Tokyo Ghoul:re

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A wise man said ''it’s better to burn out than to fade away’’, and this is exactly what sprang to mind throughout this sequel, especially during the last few arcs.

:Re is the continuation of TG, a prequel that offered an intense journey, delving deep in the characters’ psyche. Kaneki, Shuu, Touka, Suzuya, Amon-- they all got a fair share of character development, making the audience care about them, their backstory and struggles. Since the ending of the prequel, :re’s task was to wrap up all the loose ends and offer another side to the story, the CCG’s, ultimately ending in a non tragic way.

While ... I certainly enjoyed reading up until Rose Extermination, it soon became apparent that :re had some fatal flaws. For one, the characters stopped getting any attention. They only served as plot points, vehicles that will move the story forward successfully. Touka was shown fleetingly before becoming Kaneki’s woman, Suzuya is just CCG’s fight tool, Hide is just a person that comes in handy for Kaneki and the CCG. Their rushed treatment erased any kind of nuance and originality they used to have.

A second mistake was Ishida’s obsession with parallels. Foreshadowing and parallels do not necessarily equal good writing. Making parallel arcs in :re that mirror TG’s means ultimately nothing if it seems forced, rushed, inconsequential or involves overused plot devices.

Thirdly, while TG has always had fight scenes, :re was filled to the brim with them-- to the extent of sacrificing character growth and reflection. New characters, new battles, new missions. All of those would be cool as long as you were getting a glimpse of the characters' struggles, thoughts and emotions. That's the only way you can care about whether a character lives or dies. If you don't have that, the battle arcs seem pointless and dull. TG’s brand and originality stem from Ishida’s masterful psychological writing. If you add a really large cast of characters and just put them in fight sequences then, even if you cared about said characters, you will disconnect from them precisely because you’ve stopped seeing what you used to love about them.

Truth be told, there were a few glimpses of excitement in :re, however it winded up a huge let-down for the aforementioned reasons. I can’t help but look back to my 16 year-old self, who was begging for a sequel announcement after TG ch.144 was released. Back then, the story was still vibrant and immersing, full of potential that :re could seamlessly explore. But now, all I see is that this sequel has come at the cost of indifference. As painful as it is, it’s better to see something you love end quickly than to slowly stop caring about everything you used to love about it.

This is an absolute slog of a manga to read. Toyko Ghoul:re tosses out every major character that we grew to know over the previous story and complicates things with another dash of vague narrative and some very off-model characters.

We're introduced to a new cast of characters, including Ken, who is now working with the ghoul hunters in a specially created squad. What then follows is 32 (up to where I got) chapters of boring filler, with Ken playing Scooby-Doo with various ghoul characters. The new cast members are not fleshed out enough to carry this story any further than the initial premise. If anything ... these chapters feel like they should be one arc, not half the entire manga.

Bit characters from the first are introduced but seemingly do nothing, some having their designs changed completely to ensure that you forget who they are. Once again furthering the confusion by adding additional characters who you may remember to an already over-crowded cast.

The author seems to have taken the vague exposition of the final chapter of the first story and applied it to everything here. You will become very, very lost as characters talk over each other about subjects that you are not savvy to. Some characters become off-model to further infuriate you.

But that vague narrative style is being applied to a very simple story, Tokyo Ghoul:re simultaneously manages to be too dense and too thin, it's not worth the effort to figure out what some of these characters are doing and you'll find yourself becoming very, very frustrated over how little of significance is occurring. After smashing through the first in a few days, I rapidly ran out of steam trying to get through re.

To start this off I would like to say that tokyo ghoul was a manga that took me through my freshman year of highschool, I went to the library and saw all 14 volumes, and proceeded to check out all of them at once and proceed to read and extend my library checkout throughout the year. It was a very good manga. However, the sequal, tokyo ghoul Re is a complete mockery of what made the original so good. one of the main gripes i have with the series is that there are so many plot lines/character arcs going on at the same time it ... becomes a headache to keep up. A second gripe is that the fight scenes are poorly choreographed, sometimes it feels like ishida just sribbled on the page and called it a day, that doesnt discount the talent he has, I do think he is a very great artist, however i felt it was lacking in the fight scenes here. To end this off, if you are massive fan of the tokyo ghoul series, and very much enjoyed the first title, by all means read this one to continue on.

EDIT 7/19/18: Imagine giving another chance to a series that already self destructed just because so much time was invested. The result? A tremendous loss. Yeah, I'll take this L because I was hoping that Tokyo Ghoul REEEEE would be anything but droll, but it consistently let me down and it got to the point where a chapter of porn was the highlight of the entire sequel. The characters continue to display unlikable traits, poor interactions, and just god awful dialogue. Accompany it with unclear art direction and you got Tokyo Ghoul REEEEE. The rushed ending was a secretly a blessing because readers just couldn't ... stand the last chapters looking like rough sketches. And the final arc was actually the most poorly constructed idea I've seen in literature. It tried to be Persona 5 so badly, but it ended up a regurgitated idea with poor execution. I really gave Tokyo Ghoul REEEEE a shot, and the 120 additional chapters I read since the initial review did not improve my opinion of this godforsaken manga. Thought Urie was bad? Toru Mutsuki takes the cake as the biggest POS in manga.


