Variante

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Alright, i think i will write a review for this since no one has written one yet, so here goes.

Variante is a horror sci-fi manga that all horror manga lovers will want to read(though i personally just read it because it involved a cute girl, lol). It involves a normal 16 year old girl whose life is thrown into chaos as one day her family is attacked by a mysterious monster. Her parents are killed but she somehow manages to survive the attack...even though she had apparently died from it.


Story: 9/10
Despite the gorge and bloody content that is in this manga, it still manages to ... get a great story to be told to go along with the horror content. The majority of the manga revolves around a horrific creature called chimera. A chimera, is a being who has many different cells from different creatures all living in it's body at once, and can involve a human possessing mutated parts of creatures, or even other humans. The manga explores the morality of chimeras, and killing them, through the main characters' feelings as the manga progresses; eventually revealing their origin. As the public starts growing ever-suspicious, and internal struggle for control of chimera ensues in the government; the manga comes to a explosive (literally, read the manga and you'll know) end. Everything involving the chimera research is destroyed, and the main character manages to find happiness in the end, despite what she went through.

Art: 9/10
This manga is one of the better well-drawn mangas i've seen. Facial features on characters, such as the ears, nose, and mouth, are drawn in more detail. And the artist also apparently did not omit any details at all...in all of the gore scenes you can clearly see body parts and internal body structures (like the spine if someone gets beheaded) very clearly when they are shown. Thus, i think the art is very well done for a horror manga.

Character: 8/10
Character development in this manga is decent. The main character started out as only a normal 16 year old girl, who was suddenly thrown into a mess which resulted in her foster parents' death, her own death, and then her returning to life with a strange left arm. It turns out that her left arm is actually a part of a chimera, and the government agency which captured her forces her to use it to kill and capture other chimera or she would be sentenced to death as a test subject. Through the rest of the manga, she deals with psychological issues such as her reason to keep on living, the chimera she kills actually being humans, and that she is a monster(literally, in the case of her left arm) who only serves to kill. All this is a bit too much for a normal 16 year old girl to handle, but she eventually manages to deal with it and find happiness in the end.

Enjoyment: 8/10
You'll find the most enjoyment out of this if you enjoy gore and very disgusting mutant-style monsters. But i'd say that most people will be able to enjoy this anyway. This manga has a interesting story, mystery, drama, and will keep most people wanting to read it to the end to find out everything about the situation in the manga. I also think this manga is enjoyable because it is only 19 chapters, and you won't get bored before you finish it.

Overall: 9/10
i'm not a fan of horror manga usually, but this manga had a great story. It had drama, wass concise, and kept me excited until the very end. I also liked how everything worked out end the end for aiko, even though she basically was forced to become a murderer and even though everyone she cared about died.

Great manga overall, read it if you have time, its not long.

I found out about this little series earlier this morning after browsing through someone's profile. Since they stated that it made them cry, I decided to check it out. I ended up reading the whole series in one sitting, which is very hard for me to do, since I often get bored and move on to other things. The story to me didn't seem like a very original one ... it reminded me of Deadman Wonderland + Elfen Lied + Tokyo Gore Police + V for Vendetta. There was a lot of blood, a lot of gore, traumatizing pasts, and female leads crying. I ... adred Aiko's character though. She seemed like a typical sixteen year old girl working hard to please everyone she loves, and is utterly devestated when she arrives home to find her parents murdered. In fact, it's implied that she was murdered as well, but she came back to life with a weird genetically mutated left arm. She handled it like I would have handled it, which gave her character a very realistic feel. But I absolutely LOVED Soudo. For once, I think he was the first male lead that wasn't drowing in angst or refusing to show any emotion. I don't know how old he was (my best guess is twenty four), but he was a police detective, and actually cared about the people he was protecting! He has a sort of soft disposition toward Aiko because she reminds him of another girl that he tried to save that was also expeiramented on. All in all, he was awesome. I liked how it made the plot into more than what it led on near the end. Needless to say, I came very close to shedding a few tears, which is not normal for me. It takes a lot to get me to cry over a fiction series (Fruits Basket doesn't count!! lol)

If you love blood and female angst, this is the series for you. It does tend to get a bit graphic, so if you get sick easily I wouldn't suggest reading it. But it's great for an afternoon read.

9/10

Let me start by saying that I liked the concept of this manga. Story itself is good. Still, there were some things that ruined my enjoyment:

1) Story could be much better. It reminds me of Elfen Lied, where secret organization tries to conduct researches in order to create a superior human being. In Elfen Lied everything is done right: we get a 113 chapter long story with a lot of details. In Variante case we get only 19 chapters. It is not enough for story to get developed well. It is just an action manga that tries to copy Elfen Lied.

2) With given 19 chapters ... only, characters do not develop enough. Author gives us pasts of Aiko and Hiromi, but their stories are very short. In Elfen Lied we get a big flashback which sets the drama and characters' motivations. In Variante we get really short flashbacks, which show development and motivations in some point, but cannot make us attach to the characters. We just do not have enough time to empathize them.

With all being said I want to tell that this manga is not bad, but because author did not give a detailed plot, it loses its potential. I give this manga 6/10, because I expected more from this story.

Thank you for reading.