Manga Review: Ao no Exorcist

Title: Ao no Exorcist
Author: Katou Kazue
Release: Monthly
Status: Ongoing
Genre: Shonen, Supernatural
Art: A
Originality: A
Story: A
Characters: A
Humor: B
Action: B

Impression: This is about misfit who one day realizes that there’s more to him than he thought when the forces of the underworld knock at his door so Satan can take over his body in order for him to exist in the human world without destroying his host body just seconds after the possession works. Turns out he’s his half-human half-demon son and he’s what’s needed for him to exist in the human world long enough to take over the place. Things go down in the first chapter which leads to the boy’s adoptive father sacrificing himself so the boy can fend for himself and this causes him to join the exorcist organization his father was part of so he can kick Satan’s ass. This series starts off pretty strong and has plenty of interesting ideas going for it but I do have to say this series would have done much better if it were a weekly publication instead. By the end of the 1st year of its publication, it finished up about 30 weekly chapters worth of plot so I can’t help but feel it’s going too slowly. That could be taken as a good indicator of the great ideas used to build up the plot and the setting but it’s going to take maybe 6-8 years to get to the pay off. Basically, this is a pretty good shonen series to follow, sadly it’s weekly.