Talk about a complete farce of a sequel, RE does not live up to it's expectations that the predecessor set for it. While Tokyo Ghoul wasn't amazing, characters had distinct personalities and the action was abundant. It is what I expected Tokyo Ghoul to be. RE takes on a different tone, shifting to a new cast of characters and taking the route of delving into the other side of the faction, the CCG.

Tokyo Ghoul didn't focus heavy on one faction, equally balancing both factions of Ghoul and CCG. Some psychological elements were present which made the story feel like there was tension and had some emotional impact. RE fails to set up in what was suppose to be a coherent action/fantasy story. With the focus on a squad within the CCG, expect a lot of exposition-heavy panels which is pretty insignificant to the story as it reaches the late 40 and into the 50 chapters. Much of the story felt stagnant with the exception of the late 50 chapters where it is looking like it's following its predecessor's footsteps. Everything leading up to that point feels like a waste of time as well with the few plot twists that pop up. It's almost as if the reader was supposed to be incredibly bored to lead up to a few chapters of action and adversity. Above all, the story just isn't fun. The stagnant nature of it with lots more dialogue then the author knows what to do with makes for an incredibly boring read.

The new cast of characters feature a squad within the CCG. All of them are poorly characterized with the exception of the main protagonist who is only interesting because of his alter ego. One guy for the WHOLE story just thinks about getting promoted within the organization. That's about it for that guy, I mean talk about one of the worst motives coupled with forced reactions in other situations makes him easily the worst character in RE. The other characters are very bland as well, making it seem like RE would've been better off having high school kids save the damn world vs what RE offered. The mindboggling thing is the previous cast of characters that made Tokyo Ghoul interesting get little panel time. Reading the first 20 chapters, the reader has to wonder if this is the sequel to Tokyo Ghoul.

A bland story coupled with terrible characters made RE easily one of the worst reads in all of literature. The more I think about it, the more I would have rathered read an economics book. It's complete shift in tone is what did it in and the open ending to the first season doesn't help. Actually, it makes RE look even worse because of that. Lack of personality within characters made for a tough cast to follow and ultimately connect with. The opposing faction was more interesting and all the reader gets in RE are little snippets of the things going on behind the scenes with minimum dialogue. I can't see RE getting any worse from here on out though, but I wouldn't hold my breath. It absolutely baffles me that I can browse the internet and find that this POS can lead in manga sales. The Tokyo Ghoul franchise is on a 90 degree downhill rollercoaster and avoid this if you can.

Through around chapter 60, TG:re is a solid 10 in every single aspect. It's beautiful with great characters and expands the world of Tokyo Ghoul while still keeping us tied to the themes and characters introduced in the first part. It's a masterpiece.

However, post chapter 60, little cracks start to show, and the issues in storytelling explode in the final arc, causing the story to cave in on itself. The main theme is truncated. The story relies on build up towards a thematic ending; however, all the build up goes nowhere in a clumsy rush towards an unsatisfying finish. Essentially, TG:re could be used ... in a creative writing class as a perfect example of what not to do in writing, and how to ruin a story's themes in a rush to end it.

I am not going to give a very detailed review of this manga because one, it is still ongoing and two, I don't quite remember everything so clearly. Around chapter 40 I stopped keeping up with each new chapter week after week. There are 80+ chapters out now so that means I didn't read the manga for 40 weeks. That is 10 months. I don't know if I am doing the math right here, but anyways I just recently picked up the manga again and got up to chapter 67 before dropping the it. My memory isn't so fresh but I do have my complaints.

Tokyo ... Ghoul was good until it ended so ambiguously. Fortunately, there was going to be a sequel so that would clear all of the confusion up, right? Wrong. Ever since Tokyo Ghoul ended, the story has only gone downhill in Tokyo Ghoul:Re.

In Tokyo Ghoul, I skipped over most of the chapters where the story would go to the CCG's point of view. I've always found the organization quite boring compared to the ghoul side of the story. I've never found any of the CCG characters interesting and I have never sympathized with any of them, even when they have died. I only feel irritated by them.

They are boring. There is endless bubbles of dialogue about their plans to take down the ghouls and it takes forever to wade through it all to get to what actually happens. I know it is necessary to talks about tactics sometimes, but it just gets ridiculous. Has this manga ever heard of show don't tell when it comes to the CCG?

So when I realized that the story was basically going to permanently be from the point of view of the CCG, firmly moving away from the ghoul side for good, I was distraught and disappointed. Again, endless bubbles of text were thrown at me as I painstakingly read through each chapter. Random new characters were introduced that I could hardly care about, even when they died.

Suddenly all sorts of new weapons and grades and ranks are introduced (or elaborated on, either way). Everyone just keeps getting more and more upgrades and more and more angsty and the story just gets further and further away from what we all once knew it to be. When something interesting finally starts to happen, it is dropped and not returned to for another 10 chapters. Just when the big climax happens in one of the arcs, the next one starts, killing all of the excitement and making the new arc even worse than the last. I just couldn't read it anymore.

The story sucks. What story is there even? Kaneki has lost his memories and isn't Kaneki anymore and now he is just getting missions and killing ghouls and trying to take down Aogiri as a member of the CCG. Interesting.

