Toriko

Before you read my review, I want to clarify one thing, I will only take information and examples only up to volume 4
For a series to be succesful, it need's to have one or more of these 3 basic things, which are: characters, plot and themes, luckily, Toriko has you covered, and you'll know why after you will read my review on this 2008 shounen series. First the title. Toriko in japanese means ''slave'' or ''taken'' or however you want to translate it, but this manga is the opposite, because it shows a lot of freedom, and shows the freedom in the different characters. Toriko is the name of our main character, he lives in a world where food is the only important thing, the ''Gourmet world''. In the Gourmet world lives a special kind of people called ''Gourmet Hunters'', they collect different ingredients around the world and their objective is to make their ultimate menu. Toriko has the same goal, to make his ultimate menu with the best out of the best ingredients. When we first meet him, he first kind of seems out of character, looking really laid back and dosent care about anything, but what's so fascinating about this manga is that, the more we read, the more we get to know our characters, and more about our main characters. But, Toriko isn't the first main character we get to see in this manga, despite the title being named after him. The first main character we get to see that will be with us through out the whole series is a chef, called Komatsu. .
Komatsu is a hotel chef that works under the company called IGO. IGO is a shortened name for ''International Gourmet Organization''. We first see Komatsu get's sent of by a higher person working in IGO, to talk with Toriko and capture an animal with greater ''capture level'' that they can handle at the moment. Capture level is a system that can show how hard it is to capture an animal or ingredient. From the short panels showing Komatsu talking with the person who is in greater position in IGO, we can see that Komatsu in some way admire Toriko, because of everything that he has heard about him. What they call Toriko is ''one of the four heavenly kings''. The four heavenly kings are four very known gourmet hunters that are known to be strong and can handle a big capture level. When Komatsu finally arrives to meet Toriko, we see Toriko fishing with a very big fishing rod. Komatsu is kind of acting suprised and you can see him panicking in some sort, but ends up telling Toriko about the ingredient/animal called ''Galala gator''. While Komatsu is explaining the deal with IGO, we see Toriko suddenly grabbing a box filled with ice next to him and start eating the food in it, in some kind of rude manner, then pulls out some kind of alcohol or wine and drinks the bottle, and lastly lights some kind of branch with his fingers, and smoking it. Komatsu acts kind of surprised when we later see Toriko standing up and holding the rod very tightly, he suddenly pulls up the fishing rod and have cought a rare kind of fish, a very big one that has crab arms instead of a breast fins. While the fish is in the air, some kind of bird comes flying down and tries to take the fish as it's food, but we see Toriko tense up and then smashing both the fish and the bird on the ground. When all of this is happening, we see Komatsu is very scared and is on the ground, indicating that Komatsu isn't ready for the adventure on taking down the galala gator. When Toriko was all done, he looks at Komatsu and discussing the deal, and him saying that he is the perfect person to do this. Later we see both Toriko and Komatsu in some kind of harbour area to meet Toriko's friend Tom, who is a wholesaler. Tom takes them to the island called ''Baron Archipelago''. When we enter the coast of the island, we see strange looking monkeys on some rocks on the sea. Toriko says that it's strange, since they usually live hiding in caves. Tom later leaves Toriko and Komatsu alone to go into the jungle since it will be hard for Tom to use his boat, it might get damaged. They go in deep when they find a special kind of tiger that only lives in Baron Archipelago, but Toriko scares it by only looking at it, to indicate that Toriko is very strong. He mentions, similar with the monkeys, that the tiger should be pretty deep inside the jungle, and then says that there must be some kind of enemy that is scaring away the animals away from their usual habitat. This is a great sign of Shimabukuro's (author's name) great story telling. Even with a small island like Baron Archipelago, he still has different systems and different animals planned out only for this island. They later after some time find the Galala gator and defeats it. They later eat the gator and both think its very delicious, but Toriko accidentally eats the whole gator, leaving only a few cuts of it for IGO. This show's Toriko's more goofy side, to show that he isn't only careless, but also funny at times.

The premise for the first chapter is easy to follow, you get a mission, you go to the location, and you complete the mission, easy isn't it? While the first chapter of Toriko showed a lot of Shimabukuro's worldbuilding, it isn't only plot that it has going for it, but it also has amazing, unique and quite simply fascinating Characters!

