Forum - View topicWhats Your Opinion on Vagabond?!
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Metabee177
Posts: 13 |
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I haven't read vagabond (yet) but I know its based on Miyamoto Musashi and his philosophy but....is it actually good? And how long is the manga? I also hear that its not even finished yet.
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Alan45
 Village Elder Posts: 10364 Location: Virginia |
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I quit reading it after a couple of volumes because it was excessively violent.
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FishLion
Crazy Fangirl Posts: 858 |
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It is excessively violent indeed, it has dismemberment and a ton of blood, if you like comics about overly violent warriors then you may enjoy. To me the art is beautiful and amazingly rendered, one of the most detailed manga I have seen in awhile, but the story has kind of fallen flat so far. To be fair I am very early on, but despite me specifically having an interest in Musashi Miyamoto and his philosophy and sword techniques I have been bored. He feels too much like a blank slate, he doesn't give any reason for being a warrior besides feeling like he is meant to and putting his intense murderous intent to the relatively noble cause of mastering swordsmanship. It could be a slow starter, but so far it has been a lot of drama and violence with no real motivation besides the fact that he is a gifted warrior who decides to take on the swordsmanship schools.
Unless it improves, I would rather read Berserk which has incredible detailed horror and violence as well as great characters and plot. Berserk is also still being published (although by a team after the death of the original author Kentaro Miura) so you won't have the same issue as the seemingly permanent hiatus Vagabond is on. |
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RupanSansei
 Posts: 258 |
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Once it gets an official ending i shall read & buy it. I'm not a pirate i just borrow copies from libraries.
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vampirehollywood
 Posts: 1 |
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First post! on on Vagabond no less. With Vagabond, like a lot of things, I think it depends on your taste and inclinations. It's intended for adults, not just in its depictions of violence (including sexual violence), but in its themes and how those themes are actualized through its characters. It will require you to engage, emphatically, with the characters. But there is a reason that Takehiko Inoue is a mangaka's mangaka--that is, someone who other artists cite as an influence or deeply respect. For me Vagabond is a masterful demonstration that it isn't enough for a manga to have just beautiful images. The literary sensibility is just as important if not more so. (For example, the editor who gave Dandadan creator Yukinobu Tatsu his break made him read 100 manga in order to understand character emotion). Vagabond is subtle and characters are ambiguous. There are no clear heroes or villains. It's unclear if any of the characters, including its protagonist, are "good."
Considering all the praise around Vagabond, I had high expectation when I first read it. If not for that, I probably would have stopped reading because its a slow burn. BUT as I got deeper and deeper into it, I'm glad I didn't because I would spend long periods of time thinking about its theme: what does it mean to be strong? Is the pursuit of it completely futile if this is the result? Is there a wisdom that only the truly weak understand? Each character arch adds layers to these questions. And there were panels where I would think "there is a level of artistry that is innate and can't be taught because no one can teach someone to illustrate frailty like this" You may not like it, but considering how much effort went into it, its worth a try. |
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Fluwm
Moderator
 Posts: 1625 |
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My thoughts are mixed. On the one hand, it features some spectacular art -- some of the best the medium's ever seen -- but also the pacing is extremely slow, and the violence is a bit too over-the-top for my tastes. It very much focuses on mood and atmosphere to the expense of plot or characterization.
I think it's important to note that Vagabond is not an original manga, but rather an adaptation of an Eiji Yoshikawa novel. The novel is great, and I can recommend it unreservedly (it's a classic for a reason). Alongside Yoshikawa's other work (esp. Taiko, which is about Hideyoshi Toyotomi). More famously than Vagaond, Yoshikawa's novel was also adapted into live action -- the so-called "Samurai Trilogy" directed by Hiroshi Inagaki in the 1950s. These movies starred the inimitable Toshiro Mifune (an absolutely unforgettable actor to anyone familiar with Akira Kurosawa's films). My general recommendation to anyone -- assuming they're, you know, into samurai shit. would be to start with either the original Yoshikawa novel or the movie trilogy, before diving into the Vagabond manga. In other words, I think Vagabond is a good manga, but I do not think it's the best entry point for anyone interested in this story. |
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