Fire Punch
a review by SIR3N
a review by SIR3N
Spoilers Ahead By the way
#Summary#
In this world there are people called the blessed who have special abilities. Agni and his sister Luna live in an era where the world is in a complete ice age. This was caused by the ice witch. Agni and his sister were "blessed" with the ability to regenerate. Due to this power, Agni takes is upon himself to feed his village by chopping of his arm. Due to his regeneration being particularly strong he able to sustain his village.
One day blessed from the only remaining city in the world: Behemdorg. After finding out about the village's cannibalistic ways, the leading blessed (Doma) lays waste to the village with his fire abilities (his fire does not go out until the "fuel" its burning runs out. Unfortunately for Agni, his sisters abilities aren't as strong as his and she along with the rest of the village is burned. The sole survivor was Agni. In constant pain and grief, Agni spends 8 years acclimating to his new condition. He then sets of on a mission;
To avenge his sister and kill Doma.
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HOWEVER, This was immediately turned around after getting through the first 20 or so chapters. I will be criticising 4 different aspects as I feel these are the most glaring issues with this manga.
While I understand that creating manga is a demanding task and sometimes hurts the health of the writer, there are still criticisms to be made about the pacing of this manga. The fact that it has 80 chapters in total is not the problem. I feel that its how the plot was spread between the short 16-20 page chapters. For example, after the battle as Behemdorg, we are introduced to 4 new characters that add nothing to the story and are only mentioned in passing. This all happens between Chapters 26-31. No depth is added to the characters. We have are given a vague idea about who they are and where they come from but any nuance to these characters is completely disregarded.
There are only two characters that are given importance outside of these chapters. In chapter 28 the "Ice Witch" is revealed. At this time the Ice Witch has only been mentioned a few times as this mysterious entity that has control over the entire earth. Yet here they are in front of Agni, with 0 build up or reason. The lead up to the reveal of the Ice Which was very underwhelming solely because the writer didn't "hype" up the witch and only left the idea to be a distant character, totally removed from the plot.
Another important point to note is that at the end of the manga it is revealed that Judah sucks the "life" of other planets which contradicts the Ice witches points about having to suck the life out of the Earth in the first place. It is also never explained how Judah new how to use this power or explained how it works. This kind of writing is lazy and leaves for an unfinished character that needed a lot more work.
My second point is about the character Togata. Not much is known about her and her only character trait is that she's sadistic and likes movies. She seems to care about Agni but we aren't given a reason as to why since the reader is already given the idea that Togata only cares about recording a film. Even their death was weakly portrayed. The death was short and by the end of it the reader is and Agni is forced to move onto the next plot point without time to digest what had just happened. This lack of closure lowers the empathy I have for Togata's death. Another grievance I have with Togata's character is the reveal that they are a trans character. This plot point is only mentioned in 2 chapters (Before Togata's death) and adds nothing to the relationship between Agni and Togata, doesn't re-contextualize any prior experiences. All of this leads me to believe that this addition to Togata's character could be removed and we would still have the same Togata to their death. This pandering to a community was not needed and could have been worked better if it was necessary to Togata as a character.
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