While people think that the art for this manga is good, I disagree. Half the time I have no idea what I'm looking at and I have trouble distinguishing between characters and who is killing who in fighting scenes. I feel half blind as twenty different things happen all on one page.

The characters were bad. I disliked all of them. I even grew less attached to Kaneki even though I thought he was a cool character before. This sequel managed to change that.

Honestly I can't bring myself to read this manga anymore. There is nothing good about it. Just when you think it is going to get good, it gets bad again. I apologize if this review seems jumbled, but this basically covers all my problems with the manga. If you disagree with my review, message me as I'd love to see if this manga can redeem itself in some way.

A mercy 1/10 because it offers a glimpse of a story that could work, if it had the right characters leading it, and if you cut out the previous manga in it's entirety. Re is what the first incarnation of Tokyo Ghoul should have been from the start. Too little too late though, and the few good characters from before have been replaced by bad ones.

An elite team of ghouls, humans, anything, engaging in what Tokyo Ghoul has to offer was always the right course of action. The suspense, gore, whatever the series wanted to show could work so long as it’s based around a ... great cast. Feel the disappointment when, like the first series, the wrong characters were focused on, and instead of this investigator team being fascinating characters (thinking of either Kaneki, Amon, guy Mado, Rize and Hide) the focus is instead on some bland quinx squad, generic police members and those with sparse likeability (Juuzou's just not interesting, Akira's drab, everyone really). They could still appear of course (this world demands demises after all) so long as the best characters are focused on.
The ones from the past that do appear are the banal ones like Touka, Nishio, of which they have been whitewashed of all personality and development. The only new person of note is Mutsuki who is the only non cliché one, and likely an editors suggestion to the author to include considering the unusually potent homophobic magnum opus the first manga was, it was good step to attempt to alleviate this.
Even with Mutsuki, this band-aid of a new character can’t cover the lack of presence we feel thinking of the potentially great characters. Who could look at this generic squad and not wonder back to fascinating, interesting people, like Amon – great fighter and investigator, one of the few to see Kaneki as not a monster. A natural born leader and would have loved to see him handle the extreme situations that would come his way, rather than disappear and replaced with non tier character whoever. Hide – charismatic, witty, an incredibly insightful best friend, indeed the only one considering the two faced nature of the ghouls. Hide fights indirectly, like leading ghouls to something that can beat them - other investigators, and unconventional fighting like using human food, why the heck Hide isn't centre stage, alongside his best friend Kaneki I have no idea. Even cooler if he could wield quinx weapons and have his impressive deductive abilities on show throughout the plot. Rize – clever, attractive, clearly should have been the female lead, definitely over bland, uninteresting Touka. To be able to explore the dynamics between Kaneki and the ghoul who was responsible for his fate would have been fascinating, not to mention that Rize battling, like against Yamori, Nutcracker or anyone would have been incredible to behold. Rize is the perfect ghoul as an antithesis to everyone. Guy Mado – could have carried the entire premise, specifically the humans can be just as bad as ghouls point, to see development and change so late in his life and to such a high ranking member would have been literary significant. Guy Mado being the ultimate mind to change for Kaneki’s purpose of having ghouls and humans live in peace, Mado was the one and the best key for the job. Yomo – he’s cool, wanted to see more, and Mutsuki – sure definitely get involved with this dream team.
How can people enjoy this series, considering who we could have had, and who we end up with: Touka, Hinami, Uta, Akira, everyone at the café, quinx squad, heck even Arima appear to be deliberately engineered to be as boring, and uninteresting as possible, and for some inexplicable reason it is these side bit characters that get the most focus. Whose head is turned for the trials and tribulations of wooden props?
The author may have thought to reset the series, though repeated the same mistakes in Re, and the inferior retcon characters can never replace the real stars briefly seen at the beginning. Still, nothing invested here, not dedication or interest, and so easy to move on and find something good, only the worst manga can generate these views.

Story wise, and unfortunately, the first manga dropped the ball on purpose and so 'Re'-set manga (essentially the same story, just told from the humans point of view) can’t even redeem it. In terms of plot there is nothing remarkable here, it’s also challenging to invest yourself in a narrative that continues to follow the lacklustre paths over the potential good ones. The arcs are banal, and what effect does it have on the cast? Even if there was anything interesting to note, who is tripping over themselves when Re once again consists of third-rate characters taking part in subpar story paths.
The greatest disappointment is the long seinen manga chapters should be creating gripping, something, anything, but it isn’t. This is not exactly a strenuous thing to achieve, and yet the fact of the matter is, the most striking feature of the non-existent story is how clichéd and monotonous it is.

