(SKIPPABLE DISCLAIMER: This is the script of a video review I did on this manga, if you want to check out this review in video format please click here. Otherwise feel free to read the review below.)

With 162 chapters, Mashle has just become one of the shortest Battle Shonens in Weekly Shonen Jump to reach a natural, conclusive ending.
And I’ve been convinced to talk about it. Now that it has ended, what is my opinion of it, what did I think it did well, and more importantly, where do I think it failed.

And before we get into my review, I need to be transparent with you guys. Even though I have followed this manga weekly since its very first chapter, I am not a fan. I am not a hater either, I think Mashle isn’t without merit, but I can’t consider myself a fan. To understand why, let's talk about Mashle!

Mashle’s first chapter was released on January 27, 2020, as part of the very first batch of the year. It was released alongside two other manga, Undead Unluck and Guardian of the Witch.
And, in the weeks before it’s release, it was the manga that people were paying less attention to.
While the fact that the other two manga were going to be pure Battle Shonens probably helped, the fact that Mashle was releasing as a gag manga at the exact time that people were becoming tired with all the new manga in the genre in Shonen Jump also had something to do with this.

However, once that first chapter hit, people were talking about it! A lot of eyes were turning to the series for reasons that I don’t really think were that great.
Mashle implemented elements of multiple things, to the point where it was hard to figure out if this was a rip-off or a parody.

The humor seemed to be extremely inspired by One, the author of One-Punch Man, as well as the main character, Mash, seemingly to be a mix of OPM’s Saitama in essence, and Mob Psycho’s Mob in looks.
The plot synopsis was basically the same as Black Clover, the story takes place in a world where almost everyone has magic, and people are extremely prejudiced against those that don’t. Our main character, a poor, extremely buff, peasant has no magic to call his own, so, they decide to reach the top of the magic world to prove that even without magic, they have their worth.
And of course, the world was literally Harry Potter. Like, that was definitely on purpose.

So, even though it definitely did the hard thing of getting a lot of people checking it out and talking about it, at this point, very little of it’s discourse was about Mashle’s quality as it’s own product, and more so on people’s opinions of the mix-match of previous ideas.

That isn’t to say that a lot of people didn’t like the first chapter, but personally, I thought that, without finding its footing, this one was going to have a hard time surviving. The highlight of the chapter to me came in the one joke in the whole thing that made me laugh. This one:

For all that I’m about to say, this joke and the repetition of it right afterwards is just pure comedy, the timing and expression are great, and it’s a joke that actually uses the, honestly, lacking quality in artstyle in its favor..

Like, Mashle’s art is going to improve somewhat, especially when it comes to usage of what I’m pretty sure are just computer graphics, but this isn’t it.
However, it wasn’t going to be one laugh that would sell me to this manga, because… well, we didn’t need more gag manga. At this point we had Agravity Boys from the previous batch, Mitama Security, that had been running since the year prior, and Mission Yozakura Family was still very much in its early gag phase. And I thought, and still think, all of them were better gag manga than Mashle.

But it doesn’t matter what I think, what matters is if it sells, and Mashle sold. I remember the manga kicking into high gear when Lance was introduced, and the second volume of the manga getting out of the shelves pretty decently, getting over 25 thousand volumes sold in its first week alone.
Whether I liked it or not, Mashle was here to stay.

And to be fair, I think the early part of Mashle was good enough to justify that, because, despite everything, Mashle excelled at one joke, and the good part of Mashle is that the manga was built on that joke.

Seeing the wizards be so full of themselves, boasting and hyping themselves up to the point where you hate them, just for Mash to appear and beat them up in the most satisfying, funny and cathartic way was always good, no matter how many times it happened, even towards the end of the manga this was true.

Mash works best when he’s this unstoppable force of sheer will that can destroy anything, but chooses to fight for good. Mash doesn’t need hardships, he doesn’t need to struggle with his opponents, because Mash isn’t the guy you're supposed to relate to with your struggles, he’s supposed to be the guy that will be there for you. Nothing can stop Mash, that’s why we love him.

