Dead End: Volume 1

In my review for for Shohei Manabe's SMUGGLER I said, while I liked the book, I knew (having already seen Manabe's later work) that the best from this artist was yet to come. Well, here it is! The plot: Shirou is a twenty-something, hair gelled, chain smoking, japanese construction worker. One day he comes across a mysterious girl, who seems to give his life meaning in the short time they are together. One day he comes home to find a madman in his apartment covered in the blood of his flat mates. An explosion occurs and Shirou awakens not sure if it was all reality or a dream. A mysterious 'friend' comes in and gives Shirou a vague idea of what he must do to find answers and possibly recover the girl of his dreams. Here Manabe creates the contemporary, psychological, urban, crime/horror/thriller that his earlier work strived for. This time his wild drawing style is refined and most earlier drawing problems fixed. The result is a raw but clearly communicative line quality. The characters are rendered in a fashion that rides the line between iconic (cartoony) and realistic. These characters reveal Manabe's unusual aesthetic, but are nonetheless likable and solidly drawn. The art creates an atomosphere of potential chaos at every turn of the page. This tension is key as the bulk of this first volume is exposition and even has a few poignant scenes between Shirou and his lost love. Highly recommended. Book one of four.