Welcome to This Week in Shonen Jump, our weekly check in on Viz’s various Shonen Jump series. Viz has recently changed their release format, but our format will mostly remain the same. We will still review the newest chapters of one title a week, now with even more options at our disposal. The big change for our readers is that, even without a Shonen Jump subscription, you can read these most recent chapters for free at Viz.com or using their app.
This week, Ken checks in with “Blue Box.” If you have thoughts on this or any other current Shonen Jump titles, please let us know in the comments!
Blue Box Ch. 6
Written & Illustrated by Kouji Miura
Translated by Christine Dashiell
Lettered by Mark McMurray
Reviewed by Ken Godberson III
“Blue Box” combines two genres that have kind of been my weaknesses in my usual readings: sports and romance manga. I am not going to lie when I said I was very skeptical of this manga just from reading a description about it, this drama between a badminton and basketball player; it felt like a made-up manga within an actual manga series. Like, the premise seemed to be something that shouldn’t really be the conflicting hook? However, now we are six chapters in, I can say that while it’s got some ways to go, I am liking it more than I thought I was going to.
I like the overall theme that was going on in this issue: That Taiki Inomata doesn’t want it misconstrued that he’s only doing badminton and being motivated by Chiantsu. Even though he is Completely Fine and Doesn’t Care what’s going on between Chainstu and one of her peers, Haryu (Seriously, ya’ll, he’s fine), the main concern was that he plays this sport because he likes it. So when Taiki is paired to face Haryu and gets destroyed his reaction is to get better because he loves the sport. He admits that he wants to get better for Chaintsu, but never use her as an excuse for when he loses. It’s a quaint idea and shows Miura wants to keep a balance between the genres in this manga.
The artwork in this manga has been fine. Like it is perfectly well done. Miura’s pens do a serviceable job at conveying the emotions that Taiki and Chaintsu are expressing. There is also a good attention to detail when focus is brought to Taiki’s shoes and something very specific in regards to that. I would like to give a particular nod to the final double page spread of Taiki hitting the birdie back. With that said, when it’s just general shots the artwork is just at that fine level that will improve over time as Miura gets more comfortable with the characters, it’s just not in that top tier level of other Shonen Jump series.
I could grow to enjoy “Blue Box.” I don’t necessarily think I could grow to love “Blue Box” though. While it will probably never be in my top tier must-read levels of books, it does seem like it is on track to being a book worth standing alongside the rest of Shonen Jump. Miura is doing a good job of blending and balancing sport and romance without ever feeling one will end up dominating. What I do think the book will need is just time. Time to really make the art stand out a bit more and time to develop. Hopefully, it will be aloud to get that time.
Final Verdict: 6.8- A good start to a series that can earn its proper place if it’s given the luxury of time.
