Ningyou no Kuni

When I saw the cover art caught my eye before I recognized the author. Personally I think the art is quite beautiful, but a significant departure from his previous works and some could be put off by that.

Besides the art the world building is alright - nothing special. In some parts the way it introduces you to new elements can be a bit blunt. This could be a problem with the translation I was using but other facets of the manga make me doubtful I can place that much blame(!) on the translation.

Story is average. I couldn't put up with it for more than 12 chapters but till that point it felt pretty hollow, witht the main charecter not being fleshed out enough and not enough time being dedicated to the scenes in between fights and setting to figure out why things are going the way they are. In fact there isn't much time spent on building scale in the world - which is something the manga seems naturally set up to do.

Still enjoyed it, though not sure that would've been true if I decided to go through the rest of the chapters. Has potential, and makes for relatively quick reading. Do I recommend checking it out if you like the art or the author? Yes, absolutely. Perhaps the story will get better in the coming issues - it seemed to be heading in a different direction and started to pace itself better.

Writing a review for a Nihei Manga is kind of tricky. Do you draw comparisons with the his previous works like Blame!, Biomega etc? Or do you come up with something that may capture the imagination of some other fellow readers to go out and buy the manga?

The story starts like any other generic sci-fi storylines.... it is an unforgiving world, where the people living on the surface are subjected to brutalities and hardship to the extreme. And our unlikely protagonist rises by a chance and he must travel far to defeat the enemies one by one, gathering power and allies incrementally. Very formulaic, right? So what makes it different?

It is the Nihei touch. It is that artwork, the death and fatalities shown in the most soul-crushing way and the transitions on the scenes with measured jumps. You feel both detached from the harsh reality of that world, at the same time be drowned by the darkness it submerges itself in. Violence of massive proportions get omitted on the next page and you just see the resulting doom and destruction in incredible details. You reach the depth of you imagination to visualize what may have happened. Yet there's a fluidity in the story here. Even if you feel lost or struggle to fill in the gaps, the rhythm feels uninterrupted. Take a deeper look and you may realize there's a master behind the art.

And our author has probably made larger strides in character development, they serve a higher purpose than to just continue the story. You can relate and tax your imagination a bit further with the characters, this is a great catalyst for the reader's appetite. Yet that trademark minimalism hasn't been lost in any way.

So that's what this manga is. It carries forward the celebrated qualities and skills of the artist, at the same time it expresses Nihei's desire to produce a "Tezuka-level mass appeal".

This might end up to be his most polished work till date.

I was excited to pick APOSIMZ up. Is it worth the read? Yes and no. I'm a big fan of BLAME! but Nihei's more recent works have been quite disappointing, despite the settings and concepts being very intriguing time after time.

That sentence probably summarizes all of Nihei's works – unique and exciting concepts, but time after time, I find myself thinking about how the storytelling itself could have been so much better. APOSIMZ, or Ningyou no Kuni, is not an exception. It reminds me more of a grittier version of the high-school drama that is Knights of Sidonia, instead of the doomed, vast and apocryphal world of BLAME!. While the latter sparks an enormous interest towards the world Nihei has created, the former always failed to do that for me. As far as I know, Nihei himself has apparently dissed or disowned his earlier works, which is a shame since there are quite a few good things about them that he could explore.

Nihei's drawing style for APOSIMZ is light and fragile, and that's what I've really liked about it. A wasteland covered in indecipherable materials, bio-mass akin to some kind of dust, ice, snow... A lot of things in existence in the world of APOSIMZ are things of legends and traditions passed down for generations for so long their workings or mechanics have been rendered unknown. Tribalism has emerged since the downfall of whatever existed before the wandering groups of the cold Surface.

Some of the things strike a resemblance to Berserk, Nausicaä or even Made in Abyss. In the unique world Nihei has created, they feel disappointingly unoriginal. It would have worked out quite nicely if they were clear homages to the works Nihei has found inspiring. I can't say I enjoyed reading the dialogue, as most of it is frankly quite boring. It's monotonous to the point I started to question whether the numerous characters have a personality of their own at all. It feels like all of the characters are simply copies of one another, mere cannon-fodder for gore.

In short, Ningyou no Kuni features biomechanical samurai armor-battles, battle droids in gothic lolita -esque outfits, gore and a little bit of fanservice. It's a biopunk re-telling of BLAME!, where Etherow is Killy and Titania is Cibo, filling the tropes of Marty Stu and Ms. Exposition, respectively.

It would seem that Nihei is searching for a synthesis of a gritty apocalyptic world and the contemporary Japanese society, but so far the amalgamation that is APOSIMZ feels rushed and not original enough. Disappointingly so, since I always keep an eye on Nihei's new works, waiting for a polished masterpiece he is more than capable of creating.

Aposimz is an engaging and wonderful exercise in world-building the Nihei way.