Prejudice wise, this allegory for LBGT people and the supposed culture has carried over from the first manga, even with the toning down with the introduction of Mutsuki (though the concentrated poison is still secure in the first manga, and spills out here). The crude LBGT stereotypes have broadened, Tsukiyama and Nico are still present, but now we have the added Souta and Naki. Tsukiyama and Naki are naturally the drooling puppy dogs revolving everything round the straight protagonist; the ghouls/gays must know their place, see. And naturally they only want to be around Kaneki so they can eat him/hurt him/come onto him because that’s of course what those yucky gays/ghouls do, is the implication behind it all. Still so nice and tolerant for him to put up with the ghouls/gays, this is the other condescending message to everyone.
Meanwhile the straight people can be happily together, Kaneki/Touka, Amon/Akira, but all the homosexuals will not be having any of it. The LGBT equivalent of blackface and those old racist cartoons, and even present-day scenarios where black people come second to white people, and where they’re treated inferior has had its sorry day. It’s just quite intriguing noticing ancient history with this manga and seeing it the same way we look at old racist stereotypes. The out-dated LGBT stereotypes and their goals/motives should be rejected for the exact same reason we would dismiss a coin grabbing Jewish stereotype, who was jut around Kaneki for his money, and a magical N word person who picks the cotton in Kaneki’s garden whilst singing about how thrilled he is for the privilege. The same applies to a Tsukiyama, Nico, Naki, Souta, Nutcracker (the man hating lesbian, have to get them all in) and Big Madam and all their awful “yuck, look at the yucky ghouls/gays and how they act” preconceptions on full gracious display here.

Not even the art style can bring what could be good back, manga drawings which hint at something pleasant to be suddenly changed into sketches of planks of wood, and how remarkable the grooves are in the wood just does nothing to stir the imagination. An actual food turns to ash in the mouth, cheers Tokyo Ghoul, really appreciate it.

The only hunch is that the author deliberately tantalised readers with suggestions of promising characters, and stories in what should be an interesting environment, but then pulled the rug out from under leaving us on the ground looking at the opposite. An effective troll concept I guess, looks like it snared some people. Invest your time and interest into something that matters, this series cannot be it.

The forgettable plot can fade from our minds no problem, the bland uninspired drawings on paper (they’re not characters, characters make us feel something) immediately blanked out, and the sketches all replaced with a good manga. But presenting a glimpse of what was available character wise…

The bitter taste will forever be the ‘what could have been’ character and plot wise; ultimately that renders any enjoyment of this series impossible.

Ishida's predictions of a tragic end drove him into a corner.He's trying way too hard to create a tragic story,but at the same time he doesn't want to end his work so he can continue to grab cash.He keeps characters alive after near death situation(he even is bringing back from life the ones that we thought were dead for almost 200 chapters).His writing has improved(maybe that's just my impression),but the plot of his story is as weak as it can get,but i believe that he can suprise me and get the plot even weaker.The only tragic thing that will come with this manga it's your ... disappointment.

Story(2/10):Literally went to shit,there are as many plot holes as litres of blood kaneki had lost from the first manga until the newest chapter of :re.

Art(8/10):I can see that there is a lot of work put into the details in art,if he would first think the goddam plot and then worry about the art.But what can i say,i like the style.

Caracter(6/10):There's character development here and there,but he's too lazy to evolve the character's mentality based on recent events in story so he doesn't really try to change them over the course of his chapters,he puts some flashbacks and then doesn't really care about that character anymore.And discussing Kaneki,Ishida just keeps changing him randomly and during the fights he becomes the mad ghoul or some shit,then again change in mentality,Kaneki has like 100 personalities and slowly gaining more,maybe this is just a meme to Pokemon,you know:"Gotta catch 'em all" personalities.

Enjoyment(4/10):I kind of enjoyed it in the beginning,but it was hard trying to relate to Sasaki,then it all turns into your basic good guys vs bad guys movie,but with the bonus of seeing kaneki being defeated in different ways Ishida testing his edgy mind(trying too hard to make sick shit).I dropped it at 147,the story was so anticlimactic that i couldn't bring myself to waste my time anymore,i have better shit to do.

Overall(3/10):You may think that (2+8+6+4)/4 isn't 3,well it isn't,but this is the score i think it deserves,the story was what really kept me reading this manga,but then the mangaka turned it in a pile of shit.

If you've read the first manga and you want more,you're my guest,but i warn you that the disappointment that comes with the latest chapters isn't worth your time,better try another manga or smth,try to remember tokyo ghoul as what it was in the first season.

Tokyo Ghoul:Re wasn't ground-breaking like it's prequel.
Instead,it was tired,messy and boring.Initially,it's hard to understand what's going on but it gets worse.
Now,hear me out.The prequel didn't have a reliable narrator to it,and did just fine through it's use of symbolism instead.Tokyo Ghoul:Re doesn't use much of a narrator as well,but expects you to understand what is going on right off the bat all while covering grounds you have not yet seen.
The pace is messy,the new characters are uninteresting,some plot aspects are overused and the art got worse.

Don't get me wrong,I've loved Tokyo Ghoul for years,i'm a fan!Just not of the sequel.I personally recommend checking out the ... both of them for perspective.

This story, much like the first one, is mired in overcomplicated plot, unclear time/scene transitions, unclear characters, and unclear actions.

I read the last volume ending like 3 times and still couldn't tell what happened. I never knew who was who.

I am probably too dumb for the series since everyone likes it so much but it's lost in it's own complexity and for me that was no good. Finished them all. Art is beautiful! Especially when we get more into the scene work or splash pages. Re picks up towards the last half of the series but I was still confused a lot. 80+ characters? Some ... of them with two or three names. Hair changes. Mask changes. Very difficult to discern between them in a black and white book with dynamic art.

