Thoughts on... Dorohedoro, Vol 1 (Manga Review)

I’ve been a fan of Japanese media for a long time, and engaged in community activity for several years, so oftentimes I underestimate the limit of my knowledge, and just assume that every notable series has already come to my attention in some way, and that it’s simply a matter of time before I finally get around to reading or watching it. Dorohedoro slipped under my radar and I’m stunned.

At the end of last year, I saw some fanart and some scans, some in-jokes and fawnings on the timeline and I was struck by the art and humour of these panels. The response was “erm this is Dorohedoro, don’t you know?” And reader, I shamelessly didn’t.

I recently left my job, and I was gifted an Amazon voucher by my manager, so the first manga I bought was the aforementioned. I think I read it in under an hour, and afterwards I kept flicking back to my favourite spreads, shaking my head in amazement. So far I’ve only read the first volume, so I plan to review each one as I purchase them, and I’m excited just thinking about it. I haven’t been this satisfied with a first volume since I picked up Berserk or even Yotsuba! for that matter.

Written by Q Hayashida, the twenty-three volume manga is set in a dichotomous world of sorcerers and the un-magicked. Whilst the latter resides in an impoverished community called the Hole, sorcerers live in corrupted affluence elsewhere, but regularly invade the Hole using magic portals to experiment on the oppressed people who live there. Sorcerers use a substance called Smoke to use magic, but Smoke is finite, and most of it appears to belong to the formidable En family, who has an army of gifted sorcerers at their beck and call.

Our main character is Caiman, a victim of an unknown sorcerer’s magic. The attack, which he cannot remember, has left him with a lizard’s head, forcing him to wear a mask out of self-consciousness. The upside of his curse is an immunity to magic, and so with his best friend Nikaido, he goes on a two-man crusade against the sorcerers, violently capturing them and ingesting their heads. The head of an unknown man resides in the back of Caiman’s throat. When the man sees a sorcerer, he angrily declares “You are not the one”. Caiman is awaiting the day when the man inside his mouth says “you are the one”, which he hopes will then bring an end to his curse, and some answers from the mysterious culprit.

Yes this is the very first panel of the whole series.

You read the premise of this story and think “what the fuck”, but you are immediately drawn in from the first page, when Caiman violently attacks two sorcerers, bites the head of the first one, teeth sinking into forehead, and allows the cruel man inside his mouth to appraise the victim. After butchering the sorcerer to death, Caiman and Nikaido eat lunch, where their playful personalities shine through in full force. In this volume, the pair engage in several skirmishes with sorcerers and travel across the Hole to find a sorcerer named Needle. Meanwhile, En recruits what appears to be his two most formidable sorcerers, Noi and Shin, to take care of Caiman.

Despite the short volume, a lot of world-building is packed within the pages. There are devastating spreads of the destitute, abandoned landscape of the Hole, contrasted by the lavish extravagance of En, with his tailored suit and dinner parties and indulgent communication methods. Like Tokyo Ghoul, masks play an integral part of characters’ identities, with most of the sorcerers concealing themselves with intimidating disguises. They quickly learn that Caiman is a force to be reckoned with, and begin sealing the magic portals leading to the Hole so that En can get some control over the situation. The portal system reminds me of the doorways in Monsters Inc, and I cannot begin to describe the disconcerting experience of reading this violent story and imagining benevolent Sully at the same time.

Pretty art. I ship them already because I’m pathetic I guess.

When starting Dorohedoro, the artwork is what jumps out at you first. It is rough, but not in a distracting way. Hayashida exploits a thin, scratchy technique that enhances the volatile setting of the Hole, whilst using heavy, gruesome strokes for the fight scenes. Character designs are equally wacky, which is exacerbated by the bizarre, almost vulgar masks that the sorcerers wear. I especially like how she draws women, enabling for a wonderfully diverse array of designs. Nikaido, Caiman’s friend and potential love interest, is stocky and athletic, which alludes to her skill as a fighter on par with her reptilian companion. The sorcerer Ebisu, by contrast, is skinny and unassuming, reflecting her subtle use of magic. The glorious Noi is a gargantuan powerhouse, towering over every other male character on the page, and yet still displaying feminine charm with thick blonde hair, tight clothing, and a buxom figure. I love the diversity of body types as it reflects the many different presentations of femininity and what womanhood can look like.

Speaking of women, I have to say this is the first time I’ve seen potentially fanservicey fight scenes and it not look distasteful. When Nikaido fights against a group of thugs, we get open leg angles and booty shots I suppose, but because she is fully clothed, the sequences look more artistic than exploitative, and it’s something I appreciated. This shows that fighting females can look sexy, but there is a tasteful way to execute it, one that doesn’t require a convenient garment degloving.

I also enjoyed the humour. Caiman provides a ludicrious juxtaposition to an otherwise dismal landscape, and he regularly switches from deranged killer to childish sweetboy, grinning contently at Nikaido’s skilful packed lunches. When the pair search for Needle, he attacks the sorcerer brutally, and is about to kill him when Needle offers to fix Caiman’s face, so perhaps it’s unwise to murder him after all. Caiman, suddenly overcome by vanity and self-consciousness, spares the sorcerer on the chance that the spell works, all the while Nikaido is offering unhelpful, sarcastic quips. In the end, though, the subsequent tingling sensation is Caiman’s scales shedding. Crestfallen, he reaffirms his ugliness, with Nikaido mockingly patting him on the shoulder. Clearly, this is a dark, violent and sometimes depressing story, but the moments of brevity work wonderfully, and Caiman’s witty humour only adds to his charm. In a way, it shows just how dire things are, that our protagonist can stoically observe the sorcerers’ massacres and simply resume his day. It suggests that these horrors are so commonplace in the Hole that the residents are now desensitised.

This volume features an exclusive side story which once again adds to the unique world of Dorohedoro. Fujita, our clumsy and ill-fated sorcerer, waits in line with other scrubs in the hope of receiving a new mask from an unknown entity on the other side of a barren door. Noi and Shin enter through another door reserved for the elites, through which Fujita hopes to one day enter. On the other side, the pair greet a demonic figure, who regurgitates the concoctions they feed him, thus creating brand new masks. Behind the other door, the lower sorcerers are pushed about, battered with steam and all sorts of contraptions. Opaque boxes are affixed to their heads, and, if the demon entity is not pleased with their gifts to him, the box explodes, and they are told to try again another time. At the end of the story, Noi and Shin refer to the entity as the devil. I suppose this implies that the origin of the sorcerers powers are of a dark, forbidden nature, and that En and his family are in cahoots with the Guy Downstairs. Either way, it’s crazy.

I am embarrassed that it’s taken me so long to get here, but I am here now and excited for my Dorohedoro journey.

10/10