Weekly Shonen Jump 052217 Featured Columns 

This Week in Shonen Jump: May 22, 2017

By and | May 24th, 2017
Posted in Columns | % Comments

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, Matt and Rowan check in with “Robot X Laserbeam” and “Yu-Gi-Oh.” If you have any thoughts on these titles, or “The Promised Neverland,” “My Hero Academia,” “We Never Learn,” “Dr. Stone,” “Black Clover,” or “Food Wars,” let us know in the comments!

Robot x Laserbeam Chapter 9
Written and Illustrated by Tadatoshi Fujimaki
Reviewed by Matt Lune

We’re still in the single digits in terms of chapter numbers, and already the plot is leading us down a rabbit hole that is convoluted yet still very entertaining. Robo now has a rival in the form of Yozan Miura, but to challenge him officially he needs to join the local golf club. Simple so far, right? To become a regular there and challenge Yozan in an official match, however, he needs to replace one of the elite four (couldn’t resist) team members, none of which take him, as a total beginner, seriously. His brazen attitude toward them leads to one of the four – Rion Osanai – to accept his offer of an unofficial match, which will lead to his acceptance to a training camp which will lead to him becoming a regular which will lead to him officially being able to challenge his rival. Still keeping up? Good, because this chapter opens with their friendly competition being interrupted by yet another set of characters, two boorish adults whose swagger and mistreatment of a caddy led to Rion challenging them to a two-on-two match to put them firmly in their place.

This series is bonkers. What started as a relatively simple golf manga has evolved into this complex social web of challenges and counter-challenges and now this chapter is a competition that interrupted the real competition which is a friendly game for another competition that- look, it’s complicated is the summary here. If this all sounds like a negative then don’t be put off: the deliriously dizzy plot gymnastics are all placed specifically to maximize the importance of the golf matches that take place. Not only that, this is (please excuse the pun) par for the course for sporting manga. The hero’s journey (even a reluctant one like Robo) is a long one, filled with challenges and competitions and tangents all piling up on top of each other. What Fujimaki is doing here is teasing the structure of that journey, and laying the groundwork for a longer-running narrative than perhaps Western audiences may be used to.

What this series doesn’t shy away from is spending as much of its narrative as possible on the golf course. That’s what the audience is here to see, so it makes sense. Plus it also makes the speed at which the plot is progressing make sense too; Fujimaki wants to get us back on the fairway as quick as he can, and flying through the narrative is certainly one way of doing that. This chapter is an absolute delight in that regard, and the entirety of the page count is spent on the course. This chapter also captures one of the other great things about “Robot x Laserbeam,” and that’s its ability to explain the rules of golf in a way that’s not intrusive but nevertheless intrinsic to the plot, allowing characters to casually drop terms or use lingo in a natural way without slowing down the reading experience. The artwork lends a hand too, on specific occasions replacing the background of the characters with helpful diagrams filled stick figures and arrows. Each hole they face comes with a handy little map that emulates actually watching golf as well as depicting the challenges the players will face, and for the first time we see a little scorecard pop up, which is a great shorthand to fill us in on the holes that the action skips over in, for example, a montage scene like the one we get in this chapter.

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Fujimaki’s art through this series is fantastic, and this chapter is a great balance between exaggeration for comic effect (something that occurs regularly in this series but is depicted particularly well when it comes to Robo and Rion’s opponents here) and highly detailed landscape work. Each hole on the course has a genuine sense of depth and scope which really draws you into the reality of the game they’re playing. The visual representation of the swings they take as a dynamic streak of white lines give the sense of precision of their shots, and we get to see what I hope is the first of many signature-moves in this series: at the end of the chapter, Rion breaks out his Serpent Bite! – an unbelievable curved shot that’s accompanied visually by a giant snake that explodes across the page and follows the course of the ball down the fairway. Seriously, this book is bonkers.

