#MangaMonday 51 “Four Lives Remain: Tatsuya Endo Before Spy x Family” by Tatsuya Endo
The success of Endo’s “Spy x Family” (see last week) has inspired a look back at his earlier one-shots.
“Western Game” was Endo’s official debut and won Shonen Jump magazine’s Story King award.
“Blade of the Moon Princess” is a scifi adaptation of folktale “The Bamboo Cutter.” It eventually became a series (and was the first Endo title recommended here.)
“Witch Craze” pits modern(ish) witches and witch hunters against, and sometimes alongside, each other.
“PMG-0” features a loose cannon in a special operations team modeled after the Three Musketeers.
The collection is an interesting snapshot of a young artist trying to find his voice, trying different things out and sometimes circling back (Edo admits in an chapter note that the first and last stories have essentially the same protagonist.)
Available in paperback and digital (Viz.)