Okay, so I promised myself I wasn't gonna give :re the pleasure of having its own review, but I got some OPINIONS I need to spill about this garbage excuse for a sequel and I'm sure I would regret it for the rest of my life if I didn't vent it all out now. So, without further ado, here goes:

[Spoilers for TG part 1 ahead]

Story: 3/10

The plot of :re goes as follows: after Kaneki gets owned by Arima at the end of part 1, he is supposedly brainwashed through some unknown means and resurfaces as Haise Sasaki, an investigator for the CCG. He has ... none of Kaneki's memories and the story revolves around Sasaki rediscovering and regaining his former identity. Or at least, it should. There's just so much other shit going on at the same time that I can hardly bring myself to care! Every arc is a long, drawn-out battle that feels like it's being overly violent just for the hell of it, and any actual character moments to be had are forcefully shoved in while that character is getting their limbs torn from their body or whatever, so it all feels very jarring. The 2 year timeskip between the end of the first series and the beginning of :re isn't exactly smooth either, and details that definitely should have been made clear in part 1 are only touched upon briefly, such that it feels like Ishida's saying "oh shit I forgot uhhh...there! That should keep em busy". At the end of the day, it feels like a shonen that's trying way too hard to be a seinen, which is only punctuated by the forced feel-good ending where humans and ghouls are suddenly at peace (and also fighting a convenient non-sentient common enemy). Yeah, Kaneki deserved to be happy in the end, but the way it was executed felt like a massive copout.

Art: 9/10

No complaints here. Ishida really grew into his own in the drawing department if not writing, and he does a great job at expressing the insanity that too many of his characters are suffering.

Character: 2/10

Jesus H Christ, where to fucking START. Let's unpack Kaneki/Sasaki first. We already know from the first series that Kaneki, like most college freshmen, is in the midst of an identity crisis. :re takes this to another level with Sasaki, which is all well and good, but THEN has him undergo roughly 15 other personality changes over the course of the story (I'm exaggerating, but who counted?) He goes from kind, to ruthless, to psychotic and back again ad nauseum. This would have been a great opportunity to have him develop some sort of DID, especially since at one point it's implied that all these different facets of himself are aware of each other. However, I don't really trust Ishida to write that in a respectful manner, if we're being honest. So, Kaneki remains a parody of himself.

:re introduces several important characters into the mix, the most notable being the Quinx, Sasaki's half-ghoul squadmates who are studying under him. For the most part, I actually liked them, with one exception being Mutsuki. Mutsuki I was at first pleasantly surprised by since, you know, CANON TRANS MAN REP, but then Ishida completely mishandles him by making him go full yandere for Sasaki for no reason other than ow the edge. Also he seemingly decides to live as a girl by the end but I just brushed that off as a dysphoria episode. Urie started off as a little shit but he gradually grew into one of my favorites, and Saiko's a sweetheart, so I have no complaints about them, but I will complain about Shirazu dying because fuck it was too soon.

As for everyone else...nothing remarkable. Most of them are either one-dimensional red shirt cops who get way more screentime than they deserve or a 14-year-old's idea of what a psychopath is, and god am I ever grateful that I didn't discover the series at that age. The more likeable characters are either sidelined completely (like Touka, Nishio, Ayato, etc.) or are involved in so many different factions that I can't be fucked to care. Seriously, all of this worldbuilding would have been really helpful to know about in part 1!

And last but certainly not least, OH GOD DEFINITELY NOT LEAST, is best boy Hideyoshi Nagachika. After showing up as a hallucination multiple times and generally being an ever-present reminder of Kaneki's gay yearning, he finally shows up literally 75% of the way through (actually rounds up to 76%. I calculated.) and proves to be WAY MORE INTERESTING than any of the other humans in the story without even trying. I wanna hear the story of how he managed to masquerade as a ghoul for 4 WHOLE YEARS all while evading capture from the Bureau Chief of the CCG AND gathering information from ghouls who would be able to tell instantly that he was human. All for Kaneki. Hide, you are fucking awesome, and I don't care what Ishida thinks of you. Seriously, Ishida? You only choose to reveal his backstory in the FUCKING EPILOGUE? Even the anime gave him more dignity when they killed him off so his crying fangirls could give them free advertising via hundreds of sadboy AMVs.

And yea, since this was a hotly contested subject while :re was still being written: Kanehide should have been canon. 100%. Touka had no chemistry with Kaneki and the part where she tells Hide when she fell in love with him is a glaringly obvious retcon. I wouldn't have even cared that they got together if there was any buildup AT ALL, but nope. They have sloppy friends-with-benefits sex in an abandoned warehouse, then when it turns out Kaneki knocked her up they decide to get married like they're goddamn Catholics or something. Kanehide, on the other hand, has a solid foundation and PLENTY of homoeroticism to boot. There is a clear choice here. That is all.

Enjoyment: 3/10

Dear lord, this was a fucking slog after around chapter 50 or so. Even the action didn't do it for me after this point. I lost track of who was in what faction after a while so I quite frankly didn't care about who was fighting who, not to mention there was little characterization in between. I would have dropped somewhere around the 90 mark if it wasn't for the promise of Hide content. God, I love that boy to death. I'm sorry Ishida did you so dirty.

Overall: 3/10

Could have very easily been worse.

