Sousei no Onmyouji

Speaking of Benio manga I can't wait to see the Princess of Impurities Benio in action.

Having read the manga until chapter 48....Wew! The story was truly different than the anime altogether...Cant wait for the raws to be translated though as iirc...Right now the manga reaches Chap. 60 although some of them haven't been published in Tankobon format

Edited by ElfenLiedFan90 on Jul 10th 2018 at 11:37:32 PM

New chapter for Twin Star Exorcist is out!!! Not sure on how I should feel about this but I won't gonna spoil anything.

So translations seems to be up to 66, but I think they still haven't catched up?

Translations seems to be up to 75 now... But what the heck is actual latest chapter currently and has manga gotten any better?

Mangaplus is up to 81 which I guess is still farther back?

Anyhoo that guy really is asshole huh

I got into this manga after finding the anime a few years ago. While the story can be generic at times, it does have mystic elements and good revelations that make me want to keep reading it. Also, Sukeno-sensei art is just too damn good.

I get a lot of people stopped reading around the Tournament Arc and yes, I admit I found that part quite boring and a lame way to flesh out the secondary characters while the main heroine was nowhere to be seen. However, I think it began to pick up again in the middle of last year.

In these few chapters where we finally have Benio back, I have pinned down what's the problem with her. It's similar to what happened to Emilia in the first arcs of Re Zero. There's nothing inherently wrong about Benio as a character. I have seen heroines with less appealing personality than her, her relationship with Rokuro has been well-handled compared to tons of those will-they-won't-they pairings in other series and her existence is justified from the beginning.

However, Benio's importance has never been about her. In the 14-year-old arc, she was the reason why Rokuro got back into exorcism while in the climatic fight against Yuuto she did little and got her legs blown up. In the 16-year-old arc, she was Rokuro's motivation for starting his own household while she was absent for 90% of the plot. Now, in the 20-year-old arc, she's being set up as the reason why Rokuro is rejecting Abe no Seimei's power and since she apparently can't fight too much without risking going into Kegare mode, she's once again forced to do little more than watching Rokuro look cool. In short, pretty much everything about Benio in terms of plot has only mattered according to how it impacts Rokuro.

I wouldn't say how Benio has been handled is that bad in terms of shonen manga. Because the target audience are teenage boys, countless shonen heroines have subpar performances and end up as either fanservice or plot tools because the one who must show off and protect the girl is the male MC. The only really good shonen heroines that come into my mind now are Gintama's Kagura and Soul Eater's Maka. At least Benio has fairly interesting stuff going on like her being the yin incarnation to Rokuro's yang incarnation. It's just that in this manga Benio being so underused is more notable because the premise is an exorcist couple and so far, it feels more like Rokuro's adventures with his waifu on the side. Unfortunately for Benio, I fear that she won't be allowed to be an effective heroine at least until she stays a Kegare permanently and gives birth to hers and Rokuro's super Yin-Yang Bomb baby. And I think even the author is aware that he could have come up with a better heroine since he once admitted that he likes Shizuru better than Benio.

Yeah, Benio constantly getting the short end of a stick and playing a second fiddle to Rokuro all the damn time, is the primary reason why my interest in the series waned over the years.

The recent arcs were just awful about this. After Benio got depowered and left behind by Rokuro who went to have the most boring tournament arc ever, after not being seen in the main series for like dozens of chapters, Benio finally comes back at the climax of the big battle with Basara and Yuuto, having gained new powers that she didn't have occasion to show off yet... and she the basically stands on the sidelines while Rokuro has one on one fight with Yuuto... her own damn brother. The guy who always insulted her and called her weak and useless, and she doesn't even get a chance to prove him wrong and settle things with him. Her own damn brother.

And in the new chapters they meet Kamui, the Basara who ate her parents and has weird obsession with her... and again she stands on the sidelines while Rokuro fights him alone.

Seriously, this is the type of thing that made me lose most of the interest in this series.

I face-palmed at that recent chapter where that little sister of Birdmaru came back & she acted like such a jealous brat because she wanted Romulo & everyone just kinda enabled her. Rokuro wouldn’t fight off her aggressive advances aside from that asinine milquetoast nervous stare & Benio actually agreed to that childish competition of hers.

Guys your both adults, she’s a child. You don’t need to lower yourselves to her level, just tell her to fuck off. It’s like everyone is competing for Rokuro & Benio now. And it’s still creepy with the little sister cause she’s like 13 while Rokuro is now in his 20s.

Though issues with Benio aside I wasn’t exactly a big fan of the previous arc. It was a just constant worf barrage as chapter upon chapter of Basara tanking the Generals strongest techniques & wiping them out like Swiss cheese. The fact that several of the General & general servants who died were characters who got major focus in the tournament which proved to me that the whole thing was nothing more than a cheap way to garner audience sympathy before immediately offing these losers just made me shake my head in disappointment.

