First reading:

Went into it with extremely high hopes and expectations since I thoroughly enjoyed the anime and fell deeply in love with so many of the characters and the overall stylistic design and aesthetic of the show and world building. I had obviously heard about and experienced for myself the decline in the last quarter or so of the anime and learned that most people attribute that to it going anime only at that point, consequently I expected that the promising greatness of the adapted anime material would make up the entirety of the manga but to my dismay, turns out that even the manga gradually spirals into a hot mess as the story progresses in spite of the huge potential of the story.

Starting off with the fan service just to get it out of the way, it has some moments where there is some genuine comedic value to it (thanks to Blair) and therefore isn’t a complete eyesore but they’re very few compared to the useless and plain annoying upskirts and comments about the flat chest of the 13 y old protagonist. It’s not an extremely common occurrence though so it is pretty ignorable for the most part.

The story itself starts off pretty strong and gradually progresses until it reaches its peak during the Arachne arc, great pacing, very well distributed involvement of all the characters, some of the funniest moments during their disguised infiltration of the towers, surprisingly compelling and valuable development of some of the side characters that I found to be irrelevant and boring before this arc, great tension due to Medusa seemingly working together with dmwa and Maka’s constant oscillation between suspicion on resentment as well as naive hopefulness that she might actually be redeemable or at least capable of feeling some form of motherly love towards Crona. Blackstar’s fight against Mifune after his spiritualistic retreat in search of absolute harmony with and understanding of his sword and his relationship with the pursuit of absolute power is absolutely stunning and cathartic, way better than every following battle including the one against Asura, same thing goes for Kid vs. Mosquito and Maka vs Arachne.

After that however, the story begins to drag, seems to lose focus and spirals into a steady decline. A lot of forgettable and utterly one dimensional characters get introduced, the pacing becomes dreadfully slow, the battles don’t seem to hit the same in spite of the character’s supposedly huge upgrade in power and techniques and the author employs some treacherously pseudo philosophical convoluted monologues/ dialogues about the essence of order vs madness, fear, pursuit of absolute power yada yada, which attempt to make the matter at hand seem really sophisticated, deep and complex but ends up doing the exact opposite due to these chaotic ramblings having little to no actual substance.

Moreover, I was hoping to see some form of development in Maka and Soul’s relationship beyond the somewhat generic “you give me strength and courage because you’re always there for me”, not to say that it had to be romantic, it could be just as good if it remained completely platonic but I just wish that they had been given the opportunity to really delve into their fears and insecurities. The audience gets to learn about them through their inner monologues but they themselves never actually have a proper confrontation with them or share any of it with their partner, they just magically shake it off and completely forget about it after literally shutting down mid fight and almost getting themselves killed because of it??…

Maka, who is a really lovable, badass, outspoken, ambitious but simultaneously human character with deep doubts and fears about her capabilities and the protagonist of the story, seems kind of underused and not as fleshed out as she could and SHOULD be even by the end.

I’m somewhat conflicted on how I feel about Medusa’s death, as she was in my opinion the best antagonist. On one hand I do appreciate the Game of thrones-esque unexpected, quick, simple and uneventful death of such a major force in the story, it also definitely leaves a lingering sense of unease from the tragic implications of that situation for Crona and his ultimate descent into madness, as well as reinforcing her wickedness as she seems to be pleased and fulfilled by the knowledge that her death will contribute to the finalisation of her goal to resurrect the Kishin and unleash his madness on the world. On the other, I was really counting on her and her only to once again deliver a true spectacle of a fight for her final battle. Perhaps that void could’ve been filled if any of the other major fights in the latter half didn’t suck.

Justin Law’s switch to evil was rushed and not really believable in the way it was portrayed, the author had a solid case for a study of religious fanaticism and uncritical loyalty to dogmatic belief systems and forms of authority but completely flunked it. Same thing can be said about Kid’s doubts and suspicions towards his father and his whole legacy but the whole resolution ends up being “nah, I know him, he would never do that, end of story”. Not even gonna comment on that atrocious last chapter.

All in all, insane potential, so many good ideas and concepts, great cast but lacklustre execution and handling on most of it especially in the second half of the story. Still giving it a 7/10 in spite of how harsh the review sounds because I still adore the main characters and the first half of the plot.