Devilman is a short horror manga written in the 70s by Go Nagai. It was the subject of heavy controversy due to the violence and dark themes within it for its time.

It is an important landmark in manga history. Many creators of popular franchises cited Devilman as one of their main sources of inspiration. Series like Berserk, Parasyte, Bastard!!, Neon Genesis Evangelion, and potentially more would not exist without Devilman.

I wanted to start watching the anime adaptation Devilman Crybaby. But I first wanted to read through the original source material. Despite the age, I tried not to let it discourage me, as it is unfair to dismiss anything to call it dated because it happens to be an old work.

However... Devilman is a TRULY dated piece of art, with its quality having greatly diminished throughout the years. Frankly, if this manga was released today everyone would agree it's awful, lets's not kid ourselves.

The story follows the MC Akira Fudo fusing with a demon while keeping his human heart and becoming "Devilman", so that he can help humanity defeat the demon race. The story is very dull at the start but it does have a good twist and an unexpected ending.

The manga has several dated and bad writing techniques.

Volume 1 - is so so bad.. more THAN 70% is a boring exposition. The exposition consists of the MC Akira listening to his best friend, Ryo’s explanation about demons. This leads to some of the most unnatural dialogs I’ve ever seen.. Ryo speaks as if he was reading off a wiki, and then introduces a retarded plan consisting of fusing Akira with a demon?? And Akira’s wimpy personality evolves into a “let’s do it” attitude almost immediately?? If your best friend suddenly told you to put a tarantula in your ass to combat enemies, would you do it?

Authors today cleverly add exposition in bits of information throughout the story. The worst part is that most of this exposition is literally useless as the last volume retcons most of it. Instead of wasting pages on this boring and overly long exposition, the author should have drawn the final battle.

In the anime Devilman Crybaby, they knew it was shit so they adapted this entire volume into the 1st episode, and they managed to turn shit into something good.

Volume 2 - is a boring fight.

Volume 3 - they introduced some child character out of the blue and gave her the label of “important person” to the MC randomly. Despite her not existing until the page you turn to, then gets murdered less than 15 pages later.

Volumes 4 & 5 - takes a twist.. turning from a bad superhero story to Armageddon of humanity. I did enjoy reading through Volumes 4 & 5, but it still suffers from meh art, bad dialog, and a skipped final battle ._.

The art quality is not very good, and the style is TOO cartoony, it feels out of place considering the story and the themes that are tackled within it. The action scenes are passable, and the quality of the environment seems to be Nagai's strength. However, the characters look incredibly lifeless, and plain, and end up just looking like Ken dolls.

When Devilman was released it was ambitious and important for the time, inspiring manga creators to make more mature and darker stories, however now it is a dated piece of history. I suggest you watch the anime adaptation Devilman Crybaby, every change they made was for the better.