 |
Title: Yu Yu Hakusho
|
| CONSUMER ADVICE |
Parents might not want to let their kids read this series unless they are sure kids can handle the violence in this movie. Yusuke is more then a trouble maker in the first few books, with Yusuke smoking, flipping up skirts, and cussing out the principle. Later volumes revolve around Yusuke getting into bloody fights with demons, and these fights are particularly intense (although not nessicarly exciting). Women may not care for this series much. While the first two books may give women quite a bit of enjoyment, future books are geared exclusivly for boys, and most women will find themselves getting increasingly bored with the series. Action fans might not care for this series too much at first, but give it some time and the action will pick up. |
And with one of the most original ways to open a series ever, we are thrust into the strange tale of Yusuke in the popular “Yu Yu Hakusho.” Now chances are if you're into anime and manga even a little bit, you've most likely heard of “Yu Yu Hakusho.” This popular show helped launch Cartoon Network's “Adult Swim” block, moved to Toonami, has a steady slew of cards and action figures, and the comic is currently serialized in Viz's “Shonen Jump.” It has enjoyed worldwide success to this day, and is considered one of the all time classics in Japanese comics, and while I enjoy the series I can't personally push the series as that good because...well, I'm getting ahead of myself here so maybe I should start with the beginning.
As you know this series starts out with the main hero of our story dying. Yusuke though is shocked to be dead as he can't really remember how he died in the first place. However that's nothing a little past narative can't fix, so Yusuke recounts the events of that morning as to bring the reader up to speed with what's going on. When the flashback begins it doesn't take you long to discover that Yusuke is, quite frankly, an unlikable punk. He skips classes, flips the skirt of his one and only friend Keiko, gets terrible grades, threatens people for money, and has a daily fight with his rival Kuwabara, and is someone you could really learn to hate as he appears to have no redeeming quality's to speak of what-so-ever. On the other hand when we follow Yusuke home from school that day we discover that his life is no better then he is. He's got an alcoholic for a mother who tells him that if he isn't happy with the way she is that he can leave, no father, and the house is the dumps. On top of which EVERYONE in school hates his guts, thinks he's some sort of devil, and wouldn't come near them even if he paid them! With that in mind it's not hard to see why he grew up to be such a stinker.
Anyway on this particular day Yusuke see's a kid chase a ball into the street while a car is coming. Once Yusuke see's that the kid is about to be hit he jumps in front of the car and pushes the kid out of the way, taking the force of the car himself and dying in the process. Had this been any other person Yusuke would have died and this story would be over after one chapter, however when the Grim Reaper Botan comes into the story (Editor's Note: This has got to be the CUTEST Grim Reaper I've ever seen!) she breaks the news to Yusuke that the kid was supposed to be hit by the car, but when Yusuke saved him it took everyone in the underworld (Including Buddha) by surprise as no thought that Yusuke would actually die doing a good deed. Since this is a phenomenon that doesn't accure very often, Yusuke now has a choice on whether or not he wants to return to life or not. He turns down Botan's offer, but after seeing what his personal life was like no one can really blame him for not jumping at the chance to rejoin society. However Botan decides to give him time to think about his choice...and to not spoil too much, after a touching scene where Yusuke observes his funeral he decides to take the test.
Now this is one of the more interesting stories I've read in quite some time, and for awhile this was grade A material, but what pulls the grade down for me is not what this comic started out as but what it became. I'm going to go on a stretch here when I assume everyone can and will figure this out, but after Yusuke comes back to life (He comes back by the end of book 2 in case your wondering), the series turns into something else completely. When Yusuke comes back to life he is given the job of being a "Spirit Detective," and it is his job to take down illegal demons and bring them into the underworld. However this changes yet again into an action series. Then it changes again, and by the end of the series the comic has turned into a martial arts series like the second half of "Dragon Ball" became...in fact, it's almost EXACTLY like "Dragon Ball," except "Dragon Ball" is a much better series!
It's this change that's the most disappointing as Yusuke gets pulled away from his family, his love interest, and his school for the sole purpose of getting into one fight after another, and it's this change that forces the comic to lose some of it's charm that it had in the first place. So am I recommending this series? Yes. Am I recommending it with all my heart? No, not by a long shot. I can easily recommend the first two volumes of the book to anyone easily, but after that I can only recommend the series to action buffs. Yoshihiro Togashi made an overall enjoyable series, but not an overall great series. Had he stopped after volume two he would have had a short but excellent series, however by making the series something it was not he created a long but decent series. It's a bit disappointing, but never-the-less the first two volumes are still excellent and worth checking out, the later volumes are for martial arts fanatics only though.
Update: 5-27-2005
When I wrote the original review for "Yu Yu Hakusho" I had read about three books of the series. Since then I have read eight books of the series, and my overall opinion of the series has changed pretty dramatically since reading more of the series. When Yusuke was brought back to life in book two of "Yu Yu Hakusho" it was hinted that the series would take a different direction then the direction the first two books had originally established. As established up above, "Yu Yu Hakusho" was about a boy who assumed everyone hated him because he did nothing but cause trouble, and when he dies saving a kid from being hit by a car he discovers how much he really ment to people, and when given the opportunity to come back to life he accepted. The first two books were about Yusuke learning to appriciate life and the people who live in it, and everything was extremely interesting and (in many cases) touching too. When book three comes around all of that is thrown out the window. Starting in book three Yusuke ends up being a "Spirit Detective," and he is called in by Kurama to help solve some crimes and beat up some bad demons who had been misbehaving. Fair enough. I guess you do owe something to the great spirit who revived you. Unfortunetly, once book five/six hits all bets are off, and the series goes in a direction most unfavorable: "Yu Yu Hakusho" decides it wants to be a fighting manga.
After one particular story which had Yusuke and Kimara saving a girl from certain death, one of the monsters challenges Yusuke and his friends to a fighting tournement. And then there is another tournement...and another, and another, and another. Then there is a story arc that revolves mostly around fighting and becoming stronger. It's like Yoshihiro Togashi decided he was tired of the original series he created and wanted to be "Dragon Ball." But "Yu Yu Hakusho" is NOT "Dragon Ball," not even close! "Dragon Ball" was a comedy adventure about a boy who was on a quest for the mystical dragon balls. Somewhere along the way he decided he wanted to become a stronger , more powerful fighter, and the series slowly but surely crept into a more serious direction in later story arcs (particularly the Freeza arc). Despite what some people claim, the change in tone for "Dragon Ball" was not some sudden thing, it was a direction Akira Toriyama was headed in all along. "Yu Yu Hakusho's" change in direction though comes abruptly, with almost no time for the reader to digest what just happened. I find myself increasingly bored with the series now, and see it as nothing more then an average fighting manga now. I'm going to give the series a C+ instead of a C just because the first two books are still excellent books and worth reading, but I have little to no respect for later installments of the story, and people really are best left to just read the first two books and stopping. Sorry Togashi, your series could have been a classic. Instead its a bum wanna-be that doesn't know it had a good thing going for it.
- -Review By Kevin T. Rodriguez- -