Tokyo Ghoul obviously needed a sequel because it was so incomplete and awful without one. I'm late to the party, but I finally read it all.

I was honestly going to put this as "mixed feelings" but seeing how I listed Demon Slayer as "recommended" I might as well do the same.... is what I thought but Demon Slayer was more enjoyable in a way because it was simple enough for the narrative's capabilities. So therefore I'm going to put this as "not recommended." Here's why.

Tokyo Ghoul was just too ambitious and complex. There are way too many characters for the author to handle. Characters you ... forget about from the original suddenly appear and have a major influence for about five chapters. And characters that were antagonistic towards the ones you were rooting for get converted to the "good" side for no reason (well of course there's always "a reason" but the point is Ishida hardly makes the time to explain why). The character designs and art consistency really didn't help because you often couldn't tell who is who, and so many characters look similar to one another. MC suffers the most from this terrible deviance in his facial features.

The story also often had no breathing room for moments to develop relationships between characters, which is largely the fault of having too many characters and their conflicts. This leads to important scenes such as a sex scene feeling like it was much too soon to happen for a romance that already had a shaky foundation writing-wise. The only relationships that weren't one-sided admiration that felt properly developed were Juzo Suzuya and his mentor, Akira and Kotaro, and Kaneki and Hide. Which isn't much considering the sheer amount of characters and Ishida's obsession with making sure you know the backstory of each and every single one of them. And speaking of one sided admiration, how those admirations came to be largely made no sense or were noticeably retconned in later chapters, such as Mutsuki's obsession with a certain character. All of this makes the story of MC really diluted and lacking in impact, as praised as he is for that.

The premise of the story, the conflict between humans and ghouls, strangely wore me out despite knowing what I was getting into from the beginning. That's because the entire time a doubt was lingering in my mind that I couldn't quite express. And it was that doubt that led me to conclude in hindsight that this story really didn't need so many chapters after all. Because the solution is presented to you as a side note in the epilogue that had no reason to had not been come up with even before the story began given the setting's technological level. I mean, this would be fine, if like I said before, there was actually breathing room to address the characters' personal journeys, but the manga couldn't even do that.

That being said the worldbuilding was truly awful. A "big reveal" that happens about halfway through the story about the higher ups of an organization really shouldn't have been all that surprising given the setting's briefly alluded to history, which is that humans have always dealt with ghouls. Now I won't elaborate further on this but if you spare any amount of effort to think about it the conclusion is really simple. Given the level of technology needed to fight toe-to-toe with ghouls and considering that this level of technology was not available for millennia, what would the ghoul's relationship to human society be in the past?

Now onto the female characters. The side female characters weren't bad, which is enough. My concern though is about the main female character Touka, a concern that extends from the previous manga and is never really addressed, which is her own motivations and how she relates to her brother and her friend. This is largely the fault of the manga being MC centric in spite of the sheer amount of characters. I would have said that "this is not a problem because male characters suffer from this too," but they still manage to feel much more fleshed out than Touka, as one of them (Tsukiyama) gets an entire arc devoted to him with a whole host of side characters that relate to him and properly wrap up their relationships with him. Meanwhile Touka never has a single conversation with her brother in this manga, and I don't think this is fair at all. Also, the only memorable female "villain" who has a strong connection to MC is barely developed and is simply kidnapped again and again for breeding stock, even though she is so prominent in MC's subconscious every time he has a mental breakdown.

Also, it's not bad writing at all, but if you're a female reader who has similar tastes, then you're going to want to see female character's relationships with other female characters holding as much weight as important male characters' relationships with other male characters. This is largely not the case, as exemplified by Touka never once interacting with her high school friend, a relationship that was supposed to parallel a certain other ghoul-human friendship. Ironically the narrative really tried to sell you on the idea that Touka was supposed to stop fighting to live a normal life with her, but these puzzling writing decisions really make you wonder if Ishida likes her at all and only included her to appeal to the target audience. Moreover Touka's relationship with Hinami (the girl she was living with and took in and killed her parents' killer for her sake) largely revolved around Kaneki and Hinami's relationship with Tsukiyama was far more engaging and humanizing. You know what, nevermind. The complete character assassination of Touka as any sort of character apart from Kaneki IS bad writing while the male characters actually have fleshed out relationships with other characters is quite frankly sexist.

TL;DR Justice for Touka and God forbid women in seinen actually mean anything

I truly, truly wanted to like this, but in the end I was sorely disappointed. Now I know why hardly anyone talks about it in mainstream these days besides jerking off Unravel every now and then.

Tokyo Ghoul? God tier. Great manga. Art was amazing. Story was enjoyable and definitely had me interested. This shit was good!

Tokyo Ghoul:re? Trash. Bad manga. Art was amazing... at first. Then only sometimes. Story was ok and lost interest as it went on. This shit was bad.

Do yourself a favor and pretend Tokyo Ghoul ended at the original. :Re definitely could've been something great. But completely falls off after the first ~30 chapters. Some very nice moments here and there, but overall was disappointing.





...
How much longer does this need to be so I can post my opinon and warn others.

