When it comes to art, let it be it music, books or even anime and manga, I've always found myself loving what's considered niche and underground. Today I'm going to review a fairly unknown manga. A total of a stunning 60 people have completed it thus far, despite the manga even being from 2016. Here goes nothing...

Description

The manga I'm talking about is panpanya's Doubutsutachi, or simply Animals, if you prefer English titles to Romaji.

Animals, while never being clearly explained, since the main character is just referred to as Shoujo (which just means Girl), is what looks like the autobiography of the author herself, telling her story as she grows up in the city that she was born in and eventually moves out to somewhere else. The narration is somewhat linear yet episodic and is at times exaggerated and turned into something surreal, to keep it interesting and fun.

Speaking of surreal, panpanya's art-style also fits that description perfectly, be it her drawing humans other than the main characters as either having normal bodies with giant heads with holes for mouths or as her drawing a platoon of raccoon-like animals you can see both on the cover and inside the manga, to really basic and simple drawings of foreground objects and people placed on extremely beautiful and detailed backgrounds. I find this style to be really poetic and I think that each person who sees it will find a different hidden meaning of their own.

The chapters are mixed in length, spanning from long ones at 20 pages each to as short as 2 or 3 pages, and are also divided by what seem like pages of panpanya's diary, narrating her daily life, her discoveries of everyday yet interesting things and sometimes even full-page panels depicting Shoujo throughout the city.

Thoughts

While I was reading it, I found Animals to be a very unique and thought-provoking experience. The art-style, the storytelling, the overall mood, everything just clicked, making me want to read even more.

The diary pages that divide the various characters are a nice break from the story, which is calm, relaxed and somewhat strangely nostalgic, and, while at first I was skipping through them, I found myself going back to read them thoroughly, as they really add a lot to the manga, despite being completely unrelated to the story itself.

This manga -and honestly this author in general- are something I'd definitely recommend getting into, as the feeling that panpanya's stories give you, and which I can only describe as nostalgic, is priceless. This manga is an overall 9 out of 10 for me and a must-read for anyone that finds enjoyment in reading poetic and thought-provoking manga.