It is much more in line with his most recent work Knights of Sidonia though, in terms of the simplicity of narrative and overall morality presented. As in, you don't need to struggle too hard to figure out who you're meant to support, oppose, etc. It's QUITE black and white here. Honestly that is a problem! I much prefer the author's work in BLAME (and its spinoffs) or even Biomega, where events are presented in a more neutral way like you're just observing situations and can make of it as you wish. For both Knights of Sidonia and Aposimz, Nihei turns into a very primitive shonen style of an extremely blatant set of protagonists and quite diabolical villains. Whenever there is some hint of grey or ambiguity he seemingly snuffs it out rapidly. It was disappointing.

Nevertheless, the main reason to read it is the sci-fi aspects, world building, and just the various interesting action scenes. And some of the characterization is at least sort of novel or engaging.

Overall I'm giving it 8/10 although, again, I'm disappointed by how simple the morals and narrative overall have been... it CAN change but at this point I really doubt it significantly will.

Really didn't expect this to be good for some reason. Probably because this is a very unusual style for someone like Nihei, but he somehow manages to pull it off either way. Good stuff.

>Story
It’s fairly decent. It’s your classic revenge story in an interesting, but sometimes way too subtle world.
The story follows our protagonist, Etherow on a quest for revenge against the oppressive Empire for slaughtering his comrades and destroying the settlement he lived in.
The world-building elements get the Nihei treatment, as in: most of the stuff gets left out unexplained, like the origins the relics, or the automatons, or the regular frames. Where does all this come from? Well, at least we get explanations as to how these things actually work and affect the world, unlike in Abara.
Then again, this manga IS ongoing, so I’m waiting to be proven wrong on the statements I made. But for now, especially after Abara, I’m not a fan of this style of world-building. Although, to give it credit, it’s miles better that the stuff I got while reading Abara. 6/10.

>Art
I’ve been hearing some people say how Nihei’s art degraded, but I disagree. He’s trying out a new style, which is very fitting for the sort of world he has created on top of being gorgeous. Even if it’s objectively less detailed, I think it’s got its’ own soul to it. Simply put, the art is fantastic. It gives of a clean, fragile, almost crystalic kind of feel, and its’ simplicity works to its’ advantage.
My only gripe with it, is that the character designs, albeit cool, are starting to feel a bit same-y, since most of the characters wear uniforms and their regular frames are made out of the same material. But that’s barely a problem, since they’re still very good. 9/10.

>Characters
I’m really torn on them. Most of the enemies, apart from maybe Yiyu, Biko and the main baddie are blank slate jobbers and the protagonist is way too OP. He barely even struggles when he deals with his enemies. This has been a problem in Blame as well, except in Blame it’s not a problem at all, because Killy isn’t out to get his revenge on a supposed powerful and oppressive government, unlike our MC here.
The characters in general have goals and motivations. Etherow wants to get revenge on the Empire because they killed his friends and his mentor, whom was like a father to him. Titania wants to stop the Empire from conquering The Core. The Emperor wants to conquer Aposimz. But what do they have going on besides that? Barely anything. Maybe the main villain doesn't count right now, since he's just barely been introduced, but the MC and Exposition-chan over here have no excuse. The only thing I can remember about Etherow and Titania besides their common goal is that one likes grape fruits and the other has two scenes in where she "pisses" and makes the MC drink that in order to restore his abilities. Phenomenal.
What about them having their own unique philosophies? What are their personalities about? What are THEY about? Say, what about if Etherow wasn't fond of being a regular frame? What if him becoming that was a split second decision that he regrets? Wouldn't that make for a more interesting story? You could also develop this trait towards the end, where he would realize that being a regular frame doesn't get in the way of being a human, or something cute like that. Just feels to me like something like that would make Etherow a more complex and deeper character, but that's just my imagination going off. Anyway, I really hope the author touches up on the feelings and personal qualities of the characters more in the later chapters.
It’s got some good characters in it too, though. Like Kajiwan, a village ruler who’s jealous of Etherow and Keisha for their regular frame abilities, he works very nice as a side character. Titania and Keisha show potential to be great characters, as well as Biko. 5/10.
[MILD SPOILER]
Edit: right as I write this review, chapter 21 has Etherow actually fail and fall into a coma of sorts, on top of that we get a little more time to look at the supposed main villain of this story, which was really nice to see. Kajiwan is also becoming a much more interesting and vital character now, with all the cult stuff going on. I'll bump the score up to a 6/10.
[MILD SPOILER END]

>Enjoyment
So far this manga has been amazing to read, quite honestly. I love the vibe it gives off, you can actually immerse yourself in the atmosphere of it so damn well. Maybe it’s the style that’s giving it this unique type of feel, or maybe it’s all the quiet moments that we get to fully observe the locations this world has, or maybe it’s all the creative and fun, albeit quite lacking in explanations of them, abilities that the characters have.
There’s really a lot here to enjoy in this manga, even if I can’t in good conscience ignore all the technical mistakes of it. 9/10.

>Overall
I like Ningyou no Kuni. I like it a lot. Sometimes it gets way too shonen for me, but I can forgive that. All the cool designs, all the gorgeous and interesting locations, all the soulful covers. Even if the story and the characters may be just a tad lacking, It’s still very interesting to read, at least for me. And it’s definitely so much better than Abara. 8/10.