Manga Review – Outlanders Vol. 6

Everything is starting to rapidly run to a climax in Outlanders as we start to approach the series conclusion.

General Information

Title: Outlanders Vol. 6
Written and Illustrated by Johji Manabe
Translated by Dana Lewis and Toren Smith
Lettering and Touch-Up by Wayne Truman
Originally Serialized by Hakushensha’s ComiComi Magazine.
Currently out-of-print, but originally published in the US by Dark Horse Comics.

The Premise

The Santovasku Empire’s massive space force has arrived in the Solar System. Our heroes small space force is outnumbered at about 250-to-1, and if they fail, the Earth and all life on it will be destroyed (plus they’ll all be dead).

No Pressure.

High Points

The destruction of the Santovasku fleet is quite spectacular.

Low Points

This volume includes a little prequel side-story thingie called “The Key of Graciale” which doesn’t quite do it for me. Also, I really didn’t get a sense of positioning in the space battle. However, I haven’t read enough space opera manga to tell if this is a problem with the medium or just this series.

Content Notes

There’s some blood, nudity, and suggestive dialog.

Scores

Originality: The way the battle played out reminded me a lot of the battle for Earth towards the end of Super Dimensional Fortress Macross, which is fine, and there are some very distinct differences between the two, but I can’t call it wholly original. 4 out of 6.

Artwork: Still solid, except for the problems I mentioned under the low point. 4 out of 6

Story: I have to admit that I kind of lost track of where everyone was during the space battle – and I’m still not sure about whether Battia and Geobaldi are alive or not. 4 out of 6.

Characterization: I have to admit that in the past stuff like the wedding party would have kind of annoyed me, as it seemed to be there to set up Love Triangle Shenanigans, but here it actually does a good job about setting up just how much everyone has changed over the course of the series before going to the big battle. 5 out of 6.

Emotional Response: Manabe did a great job of setting up that with this volume we could seriously start seeing major supporting characters getting killed off, thus putting the supporting characters we’ve come to know in jeopardy (in particular Geobaldi and co.) 5 out of 6.

Flow: 6 out of 6.

Overall: To paraphrase Jim Ross, Business has picked up, and in a very impressive fashion. 6 out of 6.

In total, Outlanders Vol. 6 gets 34 out of 42.