Jul 20, 2019
I recently found out about this manga and given the interesting title and description I decided to give it a read. However, if the score isn't an indication enough I came out very unsatisfied. The premise of Patch of Dreams was interesting and I love stories that delve into the boundaries between fantasy and reality, sanity and insanity. This story does not lack that aspect yet I couldn't help but feel that this manga was hollow. I fear this could be due, in part at least, to the translation by Ponet as they are notorious for lackluster translations. The dialogue was choppy at best and
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awful at worst. It was not only unengaging but also insulting at times to read through the mess that was this book's writing. Since this partially to do with poor translation it is hard for me to get a real grasp on my enjoyment and appreciation for this book. It is possible that there are scans available that do a much better job at presenting this in a readable way however, I want to give my thoughts on it in the form I read. I would recommend looking for scans if you are interested in this manga and skip the Ponet Mon release.
As for criticism beyond the clunky translation I have quite a lot. For one, the character art was confusing. The main character is supposed to be in her 20s yet from her design I really thought she was 12. Now normally this wouldn't really be an issue except there are flashbacks to when she was actually 12 in the story and her character looks exactly the same. Despite the decade of aging I could not make out many differences and I was constantly getting confused as to which time we are in. This coupled with the story being "surreal" and switching between past, present and dream I was lost for the majority of this book. This leads to a broader issue in the art, I did not like the character designs. Aside from the deliberately weird dream characters the humans all had very similar looks that I was often confused at which minor characters were appearing as they looked way too much like other ones. The art otherwise is passable but the character designs really messed with me.
If it couldn't get any worse in general the story and characters were flat, dull and clunky. The translation certainly hinders here but I think there is a general failure on the part of the original author as well. The message was hamfisted in on nearly every page that by the time I finished reading I had heard it so much I could recite it verbatim. Not only is the story is repetitive it somehow also manages to go nowhere and do nothing interesting with its premise. She is losing her mind from dreaming so much, okay cool but what does that mean? Her friend and brother died okay obviously that bothers her but again what is the dream world for? Conflicts seemingly arise due to her being in these different worlds but they are never resolved they just sit a limbo world. Did that person really get killed by her dreams? She fell in her dreams in the past and supposedly couldn't go back now she can, why, what is happening recently that changed? I really do not know. There is so little development and depth put into the dream world it could easily have been discarded from this story and the message remains the same. She can still have her hallucinations without the dream world. So again what the hell is the point of the dream world? If anyone else can figure it out please message me because I just could not piece together any reason why it is in the story other than to be a vehicle for the author's preaching.
The characters are boring and have no depth. I really cannot think of any good qualities about any of the characters. The main girl is losing her mind but she doesn't do anything that made me even remotely interested. I could not figure out why she acts the way she does. Is it the trauma of losing her friend and brother? Is it because she is just a strange person to begin with? She doesn't do anything nice or thoughtful for others she just acts like an airhead and yet people seem to like her despite her drifting off into dreams every 3 pages. Really I have nothing good to say about the characters. The only interesting things are in the dream world and they just are there for show not one mention of any sort of reason why they look the way they do or what meaning they have to the main character. Plain and simply I could not identify with these characters. This further hurts the story as now not only is the message hamfisted in every other line, the dialogue sucking and the art being meh, I couldn't even find one character moment I liked.
Overall, I did not like this manga. Maybe it was my high expectations after coming off re-reading some of Neil Gaiman's "Sandman" series I was keen on a powerful story about a troubled girl retreating into the dreamworld. Sadly, Patch of Dreams lacks everything that Sandman has: well written and human characters, meaningful and interesting purpose for the dreamworld, good art etc and etc. I don't rate this lower for the fact that a lot of my issues stem from the presentation of the story which I think the translation hurts and that could have been salvaged from a better translation. However, that doesn't excuse the general level of mediocrity from this manga. As someone who would consider themselves a fan of this genre of manga and comics "Patch of Dreams" or "Yume no Akichi" is one I would not recommend.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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