Edited by slimcoder on Dec 4th 2020 at 5:57:26 AM

I admit I too got frustrated with problems with Benio and the secondary exorcists being explored in lame ways. I suppose I just came to like the author more after reading Binbougami Ga which I believe is where Sukeno-sensei showed his strengths. Basically, he's great at drawing in different styles, comedy with lots of parody, and character dynamics. However, in this manga, he's sort of trying to do a shonen with innovating themes like a Battle Couple raising a Badass Family, but falls back to lots of cliches to "play it safe" so the result is even the main heroine being pushed aside. To be honest, I would have probably dropped it long ago if Rokuro was too boring or annoying. I find him okay-ish, even if only because his relationship with Benio is sweet.

The issues I have found with this manga is that the very long 16-year-old arc was much more focused on the shonen setting and generic battles instead of the elements that do make the manga feel different, mainly the yin-yang theme of the Twin Stars and their connection to Abe no Seimei/Ashiya Doman. Frankly, the only two characters I really like in the Heavenly Commanders are Shimon and Tenma because their powers are cool and I do like the Vitriolic Best Buds thing they have. Mayura and Shizuru have been alright, could have been worse. I do hope they stop pining after Rokuro because really, doing Supporting Harem is only okay when you're doing a romantic comedy, but here literally everyone knows Rokuro needs to marry Benio so their kid saves the world. Speaking of which, yes, Shimon's sister Sayo is the one character in this manga who I dislike because she's the most annoying kind of haremette stereotype shoehorned in a kind of series where she only gets in the way. It didn't help she was a defenseless Damsel in Distress until her most recent chapter. From what I remember, Sayo never had the decency to apologize to Benio for mocking the harsh fact that her brother is a sick psycho and basically called her a Gold Digger. Instead, she kept being a brat because Benio is the one destined for Rokuro. At least, I hope her little "antics" won't come up again now that she accepted she's never getting Rokuro and we're moving to more serious stuff.

Another thing I wanted to comment on was the villains of this manga. I found it strange in how the manga seems to present them as purely evil and depraved, but when they're about to get killed off, the manga acts as if they want them to be sympathetic through an unexplored Villainous Friendship or a rushed tragic backstory. It even tried to make Yuto, who was nothing but a Complete Monster in the 14-year-old arc, into a Tragic Villain by saying he went crazy because of some visions. Sorry, hard to feel sympathy for a guy who massacred orphans and blew up his own sister's legs. I was actually relieved when it looked like he died instead of getting friendship redemption. However, that might not last seeing how his regenerating head is in that underground cave.

For all my critics, I do still like this manga even when it gets unengaging and fails to reach full potential because I have a sense that the author loves what he does and his drawings are full of an energy only few mangaka have. There's many good elements here that make it stand out from other shonen and since I believe the most generic events were over with the previous arc, my personal hope is those elements that got sidelined before can shine more from now on.

Edited by Alice_Luna on May 3rd 2020 at 5:55:55 AM

So what is this about? Stumbled on it by accident.

Okay so it’s like an exorcist series. Ya got these demon-ass motherfuckers called Impurities born from human negativity who come from the Hellscape Magano to corrupt humans. Exorcists fight em off on Japan but the main base is on an island that houses the majority of the exorcist civilization. They do so with a mix of advanced technology & magic. So you can be summoning artificial constructs like snakes while at the same time fighting with a hammer that’s equipped with a jet engine.

Main characters are these 2 exorcists Rokuro & Benio who are destined to get together & conceive the super child who will save the world. So it’s kinda advertised as a battle couple romance series but they actually spend more time apart than together & Benio’s second-fiddle to the guy Rokuro.

Alright, colour me intrigued.

Fair warning, female lead again totally shafted. Insultingly so really, she does not get as much focus as the guy.

Also annoying harem elements. There are several women who have feelings for him & have these shippy moments despite already being locked down. Worst of which is this little girl who gets these odd sexual-ish moments like having to get nude as apart of a ritual & doing a seductive tongue stick-out & wink despite being 11.

Also the pacing can be very slow. Like it’s a monthly manga yet it can take multiple chapters to get through one event which reaches its head very later on once we have a tournament arc. At that point the story reaches a grinding halt as multiple unimportant tertiary-characters get chapter long fights in a misguided attempt at fleshing them out.

Like at least one fight did that thing with the “girl who wants to prove other girls can fight” which makes no sense because at no point in the entire story was it mentioned that girl Exorcists are discriminated against & told to stay in the kitchen, with plenty of female fighters seen beforehand & even several of the clan heads are women. The whole thing was just fucking stupid.

Granted there are positives of course, the art is fucking amaze-balls. It has some of the most cleanest panels & line-work I have ever seen. Like the techno-magic aesthetic the Exorcists use in their weaponary is among some of my favorites in any manga.

