My Review of the Sherlock Manga

I've had some extra time to spare recently, and I recently got a lot of Sherlock merchandise in the mail, so I thought I would post my thoughts about some of them.

DISCLAIMER: I don't own this manga or any of its content. Just saying.

The first item up on our list is the manga adaptation of "A Study In Pink"- published by Titan Comics.

I just got this today, after receiving an email about its shipping status yesterday. You can read about the dilemma I faced trying to acquire this thing here: http://aminoapps.vertvonline.info/p/cl5mt

But now that I finally have it, I can form an opinion on it.

Is it worth the wait? In my eyes, it tries to make for it.

It flows the same way the actually episode did, with some lines being removed and events shortened in order to fit the 90 minute episode into approximately 280 pages. A lot of the editing choices that were made in this process don't affect the accuracy of the story at all, and the transitions between events are executed well.

It even includes a handy manga-reading guide for people reading manga for the first time (since some of the Sherlock fans buying it probably have never read a manga before and are reading this due to its connection to the show) as well as some of the cover photos they made during the manga's production.

If there is any drawback, it's the artwork.

It's extremely hard to depict real people in the manga style of art and do it correctly. It is much easier to pick people and dress them up as the characters first depicted in manga. (That's why cosplay is so popular in anime/manga fandoms and so effective when enough time and monetary effort is put into it.)

I feel like the style in which the illustrator chose to draw these characters in is a mixture of the manga art style and realism, so what you end up with is an amalgam of cartoonish people. I can still understand which characters are supposed to be which, but the animated quality that is brought to them makes their faces and forms slightly distorted. Sherlock ends up looking like a weird alien half of the time, and way too much emphasis is put on John's eyebrows. Don't get me started on Mycroft's nose. I really wish they had chose to either do it all in manga style or all in realism to save my eyes some rest.

Overall, if it is available in your country, and you have the money for it, it's worth your time. I would definitely recommend learning how to read manga BEFORE buying it, that way when you finally obtain a copy of your own, you can simply begin reading it without having to slowly creep through the s so you don't lose track of what's happening.

Rating: 8/10