Franken Fran

Franken Fran is an episodic body horror manga with a soft hint of comedy put into the mix.

The story revolves around a frankenstein-like girl named Fran and her encounters with various people who often seek her advanced medical knowledge in order to solve a particular problem they face. Almost all chapters are self-contained individual stories with new casts of characters, with Fran and company being the only thing that ties it all together. However, I do recommend reading Fran in chronological order because a lot of stories get referenced in later chapters. The stories by themselves arent that scary in a graphic sense but they are pretty scary and very interesting in terms of ideas of what sorts of things could be done to the human body. The only big problem I had with this one was that the pace of every chapter sped up like crazy on the last third or fourth pages of a lot of chapters which kind of messed with my immersion in the story. However, most of them end on a unique bitter-sweet note that felt unpredictable and left me craving for more.



As for the main cast, I definitely felt like they weren't fully fleshed out.
Fran Madaraki(the MC) was, in my opinion, the vocal point of this manga. She is a master surgeon with a very nuanced philosophy and charm that captivates the reader. She is like a clever subversion of the mad-scientist archetype that's believable and works exceptionally well.

The only thing she lacked was character development and progression. You could argue that this was because she was from the start an accomplished individual and that's fair. But still, much of her character and her relationships with other charecters were unexplored. The same could be said for the rest of the cast excluding Frans little sister Veronica who developed quite a bit.

The art was pretty decent, with great detail put into the body horror big page layouts. The character designs were very unique and the monsters that were introduced always felt fresh.
The one thing I found very misleading about Franken Fran( and I think most fans will agree with me on this one) were the volume covers of the manga. All of the eight volumes feature a very sexualized depiction of one or more of the main characters. Which would be fine if this was an ecchi series, but its definitely not. None of the characters are depicted in a sexual way in the manga and nudity is only shown when it is accompanied by body horror. Although, I must say that the cover art definitely differs from the style of the manga so it's possible the covers were done by another guy who just happens to have a thing for Frankenstein girls, who knows.

Overall I think this is a nice read, and I am giving it a 6 out of 10.
I would've given it a 7 or maybe even an 8 if the story actually concluded. But after 70 chapters the story just kind of stops without ending. Hopefully the sequel Franken Fran frantic won't meet the same fate.


Thanks for reading, peace out :)