Welcome to This Week in Shonen Jump, in which a rotating duo of Multiversity staffers take a look at two stories contained in each installment of Viz Media’s Weekly Shonen Jump. For the uninitiated, Weekly Shonen Jump is an anthology that delivers more than 200 pages of manga of all varieties. We hope that you’ll join us in exploring the world of Weekly Shonen Jump each week. If you are unfamiliar, you can read sample chapters and subscribe at Viz.com.
This week, Alice and Jess are back! If you have any thoughts on the two titles discussed this week, or thoughts on “Dr. Stone,” “We Never Learn,” “The Promised Neverland,” “Black Clover,” or “Food Wars,” let us know in the comments!
Robot x Laserbeam Chapter 5
Written and Illustrated by Tadatoshi Fujimaki
Reviewed by Jess Camacho
I watch a lot of sports and genuinely enjoy the spirit of rooting on your favorite team and the crushing defeat that often times comes with it. I’m a Mets fan so I know all about that. However, I hate golf. I think it is the most boring thing in the entire world and would rather do anything else but suffer through it. However, I love “Robot x Laserbeam.” As one of the recent Jump Start series, I took to it immediately because it didn’t have a long history behind it. I’m extremely excited that it will be sticking around and chapter 5 does a great job at moving things along. With chapter 5, we get to see just how good Roboto really is as he goes up against Yozan for what will surely be the first of many rounds.
Fujimaki, in a very short time, has made “Robot x Laserbeam” so much more than your average sports drama. Roboto is a tough lead to pull off because he can lean on the unlikable side almost too hard. I think Fujimaki is doing solid work pulling back the layers on this characters and slowly showing us more of his actual emotions. Chapter 5 is a great example of that as his cold, calculated approach begins to give way to desire. He has feelings about golf but still a little scared of them. The reasons for this aren’t entirely apparent but in time, we’ll find out. For now, this chapter perfectly mirrors these two rivals and flows very nicely.
The aforementioned peeling away at Roboto’s exterior is really exacerbated in Fujimaki’s art. He’s very good at not giving a lot away but still doing enough. The looks Roboto gives each swing and result shows some level of care in him. As he delivers his purposely cold dialogue, his face never looks malicious or conceited. He genuinely is this way and expressing that is not an easy task. Fujimaki does wonderful work with this and it’s even better in contrast to Yozan, who wears his emotions on his sleeve. He loves this sport and Fujimaki makes sure that we know this through every way he can show us. The golf playing is the most exciting I’ve ever seen golf be proving once again that artists can make anything exciting through dynamic work.
Final Verdict: 7.6 – Really solid chapter that highlights the differences in these two young men.
My Hero Academia Chapter Chapter 134
Written & Illustrated by Kohei Horikoshi
Reviewed by Alice W. Castle
“My Hero Academia” has had a lot of praise given to it and has been described by a few whose opinions I trust as generally better than most Western superhero comics. After hearing that, I was pretty excited to check it out. Chapter 134 is my first chapter of “My Hero Academia” and if you read my previous review of “Black Clover,” you’ll know I’ve started to appreciate the art of jumping into a series feet first. This chapter primarily deals with a showdown between Red Riot, a fledgling superhero sidekick, and a villain seemingly able to shoot blades from his body at will.
One of the aspects Kohei Horikoshi emphasises about this fight is Red Riot’s focus on defending the civilians behind him from the blades. Red Riot’s quirk (read: superpower) is able to maintain a rock hard form and uses that bulldoze through the stream of blades before knocking out the villain. It’s a sequence that plays out over four pages and Horikoshi is able to immediately key into an adrenaline fuelled action sequence. Each panel is filled with detail from the speed lines in the background to the stream of blades to Red Riot’s diamond-esque form, but the storytelling is still clear. Each panel is measured and the details in the linework never muddy the storytelling on display. It’s a pulse pounding action sequence in the way that only a great mangaka can deliver filtered through the sensibilities of superhero storytelling.
Continued belowFrom there, the rest of chapter shifts into a slower gear as Red Riot makes a rookie mistake out of empathy that’s cleaned up by the more experienced heroes. It’s an interesting move on Horikoshi’s part as Red Riot is definitely shown as someone without experience, making a simple mistake, but is still praised for being able to hold off the villain in the first place. There’s an emphasis placed on the learning experience. Sure, it wasn’t perfect and the heroes had to clean up after Riot’s mistake, but it was made from an earnest place and shows that he’ll learn to be better next time.
It’s the kind of genuine development that we don’t often see in Western superhero stories. Either our hero is infallible, incapable of making a mistake even when it seems impossible not to or they mess up and spend the next four story arcs wallowing in self pity over it. Here, Horikoshi shows that being a hero is a learning experience and what matters is that no one got hurt and the villain was captured. Everything else can be improved on next time. It’s a refreshing take on a storytelling style that’s so ingrained in Western comics that it’s nigh inescapable. The kind of perspective that could only be provided from a storyteller outside that circle.
Final Verdict: 8.0 – Definitely well deserving the praise it got and one I will be revisiting.
