Retellings of classics isn't something new, it is usually done either by people who are new into storytelling or people who are so used to it they want to retell a story they loved for a long time, Kawaguchi seems like a mix of both while his love for the grimm fairy tales is obvious, so are his rookie mistakes, the first and most baffling one is going against the structure of the hero's journey and making the protagonist refuse the call of adventure at the end of the first chapter. Subverting common expectations can work if done right but here it is used incredibly clumsy since after 4 chapters of fighting folder villains our main character is yet again at point 0 receiving once again the call of adventure, only this time he answers it, then, what was the point of refusing it the first time?
So five chapters inand we are already in a rough start, after a very nice travelling chapter (6) we begin an entrance exam arc.
Now an entrance exam arc to join a guild of monster hunters should involve some monster hunting, right? I mean, who haven't read hunter x hunter, during the hunter exam various monsters and critters are shown while fun and simple tasks are given to the participants, but in Red Hood it doesn't happen like that. From chapter 7 to chapter 14 we are stuck in an extremely boring and overcomplicated cops and robbers game with handcuffs, and while the overcomplicated plan is being infodumped like crazy the author tries to introduce a million new characters, which turns everything dull. All he had to do was write simple tasks involving monsters and monster hunting, anything, like getting an unicorn's hair or a phoenix feather, but no, boring cops and robbers, after this the manga gets axed and goes in a meta shift that honestly isn't even worth talking about.
The characters honestly were nothing, Velou is extremely dull and Grimm didn't have enough time to develop so she is just waifu bait as she is now, at least the werewolves and other monster designs were nice, I wish I could've seen them instead of the boring cops and robbers game.
Better luck with the next manga.
