Run Time: Aug 7, 2013 - Nov 19,2014 Author: Yoshitoki Oima Publisher: Kadansha Volumes: 7 (62 Chapters) Welcome back everyone! First of all, I wanted to apologize for skipping a post last week ._. I was sick all week and felt like death so did not have any energy to get something out. I will make it up to you guys this week by changing our pace and talk about one of my favorite mangas, Koe no Katachi. I know that this manga has a film adaptation, but I want to speak more on the manga since the movie missed out on a lot of the charm this story (which actually made me severely disappointed). I will touch up a little on the film adaptation towards the end of the post, but let us focus on the amazing story that the manga offers. This manga was actually published as a one shot, but received serialization to become a full manga; for good reason. Let us read about what this silent voice is (since we can't hear it (ᗒᗜᗕ)՛. Synopsis: Shoya Ishida was a youthful delinquent popular amongst his friends in elementary school. When a new girl, Shoko Nishimiya, transferred into his class, everyone commented on how cute she was and looked forward to making friends with her. The class soon finds out that she's different when she came to introduce herself in front of the whole class. Nishimiya pulls out a notepad and writes "I'm deaf." To get over the monotonous classroom routine, Ishida starts to bully Nishimiya along with the rest of the class. One day, Nishimiya transfers out of the school and an investigation from the principal causes the whole class to turn on Ishida, making him become the victim of bullying and becomes isolated from everyone else well into high school. One day in high school, Ishida bumps into Nishimiya where he tries to befriend her and tries to reconcile himself from the deeds he did to her back in elementary school. As the two slowly develop their friendship, they meet others along the way and create a group of friends. The following events of the group causes a dynamic between Nishimiya and Ishida where they start to learn the importance of friendship and that having good friends is what makes life worth living for. Storyline: Koe no Katachi has a story so different than anything else I have read. Most of the time, characters have a difficult time of understanding each other and communicating with each other normally, but adding in the spin of having one character being deaf adds a layer of complexity. This dynamic causes characters in the manga to learn sign language to communicate with Nishimiya because one of the most important aspects of being human is socialization. The urge and need to talk to other humans is something that helps the brain develop and also the way people learn. You can see that in the beginning of the manga, communication is difficult, but as people started caring more for Nishimiya, sign language is more frequently used. As communication becomes less of an obstacle, the characters start to learn from each other and start getting closer. So on the surface, this manga might seem like a love story between Ishida and Nishimiya and how they overcome all the obstacles to create the cliche "love conquers all" motif. You start to quickly see how more complex this story is and you start to realize that there are different forms of love that can contribute to the previously mentioned theme. This is where the story excels. The character development between everyone on the page deeply affects the others. You can see that the actions of one character or words said by another affects the relationship between everyone else. This fluid interaction and reaction is the cornerstone of this manga and its greatest strength. With the added little twists within the plot , this manga is definitely a page turner. I'm going to be honest and say that I binge read this manga in maybe like two days. My attachment to these characters and the need to see how the events progress their relationship is what made me fall in love with this manga. If you love coming-of-age stories or love seeing personal growth, this manga is for you. Art: The art is definitely from an earlier time and without the help of CGI, the illustrations are not as crisp as they are in anime, but that is expected. Part of the charm of manga is not so much for the art, but for the atmosphere the story immerses you in. To me, the illustrations are there to help supplement the words on the page. It is used more as an aid to visualize what the characters are doing or how the scene looks so you don't have to put too much energy in imagining how the stage is placed, allowing you to focus on the interactions between the characters on the page. This is perfect as well because could you imagine how the sign language would be described if there weren't any illustrations? That being said, they artist does an excellent job of using facial expressions and body language throughout the manga. I think this is amazingly important because a big part of communicating through sign language is eye contact, facial expressions, and body langauge which is clearly shown in the panels. In the above picture, you can definitely see how angry Nishimiya is and you can see how furiously she is signing. Film Adaptation: Like I said earlier in the intro, this manga had a film adaptation. I will just give my thoughts on the movie compared to the manga. It will be short so don't expect a thorough review. First of all, the art and animation in this movie really brought what I imagined what was happening in the panels come to life. Facial expressions, body language, same art style: everything was the same as is seen in the manga but with color and a crisper finish. The animation in this movie is top notch and loved seeing how fluid their movements are. I also loved how true they kept the basic storyline in the movie. The OST as well from this movie is fantastic. I might be biased because I love OST that have piano music in it (Your Lie in April anyone?). Now onto the negatives which I have tons on, but my biggest complaint is the lack of character development from the secondary characters which played HUGE and IMPORTANT parts in the manga. This took several chapters to develop and I understand the time constraint they had in the movie, but it made everything feel too rushed and lacking. If they instead pushed this to become a series with maybe two seasons, it would have been way more successful in my opinion. Like it makes me so disappointed that they had something great to work with and only made it somewhat decent. If you have watched this movie and felt like it was missing something, it's because the friends didn't play huge parts in the movie and were rarely seen. I highly suggest you all to read the manga if you liked the movie. Thank you guys for joining me again another week! It was kind of odd writing a post on a manga since all I can really talk about is the storyline, but I had fun overcoming this challenge. If you had any suggestions for me that I could work on when I write about my next manga, please tell me on twitter (@JamesLeuterio) or my instagram! (@duuudeitsjames)
I will see you guys next week!
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Coffee senpaiJust an Otaku who also loves his coffee. Grab some coffee and watch anime with me ٩(θ‿θ)۶ Posts for this blog every Friday!
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