Hynavian

Set in the year 2010, there are a series of violent crimes and homicides are rampant in Tokyo. Thus to counter such crimes, the police set up a special task unit known as Tokko. The thing with Tokko is that, nobody, except for those who are in it, knows what the unit is about. Bizarre as it sounds, the folks from Tokko wield swords more than their guns.

The protagonist, Shindo, is a freshman in the detective line who’s traumatized by his past. Left with only his sister, Saya, Shindo is determined to restore the city’s peace and to avenge their parents who were brutally mutilated years back. Except that there’s a problem. The culprits are not exactly humans to begin with.

The series has a plot where the protagonist is involved in a situation where he cannot un-involve himself from. Danger seems to be heading his way all the time and he’s one lucky fella to be able to survive that long. Meanwhile, the folks from Tokko have taken a special interest in him, and him towards them.

After reading volume 1, what’s keeping me on the edge of my seat would be the mystery that’s surrounding the plot where nothing much is explained where volume 1 feels more like a prologue for the whole series. I must have leveled up in my “gore tolerance” arena because I could handle the pages that have scenes of mutilation. Or probably, it could be due to the manga’s style. There’s deliberate exclusion of ripped body parts on the mangaka’s part and even if there are, not much focus is placed on the gore. Scenes or pages with blood splattered all over are portrayed with blotches that do not look horrifying.

Overall, interesting plot with a good start. I love the action cum supernatural elements but the publisher did not do the manga justice. The mangaka relies heavily on shades to differentiate the various elements; blood from non-blood, foreground from background, and characters from items. Sadly, it got a lousy publisher that did not help in “artistry” and all the shades seem to have aligned to become one black patch due to bad printing. Tokyopop, where are the beautifully colored pages? I’ve seen the raw version and the pages are so nicely colored that I dream of owning them.

If I have never peeked into the raws before, I would have shot down the mangaka’s style; for coming up with a manga that has black patches everywhere. Now feeling enlightened, I blame Tokyopop for ruining my visual enjoyment. Another complain that I have would be the speech bubbles; the words are so small for some that I need to squint my eyes just to read them. Tokko has great plot potential along with room for character development but the publisher sucks. If you’re looking for maximum enjoyment, get the raws. If not, bear with the blotches.