Scan barcode
A review by crookedtreehouse
Blade of the Immortal Volume 2: Cry of the Worm by Hiroaki Samura
4.0
I've been collecting the Blade Of The Immortal books for about twenty years, but never really sat down to read them because for Years, volume two was out of print and going for hundreds of dollars online. Dark Horse has some fantastic series but their collections editing has been pretty terrible for almost thirty years. If you have a thirty volume series, and volume two has been out of print since volume six came out, you're not going to sell as many books. They've since reprinted the volumes as omnibus edition trade paperbacks, and are currently printing them as Deluxe Hardcovers. If you're interested in the books, you should sntach them up soon because, again, they are grossly negligent at keeping series in print.
I lucked out a few years ago, and while looking for some Marvel books at a used bookstore, I found an unnumbered Blade Of The Immortal trade on a shelf, and it was Volume Two for $5. I snatched it up, paid for it, and sprinted out of the store before anyone looked at how much it was going for online. And then I put it on my manga shelf, forgot about it, moved, put it on a shelf, forgot about it, and moved again. And Now I'm finally getting down to reading it.
Volume two is an improvement, pacing and art-wise from the first volume, which was mostly very good. The one issue I have is that it seems a little early in an epic for The Immortal Protagonist to discover an Immortal Antagonist, given that the story is currently focused on dealing with a mortal antagonist who is mentioned several times in this book but neither he nor his henches are anywhere to be found. This is a trifling complaint, as I doubt Samura knew how long this story was going to end up being, though we're into volume two of an I Have To Kill A Thousand Bad Guys storyline, and I think we're only up to about twenty dead people.
The fight scenes are a little DC Live Action, as the actual fights look blurry, and you tend to see wounds without actually seeing how the combatant is wounded. But that could be just to show you how fast these people are with their swords.
I still think this is an excellent series for people looking to read an action manga, as the art is excellent and the storytelling is superior to most of the manga I've read.
I lucked out a few years ago, and while looking for some Marvel books at a used bookstore, I found an unnumbered Blade Of The Immortal trade on a shelf, and it was Volume Two for $5. I snatched it up, paid for it, and sprinted out of the store before anyone looked at how much it was going for online. And then I put it on my manga shelf, forgot about it, moved, put it on a shelf, forgot about it, and moved again. And Now I'm finally getting down to reading it.
Volume two is an improvement, pacing and art-wise from the first volume, which was mostly very good. The one issue I have is that it seems a little early in an epic for The Immortal Protagonist to discover an Immortal Antagonist, given that the story is currently focused on dealing with a mortal antagonist who is mentioned several times in this book but neither he nor his henches are anywhere to be found. This is a trifling complaint, as I doubt Samura knew how long this story was going to end up being, though we're into volume two of an I Have To Kill A Thousand Bad Guys storyline, and I think we're only up to about twenty dead people.
The fight scenes are a little DC Live Action, as the actual fights look blurry, and you tend to see wounds without actually seeing how the combatant is wounded. But that could be just to show you how fast these people are with their swords.
I still think this is an excellent series for people looking to read an action manga, as the art is excellent and the storytelling is superior to most of the manga I've read.