Another

This book is really eerie and mysterious! A must read for all anime horror lovers!

So I read the manga and the light novel concurrently. Most people consider this story to be horror. For me, it felt more as though it was a thriller with some horror elements, particularly Japanese curse horror.

What this manga does well is condense the narrative of Another, the novel, in a way that remains true to the original. The artist’s use of screen tones and heavy black inks also help to create a horror-esque atmosphere. Finally, Mei Misaki’s character is captured accurately to the way she’s depicted in the novel.

What brings this adaptation down for me is the art style, unfortunately. I can’t really critique the story here because it is not an original idea to this manga. Therefore, the art has to be able to elevate the story in order to justify the transition into a new medium. And it just doesn’t do that for me. Here there are a lot of blank backgrounds, awkward poses, and flat character designs (particularly the adults).

The worst issue of all is the pacing which oftentimes slowed the momentum to a crawl. It is a really difficult story to adapt into a medium that is not aided by music, vocal performance, or moving visuals. I can’t fault the mangaka entirely for struggling to produce the same sense of dread, but I can imagine that, with a different art style (maybe something a little more surrealistic) and a more condensed version of the narrative (there are a few plot elements that could’ve been dropped), it could have made for a really enjoyable read.

It’s by no means a horrible adaptation. I just feel as though it had the potential to really stand out given the strength of the source material, and it ended up falling a little flat.