Dorohedoro 2

Q Hayashida – Viz – 2010 – 14+ volumes

This is RIDICULOUSLY good. I like absolutely everything about it, and am ravenous for more. No series has struck all these high notes for me so quickly in a long time.

I never talk about it ever, in any review, but the art is worth mentioning here. I’ve heard people describe it as messy, which is legitimate since there’s a lot of shading done with scribbly lines, but I like the way it looks. I also love all the detail she includes. There are lots of little details in the way things are put together, like screws and crossbars and whatnot.. The sorcerers have to bite their fingers to use magic, and whenever you see Shin’s hands, you’ll notice all the fingertips are stitched back together. I love the sorcerer masks, some of which you can see the screw-heads in (like Noi’s), some of which are backwards, and some of which are recognizable objects, like cooked turkeys and whole fish. There are tons of little details in any given scenes.

I also love the character designs. Even the most feminine women have something pretty beefy and manly about them, including the times they are completely naked. I love the strange clothing design, which often includes heavy-duty boots and gloves (thus you usually can’t see the detail of the sorcerer’s fingers).

I love the sense of humor. One of the sorcerers is near-resurrected, and she is dragged along while “not quite right” during the first half of the volume. She takes all kinds of abuse and dismemberment, and even turns into a zombie at one point. A character is dragged along with her that seems to serve the sole purpose of whining about her condition while the two main sorcerers completely ignore him. I’m pretty sure Caiman getting decapitated, and everyone taking it so lightly, is another instance of the twisted sense of humor. My favorite part, though, was a callback to a joke last volume when, after a disturbing dream, Caiman is sitting up in bed with his pillow stuck to his head spikes. He doesn’t comment on this, it just happens.

And I love the dark plot. With all the goofy stuff going on, it’s sometimes a shock when things get back to basics and Caiman and/or the sorcerers messily pulp someone. The fact that neither the sorcerers nor Caiman really die is pretty fascinating, and I can see that making for some spectacularly ugly fights down the road.

Other than Caiman’s quest to find the person who changed him and to find out about his past, and the sorcerer’s quest to kill Caiman… within that loose framework, I have literally no idea what’s going to happen next. In this volume, it was a zombie killing marathon. I cannot wait to see what volume three will offer.

Dorohedoro can do no wrong, as far as I’m concerned.