Edited by slimcoder on Dec 4th 2020 at 5:58:46 AM

Harem elements don't bother me much, though the part with "girls can fight too" plot does because it smells of "I have no bloody clue where this story is supposed to go so I'll just tell some cliched hackeyned plots until I figure it out" syndrome.

Which some stories never live past.

Really gotta wonder why mangaka feel the need to add a female lead that just gonna get shafted in the first place, though.

I mean seriously, guys, just do a single male lead. The amount of people who like these types of comics and would hold it against you won't be the diciding factor of if you're gonna keep being published or not, I assure you.

Edited by HailMuffins on May 3rd 2020 at 2:28:10 PM

This is worse than that, since them being a Battle Couple is pretty much central premise of the manga. This is not situation of creating a male lead and then realizing he should probably have a love interest but having no idea what to do with her. There being two of them is like the central dynamic of the story.

I have no idea what the author was even thinking to botch it up so bad.

Rokuro calling out Kamui for treating Benio like an object is really undercut by the story not giving her any agency in that encounter.

The tournament arc also almost me quit tbh.

I admit the one reason I tolerated that Tournament Arc was that I picked up the manga when it was already in the big battle of Magano and could easily skip through the tournament. Really, the only fight that was kinda important and entertaining was Tenma vs. Shimon. The rest really felt like the author realizing he created way too many side characters and couldn't think of any way to present their skills and backstories in the plot he was writing. The only true purpose of that tournament plot-wise was giving Rokuro the chance to have his rematch with Yuto anyway.

Looking back at Binbougami ga!, the quality of Sukeno-sensei's female characters is significantly inferior here. In his previous series, the girls were all unique and funny in their own ways, especially Momiji, making them much more memorable since the prominent guys there were a love interest who didn't have much going for him other than being a hot guy who took care of his siblings and the rest were three perverted horndogs. In comparison, the girls here are more like staples of harem stereotypes, mainly Mayura and Shimon's loli sister.

The main duo dynamic was also much stronger in Binbougami ga! from start to end. Rokuro and Benio had a great setup at the start, where both felt like their own characters while being able to play each other off and help with their mutual growth. Ever since the end of the 14-year-old arc, however, both became kinda standard, with their love for each other having become what defines them both. Rokuro is the typical shonen hero who loves his girl a lot while Benio is the easily jealous, lovely wife. The most interesting thing about them now is the thematic of great yin vessel and great yang vessel. I do still find their interactions cute, but I would have liked both had stayed more interesting on their own.

Maybe the issue here is that Sukeno-sensei has much more skill for writing rival-turned-Vitriolic Best Buds duos than romantic couples, given that in later parts of the manga I have enjoyed the chemistry between Shimon and Tenma the most. Even in Binbougami ga!, Ichiko's relationship with her love interest wasn't that good and had too many cliched romcom moments that I found underwhelming in a series that showed much more original and energized comedy in about everything else.

I've always felt like talking about this but I rather don't like the Basara. It's due to several reasons.

For one, they all have the same face. Like I've been noticing this but all 10 of them appear to have the triangle chin pretty face. Facial wise, there's no diversity like square jaws, they all have the near same physical features. Because of the lack of designs diversity it makes them all sorta blend in together & lessens the effectiveness of their clothing. It makes the attempts at unique in the wackier clothing cringe worthy & outright creepy in the case of the youngest looking Basara having the appearance of a child with the clothing of a one=piece swimsuit with bunny ears. It's not good designs.

And the powers ehhhh, like a lot of its generic elemental stuff or nondescript stuff. Lighting control, water control, its just kinda plain & immemorable as a result. I can't really remember what the individual powers of the Basara even are. Like I know one chick turns into water but she never really used to extreme effectiveness that makes me really go Wow.

Edited by slimcoder on May 6th 2020 at 8:54:29 AM

Anyone remember how Kamui killed Benio's parents? Like really traumatised Benio with the whole choosing who to die thing? Because I think the author forgot since for some reason Benio has to be stand on the sidelines while Rokuro tries to do this shit solo despite fighting together is supposed to be their biggest strength and that she has way more of a stake in this battle than his toxic masculinity.

The author has Rokuro say Benio isn't a trophy to be fought over and then literally tells Benio to stand back since he wants to takes the challenge anyway to prove himself worthy of her while both of them describe how awesome she is. And even more insulting is her being instantly choked by Kamui despite how much he hyped her up so that Rokuro can save her.

Sooo shipping chapter?

Did anyone else just kind of mentally check out during this chapter?

Edited by Aquaconda on Oct 2nd 2020 at 9:04:00 AM

I haven't been reading in a while so I don't remember what happened last chapter either

Something something... Benio sits passively while Rokuro saves her.... something something... pleading with the assholes to not do the same goddamn mistake that always prevented the end of the war... something something.

Meanwhile this chapter is just Beta Couple shenanigans.

And it was recently announced that this is the final arc so we are almost done with......... whatever this is.