As unfortunate as it may be, not every manga gets the attention it deserves. Sometimes, a promising story will get canceled before it can find its footing, but more often than not, a great manga will be ignored because it doesn’t have an anime or is overshadowed by bigger stories, and those factors and others are almost impossible to overcome.
Videos by ComicBook.com
It’s easy for fans to default to reading the most popular manga around, but even if a manga isn’t getting the most attention, it can still be one of the best stories a person can read. That’s been truer than ever for the past decade, and there are a few underrated gems that everyone would be remiss to pass up.
7) Parashoppers
In Tsubasa Fukuchi’s Parashoppers, Mitsusada Amaragi is one of many people gifted the Parashop app, a mysterious phone app that grants the user superpowers in exchange for forcing them to compete in deadly games, and with his friends and allies, Amaragi vows to survive long enough to uncover the truth of it all.
Tsubasa Fukuchi is best known for creating the cult 2000s hit The Law of Ueki, and sure enough, Parashoppers does an even better job of being a quirky action series with a fun cast and clever fight choreography. Parashoppers isn’t even a year old, so it has yet to build up momentum, but hopefully, that will change soon.
6) Astra Lost In Space
Kenta Shinohara’s Astra Lost in Space takes place in the far future, where nine children find themselves lost in space on a field trip gone wrong. Fortunately, an abandoned spaceship they named the Astra allows them to make the long trip home, during which time they must slowly uncover the conspiracy behind what happened to them and their world.
As another series from Sket Dance and Witch Watch creator Kenta Shinohara, Astra Lost in Space perfectly combines stellar comedy and heartwarming character drama, and the sci-fi elements add a surprising amount of complexity to both at every turn. As a short series, it isn’t Shinohara’s most recognizable work, but that doesn’t make it any less worth reading.
5) RuriDragon
In Masaoki Shindo’s RuriDragon, ordinary girl Ruri Aoki wakes up one day to find that horns have sprouted out of her head. Ruri’s mother casually explains that her dragon heritage from her father’s side has started to emerge, and now Ruri must deal with handling her new powers along with all the typical difficulties of being a high school girl.
RuriDragon’s commitment to telling a slice-of-life story that isn’t centered around comedy or drama makes every chapter fun to read, and it’s easily one of the most unique titles to come out of Shonen Jump in years. The manga’s year-long hiatus and switch to digital killed much of its momentum, but fortunately, it’s still plenty fun to read.
4) Undead Unluck
Yoshifumi Tozuka’s Undead Unluck is set in a world plagued by physical, monstrous manifestations of the laws of nature and people called Negators who counteract them, despite the chaos it brings. Among those Negators are “Undead” Andy and “Unluck” Fuuko Izumo, and together, they and other Negators will fight against the Rules and save the world from its imminent destruction.
Undead Unluck was always overshadowed by some of Shonen Jump’s bigger titles, and the mixed reception of the anime didn’t do much to improve its reputation. That being said, with its clever action, incredible worldbuilding, and the amazing character development Fuuko goes through, it’s nothing short of a modern classic that everyone should read.
3) City
Keiichi Arawi’s City is centered around the daily events that go on in a city that’s simply called City. Many of the adventures center around perpetual slacker Midori Nagumo and her friends, but overall, the story is about every weird person who lives in the City and the odd things they go through every day.
City is another story from Keiichi Arawi of Nichijo fame, and it can even be seen as a spiritual successor of sorts for sporting the same great artwork and wonderfully surreal storytelling at every turn. City the Animation from Kyoto Animation was as great as one could expect, and hopefully, it will bring far more attention to the manga.
2) Dark Gathering
In Kenichi Kondo’s Dark Gathering, Keitaro Gentoga wants to put his supernatural abilities behind him and be a normal college student, but that changes when he meets Yayoi, a girl with similar supernatural abilities who drags him into her mission to capture and enslave violent spirits to prepare for battle against the spirit that stole her mother’s soul.
Dark Gathering often gets lost amidst the massive amount of exorcism manga, but with its haunting monster designs and surprisingly strong action and characters, it’s one of the best supernatural stories a person can read. Season 2 of the Dark Gathering anime is currently in development, and with any luck, that will help bring far more attention to the series.
1) Shy
Bukimi Miki’s Shy takes place in an era of relative peace after the superheroes of the world prevented World War III. However, a mysterious organization called Amarariku threatens that peace, and the heroes must unite once more to save the world, with the battle surprisingly being led by Teru Momijiyama, the socially awkward hero of Japan better known as Shy.
While My Hero Academia is the premier superhero manga, Shy’s unique take on things that uses the themes and aesthetic of magical girl and tokusatsu stories has led to a manga with just as many emotional highlights. Shy is a truly underrated gem among modern manga, and there’s no better example of an underrated manga from the past 10 years.
What do you think? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!
Most Viewed
-
Courtesy of Netflix -
Image Courtesy of HBO
