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Tokyo Ghoul is a seinen manga series serialized in Young Jump, the most prestigious and well-known seinen magazine in Japan. Around 2014, when the anime had started, the fandom increased rapidly and endless screams of the internet community were heard about the "superb" quality and characters of the series. So, being a fan of seinen manga (Berserk, Kingdom, etc.) myself I decided to dig in.

There are MINOR SPOILERS in the following review

What I expected? Maturity, epicness and quality violent fight scenes
What I got? Well..., the above in pretty SMALL proportions, a feeling of pseudo-darkness and worst of all a taste of ... wasted potential.

Let's be more specific..

Plot: Tokyo Ghoul takes place in a world where ghouls and humans live together and explores the usually violent relations between the two sides. The setting of the series is very promising as there is always a hostile "war" atmosphere between the ghouls and the CCG (human organization that kills ghouls in the name of justice) even when there is no direct conflict. The series has two underlying themes: Firstly, is that justice is subjective and one-sided and true righteousness cannot be easily achieved as seen by the devastating losses of both sides. Secondly, if you have had psychological traumas or issues in general as a kid you ARE strong. Guess what... The first theme helps the series climb to the top while the second throws it to the pits of hell. Unfortunately many fights in T.G are resolved when one of the two sides remembers the sadness of the past, gains a power-up and demolishes the other side. This trait removes all the suspense from fights. Moreover, with regards to the "sadness of the past", almost all flashbacks are the same: Ghoul loses his family to humans and vice-versa. As far as the pacing is concerned, it is generally decent with the exception of a CCG-elaborated part where it is somewhat slow. The ending felt satisfying but rushed, however, it should not be criticized negatively as there is a sequel.

Artwork: This is by far the strongest point of this manga. At first it might seem simplistic but as the series continues you start to value the detailed and dark artwork. Despite being a few instances of "vague" panels, the fight scenes are really enjoyable to read, the choreography is well-made and the enjoyment is enforced with the detailed design of most kagune and ghoul masks.

Characters: Unfortunately, this is the weakest part of the series and mainly due to the main protagonist. Kaneki is a timid 14-year old orphan of medium built; a typical shonen protagonist you could say. Regrettably being "typical" is probably the smallest of the flaws. After his torture and power "awakening" is when what he had built as a character starts being demolished. After being tied to a chair, seeing scenes of sheer brutality and having his finger toes cut off ( FOR GOD'S SAKE they grew back and he still cried, think about poor Guts for an instant) Kaneki finally unlocks his ghoul potential and a sadistic darker part of his personality. Although the "dark counterpart" is a common and generally favorable trait of manga nowadays it is the bad execution that destroys it here. In Kaneki's case he jumps straight from being a shy kid with no backbone to a blood-thirsty, relentless badass (wannabe). Moreover, this doesn't just happen once, it repeatedly throughout the story making you wonder if there is any actual character development. The palindromic state between an irritating crybaby and a psychotic brutal ghoul is by no means considered character development; it is just putting two one-dimensional characters in the same body and changing between them whenever the plot commands. As for the secondary protagonist Touka, she is initially introduced as a cold-hearted and emotionless emo girl but she soon loses her "roughness" and lightens up to the rest of the cast as the series progresses, only to become a side character on the second half. In spite of being a typical tsundere she didn't deserve this lack of screentime. Most ghouls in the series give off a tone of depression, being prejudiced by humans and often having one of their loved ones killed by humans in the past, a trait that makes them quite repetitive. However, there are of course some very decent ones like Yamori, an old ghoul whose past is a mystery and Sachi a muscular man with a macho mustache (and my image of the average ghoul before starting the series).Finally, regarding the CCG investigators, they also come in all shapes and sizes from the stoic badass Arima to the extremely annoying anthropomorphic creature named Juuzo that wanted to know its gender.

Enjoyment: The series surely had a few memorable scenes(mostly from fights) but regrettably left a bad aftertaste as I said in the beginning of the review. It was really miserable seeing your main character going from a berserk mindless animal in one page to an immature wimp in the next. It is even more miserable when he starts having some weird guilts and monologues with himself just to put reason to his previous rage. In general, it was like the ghouls tried to have an edgy and dark attitude that foreshadowed their harsh past just to look cool, without really having any depth whatsoever; a characteristic that made me take the side of the CCG as the series progress

All in all, had it not been for the cast, especially the annoying main character and the edgy, disturbing vibe of ghouls, this series could have reached the top. It has decent story, very good art but it missed a very importatnt ingredient. It seems that the author tried to fit many shonen-ish traits to a seinen manga and still make it dark and mature through Kaneki's unnatural changes from a normal kid to monster. Unfortunately, it was a failed attempt.