With this and the previous chapter, “Robot x Laserbeam” has proven itself to be a visually engaging and exceptionally entertaining series. Each chapter brings with it yet another obstacle on Robo’s journey to beat his rival, and even though this chapter leans hard into the game of golf, its way of explaining the rules as the characters play is accessible and a lot of fun. Yes, the plot is getting convoluted as hell, but at its core this is an extremely fun series that is doing all it can to make golf exciting. By the way, it’s definitely working.

Final verdict: 8.8 – one of the best chapters by far; with a lightning fast plot and crazy thrills, this series keeps getting better and better

Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc-V Chapter 22
Written by Shin Yoshida
Illustrated by Naohita Miyoshi
Reviewed by Rowan Grover

“Arc V” takes a drastic change this week as we delve further into the duel with Ren. This chapter fleshes out the setting, having interdimensional watchers, time travel and some all-powerful entity called ‘G.O.D.’?? Shin Yoshida writes with the kind of nonsensical panache that we see in the best of mangas, and I feel lost in the best kind of way – the kind where I’m eager to read again and find out more. It’s a great approach to long form storytelling, drip feeding information and handing us mysterious characters like the two figures on the satellite spying on the duel early on.

I’m loving Yoshida’s approach to Ren’s character, especially with the origin story this chapter. He’s a bit of a twist on the rags to riches trope, however his turning point is the most interesting part. Yoshida has Ren almost completely broken, before having him witness a ‘miracle’ setting alight his deep religious beliefs in this ‘G.O.D.’. He works as a sympathetic antagonist in this sense, as his backstory is fleshed out and we find out about the almost tragically devoted man beneath the mask. Yoshida pens a scene around the climax of the origin story that slows the reading pace and flow right down as Ren’s motorbike is about to hit a butterfly – sounds ridiculous, I know, but the sincerity with which it is executed makes it so very effective in bringing the reader right up to the driver’s seat.

As someone who has only dabbled time to time in the card game itself, the duel sequences are the least interesting to me and arguably low points of the book. However, this chapter, Naohita Miyoshi’s art balances out the pacing by being over the top and dynamic in these sections. Miyoshi goes all out drawing the titanic monsters of the card game as they brawl it out on the fast-paced duel track. Pages flow well and are paced well, with big half page splashes like where Clay Breaker decks Biphamet square in the face being undercut by panels that don’t interrupt the scale of these moments. My only gripe with these shots is that they’re often plagued by dominating word balloons, which if positioned better could have a drastic effect on the final product.

The additional settings presented in this chapter add a lot of intrigue, and Miyoshi ramps up the mysterious elements they contain. The scene with the satellite and the oddly clothed voyeur types is set in a very abstract space filled with viewing screens. It’s never properly explained, instead going for the enigmatic approach – this scene does the best job at balancing dialogue and wordless space, chilling the reader with the introduction of the unknown. Similarly, Ren’s race setting in the origin story feels thrilling and fast paced. You can feel the tension that’s created by juxtaposing the packed race scenes by the interrupting Butterfly scene, which is sparser and heavier.

“Arc-V” has stepped up in this chapter, deepening it’s plot and playing hard on the intrigue. We’re still treated to some great monster visuals and “Akira”-esque motorcycle fights. If the series continues to deliver on these plot points, this may turn into one of the best “Yu-Gi-Oh” series since the original.

Final Verdict: 8.3 – A great balance of extreme card gaming and interesting plot points, this looks to be a turning point for the series.


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Rowan Grover

Rowan is from Sydney, Australia! Rowan writes about comics and reads the heck out of them, too. Talk to them on Twitter at @rowan_grover. You might just spur an insightful rant on what they're currently reading, but most likely, you'll just be interrupting a heated and intimate eating session.

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Matt Lune

Born and raised in Birmingham, England, when Matt's not reading comics he's writing about them and hosting podcasts about them. From reading The Beano and The Dandy as a child, he first discovered American comics with Marvel's Heroes Reborn and, despite that questionable start, still fell in love and has never looked back. You can find him on Twitter @MattLune

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