Jigokuraku
Hell's Paradise: Jigokuraku

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The manga that reignited my passion for this culture. Short, concise and precise (much like the main character, mind you), this manga takes familiar concepts like the heist with impossible odds, enemies-to-friends-to-maybe-lovers, samurai and ninja action, etc., and gives it a twist with tons of personality. Nothing in this manga overstays its welcome. The art is very good in its dirty, gritty and scratchy feel. The writing is also to the point, there's a clear path ahead and no time to waste or wasted on secondary plots that go nowhere. However, I do feel that characters aren't allowed to breathe too much sometimes. The cast ... could've been like half of its size (especially when the second expedition arrives) and it would've been all the better. But still, it's an excellent manga and one that you should all be reading.

Jigokuraku or Hell's Paradise is a short to medium length read that is inspired from various Eastern religions in an attempt to create a mystified amalgamation of elements that the sole cast is set to explore throughout the one week timespan set on a single island during the Edo period. The initial concept of a band of criminals and executioners thrown into "Paradise" to acquire the "Elixir of Life" at the Shogun's whim as a precursor to a suicide mission is a great, unique, and captivating start that had massive loads of potential in terms of plot development or nuance, while also being complemented by ... its outstanding and consistent visuals, artstyle, and character individuality. Sadly, it was slightly wasted with its mediocre and poorly structured writing.

Despite the deep focus of the author towards paradoxical circumstances of life while also managing to implement it as Tao; a power system revolving around life force, its poor execution in terms of its rules and explanation gives off an uninspired feeling that is worsened by the story's abundance of deus ex machina "with the power of friendship". Simultaneously, the powerscaling is unbalanced and rushed to the point where it manages to clown the supporting characters that died early (despite them being "the same level" as those who remained) while it places the supporting cast that appeared later on at the same tier of power level as the main cast despite the former not knowing what "Tao" is nor being trained for it compared to the latter who managed to be conditioned just by nerding out on religion or by being beaten up repeatedly during their three days of stay.

Another concern of mine is how either underutilized or oversaturated the characters are. This might be the fault of the manga only being set at a single island spanning a couple of days but the writing could've progressed in a way where flashbacks and sappy stories aren't the only way we could get ourselves emotionally attached towards a character before or after they are brutally murdered. There are so many strong characters that make "horror story" levels of dumbassery that allowed the author to kill them off unnaturally or to stand there being useless despite their strength exceeding those of the main cast. Even the villains were just stepping stones to highlight how absurd the plot armor of the main cast is where the last half of the manga starts to degrade literary-wise. And the plot armor struggles to give a valid reason on how the main cast manages to stand up and keep on fighting against pseudo-gods despite being near death's door a couple number of times.

The only good thing about this manga's writing is that it had a very happy and satisfying ending despite it only being lazily inserted like a "Where are they now?" credits scene from a 90's movie. It also knew how to not pace itself hyperaggressively, but maybe this is what restricted it thematically on how to expand itself based on the limited options presented with its sole focus on the "elixir of life", paradoxes, shallow power systems, and the characters' personal conflicts and backgrounds halfassedly inserted killing the initial mystique and threat the residents of the island initially had due to poor execution.

Considering this was the mangaka's first solid work where he handled the story and art all by himself while also writing a light novel, this is pretty respectable. Alas, for a good manga to work objectively, the good visuals also has to have good writing, and this manga suffered from mediocre writing and poor execution of lore drop all throughout the story that is disguised as several arcs.

Hell's paradise review:

It's a cliché power fantasy that feels like it should be the final arc of any other manga.

Setting:

The manga is set almost entirely on an island called Paradise. (Spoiler-ish about the design of the island) The island is full of religious body horror monsters with some being quite creative. But the island itself is quite boring besides that which lives on it. The only standout areas in this entire claustrophobic area the manga takes place in is the Palace. The palace has some memorable scenery and is just as wild as the monsters that Guard it. However the fast paced nature of ... the manga makes it so that you can never truly appreciate the palace as there are barely any establishing shots, especially during fight scenes. The inner palace is very dark and dull, with all rooms being samey (for story reasons, alas) despite having the opportunity to be wildly different because of the characters which inhabit each room pursuing different "goals" but end up being quite plain and traditional old Japanese and Chinese architecture. The opportunity to have a truly stunning island with creative flora and fauna and an even more beautiful Palace is instead opted for a run-down, bland and barren setting in both nature and buildings. For story reasons this is acceptable, however it is insanely stale and uninteresting.


Art/Structure:

The art in general is fine. With Lackluster and mediocre panelling, choreography and layouts. Though some panels with Hatching and calligraphy-esque art are praise worthy albeit rare. The manga has many Biological-Lovecraftian horrors that are genuinely creative and unorthodox. There are a few outliers with some panels genuinely leading well into the next, which warrants praise albeit it's few and far between. Ultimately, this manga is as standard as you can get. There's no creative angles, the medium of manga is not used in any way whatsoever to enhance the structure in an out of the box way. For an action battle shounen, there NEEDS to be unending creativity to keep your reader hooked, Lest the action becomes stale. Which is exactly what happens here. So much repetition.
A good thing about this manga is it's uncensored freedom. The mangaka always says that they let him "draw whatever he wanted" and that shows, that freedom you feel from this manga is pretty unique and adds to the visceral carnage of the unrelenting world of Hell's paradise.




Story/Characters:

Interesting premise with a cliché execution. The manga consists of 90% fighting with little character development, though the "The strongest bonds are formed in the toughest situations" saying can apply here. Characters are eerily similar to Bleach both in design, function, and looks and are all 1 dimensional. The problem with battle shounen, Is that there is no hype. No buildup. It's constant stimulation and you get numb to it without periods in between to build up tension and hype, leading to boredom no matter how good the choreography or art is. There is a story reason for this initially, but it still does not negate the issues in retrospect. Villains are extremely boring and offer nothing, despite being different in designs, they all offer the same functionality despite supposed to be filling different roles and could easily be merged into one entity with the way the awful power scaling functions.
Characters are laughably overpowered, to the point where a Character who lost their right hand literally learns to become left-handed after a few swings of a sword. There is a power system in which almost every character masters or is a prodigy at immediately. Therefore, the fights have no tension or stakes behind them. The wishy washy power system leaves lots of plot convenience, anything can happen so long as the author wills it, rather than it being grounded in the power system's scaling and rules. Pretty good ending that's not rushed. The biggest issue I have with this manga is that it feels like the last arc in any other manga. All of the characters are already trained, and have already been through large moments of their lives. Unlike Naruto for example, we don't experience that with them, we are simply told them. Leading to not being attached to the characters, being told what to feel is not an effective way to make people care about your characters. As such, while all the characters have decent designs, they are all shallow. Or rather, Hollow.

Overall, If you only care about fights, this is the manga for you. I do not recommend this otherwise.

Rating: 4/10