The Young Magician (manga)
September 30th, 2007 by Lianne
PG-18 for extreme violence, swearing, and a bit of sex (some of which is terrifying); official series website
This is one of the best, coolest, most riveting manga I’ve read in years. It’s CRAZY, and in typical Yuri Narushima style, a lot of stuff doesn’t make sense until you’ve read a handful of volumes; she essentially throws you into a whirlwind of events in a world you know nothing about and slowly fills in the details over time. This is an incredibly hard storytelling technique to pull off, and this series would have been absolute murder to read in serialized format (the same goes for Planet Ladder, which I first disliked in Smile magazine but now am completely in love with), but Narushima has cleverness and creativity in spades. She nails this story of two teenage boys with power they can’t control. The Young Magician has secret societies of magic, multiculturalism, people who live hundreds of years, religious strife, doomed romance, time travel, and pretty much anything else cool you can think of, all taking place in present day. She also effortlessly throws in an incredibly touching friendship story and humor when you least expect it, which is impressive considering how dark the manga gets. Case in point, the above picture took place a few pages before this panel (sorry for the crappy scan):
I don’t know how she does what she does, but this manga is, to sum up, a great big ball of badass. It’s just unique and insane to the point that I can’t clearly explain why. Just read it…and every time you don’t understand something, give the mangaka the benefit of the doubt. She’ll make it worth your while.
Educated impression: If you’re of age, absolutely try this. (Lianne)
I’ve seen the cover at a bookstore and shocked to know it is rated M. Based on the covers, there are no female characters, so I concluded it must be yaoi. But upon reading this, there is no statement about boy love boy and cleared why it is rated M. So just to be sure, are there ANY implications to yaoi?
The M is for the extreme, graphic violence (people getting ripped apart, disemboweled, etc.) and the language. There’s also a bit of sex, including an incestuous rape that wasn’t graphic enough to be gratuitous but graphic enough to be disturbing. But as of Volume 9, there isn’t any yaoi at all (or yuri, for that matter). You would very, very hard-pressed to interpret the relationship between the two main (male) characters as sexual–there are many instances where they talk about it very directly as being a slow and somewhat desperate friendship. Besides, if Planet Ladder is any indication, Yuri Narushima uses romance very sparingly in her manga. And it’s a shoujo! And it still works! How does she do it?! This manga is awesome awesome awesome awesome awesome awesome awesome awesome.
Whooooa! This sounds good! The panel linked at the top had me snickering (in a desperate attempt not to laugh) since I’m at a friend’s house and it’s four in the morning.
I will definitely try to check this one out next time I’m near a bookstore. ^^
And YAY for friendship between two boys without yaoi!
Wow, this is definitely one of my favorite series. It did indeed take me several tries to really get parts of the story, with me sometimes having to read just specific sections to fully understand what was going on. Once I did though.. wow. xD Love the themes, they’re very awesome. I can’t wait for the next book to come out, especially since Ibuki looks so cool on the cover. x] He’s definitely one of my favorite manga characters ever.
Random note.. I especially loved what she did with all the multicultralism and the different sects of magic. I don’t see it done like that very often x]
I especially loved what she did with all the multicultralism and the different sects of magic. I don’t see it done like that very often
Young Magician does indeed handle that material fantastically, but for two other series that do the same: Island and Shaman King.
And there were some sections of Young Magician I read MANY times in order to fully understand what was going on. Case in point: when Volume 6 came out, I read it twice in English, then I looked up Chinese scans for Volume 7, then I bought Volume 7 in English when it came out and read through that once, then I read Volumes 6 and 7 in English back to back, and THEN I finally understood the Passion Flower Blue arc. And LOVED it. It even made Volumes 1-5 make more sense. To hell with linear storytelling–Young Magician has more re-read value than anything else I’ve ever had in my hands. I pick up something new every time I re-read it.