Blue exorcist vol. 1

Creator: Norihiro Yagi

Publisher: Viz Media

Pages: 202 (21 volumes in total)

Blue Exorcist takes place in a world where demons exists in a alternate dimension, trying to break into the human world by possesing humans. Rin Okumura, our protagonist, learns that he is the son of Satan, when the exorcist Shiro Fujimoto, the man who raised him, sacrifices himself to save Rins life. After learning about his demonic powers Rin enrolls in an exorcist school in order to become stronger and avenge his foster fathers death.

The story has a weird pacing, and my eyes are not compelled to linger on any panel which gives the story a fast pace even in moments where it should not. Its hard to feel anything for the characters when everything goes at this pace, and does not give me a reason to slow down. I have seen the first epsiode of the anime too, and that 20 minute episode covers only about half of the first chapter which is pretty abnormal.

At the same time i also feel like there is too much text, solely because of the small extra sentences showing up besides the speech bubbles, commenting on what is said. These are typically small jokes or addons to what is said in the bubbles, and is so weird and misplaced that it takes me out the story whenever one pops up. Not to say it cannot be used but in this instance they are used to poor effect. furthermore you could decrease the amount of text needed if the poses were just drawn better as to convey what is happening instead of telling it through text.

The art is pretty okay with some interesting character designs which can probably lead to some interesting attacks and special powers along the way.

Pros:

• Interesting character designs

Cons:

• Bad pacing
• Unnecessary extra text
• Cliche shonen story

4/10 Okay