The wolfman Deseo once slaughtered his family out of morbid curiosity. Now he has a family of his own. Haut, a wealthy elk heir struggling with their gender, falls in love with Clivia, a fox-woman servant, and together they must hide their relationship from Haut's domineering father. What will happen to these cursed families of beastfolk? This full-color manga tears open the heart of their madness.

The Scum Laugh has a story by and art by Atatakairo. English translation is done by Adrienne Beck and lettering by Arbash Mughal. Published by Seven Seas Entertainment (May 19, 2026). Rated OT.

Bolts
Rating:

The world can give birth to some really twisted individuals. Some people see the world in a way that's a little bit off, but I don't mean these people are persecuted for being misunderstood. Some people are born dangerous in the twisted way that they go about their business. They could have dangerous vices or live a life that just inherently preys on the lives of other people. Sometimes there's no real remorse or even really a point to all of it outside of just highlighting the fact that these twisted people exist, and maybe it's interesting to see how those people end up shaping the world around them. They truly are “scrum”.

The Scum is one of those stories where there's not really a point outside of just showing progressively terrible people in an already really messed-up society. There are some extreme circumstances that this book is allowed to play with due to the nature of the characters being anthropomorphic animals, even if it doesn't really make things better when you actually break down exactly what's happening on the page. I might be able to more easily get through a scene where a character killed his entire family and is now feasting on their flesh because it's a wolf person doing it, but then that wolf is gonna grow up into somebody who ends up tearing another complete family apart. Sometimes the book will try to connect people's horrible circumstances to a new, horrible outlook. There can be an origin for a darkness that festers, but there isn't really a resolution to that darkness as much as it just either exists or gets snuffed out by something even stronger. I was very fascinated reading this book because I kept trying to ask myself what it was all building towards, only to get to the end and realize that it wasn't necessarily building towards anything. It's just a series of chapters showcasing characters that have their own way of dealing with things. Sometimes they get to live on, and sometimes they're met with an unfortunate event.

The book was a little awkward to read at times, with some chapters lasting a couple of pages, and they end so abruptly that I genuinely had no idea what was going on when the story would sometimes jump between different ages for the characters. The first part of the book focuses on a white wolf who acts as an animal trader and has a sort of “survival of the fittest” outlook on life, but then it randomly cuts to his backstory, and I find out this guy is way more messed up than I originally thought. Then later the story shifts to a completely different character dealing with a deep-rooted trauma, gender dysmorphia, survivor's guilt, and suicidal tendencies brought about by an incredibly harsh upbringing, which then carries over into other characters who were left suffering due to how they were treated by the previous character's actions. I was legitimately holding my mouth when I was reading because it just got progressively more sickening, but in a sort of fascinating way. I feel like I was reading this book, not because I was wondering when things were finally going to work out, but rather because I knew that things were potentially going to get so much worse.

I think what contributes to this book's twisted beauty is the overall presentation. While the pacing and panel layouts can be incredibly confusing, the art has so much life to it. All of the characters are drawn with this incredibly lush fur and distinct animalistic features. I love the way that the story plays with the scale of all these characters, where some are just towering over others depending on their animal type. The art feels messy and reflects the violent actions, but everything also feels really soft and cartoony to lean into that sense of exaggeration that I actually really like in stories like this. This is such a difficult recommendation for me because I'm basically recommending a story to people that will undoubtedly make them feel bad. Sometimes stories like that need to be treated with caution because there's a lot of very triggering material in here, but if you're weirdly in the mood to read something that just puts you in a similarly twisted mindset, then I could see this being a somewhat careful recommendation.