I rage quit this manga so many times because Kaneki is so stupid. I wish I could further explain why this manga is so bad but just thinking about it makes me mad. The MC ruined the entire story, which in my opinion had great potential, due to his incapability of making any good decisions. Pretty sure that if you go through my group chat you see years of complaints that are solely related to Kaneki's stupidity. I know I am repeating myself but I am so filled with rage while typing this that I forgot to check the thesaurus :/. I genuinely forced myself ... to read this at some point because I thought if I already came this far I might already finish this. Amazing art style though 10/10

I really loved this manga In the beginning. I loved the characters, the symbolism and the art (expect the battles sequences...those were painful). I loved it so much that my initial score for it was a 9/10. But as the story progressed (past chapter 60) I could not help but notice that it was slowly but surely getting worse. The characters relationships stopped mattering. There were a ton of fake deaths. And I slowly started losing interest in the series until it ended, by which point I really didn't care anymore.

For old time's sake I read the spoilers, and, I could not find it ... more insulting. I wish I could say that I'll remember this manga fondly, but I'm afraid that every time I look back at it I only feel disappointment and anger.

WARNING! SPOILERS!

"What is right... what is wrong... you can't easily tell the difference. That's why you must keep thinking, whether what you are doing is right or not. That act itself, alone, can be called right."

When I heard that there will be a sequel to Tokyo Ghoul I was pretty excited thought I didn't really want a sequel, since I was okay with the finale. But what I got in Tokyo Ghoul:re was something that I never expected. With the beginning of Tokyo Ghoul:re, the story was driven to a point which audience wasn't ever expecting. We all thought Kaneki was brutally murdered (and ... yeah it didnt made sense at all when he came back to life) but he actually turned out to be now working as a ghoul investigator in CCG, lost his memories and CCG is hiding his true identity from him, unless he might cause huge trouble. HE EVEN HAD HIS OWN SQUAD??!! Yeah, now he is also the mentor of the ghoul investigator squad called Quinx, and its full of BRRROKE teenagers. We have Urie, the super edgy maniac only thinking about promotion. Saiko, the low budget e-girl but she's a cutie. Mutsuki,aah... she starts as a innocent girl, but ends up as a fake ass kaneki. And Shirazu, only pure boi after Kaneki (now called Sasaki). Yeah, we had a quite fun start. A brand new cast and many new villains. Oh boy, I hope Haise gets his memories back and turn back to Kaneki ... Well, nope not a good thing may happen from that. But everything turns into a massacre when Kaneki turns back and Shirazu dies, later on a lotta fights and confrontions blah, blah Dragon Arc and the Final Arc were trash... Tokyo Ghoul:re is ruined in the end.

Story:
I was sooooo excited since the beginning of each chapter, wondering if this sequel will be worthy. The first few arcs were great. New squad, problematic newbie investigators also dumb villains. It might be a squad full of problem children but Quinx was a real good thing. Its much better than Anteiku cast in the first part, they are more relevant and symphatic. The time they spend with Sasaki and their meetings... It was very good. Then important operations and BOOOM! Shirazu dies. It broke me but im totally fine with his death since it wasnt a stupid death. And Kaneki comes back, goes mad, kills Arima (not actually but yea), then the useless arcs start. I personally believe the story was extremely prolonged for nothing. Ishida probably write the Dragon Arc so he could make an excuse to revive Kaneki again. Which is, he chose the worst excuse by turning him into a gigantic cock & ball dragon. The whole Dragon Arc was suprisingly optimistic despite the brutal damage dragon causes. I mean, like all of the CCG and GOAT organization gathered forces and thats a pretty big thing since like the entire Tokyo Ghoul was made for ghouls vs. ccg. I barely remember what exactly happened in the final arc. And reviving Rize and making her fight as the final boss was a very rushed idea. You can easily realize that how small her role was thought she came back to life. I believe she only talked a few words yet she was the vital element of the Tokyo Ghoul. The whole story happened thanks to her and she was the least relevant character in :re. The final chapter was kinda satisfying. It really didn't have any cons. We got to know how everyone ended up except a few people but yeah it was fine. But the rest of the manga at some point is worthless. Not the first arcs with quinx, once the thing with goat organization began I was bored of reading this manga I used to be in love with. It's ruined.

Title:
Yeah I actually wanted to talk about this in story part. But I noticed in the chapter called "Title" where we see Kaneki transforming into Dragon and covering the whole Tokyo and violating everywhere, he became the "title". He became the ghoul who is devouring the Tokyo. The Tokyo Ghoul. So, I believe this idea was always in Ishida's head since the very beginning, and its getting me real mad since Dragon Arc was in my opinion the worst arc in the story. I can't believe Ishida wrote this holy grail manga just to bring up this trash arc. I didn't even notice that manga took place in Tokyo.

Art:
Near the last arcs of :re, we realize that Ishida's artwork has once again leveled up. This time fans were quite unhappy with the new art style. But I always love Ishida's style. Every cover of Tokyo Ghoul:re volumes were incredibly beautiful and needed attention. The artwork inside the manga, otherwise can sometimes be quite different from the covers. But anyway I don't believe Ishida ever dropped quality on artwork of tokyo ghoul. In :re, he reached another level and became even better. I'm very happy for him.

