16829 Followers
195 Following
LG

Familiar Diversions

I'm a librarian who loves anime, manga, and reading a wide variety of genres.

Currently reading

How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, Vol. 1
Dojyomaru, Fuyuyuki, Sean McCann
Progress: 103/374 pages
Darkly Dreaming Dexter
Jeff Lindsay
Progress: 424/470 minutes
Wait Till Helen Comes: A Ghost Story
Mary Downing Hahn
Progress: 184/184 pages
Parental Guidance
Avery Flynn
Progress: 40 %
An Offer From a Gentleman
Julia Quinn
Progress: 102/358 pages
The Twisted Ones
T. Kingfisher
Progress: 385/385 pages
Educated
Tara Westover
Progress: 315/730 minutes
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!, Vol. 2
Satoru Yamaguchi, Nami Hidaka
Progress: 24/171 pages
Graphic Medicine Manifesto
MK Czerwiec, Kimberly R. Myers, Scott T. Smith, Michael J. Green, Susan Merrill Squier, Ian Williams
Progress: 26/172 pages
Ao Oni: Mutation
Kenji Kuroda, Karin Suzuragi, Alexander Keller-Nelson
Progress: 30/152 pages

The Seven Deadly Sins (manga, vol. 1) by Nakaba Suzuki, translated by Christine Dashiell

The Seven Deadly Sins 1 (Seven Deadly Sins, The) - Nakaba Suzuki

The Seven Deadly Sins stars Meliodas, a tavern owner who serves utterly terrible food and whose only companion is a talking pig named Hawk. One day a mysterious "Rust Knight" arrives at Meliodas' tavern. The Knight, who turns out to really be Princess Elizabeth, is looking for the Seven Deadly Sins, a chivalric order made up of seven criminals who each bear the mark of a beast upon their bodies. The Holy Knights disbanded the Seven Deadly Sins years ago after they were accused of plotting to overthrow the kingdom.

Now, however, the Holy Knights have done what they accused the Seven Deadly Sins of trying to do, and Princess Elizabeth believes the Seven Deadly Sins are the kingdom's last hope. Luckily for her, Meliodas is not only one of those famed warriors, specifically the Dragon Sin of Wrath, he's looking for the others too.

I got this first volume in PDF form via a Humble Bundle a while back. Interestingly, the file was formatted in such a way that changing to "two page layout" actually properly placed the pages for right-to-left reading - definitely a step up from the Inuyashiki volume formatting.

This was technically okay. The artwork was actually pretty good, more detailed than I expected. I loved the way Suzuki drew the foggy forest. I occasionally had trouble following some of the action, but I think that was more due to the size of the PDF pages on my monitor (I didn't feel like zooming in) than to any problems with the artwork.

The fantasy aspect felt a bit generic, but that could change. This first volume was light on details as to what, exactly, each of the Seven Deadly Sins could do. Meliodas appeared to have super-strength - I wasn't sure if his broken sword was anything special or really just a random broken sword. One of the other Seven Deadly Sins, Diana, was a giant, but apparently that had nothing to do with the mark she bore (Serpent Sin of Envy) as a member of the Seven Deadly Sins. No information was given as to what the different beasts signified, although I assume they're important in some way and are maybe tied in to what each of the members of the group can do.

Hawk, Meliodas' animal companion, was reasonably cute and got points for calling out Meliodas' frequent gross behavior. Unfortunately, the character also added to the series' overall generic feel. I was reminded of Fairy Tail's Plue and Happy - it seems like every shounen fantasy adventure group needs at least one cute and comedic animal character.

The series' overly generic feeling is part of the reason I'm not sure I want to continue on. My other issue with this series was how much fan service and boob and butt grabbing it contained. The first time Meliodas met Princess Elizabeth, he groped her breasts while she was still unconscious, supposedly to confirm that she was female. From that point on, it felt like the story was a series of action scenes glued together with boob and butt grabbing jokes. Readers were supposed to laugh at Meliodas' antics and Princess Elizabeth's reactions (she mostly either didn't notice what he was doing or dismissed it as harmless - Hawk was more disgusted and upset than she was). I not only didn't think it was funny, I found myself becoming increasingly annoyed. It was a lazy and gross way for Suzuki to try to get some laughs.

There's a Humble Bundle available for another 24 hours that has volumes 1 to 22 of this series. Wikipedia tells me that The Seven Deadly Sins is still ongoing and is currently up to 31 volumes, so this is a pretty significant chunk. That said, I'm not sure that I want to take the plunge.

Extras:

Eight pages of design sketches for The Seven Deadly Sins.

 

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)