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, Robbie checks in with “Shadow Eliminators.” If you have thoughts on this or any other current Shonen Jump titles, please let us know in the comments!
Shadow Eliminators Chapter 1: Layers of Shadows
Written and illustrated by Kento Amemiya
Translated by Dan Luffey
Lettered by Rina Mapa
Reviewed by Robbie Pleasant
That’s right, it’s time for a new manga series to take its shot at making an impact in the pages of Shonen Jump! Hopeful creators have a high hurdle to clear if they want to last, but a good first chapter can set the stage and put a good series on its way to becoming one of the next “Big Three.”
And “Shadow Eliminators” is… not off to the greatest start.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. “Shadow Eliminators,” created by Kento Amemiya, is the newest manga to debut in Shonen Jump. The series features a pair of protagonists – a regular (if far too uptight) high school student named Yayoi Asakaze, and the mysterious transfer student with supernatural powers, Aoba Kuromori. It’s through Asakaze that we, as readers, get introduced to the mystical elements that will make up the main conflict and threat that drives this series.
What is this threat? Something about evil spirits that latch on to negative emotions (or “the shadows in peoples’ hearts”) and transform people, and the city the series is set in has become a beacon for them. So far, it’s a generic threat that will enable a “monster of the week” situation whenever the story calls for it, albeit one with some nice designs behind them.
However, this is a setup that depends on the deuteragonists both being compelling characters, and what we get isn’t that quite yet. Asakaze is introduced as the overly strict “public morals committee vice-chairman,” a role usually given to a minor antagonist in a school setting, and while it is a nice change from the usual formula to use that kind of character as a protagonist, reframing it as “wanting to protect people from unfairness and injustice” doesn’t vibe with anything we’d seen from him for most of the chapter. Kuromori, on the other hand, is more of a typical Shonen Jump protagonist, who shows up with mysterious spiritual powers and a dark past that helps empower him. in other words: it’s the kind of backstory we’ve seen a million times before. It’s not necessarily bad, just generic.
None of this would be a problem if it was executed well, but even though we’re given a good 55 pages for the first chapter, the pacing is still off. For instance, the first meeting of the two is interrupted as it immediately cuts to Kuromori introducing himself to the class, rather than using the encounter to let us see what Kuromori is like or what kind of chemistry their interactions have. It’s then immediately followed by a sudden flashback from another student, where it goes straight from an “AHHHH!” of recognition to the flashback itself without anything to indicate or transition to it other than a little rewind symbol. At other points, characters just kind of appear, and action scenes skip from one moment to the next with little to connect them visually.
It doesn’t help that the manga’s panels often try to fit too much into too little space, like a thin vertical panel showing a character’s monstrous transformation in the same cinematic detail as a vertical cell phone video. Other panels could benefit from giving us a bit of a wider view to really see what’s happening, as they feel cluttered and focused on smaller areas that don’t get enough room to breathe.
Continued belowThis is particularly a shame because Kento Amemiya’s artwork isn’t bad at all. The fundamentals are all very solid, with clean designs, expressive characters, and background work that makes each scene feel grounded. More importantly, the monstrous designs of not only the Threads and the people they infect, but the world they live in, creates a solid hook for “Shadow Eliminators.” Similarly, while Asakaze’s character design is intentionally “generic anime high school student,” it still fits his personality well, and Kuromori has plenty of little accents and features that make his design full of personality and provide a very clear voice. Kuromori’s powers, too, get some great illustrative touches, including a summoned figure and a sword with matching circular patterns. And while the action can feel choppy at times, with how cluttered the panels are, it could be great if given more room.
Additionally, the dialogue can be a little clunky, with sentence fragments spread throughout multiple word balloons. It works well enough for the people possessed by Threads, but not so much for the opening narration or when characters are talking to each other.
Now for all my complaints, are there good things about this manga too? Oh yes, I can’t and won’t deny that. The “otherworld hollows” where Threads exist is an effectively eerie setting, and the corrupt designs of the Kasane (people fully possessed by Threads) are well-done. I also like the general concepts behind the characters, even if the execution is a little funky. The idea of how Threads feed on our insecurities, frustrations, and other negative emotions could potentially lead to some good character arcs for anyone who ends up having to deal with them. Additionally, as I mentioned above, the artwork is solid, with some nice artistic flourishes and character designs that have plenty of personality behind them.
So while the first chapter of “Shadow Eliminators” is a bit of a rough start, the series does still have some potential to it. From here, it’s up to Kento Amemiya to build on that potential, fix up the rough edges, and really build the series into something great. Whether or not that will happen remains to be seen, but every new series deserves a chance to grow.
Final Verdict: 5.0 – A rough first chapter in terms of pacing and page layout, but with some potential to grow into something better.
