first enemy he encounters. The main cast of characters is pretty much nonexistent outside of some recurring characters and MAYBE 1 support character who doesn't really contribute to the story. As for character development, it seems like there's essentially none either. After the MC becomes a "player", he becomes buff and confident in his abilities after levelling up and, having faced death, fearless, however THAT'S IT. After that there's nothing, nada, null, ZERO. 99 chapters in, we have a nonexistent main cast and no character development for the last 96 (?) chapters. A bland self insert is the only thing carrying the story forward and if he were to die, the story would instantly end because all the story is about is Sung Jinwoo levelling up.

So what does Solo Leveling offer? Nice visuals and thrilling action (if you try to ignore that the MC absolutely always must overcome his enemies and win in whatever ridiculously showy, dangerous, reckless or life-threatening way possible). Like I said, it's a very simple story that doesn't deliver on the mysteries set up like what a "player" is or why there are monsters and dungeons nearly enough and instead lavishes in excessive battles not of wit, but of brute force.

The character's rate of improvement is off the charts and after just a few months, the MC is already immeasurably powerful and his power level seems to increase faster and faster as the story progresses, but don't get me wrong, with his overpowered plot armor and his one-of-a-kind ability to level up, he was already the most powerful character in the whole manga from the get-go. These kinds of stories seem to pretty common in Korea and China, but not very enjoyable. I don't want to see a wise sage inside a 0 y/o's body become the wizard lord or whatever at the age of 2 after being tansported back in time or Sung Jinwoo becoming South Korea's strongest hunter in like 2-3 months or something, I wanna see a person grow not only physically, but mentally also, I wanna see interesting plot developments, fascinating characters, an expansive and well-crafted world, elusive mysteries and a kickass ending to tie it all up, I doubt Solo Leveling will ever deliver on any of those things in the future.

Now, the overarching elements of Solo Leveling. Vinland Saga has taught us how to properly "love thy neighbor", that we aren't born with any enemies, we make them, that chasing revenge can lead you down a dark path and the concept of being "irredeemable" and more. Re;Zero revolves around beating the 7 deadly sins with Subaru having to reject his own greed, gluttony, sloth, pride, etc. to grow as a person. When facing adversity, it encourages you to face your problems, not run away from them because it won't fix them. It also says that you can't beat all problems on your own and you should be eager to accept help from others if you're helpless and more. NOW FINALLY, what grand themes does Solo Leveling follow, what lessons does it teach? "Become stronger to protect the people around you" - that's literally it. To add salt to the wound, even this theme is half-assed as Sung Jinwoo mostly just enjoys the thrills of almost dying while fighting a powerful enemy, levelling up and getting shiny new items.

All-in-all this seems to be another overhyped generic story about a self-insert being badass to make you feel good. Nothing of note, you can safely skip

So, Solo Leveling, the manhwa everyone reads and everyone praises and defends but in the end its just another dungeon based manhwa with a character that is weak and gets strong so fast you might not even notice.
The art is great, redice did a wonderful job here but thats where the good things end, the story is generic and boring, its the classic "oh no dungeons have appeared what are we gonna do bam op normal guy appears" but it doesnt take place when the dungeons start but some time after, the characters oh god the characters, sung jin woo barely had any character development ... in the last 150 chapter other than getting stronger and the other characters are barely memorable, tell, do you remember the name of the chairman of the hunter association? do you remember anyone from the jeju island event? did you care when they died in the jeju island incident? probably not, because all of them feel like background characters that sometimes speaks and are supposed to be the strongest of the storngest but get killed by anything so that sung jin woo can be shown as the strong character he is. if the characters were a bit more developed it would've been a 9/10 for me but that just kills the manhwa.

This is my first review.

Solo leveling is one of the most unenjoyable series and with terrible writing.

First let's talk about the main character, I generally hate over powered main characters like jin woo except if their are comedic or like mob. Sure it's cool when he beats them up and shit but that's the same thing as saying some anime is good cause the fights with great animation without any story

Character:- which I'm gonna be real is a 1/10, the worst side cast i have seen in all of media. Most of them are non existent and don't get much characterization so I couldn't ... care what happened to them since the series don't want them to shine out.

I prefer a strong story but the story itself is boring af cause at the end the main character beats everyone and saves the day. Sure even if I know the ending the ride is what makes the journey also puts it off for me cause he just wins with easy and so far he has never had a tough battle where it would seem like he would loose except when he was growing strong.

The story was interesting at first and look promising but now it just fails to make me care with it being more dependent on main characters and not plot. I could go on and on but I have said enough for now..

Final rating 4

"Solo Leveling" is more akin to "Zero Leveling", because not a single character develops throughout the entirety of 179 chapters. It's just boring and has been done thousands of times before. Not a single character (no exaggeration) is likeable or interesting. Overall, the plot is very predictable and the protagonist never really has to struggle. If you want to read manhwa, Solo Leveling is a good starter, but after you read a some more (better) works, you'll begin to realize that it's all the SAME. Solo Leveling is a story full of clichés and bad world building that reminds me of kindergarten when I'd play ... "pretend" with my friends. We'd go back and forth being like "okay so I punch you and you die" and "no, actually I was wearing diamond protection IV armor with thorns enchantment so you died instead" and "okay well I punched you in your weak point so you're down" and "no my full body is coated in netherite so I don't have any weak points" etc. etc. The hype of each battle loses flare since it's hard to get attached to characters who lack backstory and development, which is worsened by the fact that ALL side characters are tossed to the back and never get any screen time; beyond that, pretty much every fight ends up with the MC stepping in like a badass and saving the day. Standard stuff.

There was one side character in particular that I had hopes for: the MC's love interest. She was introduced in an interesting way that hinted at perhaps a bigger motivation or mystery to her history. However, this line of plot was never explored. It is highly disappointing how the side characters are treated in Solo Leveling-- it's not just this girl that wasn't able to meet expectations. It's so frustrating when characters that have been hyped up throughout the entire story are finally introduced, only to be met with immense letdowns as the protagonist swiftly defeats them without breaking a sweat. Yet despite all these achievements, even the protagonist feels very plain. He has no defining character traits; you could replace him with any other battle manhwa male lead with black hair and edgy personality and nobody would ever notice the difference. He has no internal or external struggle because he is able to overcome any problems almost immediately with zero buildup. It becomes formulaic to watch.

Stupid plot and bland characters that only serve as plot devices to make the MC look cooler. The story feels very retconned because none of it is character driven. I can't name a single memorable feat by any character besides the MC. Don't waste your time, but if you like low substance power fantasy type of story, go ahead. Solo Leveling is a chill kind of read though, especially because you can just turn off your brain and enjoy the flashy fight sequences. The art gets considerably better as the chapters go on, but I still give this series a 1/10 because it does not make up for the awful character writing.