also share it on your page if you can,I want to push the Kaiji agenda even further
well this is without a doubt the BEST arc in all of the Kaiji series,feels like everything was a build up just for this arc, Kaiji and Kazuya's dynamic of yin and yang was done materfully as expected and even if the arc was pretty long for a 1 match arc I enjoyed it from start to finish
___When I say that a specific antagonist is amazing I'd say that they achieved something that other antagonists simply don't like how Tsurumi from Golden Kamuy or Griffith from Berserk are very charismatic or characters like Askeladd from VInland Saga who had a long history with the protagonist Kazuya has any of these criteria in fact on paper Kazuya is fairly simplistic similar to most of Fukumoto's antagonists but what makes him so unique and incredible is how real he is,he might acts a little too overboard most of the time but even through he has a massive twisted ego, thirst for blood and in general a really shitty person he's still a character that no one can really hate.
The idea of a gambling antagonist is someone who who's opposed to the ideology of the protagonist or a character that was bond to face against him like Souichi from the mange Usogui for example, Kazuya's ideology is always clashed with Kaiji's and that brings me to the next topic of my review
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# KAIJI AND KAZUYA'S DYNAMIC
After the events of the arc and Kaiji's victory Kaiji relates to Kazuya because he was in the exacts same situation as him, doesn't sound that interesting but when you think about it Kaiji for the past 2 arcs wanted Kazuya dead because of how horrible of a person he is but then again after some time he understand that Kazuya isn't at fault and what truly made Kazuya such an evil person is his power,position and childhood trauma.
Kazuya as someone who was never been loved wanted to seek out and experience what he has never received in his life through seeing the love and affliction of the people he tortured and how their strong bond was slowly tearing in the process, Kazuya was sure that love isn't something real and people only "love" each other just in order to get something but just moments before Kazuya's execution he realized how great of a man Kaiji really is, the man who wished for his death is now saving his enemy without expecting something in return, a man who sweared to never let Kazuya get away after he caused so many deaths let his true nemesis get away because he knew that doing nothing will make him sort of a murderer.
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# MOTHER SOPHIE, A REINCARNATION OF A REAL MOTHER
The machine we're introduced to is called Sophie and Kazuya always talks to her like she's alive and breathing later do we know about the tragic events that made Kazuya choose and act this way.
After a utter defeat in a battle of wits against Kaiji he realized that his life full of hatred and distrust of people was over, when Kazuya fell for what he thought was his death he fainted mid-air and finally forgives his one and only mother, whom he stopped trusting after what happened, he knows it's too late to see the truth but he still except it nonetheless, his mother was the only real person in his life in whom he could put his trust.
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# CONCLUCIONPROS:
-Kazuya is an amazingly well written and unique antagonist
-The madness and fear in this arc make it's long chap count fairly bingable
-Expressive as always
-Kaiji's development is showing especially in this arc
-Kazuya and Kaiji share one of the greatest dynamics in manga
CONS:
-Literally none, I don't want to suck on Fukumoto's but it's as of now the only single work I've read from him that I consider flawless
This review took so much time to be published because of a specific reason with the site's rules, like I said before in my previous reviews if you see any typo or you just want to help me make my reviews more aesthetically appealing you can always shoot me a DM and I'll answer when I'm online :)
46.5 out of 48 users liked this review
