Japan Man

Line Barrels is a new manga/anime by Shimizu Eichi and Shimoguchi Tomohiri about a young student Kouichi’s encounter with a huge mecha named Line Barrels and…..pages upon pages of action for no reason. Allow me to state the facts so you guys can understand that I am being reasonable. Don’t read ahead if you can’t stand spoilers.

Before I could really get into the story  I learned that Line Barrels accidentally killed Kouichi. Because Line Barrels is not allowed to kill humans for some reason, the huge mecha uses his super nano technology to bring Kouichi back to life, which gives Kouichi super human strength, endurance, agility, and the ability to ride Line Barrels. Why wasn’t this kept a secret in order to create a sense of mystery and intrigue? Is there any reason for me to care about the story any longer?  No of course not!

Surprisingly, neither the horrible writing nor the elimination of potentially cool characters (Kouichi’s best friend Yajima) ruined Line Barrels for me. I hated when Kouichi decided to join some mysterious company for no reason. Why did he need to join some weak ass corporation when he controls the ultimate death mobile Line Barrels?  Even if he did want to save the world and have enemies to fight, he could have found that easily without any help. I know Line Barrels was aiming for that Evangelion shadowy organization appeal, but none of the characters are deep enough to care about. The most complex character dies before the story gets interesting.

Line Barrels could have been a great Evangelion runner up, but I can’t respect a manga that doesn’t even try to have some integrity. The characters are two dimensional at best. The story degenerated into predictable Death Note and Code Geass trash (I’m gonna save the world by being an asshole!) The Line Barrels mecha design is a fusion of Zone of Enders and Evangelion which isn’t half bad, but the weapons are sloppy and poorly explained. I could go on and on, but for what? I’m not reading it anymore but it’s good to write a review so I can remember how much I think it sucks. If you are reading Line Barrels, why are you reading it?  How often do you decide not to read it again it but then pick it back up because you are bored? And if you do like Line Barrels, please tell me…..why?