RWBY: The Manga
Publisher: Viz Media
Story and Art: Shirow Miwa
Volume: Volume 1, $14.99
Original Concept: Monty Ohm
RWBY is the first western based anime to be distributed in Japan and produced by Rooster Teeth, the company responsible for the long running internet comedy series Red vs. Blue.
In the world of Remnant, humans and human/animal hybrid known as Faunus live together in an unequal society while monsters known as the Creatures of Grimm run rampant, terrorizing the land with devastating power. Hunters and Huntresses, individuals with enhanced abilities and combat skills, are tasked with the destruction of Grimm and the protection of the people of Remnant. RWBY The Manga follows the exploits of Team RWBY, consisting of team leader Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna and Yang Xiao Long, who are all in their first year of training at Beacon Academy to become Huntresses.
RWBY the Manga Vol 1 serves more as a primer for fans of the anime and does a somewhat adequate job of explaining things for the uninitiated. RWBY opens with a series of character introductions showcasing the main characters’ solo abilities and giving a decent insight into where they come from and their motivations. Ruby’s display of ability fighting solo against a gang of wolflike Grimm, Weiss’s attempts to step out of her rich and famous family’s shadow, Blake’s troubled past as a member of the anti-human organization White Fang and Yang just being a badass punching her way through a mafia run nightclub.
With the intro chapters, Shirow Miwa adapts the four trailers that accompanied season one of RWBY’s YouTube debute. However, after the introductions, readers are thrust into the middle of a Grimm hunt in which Team’s RWBY and their fellow student team JNPR take on an enormous hydra like Grimm without much explanation or fanfare and seems to take place somewhere between seasons one and two of the show. This fast-forward was a bit jarring for me as a new adopter of the series and it took a little time for me to realize what was going on.
Let me be frank, reading RWBY the manga made me go back and watch RWBY the show as I’ve always wanted to get into RWBY. From my friends I was told it had amazing action, it was funny and the characters were quirky and interesting. In fact, after sitting through a debate about which character was the best I had to ask myself what was keeping me from watching the show and in retrospect it was most definitely the animation style. RWBY the manga fixes that huge hurdle for my personal enjoyment of this series. It practically bodyslams the anime in the art department. The artwork of RWBY is beyond amazing and I understand that it may be sacrilege for a manga but I wish this book was completely rendered in color. Between the cover art and the opening, the colored pages are so dynamic you’ll be immediately enamored with them.
RWBY the Manga Vol. 1 is a bit of a mixed bag. It’s well written and gorgeously illustrated. It loses a bit of the humor of the show but the fight scenes are fast, flashy and nail-bitingly tense in a way that the anime doesn’t pull off until about season 3. However, for new readers I would strongly suggest that you get on YouTube or RoosterTeeth’s website and watch the show before jumping into RWBY the Manga. After doing so myself and then returning for a second and third read of the book I can say that having a relationship with the anime dramatically increased my understanding and enjoyment of the manga. It is a stronger as a companion to the anime rather than a standalone series and I believe that the established audience will get more out of RWBY the Manga than newer readers. 3/5
Eric Snell
esnell@comicattack.net