However, you can’t really have a long running narrative that depends exclusively on this one thing. It’s a problem that One-Punch Man came across and it’s a problem that Mashle, as it became clearer it was going to stay, started facing as well.

Mashle became more serious, especially starting from the Divine Visionary Exam Arc onwards. Not completely serious, not gritty or dark… but it started to be less about the jokes and be more about the battles, the characters and the world.
And this is something that worked wonderfully with the previously mentioned Yozakura Family. Both of these series shifted to a more action based storytelling, became a bit more serious, but without ditching their gag origins completely. But there’s a big difference between Mission Yozakura and Mashle when it comes to their execution and I think that has all to do with the battles, the characters and the world.

Mashle’s strongest point when it comes to fights is the cathartic beatdowns the opponent receives from Mashle. But moving forward we start to see fights be longer, with the enemies having brand new powers, and the side cast started being featured more, which sounds good if we want to have a battle shonen. The problem is that, once you remove what makes Mashle different, it ceases to be different.

This manga, especially in the middle, becomes awfully dull. It’s not like the fights are bad, but when compared to One Piece, Jujutsu Kaisen, Undead Unluck, Sakamoto Days, My Hero Academia, Black Clover… Mashle lacks anything that really competes when it comes to spectacle, choreography, power system or even just plain compelling storytelling. It’s an okay battle shonen in a sea of much better ones.
When it comes to the world… Any attempt to take it more seriously and to differ from Harry Potter at this point is bound to fail.
This has been a blunt parody, everything up to this point has literally been lifted from Harry Potter, from the places, to the rules, to the characters. Mashle’s villain is going to be Voldemort even if it’s not. Nothing will make me think of this world as anything else but the Harry Potter world.

And finally, the one aspect I’m sure people will disagree with me… the characters.
It’s a strange thing, characters will always make it or break it for me. More than anything else, if your manga has a cast of characters who mesh well with each other I’m going to love it. It’s why Dorohedoro is my favorite manga. The characters individually are great, but together they are extremely fun and make me want to read more.

Strangely enough, I think the characters individually in Mashle are good. Mash I’ve talked about, but Lance is just really cool and badass, and Finn’s story arc throughout the manga was honestly compelling, especially his final battle with his brother, which is, to me, the highlight of the series!
Dot and Lemon can be annoying, but they’re honestly far from being the worst characters, so why… Why is it so hard to enjoy them as a group?

When I tell you that this is something that’s been haunting me for most of my time reading Mashle, I mean it!
It just feels like every chapter, every panel of this group interacting with each other, which normally is my favorite part of a manga… it’s just annoying and cringy. That would legitimately be the word that describes my reaction towards it the best, I cringe.
And comedy is subjective, I get that, but I just don’t think most jokes in Mashle really land, they seem forced. Which sucks for a manga that is heavily built upon its comedy.

All in all, I don’t think Mashle excels at most of the things that it does, it’s really just the way Mash destroys his opponents that saves it.
And as we go throughout the story and the lore becomes deeper and less interesting, it leads to a final villain that is underwhelming and a final arc that… fuck… it ain’t that bad.

Like I mentioned before, the characters, individually, are good. As we reach their respective final battles, it was actually quite nice to see their character arcs reach their conclusions through fighting, plus, some of Mashle’s previous villains were somewhat interesting and it was good to see them return as allies.

The highlight to me was, again, Linn’s fight, it was the most emotionally invested I was at any point in this series.
The final battle… it’s over the top in a way that works with Mashle, and it goes back to it’s origins in a grand way.
Plus, with 162 chapters, this manga doesn’t really overstay its welcome, nor does it feel rushed, which is honestly not something we can say about 99% of Shonen Jump titles.

Most Battle Shonens will be dragged to Hell and see themselves being pushed to a conclusion that can’t possibly tie all the knots that they were forced to write. In that regard, Mashle is a breath of fresh air.

So all in all, was Mashle good? I think it had good parts, but both in comedy manga, action manga and comey/action manga, there are better options in the magazine right now. But it was alright, and it did end well.