Rainbow: Nisha Rokubou no Shichinin

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Almost a decade after I watched the anime (2015), I'm happy that I could read all the original manga. All these years I didn't know what to expect from the rest of the story that the anime didn't cover, and I can safely say it was a pleasant surprise.

This is a tale about seven young men – Nicknames Mario, Suppon, Heitai, Kyabetsu, Joe, Baremoto and Anchan - in a juvenile reformatory in the post-war Japan (1955, more specifically), and how their encounter changed their lives.

Being written by George Abe, who was a teenager in the 1950’s Japan, takes great care in addressing social topics such ... as the American occupation and how it affected the country culturally (we see an ascension of Jazz and Rock music, boxing and other western sports, etc.).

But the main point is the economical devastation affected the Japanese people for decades after the war.

The manga expands beautifully on the backstory and development of all the seven characters, their personal struggles, families, goals, traumas, hopes and dreams. But the focus is on their relationship since juvie, and how there is no bond as unbreakable as a strong friendship.

It’s a wonderful tale wonderfully illustrated by Masasumi Kakizaki, a very talented artist.

Despite all the social criticisms Abe makes, you can tell a lot of the plot has his own life story in it, and the main point he makes is and how having good, trustworthy people by your side is what makes you overcome even your most rough hardships.

Overall, a great and very human story, great character design and development, beautiful art and a clear philosophy. I can respect that.

Recommended specially if you like historical novels and such. It was the first piece of media that I saw being set on 50’s-60’s Japan, and being told by someone that lived the period, at that.

“If there’s a place inside this world,
Where hopes and dreams are not yet lost
We stand and climb against this walls,
And fight this fight forever more.
If there’s a place inside this world,
Where hopes and dreams are not yet lost
Where we must go back to once more,
Until the day,
We find that place…
We are not alone”

the art is very mediocre, both in characters and locations, also, the fact that suppon resembles some cartoon character with those ears and his height while the rest of the characters are make to look more realistic, is a bad contrast in my opinion. The fact that by their looks alone you can establish who is bad a who is good takes away from the plot, from the moment characters are introduced you know who is going to be the enemy, also the fact that the plot is black and white, in the sense that good and bad people are very clearly delimited, the protagonist ... are angels underserving of their punishment and the antagonist are demons that fuck little children and drink blood, the beatings carry little weight, when someone is beat up the artist just adds some blood over their faces and thats it, their characters remain unchanged besides that, like some character is supposedly beated regularly but he doesnt even had a black eye, a broken nose or swelling, no, just some black ink seeping across his face.

a group of young men that continue to fight for their place in the world despite all the pushback and the continuous stream of problems they face. rainbow manages to take a simple and timeless premise and make it utterly unrecognisable.

the title's biggest downfall is sacrificing good, simple storytelling for moments of spectacle. everything has to be an event and our heroes have to fight against oppression and horrid villains all the time. to put it simply, it suffers from delusions of grandeur. it assigns nonsensical character motivations at every turn and all of this makes for a horrible reading experience.

if you look past all ... that you might find a heartwarming, inspiring tale about a couple of boys seemingly brought together by fate, striving to follow their dreams. unfortunately, it's very difficult to look past all of it's drawbacks and downright infuriating. you could chalk up my horrible experience to reading scanlations, though.