Vagabond

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Some seinen manga, I believe, take the meaning too far. The gore and nudity found in them is simply disturbing, no longer artistic, just omnipresent and absolutely in-your-face.

Vagabond is not like those seinen manga.

From the beginning, Vagabond has this strange allure to it. Drawn to this manga by the promise of awesome fight scenes, [oh yes, I assure you, you will not be disappointed by the fight scenes], you find yourself hooked to this manga.

Absolutely, completely, utterly, hooked.

It starts off with a rather rude and yet beautiful jerk, depicting the scene of a battlefield in splendid watercolor. The manga just rides on from there, rising ... from peak to peak. The fights get better, and the character himself grows. He grows realistically, he stumbles, he falls, he falls so hard that he finds it difficult to get back onto his feet, he takes the wrong path, goes the wrong way, makes the wrong enemies, and kills the wrong people, but he gets back up, and the story continues.

It is just so completely believable, so persuasive and so artistic all at the same time that with this manga just feels so raw and yet so real.

The main character, who one will find it hard to identify with on the surface, has something deep within him that every single one of us can possibly understand and aspire towards.

His growth and development, in more ways than just of the sword, but yet at the same time never truly leaving the sword, are so simple and yet so spectacular at the same time. He manages to bring out the best in some people and the worst in others, brushing past some like a whirlwind and crashing headlong into others, leaving behind a trail of death, destruction, and new life. All this happens while he himself is still growing, and while he is nowhere near perfect, there is just something so addictive about getting to know more about him.

And getting to know more about the main character is exactly what this entire manga is about. It is about seeing Miyamoto Musashi through the eyes of the world, through the eyes of others, and through his own eyes.

With a brilliant blend of flashbacks, flashforwards and glimpses into the lives of others besides those who surround the main character, Vagabond paints a rich picture of the samurai scene in the time of Miyamoto Musashi, the main character.

If you have been hesitating about reading a seinen manga, hesitate no more.

Vagabond will open your eyes to a brilliant new genre.

[Spoiler Warning]

I read Vagabond to see what all the fuss is about. It's a very fast read. There are huge image panels and barely anything happening per chapter, which flows well if you're reading straight through but hellish if you're waiting chapter by chapter. The art is simply gorgeous - probably the best I've ever seen in a manga - but stands in stark contrast to the lack of actual story... sort of like special effects in a movie.

The "story" appears to be the warrior's drive to be the best, err, I mean "invincible under the sun." This results in such battles as the infamous ... "lets duel next year when our dojo isn't on fire" incident, the exhilarating stare down with Aang from Avatar, and the riveting stand off with the sleeping guy. It got a bit more interesting after Musashi killed enough people for their friends to start caring about it and gaining motives other than perfecting their skills, thus inspiring a semblance of sympathy and emotional investment in battle outcomes... but this didn't last long.

Over 50 chapters of spoon-fed philosophizing ensued. Triggered not by a sincere, voluntary revelation, mind you, but by circumstances that physically prevented the character from pursuing the goals he otherwise would continue chasing after. Over time the endless conversations and bouts of schizophrenia just glazed over in their repetitiveness for me.

Many of the characters also clung to highly romanticized notions of "honor" which made their motives/actions unrelatable and at times unrealistic. Sometimes they even got confused over conflicting honor codes and nearly sabotaged what their goal was in the first place. Other times they switched gears from a genuine emotional reaction to some intellectualized bushido ideal so quickly that I wanted to slap them. There was much facepalming on my end over this.

The 70-man battle should've been exciting, but it instead served as a perfect example of action over substance. Chapter after chapter of countless sword swings and I didn't care about any of these people. I love action, I truly do, but action only has meaning for me when there's something more at stake than just fighting stronger guys later. That's why my favorite fight, and the highlight of the series, was the twig battle between Sasaki and Musashi. It's sad when a twig battle is more exciting than a 70 man bloodbath.

I read 6 chapters of this garbage. In those 6 chapters, 2 rape attempts happened. Seinen truly is something.

The art is great, nothing to complain about that. Matahachi is a garbage deuteragonist who does not gain any sympathy from me in the few chapters I've read, though Takezo is a pretty cool character. The plot involving the two ladies being thieves was pretty cool, but it was cut off so some guy who killed the 15yo that Matahachi tries to rape's dad could threaten to rape who I believe is her mom.

Honestly, I expected much more from such a respected manga. Though you can ... say 6 chapter isn't enough to judge, it's more than enough to show at least SOMETHING worth of praise. Vagabond did not deliver.