Toriko's characters are very unique in their own special way. First, the appearance of the different characters. With the help of Shimabukuro's art, the appearance of every character can be cool, funny, cute and etc. The fashion in Toriko is very unique, since you can see the similarities between Toriko's fashion and the fashion we have today. It's in some ways relatable as if you have seen someone wear some kind of similar style but at the same time not, since it will probably look ridiculous and weird. But, that is what makes all of the characters stand out in different unique ways. Not only fashion is unique about the characters, but also their first appearance. As you probably know, first impressions are very important when meeting new characters, luckily with Toriko, when you first meet a character, you will most likely be intrigued and want to know more about the character. With Toriko, even small characters that may not look important, come back time to time and you will maybe even like them, a prime example of a character like that is Zongeh. Zongeh is a character that you first meet in volume 2, while he may look very annoying and not so fun, you'll later on kind of like him just because of how unique and different he is from everyone else. Toriko is also good for making some characters feel mysterious and hidden, kind of hyping up characters, a prime example for that is Zebra, one of the four Heavenly Kings. He first get's mentioned in volume 2 when Toriko was talking with another Heavenly King, Coco, an old friend of his. In the panel, you can see Toriko, Coco and Zebra fighting side by side.
Zebra looks massive in comparison with Toriko and Coco, indicating that Zebra is probably a bit more stronger than them and or that he can take more hits. Zebra dosen't get mentioned a lot, but when he does, he looks very badass, with shadow all around him, hiding his face and his identity. With every new time someone mentions Zebra, we get just a bit more information, making it feel like we're getting closer and closer to his reveal. You get ofcourse introduced with many characters along Toriko's adventure, both fun, annoying, badass and bad characters, with all having unique and different personalitites that you wont get bored of, it's always a new fun experience when you get introduced to a new character! A last thing to mention about characters is the villains. While you can see why and how the villains are how they are, they are very interesting too see, how they act, react, how they manage thing's, how they fight and etc. Luckily Shimabukuro has different pages showing different stats of different characters. In those pages, you get to see both main characters but also villains. The different stats are divided by 5 different stats, which are: Power, Special Abilities, Appetite, Brains and Speed. With the help of the diagram Shimabukuro uses we can see how good each character does in each stat, giving us a general impression on the character. In addition, below the diagram are additional facts about the character, which are: Age, Blood Type, Height, Eye Sight, Special Moves/Abilities, Birthday, Sign, Weight and Shoe Size and below that is a small summary about the character, all we know about them. If there is information that we don't know about the character, it will just say ''???''.

After going over both Plot and Characters, i want to know talk about Theme's! Toriko has a lot of different theme's and different island's. For Toriko to get the best ingredient's, he has to travel a lot, and because of that there are different themes through out the series. At first we are in some kind of jungle, fighting a crocodile and the next we're at a mountain fighting a giant monkey. It's always fun when we're at different places, different enviroments, It's a nice change of pace for the reader and not having the same thing everytime. You can in a way think of it like the series One Piece, the main cast travel to get closer to the great treasure ''One Piece'', in Toriko, they travel to get closer to finishing their menu. When we first arrive at a new island, it always starts of with nice full pages or a nice big panel, showing the beuty of the island and then the cast's reactions. Every time we arrive in a new island, it isn't the same reaction, it's always different, which is very enjoyable to see, some times they have to fight, and some times they can take it easy. We also get to know the different animals that live on this island, it may not be all of the animals, but we get to know a lot from those that are explained. Just like the character stats, different ingredients also have stats. It isn't devided by different powers/section, but it show's the size compared to an average human, the Capture level and a little bio about it. From this we can get a general thought of the ingredient, if it's rare, hard to catch, very big etc. Toriko as expected, cares a lot about the different habitats and different animals in a very generous way. The readers in a way almost know's just as much about an ingredient as the cast in the Toriko, as if we are on the same page. Toriko can also change things up a bit and make the main cast scattered around in the island, which makes everything more interesting! We maybe have one group that are fighting some kind of animals, while the other is trying and eating different ingredients. With this kind of technique, we get to know more ingredients and how they taste, but also see different fighting abilities and how the different animals fight. The higher Capture level we get with an animal, the more interesting it is in fighting. It will have smart abilities, good speed to run around, and also smart when fighting, making the different fights with it very interesting and enjoyable to read, making the series even more interesting. If we take away the animals, fighting the villains are also very enjoyable and fun to read. That situation is very different from the animals, since the villains are much more stronger, much faster, better thinkers, and better in almost everything overall. You can see Toriko struggle sometimes when ex. fighting different villains, which is fun to read, hoping that Toriko will win and not lose!

A last thing to mention is the author himself, Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro. As you might know, he was in a bad situation in 2002, having done some lewd stuff with a underage girl, the police found out and sent shimabukuro to jail, and in addition adding up the jail time 2+ years. While this was back in 2002, almost 2 decades ago, this still get's talked about, about his actions and why it is wrong. While yes his actions were wrong, everyone can agree to that, i think that this should be talked about less. This action was in 2002, two decades ago, a human being by that time has changed, being more mature, knowing why they did what they did and knowing that it is wrong. His jail time was also also 2x as much then what it should've been, instead of two years, it was four years. Being in 4 years in prison must 90% change the way you think, especially that shimabukuro isn't knows for being a big criminal, he was a mangaka. So by that time he mustve changed, he must have matured, he must know what he did wrong and that he wont do it again, and it shows, because after 2002, he never did anything that wrong again, instead, he got married, wrote Toriko and became succesful. Shimabukuros private life in my opinion shouldn't stop you from reading a wonderful story about a man that loves food, no in fact, you need to read it! It is very well known, having a lot of video games, having 2 anime's and a lot of merchandice, from pins to pencil cases having just a picture of Toriko on it.

So these are my last words before i end this review. You need to give Toriko a try for how it is with it's plot, characters and different themes, I give Toriko a 100/100.