[Review] How I Got Hooked on Kengan Ashura

 

Over the past 2 months, I have successfully cultivated a ferocious appetite of anything Kengan Ashura related due to finally giving the series a chance. Having breezed through the two seasons on Netflix, I am really eager to see season 3. Before watching the show, I originally had a negative impression based on the manga. About a couple years back when Kengan Ashura was first picked up by the scanlating group, Hokuto no Gun, I had read through the first chapter. I was not impressed and was very turned off. If I had to guess why, I wasn't in particular a fan of the art style and I don't remember reading manga with much intent. At the time, it didn't click with me so I had put it down and forgotten about it altogether. Fast forward to 2020, I'm approaching the series with an entirely different attitude.

[January 2018] End of the Year Anime/Manga/Music Pick

I am so overdue on this post! The title says January, but it's already the ides of March. There's already some new series I'm starting and also some that are slated for April. I'm looking forward to the Persona 5 anime, the continuation of Shokugeki no Soma and finally an adaptation of Golden Kamuy. Guess what? It's also on my manga list too!

Another year on the "A Desecrated Soul" blog has passed. Rather than do a year in review post like the previous 2 years, I've decided to do a mashup extravaganza. However I do want to point out some things that stood out to me in 2017. My anime of the year was Mob Psycho 100 and 91 Days. Mob Psycho 100 is funny and ironic with an intentionally sketchy animation style giving it a free-flowing look. 91 Days was an underrated series that deserved recognition for its storytelling. Music wise there are too many titles to name and for manga, I keep revisiting Super Doctor K and The Case Records of Professor Munakata. Without further ado, let me introduce January's anime, manga, and music picks.

[November 2017] The Ultra Rare Manga Post

It's been a while since I read some manga and two months since my last monthly post. During this time, I did some searching under the genres of mystery, horror, and supernatural. The titles I read this month fall under all three. Like most of the time, I am reading several titles at once and only managed to finish three on my list.

[June 2016] A Little Bit of Each

It's been hard trying to find something to recommend. For a change, I'll be giving you guys this month a little bit of each. Some music. Some manga. Some stuff I recently discovered.

October 2014 Scalpels and Mighty Fists

 This month's post is more of a hodge-podge of subjects. I decided to include three mangas that I discovered in the recent months and three animes that I watched and enjoyed very much. There's always something new to find and something old to revisit.

May 2014 Manga Picks

Last month I recommended a couple of manga I had started reading. I didn't read so much new ones this month, but I have a few old ones that I really like. I was really busy with end of the semester work and there was simply no time to waste. All my entertainment whether it be anime watching or manga reading was put on hold. It was really towards the end when I could free up a bit of time that I started to watch an episode of jdrama.

April Manga Recommendations

I've been reading a couple of manga recently that are worth reading. They are not as well known to the general public, but they do have a bit of their own charm. I haven't read manga in quite a while because I have chosen anime and schoolwork to occupy my time. Manga may not have sound and movement like an animation, but imagery is a powerful tool to tell a story. Every mangaka has their own way of designing. For instance, "Bleach" uses a lot of large panels and I don't think it has a lot of small panels on a single page. Kubo Tite deliberately stated that he doesn't draw in backgrounds because that was how he envisioned the scenes; to appear in empty space. As opposed to "Naruto" which often times includes splash pages of detailed backgrounds and scenery because setting is very important to the story. We also see that manga doesn't always have to drawn in squares. Panels can be rectangular or in a variety of shapes. They can bleed off the page and objects do not necessarily have to contained within a panel. People belittle comics and graphic novels dismissing it as childish art or art that is not art, but they don't realize how much work goes into a page. It isn't simply the skill of an artist to render scenes. The artist has to be a good designer knowing how to place items on a page and make decisions on how it should be presented. Otherwise no matter how good you can draw, your work may end up unreadable.