It's shorter and thus would have made for a perfect movie length. It's also really fucking dark and depressing and managed to make me feel both sad and deeply uncomfortable with... I dunno. Fist of the North Star, shonen traditions, hell even reality itself. But it's done really well so it comes off as natural and never feels like it's saying "THIS IS SAD PLEASE CRY PLEASE FEEL BAD". There's also an undercurrent of "things could have turned out better for these guys", so under all the cynicism it's anything but misanthropic; there's still an obvious, honest hope for a better world.
Great manga, I recommend it to everyone.
>butbut the style is different, this doesn't work at all for Hokuto no Ken!
Yeah, you're right, this would work horribly with Ken's story. Too bad this is the story of Jagi's life and Hiromoto couldn't have picked a more fitting style for such a murderous, mentally ill guy that switches back and forth between crippling depression and heart-warming optimism. The art is some of the most hyper-expressive, maximalistic stuff I've ever seen and it works perfectly for a series about intense emotions.
>>137265429
The way they set up Jagi as a cute young boy with the typical shonen ideal of "BECOME THE STRONGEST!!!", only to slowly figure out that reality doesn't operate on an "insert effort and guts, receive victory" basis and that in-born talent exists (which, along with something else I won't spoil, drives him to become the crazy psycho he is in the 80s series) is some of the best writing I've ever seen in a short, loosely drawn, action manga; it's almost Devilman-tier brilliance.
>>137265522
From the get-go Jagi has nailed into his head the typical shonen idea that "if you work hard enough, you WILL be the victor"
>>137265564
But the thing is, it doesn't feel like a "satire of generic shonen" or anything like that. It's not intentionally bad; hell, if this WE>>137265594
RE a normal success story it would still be good. The fact that it takes such a depressing turn is what makes it more than just good.
Some more stand-out pages
Fist of the North Star fans would go autistic if they saw something not in the standard style, even if it's better.
There are too many good pages to be fair, if I wasn't too lazy I'd just have storytimed
>>137265737
This is hugely subjective IMO. I like the art in FOTNS and it can make it exciting to read, but I also think Araki did that sort of aesthetic a million times better in every other regard beyond pure anatomical skill. Jojo style is just more... fun while FOTNS feels too serious given how campy it is.
"Lolopinions" out of the way most people on sites just gave Jagi Gaiden it a 6/10 score and dropped it....... BUT, I couldn't find a single user review from someone who read the entire thing and didn't fucking love it. Even a guy who hated the art at first gave it a 10/10 score because he realized the style choice was absolutely perfect for the character, atmosphere and themes throughout the story.
I don't really want to turn this into a "read it if you hate Fist of the North Star" thing; it's just a very, very different look at its universe focusing on a villain few people cared about. If you treat it like "a story in the Fist of the North Star world by a different artist with totally different artistic ideas" it will work. It's a fucking great story on its own that has its own themes and message, it doesn't piggyback on Buronson's Hokuto in the slightest.
>>137265940
And that message is basically "Hard work and guts usually does not equal being the best". Being good at something is obviously a positive trait; Jagi found a use for his fighting ability by saving his girlfriend. He could have just realized he's shit at Hokuto Shinken and lived his own life, hanging out with Anna and using his decent-tier fighting ability to take out whatever dudes came up. But instead, he was consumed by the idea that "I NEED to become the strongest, there's NO WAY that the other guys could have more talent and in-born skill than me!" to realize that he was destroying himself and he always had a happy life of hanging out with his cute girlfriend and beating up punks right in front of him.
>>137266071
I'm gonna post a couple more pages hoping at least one person will get introduced to this manga through my thread
>>137266159
FOTNS: so uh, nuclear warfare happened and the world is over. OKAY ENOUGH OF THAT SHIT, TIME FOR BADASS FIGHTING SHONEN ACTION AW YEAH LOOK AT THIS GUY'S HEAD EXPLODE
Jagi Gaiden: hOLY FUG
>>137266182
>>137266217
I mean holy fuck I know Japan does the "le deep nuke" thing a lot but the way it's done here is so fucking sad and uncomfortable that it works really well
SAY MY NAME
>>137265107
Hiromoto is most probably the fucking shittiest artist that ever worked in japan.
>you say so because you can't handle a peculiar style
his peculiar style is backed by literally inexistant drawing skills. He should do storyboard, concepts and whatnot, Madhouse demonstrated that his ideas can deliver some really cool stuff if filtered by someone with existing drawing skills. He just shouldn't draw comics
Or writing them, even worse
>>137266159
>>137266182
>posts in this thread
How unsightly retarded
Thought of the day:
shitty the author, shitty the fans.
