Bastard

~~~Bastard is a manwha that has cemented it place among my favorite series for having the excellent qualities a great thriller should have. But what exactly makes Bastard great among the rest?

Usually in a good thriller, it should be the key focus to make the reader feel compelling to read through, but also intense so you keep on reading. Bastard already achieves that goal with the absolute amazing 1st chapter, which seriously impressed me alot. The suspense in the dialogue and the gritty artstyle complements the dark enviroment the author is trying to make, which i think he succeeded really well.

Already from that point, i am personally hooked in, but what made me more interested? Well, to be fair, it is the story. Usually in other great thriller mangas like Monster and Death Note, the main character is usually already likeable and you're drawn in to experience the full journey, but that isn't the same for this one. Jin, the main protagonist, is super cold in the first beginning chapters of the series and acts very much like a depressed teenager when he comes in. He is also very weak and doesn't involve himself in fights due to him knowing he will lose.
But i think that is a strong point in the story-telling departments, because it sets up the antagonist of the series, his father - the serial killer which gets in his sons way in his young school life. Combine the both and you have yourself a great story.

I loved seeing other viewpoints of the stories and the character interactions were good but what really made me love it was Jins development as a character. He is forced to change due to his fathers tyranical nature in forcing him to do some really messed up sh#! and its developed well enough that i liked Jin as a character at the end of this story, which was very unpredictable aswell.

I'd like to go a bitmore into the artstyle of Bastard, which is the usage of colour. The dark, brown colours used really sets up the dark atmosphere Jin is forced to be in, which makes me as a reader more interested, and every damn cliffhanger doesn't quench my curiosity for what is about to unfold in the next chapter.

I already feel like re-reading it again

Finally, we have the characters.

Manny is a character that goes through a redemption arc and even though it really isn't the most well-done, i think he does a fairly good job in succeeding at it and being kind of a side character to Jin which was enjoyable to get to know. Definetly the weakest character in the manwha, but i don't see her as the worst. Though used as a plot tool sometimes, she is the one that forces a change on Jin which makes me like her alot. She also warmed my heart with her backstory which genuinly sad, which i definetly did NOT expect from a thriller manwha.

Finally, we have the bad guy. There is much to be said about this cruel and old ass dude but one thing i will have to say is that the author is really great at using this character. You expect him to do one thing but he suprises you in ways you would not expect. He also brings many plot twists into the series, which just makes me appreciate his character alot more. He is definetly no Johan Liebert but damn does he do a good job at making me feel fear.

With that out of the way, what is my consensus on the manwha Bastard? It is a great thriller manwha that does things right, and adds twists like character development, a bit of other genres into the horror genre but also does things well like genuinly shocking plot twists. The artstyle is downright 10/10 though the art CAN be lacking sometimes and the characters really arent the most fleshed out. Still, this was genuinly a manwha i would wholeheartedly reccomend, and is an absolute fantastic start if you want to get more into manwha/Webtoons.

Thanks for reading my review! This is a bit more in-depth to my usual reviews, as i really took my time with it since i really enjoyed Bastard alot. Feedback would be appreciate on my page, so hit me up once you are done reading. See you on the next review, peace!

~~~