Versailles of the Dead

Versailles of the Dead starts simple. The main character, Albert, is accompanying his sister Marie Antoinette as she makes her trip to meet her future husband when they get attacked by zombies. Unfortunately, she dies, so as her twin, he decides to take her place to ensure the alliance between France and Austria. And I know what you’re thinking, this is just going to be a gender-bent historical story where Albert is trying to hide his identity.

And that is where you’re wrong.

Not only is he found out pretty much the next chapter, shifting the story to trying to find the missing pieces of the Diamond Necklace instead (which is a scandal that historically happened way after she got into power), but don’t confuse this with, say, Le Chevalier D’Eon or Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, where it’s mostly a historical setting with the occasional supernatural element. This manga is quite the opposite, focusing instead on the supernatural while taking quite a few liberties with its historical materials.

This coupled with an uninteresting cast, most of the actual historical characters being relegated to minor roles (how do you manage to write a Versailles story and have Fersen appear only twice throughout the whole thing?), “Marie Antoinette” being evil for evil’s sake (which, sure, is a take on the former queen, but seems to come out of nowhere when it comes to Albert’s personality), and the uneven pacing should give you a good idea of what you’re getting into.

Is Versailles of the Dead good? No.

So, why am I still recommending it? Because it’s fun.

First of all, the art is gorgeous. Not only on the main characters themselves or the costumes, which don’t get me wrong, they are pretty good, but the monster designs are the cream on top. In fact, it could easily be argued that they are the best when it comes to art style.

The plot itself, while uneven, has a strong start that becomes zanier and zanier the more it goes along, and while the cast itself sucks for the most part, I do have to admit that it has what I consider the best representation of Louis XVI that I’ve seen so far. They even somehow made his blacksmithing/lock obsession plot relevant! As for the original characters, in general, they tend to fare better than the historical characters (with Bastien easily takes the cake when it comes to both likeability and relevance).

There is a fair amount of action as well, and relatively low amount of gore, which should make this an easy to read and accessible manga as well.

All in all, it is dumb fun, with a huge emphasis on the dumb, but fun nonetheless, so if you can just relax and turn your brain off for a few hours, you’ll have a great time.