Story:
Let me put it this way. Cat Eyed Boy is kind of like Mushishi. Like Mushishi, the series centers around one character, which is Cat Eyed Boy for this story. Just like Mushishi, the entire series is a collection of short or sometimes long stories that happen to Cat Eyed Boy or the people he runs into. The stories themselves are quite interesting, exciting, and sometimes freaky. Examples of these are The Band of 100 Monsters, The Immortal Man, and The Promise. Other stories, aren’t really interesting and just not plain scary, like The Ugly Demon. Overall, since this series is a bunch of mini stories combined into two volumes, I’m sure you’ll find at least one story you’ll like.
Art:
Well… this comic was made back in the 60s from what I’ve heard and it sure shows. The art looks very old school and the basic layout of the panels is also very old school. However, this art is rather impressive. The world the characters all live in very detailed, the characters are drawn very nice and look more realistic compared to most manga characters today, and the monsters themselves are often freaky and scary to look at.
Still, a lot of the human characters often look very cartoonish and take away from the fright level of many of the stories. A lot of the demons themselves look weird and often don’t provide any chills.
Character:
There is only one main character and the rest are just characters that appear only once for one story. Cat Eyed Boy himself… or itself is an unique character. He sides with no one most often and is often a spectator to the situation, but he often lends a helping hand to humans or demons, despite getting no thanks at all for his work. He also likes causing mischief and sometimes likes to harass humans for fun as well. So, he is a good guy often and sometimes a bad guy depending on the situation.
As for the rest, there is no one else really to mention. Like I said before, the series only has one character and everyone else is a one time appearance. The one timers for most stories are interesting for the most part, such as Kodomo from The Band of 100 Demons and The Monster Professor from The Ugly Demon. Still, a lot of these characters are not appealing and you will not miss them at all after the story has passed.
Enjoyment:
Well, since I’m a fan of Kazuo Umezu, I picked up this series in hopes of finding a brand new good story to read. Overall, it was a good choice. If you enjoy Kazuo Umezu and his works, you’ll probably want to get this story. If you also enjoy horror mangas, you’ll probably like this one as well. Everyone else will probably want to look away from this series and even some horror fans might want to avoid this series since it often does not provide many horror thrills.
Overall:
Like I said before, fans of horror and Kazuo Umezu will enjoy this series, while other might steer clear of Cat Eyed Boy. The series provides some great horror stories that are freaky enough and will make your heart race as you read. I highly recommend you read one of the stories from the series first before you buy it, just so you know what you are getting yourself into.
This series contains blood and gore, strong violence, some violence against children, and a lot of disturbing images. If you are not into this stuff, avoid this series or view at your own risk.
