Kouya ni Kemono Doukokusu

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I have no idea how a manga this good is so obscure.

Kouya ni Kemono Doukokusu is a genuine hidden gem. The story of a young biology researcher turned into an amnesiac superhuman beast-man warrior is a rollercoaster of thrilling action that travels from Japan to Papua New Guinea to Mexico as characters uncover a complex web of conspiracies involving major corporations and world governments, while also exploring some really out-there ideas on culture, history, religion and biology, and how all of those interact and shape eachother.

Art: Exquisite. The character art is expressive and detailed, with a wonderful linework that truly captures the texture of all ... the fur, feathers and scales of it's human-animal hybrids, while the designs for the hybrids themselves are very imaginative, capturing the anatomy and unique characteristics of various animals and applying them onto a human body to create some beautifully grotesque and realized designs (and Makura, who just just regular beautiful). The backgrounds are similarly beautiful, truly capturing the feeling of being in a vast Central American jungle. The fights, meanwhile, are dynamic, action-packed, and very, very violent (the gore is not for the faint of heart, in some moments).

Story: Great. Again, it is a rollercoaster. It has moments of intense action punctuated with with subdued and introspective moments where characters discuss philosophy and religion. The plot is quite intricate, with multiple opposing factions and characters with their own goals that interact with each other, leading to frequent twists, betrayals and unexpected moments. As the conspiracy behind the Dokkaku soldiers is uncovered, the story goes into some really strange directions, as it explores the cultural beliefs of the tribes of Papua New Guinea and the ancient Mayans, leading to some really unexpected plot reveals

Characters: Also great. The characters are, by and large, very likable and charismatic, even the villainous ones. The main character, Mikado Shuuhei, starts as a typical amnesiac protagonist that is just trying to survive, but quickly becomes very proactive as he finds out the truth of what happened to him, and what happened to the girl he loves. The other characters are similarly cool. Yakushimaru Houzan is a great antagonist, being both an overwhelming menace that the protagonists can barely hold up against, and also a genuinely likable man with some really interesting philosophical ideas. Also Makura, who is a top tier waifu: fun, tough, clever, and takes no shit from anyone.

Overall: It's great, go read it. It has lots of great action, freaky fucked up moments, cool plot twists, interesting discussions of topics as varied as retroviral infections to Buddhist theology, amazing art, a top tier monkey waifu. Again, I really don't know how it managed to stay so obscure. A 10 is too much, it's not some kind of life-chagning masterpiece, but a 9 isn't enough so 10 it is. Anyway go read it.

So close to being perfect in my opinion. The plot is interesting and overarching, while remaining tight and tantalisingly just out of grasp. The artwork is some of the cleanest I've ever seen! Humour is interspersed alongside actual worldly knowledge and academic theory, which, while can take you out of the moment when a character suddenly starts theorising academia alongside an enemy, I found informative and enjoyable and part of the fun being that the mangaka and their editor are made characters in the story and interact with the main cast often. Even saving their lives.
But, some characters still felt like they are there ... to fulfil a purpose, and as such are more agents of advancing the plot rather than believable people. Maya (for example) starts off as a badass fem-fatale and undercover spy, but quickly devolves into a "damsel in distress", even going so far as cooking and cleaning for the "bad guys". This is after the male lead has sex with her, of course. Maya then goes from constant captive to being "fridged" in order to motivate our hero, Mikado, into his final form.
Males in this are almost always some variant of the "crouching moron, hidden badass" trope, with the hidden bad-ass usually some alpha male power fantasy, from modern samurai to literally turning men (and like three women) into animals (sort of). So not huge on sex equality, although it does have moments.
Why isn't this a 10? Aside from everything I've mentioned (both good and bad), right at the penultimate moment, there's a time skip to Tokyo from the Jungles of South America. It serves no purpose. The very next thing the protagonists do is grab the "bad guy" and take him back to South America to face Mikado in the fight they would have had before the time skip any way.

The art in this manga is possibly the best I have ever seen, easy 10/10, I must say if I were to ever write a manga I would want this man as the artist. It has a delicious faux-90's quality to it with sharp black and white contrast that I love, it gets so creative with the paneling and the designs of the beastmen/women and the spreads of the Mesoamerican imagery in particular are magnificent. I would recommend this title to most people on the strength of the art alone, it's seriously that good.

So why mixed feelings? Well there's a problem with Kouya. Kind of ... the biggest problem a manga can have.

The story and characters are not very good. Not irredeemable but subpar to say the least.

It's all very fast paced and has a bunch of different organizations and minor characters (a great portion of the dialogue is dedicated to expositing about this) all after our amnesia having MC for different reasons. Basically it's just a vehicle to get the reader from one incredible looking sequence to the next, which is fun for what it is but leaves you not caring at several moments that should be emotional because these characters give you no reason to be attached to them or their relationships. Indeed there is only one character from this series you see posted everywhere and that's Makura. Fittingly this isn't because of the strength of her writing but because she's a sexy well designed monkey waifu.

If you did somehow get yourself emotionally invested despite the lack of reasons to, prepare to have it dampened every time the too frequent meta humor interrupts a serious moment. I wouldn't call this more than an annoyance usually but there's an entire poorly integrated subplot dedicated to meta humor about being a mangaka.

But it didn't have to be like this! The concepts of the story are so cool! I love beastification stuff! I love Mesoamerican mythology and i'm happy to see a manga utilize it! I even love the somewhat cliche points about humanity it tries to make!

But concepts aren't enough, because I know if it had average art i'd probably forget about it the second I finished it and it's all down to the frustrating execution. Still, it does have it's art so even though I just called it a subpar story i'm going to give it a 6/10 and a cautious recommendation just because I love looking at it and it's sexy monkey so much.