Forged in battle?
Creative Staff
Story/Art: Asahi Sakano
Translation: Adrienne Beck
What They Say
In a world full of Evils, humanity’s only hope is the inhuman power of the witches.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Guardian of the Witch continues to be a pretty standard project by all appearances and as we get into the sixth chapter here. Asahi Sakano has put together something with a bit of style and a lot of familiarities and put it into traditional shonen mode with plenty of action hitting fast and moving quickly. I’ve talked about how I like it in the general sense because I’ve enjoyed a lot of shonen shows and this is clearly working from the template. But it’s also lacking just enough of what it needs to really make it its own thing at this point, though there’s still plenty of time for that considering where we’re at with it.
The face-off between the two sides has Gen basically looking at this as a very unfair fight for many reasons. That doesn’t make him sympathetic toward them but he’s ready to just be done with it all. Manasfa has spent all her time up in the castle fighting the Evils from a distance so she has no real control over her abilities and none of the devices that are often embedded into the castle walls to help either. She’s learning just how many things were put into play to control her that it’s making her even angrier, which isn’t a bad thing. Coming from breaking the collar bonding herself, Ruli realizes that she has some real raw power but simply hasn’t been able to figure it out. Gen, meanwhile, just sees them as out of control newbies that are no real threat, leaving him intent on eliminating them quickly now that he’s figured that out.
Of course, Fafner and Manasfa aren’t going to give up but her lack of real control and fine-tune precision isn’t going to make it easy. Neither of them wants to just roll over and be taken in or die and that has Fafner attempting something creative based on what he’s seen of how Gen and Ruli are operating. The idea of her using her flame toward his sword and letting him use that power is certainly interesting, but she mostly ends up torching his backend more than anything else. But it’s the start of things and once you get the chance to be creative, you try more things and we see Manasfa cutting loose a bit and Fafner using it to good advantage – though whether it’ll make a real impact remains to be seen. But what I like is that she’s getting more directly involved herself now and Fafner is learning that they really do have to work together in full form.
In Summary:
The latest installment keeps the first main fight going and there’s no surprise in that at all at this stage. It’s a good chance for us to see how more experienced characters are handling themselves while rooting for our leads to get their act in order and stand tall against them. I like what we get out of Gen and Ruli, particularly with Ruli appreciating more what it is that Manasfa has done, and I like seeing how Fafner and Manasfa are starting to get on the same page more with what needs to be done. The story moves in familiar patterns and has some decent artwork that’s a bit lighter on backgrounds than I care for but it’s’ also fairly standard Shonen Jump style.
Content Grade: B
Art Grade: B
Text/Translation Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Shonen Jump
Release Date: March 8th, 2020