Plot twists:
We now know that One Eyed King is originally a title that is inherited from one to another. I was already aware that Arima might be the king, but it was eventually confirmed in :re it was true. I really hate Arima, being secretly associated and admired by Aogiri and also working for CCG. And Furuta/Souta turning out to be the main antagonist was a great idea. I really liked him as a villain and never expected him to show up. He had great potential, yet he was underrated af. I can't believe him being so underrated yet antagonist. How could the fanbase be so ignorant?

Cast:
I really loved the cast and characters' development. Such as Urie was a jackass, but once Shirazu dies he finally becomes a better person, more caring and compassionate. Mutsuki was innocent girl yet she was devastated once Haise is gone, and now its Kaneki. So she turns into "female badass kaneki" . For Kaneki, I really liked his new persona Haise. He is completely different from initial Kaneki. He is more like a leader and confident. Once he gets back his memories, and gone mad, the story of :re finally began. I don't know if making him go berserk was a fine idea but we were all waiting for that moment. Once his fight with arima ended Kaneki becomes calm and we really get him back that moment. I really hate Arima and his relationship with Kaneki. He said to Kaneki that he can kill him in just 2 seconds, yet he commit suicide. It was very hard to see Arima, a very stonehearthed character having something for a ghoul. Also we got our best boi back, Amon Kotaro, yet he is irrelevant af. Damn Ishida, why dont you evaluate this god tier character? We also got homeboy Takizawa back. But now he is a psycho ghoul. His appearence somehow reminded me of jeff the killer but whatever. After a lot of damage he causes, he finally turns into an ally. Yeah, that side of Takizama, he was a f*cking maniac, I really hate him in :re, even thought he turned into an ally. I was almost forgetting Shirazu and Saiko. They are both one of the best characters in :re. I felt real bad for Shirazu when he died, all reason he fought for was so he could cure his sister (which eventually happened) . And Furuta, he is probably one of the best villains I've ever seen. He is a greatly written character, yet so underrated. His lunatic side is both funny and scary.

Eto Yoshimura (wtf is the deal with her)
Eto is my least favorite character in Tokyo Ghoul, but unfortunately she is a fan-favorite character. But anyway, I hate him so much. She tortures people, she is sadistic and even made his father an experiment for ghoul transplantations. But anyway, in the final arc we finally got to see her after a while, yet we couldn't understand what exactly happened to her. Was she dead or idk brainwashed? Probably she survived thought she was absent in very final chapter. Also I don't think Ishida would have a reason to kill her off.

TLDR: You should never expect respect from someone who put a 6 page sex scene in the middle of a war instead of literally ANYTHING else. Fuck Sui Ishida.

[SPOILERS AHEAD]

After taking time to reflect on my opinions about Tokyo ghoul re I can say proudly that this series was garbage with no respect to its predecessor and even less to the reader.

When a sequel series starts and throws 20+ new charterers at the beginning that is how I should have known it wasn't going to get us to form bonds with these characters and just kill them off. Bad thing is that no ... one is ever killed off. If these characters are super strong and blah blah blah, why aren't more characters that "matter" dying? Where is the blood shed and anguish? Yeah CCG officers are dying but its not sad or even cathartic. "oh wow this guy died" is as emotional as I got and in comparison I cried a lot during Tokyo ghoul.

With such a big cast I couldn't for the life of me remember who's who. I had to flip to the beginning with all the characters profiles to figure out who these characters are for all 12 volumes that I read. I know my memory isn't the greatest but if in the same sitting I can't recognize a character that was introduced in the previous volume your doing a bad job. I think what also doesn't help is the way appearances are changed from Tokyo ghoul. Good for Touka for getting blue hair but I didn't know who she was.

These characters also just drastically change. Suddenly all the people we know and love are shells of their former selves. Touka doesn't even do anything except get pregnant and fuck and be motherly to orphans. Relationships like this entire manga go from 0 to 100 real quick. All this insta love which seemingly comes out of nowhere is meant to make me feel something which I dont. I also don't understand how anyone thought this was a seemingly good gift to people who are shipping these pairings. Im not happy when i see my favourite pairings speedrun marriage why would anyone.

As for the actual plot it was boring and never explains the initiatives of the villains. The big bad wants to be the head of the family or whatever and the clowns just do this for fun I guess??? Crushing the ghoul society and killing people for fun doesn't make sense? They are ghouls wouldn't that mega impact them? I also don't get why we didn't end that Haise Kaneki dilemma sooner? It does create tension but messes up everything else. At the very least why didn't we get previously established characters if we wanted to do a CCG route. Its also a big "fuck you!" to bring side characters back from the dead. Your not even doing anything substantial with them WHY ARE THEY HERE??? Im not going to even dip my toes in the whole "one eyed king" thing because I thought some of it was interesting but it fell flat in the "make sense story wise" department. In 2014 did no one ever think to hire someone to help with the continuity or did money overtake the eyes of all.

My last compliant is the art, I get the covers are now pretty but im looking at some of these fight scenes confused. Its sometimes not even just the fight scenes but any part where there's meant to be suspense. The whole reason I read manga is for the art and you're giving me scribbles but selling them for 17.99 dollars. Im fighting Sui Ishida and anyone who worked on this garbage.

Art: 3 / 10
Story: 0.5 / 10
Characters: -9 /10
Enjoyment: -100 /10