Riuva : Research Institute for Unicultural Visual Arts

Amazingly, I did a quick search on the various anime blogs out there and found that absolutely nobody has blogged on the new manga series, Beelzebub, yet. It’s probably one of the best, if not the best, comedy battle manga I’ve read in years and yes, it’s far better than even M x 0, which for me, was the best comedy battle manga I’ve read in years.

With 17 chapters out so far in Shounen Jump, Beelzebub, by rookie mangaka Tamura Ryuhei, is about a super-strong, super evil and utterly hilarious high school kid named Oga, who chances upon a baby who pops out of a old man who splits into half. Apparently, the baby turns out to be the future demon king who’ll destroy the world and he was sent to the human plane to get attached to a human parent, who’ll be the catalyst for the channeling of his evil powers. A gothloli demon girl follows him and acts as his babysitter. Like Persona 4, there is a social link between the Oga and the baby Beelzebub, and this link is increased by an upping in mutual trust, which is in turn increased by Oga’s doing of evil acts. The catch is that the baby cannot be further than 15 metres away from Oga or he’ll die instantly. Of course, this sucks, so Oga tries to get rid of the baby by being good but obviously since he is pure evil he can’t do it. He’s also in a super delinquent high school where everyone fights to the death more often than not. Along the way, high school delinquent bosses fight him, sort of similar to how Onizuka is challenged in Shounan Junaigumi, the prequel to GTO.

Think of it as a variation of the M x 0 style of gag battle manga, with less ecchi but more side-splitting humour. The writing is really witty and I laughed more in the first few chapters than I ever did for any manga, I suspect. If you ever feel like picking up a brand new shounen series, make this your first pick! As is evident from the Jump questionaires, which have Beelzebub in the top 5, beating the likes of Bleach! Art-wise it’s a bit similar to Bleach, but more rough about the edges, with fewer pretty boys, and the faces aren’t that consistently drawn, which is as expected of a newbie mangaka.

Ever since I read Bakuman which actually mentioned Beelzebub as one of the Gold Future Cup winners (true in real life), I’ve sort of leveled up my manga reading stats and I predict this manga will go places. So, mark my words, this manga, if it is sustained, will probably become one of the new Jump top series, replacing the likes of Bleach and Naruto, the latter ending pretty soon. In conclusion, if you like shounen, or just like comedy in general, READ THIS AT ALL COSTS, even if you have to pirate it on onemanga.com like I did, though I do intend to buy the series when they are released.