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nmcannon's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
After reading Devilman, I thought, “It can’t end like this!” because my heart is a squishy, squishy organ. Devilman Lady was certainly an ending, but a confused, rushed plot greatly muddled the waters.
After a successful stint as an Olympic swimmer, Fudo Jun settled into a high school teaching career. Popular with the students, she enjoys mentoring them in and out of the classroom as a tennis (and later, swimming) coach. Her peace is ripped away during a school training trip to the mountains. Students from a rival school transform into huge, hairy beasts and attack, cannibalize, and rape Fudo and her charges. With the psychic urging of Asuka Ran, Jun transforms into a beast too, but retains her mind–and swiftly gets revenge. After the survivors are consoled and healed, Ran recruits Jun to a secret war to bring other beasts to justice.
Some might argue that my summary spoils the first chapter, but I think it’s important to know the level of graphic detail Devilman Lady has. If you can’t stomach the summary, you’ll not enjoy the manga. The story only becomes more upsetting from there. With seventeen volumes, Nagai-san has plenty of room to expand on his ideas in Devilman, and there’s much more going on than a simple cisswap for Akira and Ryo. I’ve linked below two other reviews I felt shed some light on this twisted, dark manga.
Room–too much or too little–may be the main problem with Devilman Lady. Nagai-san couldn’t seem to decide what the manga should be. Is it a rape kink comic? An apocalypse story? A meditation on at one point does a person become irredeemable, if ever? A Divine Comedy fanfic? A diary chronicling whatever Nagai-san looked up in an encyclopedia that week? The story can’t decide. Jun and Ran’s adventures begin as solid “monster of the week” with a Jun/Ran romance subplot. Then Dante shows up, and Devil Lady disappears from her own manga. Asuka leaves for vast stretches, and is replaced by a typical sunshine-y rookie detective, who I found boring. We find our place again in the trip to hell, but divert to major side plots that could have been cut. Cut, cut, cut. I’d cut so much of this series to keep the pacing better, and the characters consistent. So many arcs felt like filler. We zip past the second end of the world, because the magazine publishing the story shut down.
Like Devilman before it, the themes are clearer than anything else. Granted, that “anything else” is as opaque as mud. Nagai-san is anti-war and pro-change. The manga concludes that humanity cannot stay in one mode forever. We’re so dynamic that deities and rigid systems cannot last. While generally pro-environment, the manga tips into eco-fascism, encouraging us to return to a mythical, human-less past by committing genocide. Instead of, yanno, funding clean energy, restructuring to equitable society, and spreading birth control, sex education, and bodily autonomy rights. While the characters can and will contradict themselves, they generally receive more development and that’s satisfying. Though everyone ends horribly, it was nice to see Devilman characters in a new context.
Like other reviewers, I’m not sure I recommend Devilman Lady to anyone. It has the same level of gore as Hellsing, but add a massive dollop of brutal rape for reader titillation. It’s, again, a seminal work of manga, and probably the source of all those sexual assault and panty-sniffing tropes you hate. The toxic yuri rewired my brain. I binge-read all seventeen volumes in a week. It opened my third eye, and made me realize that if I can read through this manga, I can read through any manga. Onto Violence Jack.
Good GoodReads review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1585954474
Good tumblr review: https://missn11.tumblr.com/post/740008302268874752
Content Warnings
Graphic: Medical content, Antisemitism, War, Violence, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Stalking, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Sexism, Body horror, Murder, Death, Genocide, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Child abuse, Bullying, Cannibalism, Kidnapping, and Misogyny
Moderate: Racism, Xenophobia, and Pregnancy
lawrenwithaw's review
challenging
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
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