Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Release Date: April 5, 2016
Price: $12.99
Creator: Takashi Tsukimi
Format: 192 pgs., Black & White, Trade Paperback
ISBN: 978-1-6165-5928-1
Age Rating: 16+
ICv2 Rating: 3 Stars out of 5
Only the best of the best get to attend this particular high school, and all of the students chosen believe that they are the luckiest people in the country once they get their acceptance letters. What they find out once they get there, though, is that they are actually extremely unlucky.
At the entrance ceremony they are informed that they are actually in a "kill or be killed" situation. In order to protect the assets that they possess, they have been locked in the school and completely cut off from the rest of the world. The only way to "graduate" from this school and get out again is to murder a classmate and get away with it.
Danganronpa is based on a horror video game and it shows, due to the large amounts of expository monologue delivered by the main character. In fact there are so many long internal speeches that it can feel like the pace of the book is being dragged down to a crawl at times. That doesn't change that fact that overall this is a bloody good book.
The biggest fear going into this one (besides the obvious ones attached to reading a gory horror manga) is wondering if the story will hold up in print form. Many horror stories have a bad habit of being predictable or throwing in blood and murder just for the sake of doing so. Danganronpa manages to walk that fine line and creates a story that urges you to keep reading and has you constantly wondering about the school. There are many questions raised by this first volume that will leave the audience constantly trying to figure out what is happening and who is ultimately pulling the strings, but don't look for any answers to be delivered within these pages.
The artwork in this book is certainly interesting, unlike anything many people have ever seen before. The characters are drawn in a style that isn't meant to make them cute in the least, which is appropriate for such a dark story.
Those who are squeamish about blood and violence should stay far, far away from this book. Students will be stabbed, skewered and more within these first chapters and the story seems to promise that the violence is only going to get worse from here on out.
This is a book for people who enjoy hyper-violence to go along with their mystery, so it should be kept away from younger eyes. Those who do like to see lots of blood and violence though will find ample enjoyment within these pages.
--L.B. Bryant
