Click here to return to the main site.

Manga Review


Book Cover

Buso Renkin
Volume 1

 

Author: Nobuhiro Watsuki
Artist: Nobuhiro Watsuki
Viz Media
RRP: £5.99, US $7.99
ISBN-13: 978 1 4215 0615 9
ISBN-10: 1 4215 0615 7
Available 03 March 2008


Talk about being at the wrong place at the wrong time. High school student Kazuki Muto had no clue what he was in for when he rescued damsel in distress Tokiko for a monster known as a "homunculus." Disguised as humans - who actually eat humans - homunculi are malevolent creatures that affix themselves to people's brains, and once fully grown, the only thing that can annihilate them is a weapon called Buso Renkin...

From award winning author and artist Nobuhiro Watsuki (creator of Rurouni Kenshin) comes Buso Renkin, the story of a young high school student who finds himself smack bang in the middle of a conflict between two factions of strange and incredible beings.

Teenager Kazuki Muto believes he has experienced his own death when he intervenes in an incident in which a young girl is being attacked by an eerie monster. The following morning, he awakes wondering whether it was all a dream. But the girl, the monster, and his death are all real.

The girl, Tokiko Tsumura, was actually trying to slay the homunculus (a beast that can take the form of humans, but whose source of food is people), but Kazuki got in her way.

To revive Kazuki, Tokiko replaces his heart with a "kakugane," an alchemic device that allows him to summon a lance with which to fight the monsters. It turns out that Tokiko is a member of Renkin Kenshi (Alchemist Soldiers), an organization sworn to protect the world from the diabolical creatures. Soon, Kazuki joins Tokiko in her quest to terminate the sinister being that creates and controls the homunculus.

There are also pretty interesting extras, that are dotted in amongst the pages, where the author explains what he was trying to achieve with each episode, where his inspiration for characters came from, how each episode was received by the public, and his thoughts on the writing and drawing process.

This is a promising start to this collection.

8

Nick Smithson

Buy this item online


We compare prices online so you get the cheapest deal
Click on the logo of the desired store below to purchase this item.


banner
£4.49 (Amazon.co.uk)
   
banner
£4.49 (Play.com)
   
banner
£4.79 (Tesco.com)
   
banner
£4.63 (Asda.co.uk)
   
banner
$7.99 (Amazon.com)

All prices correct at time of going to press.