Yumi Tamura has done it again and written another manga that Im obsessed with. Id go so far as to say that this ties with 7SEEDS one of her other major series as my fourth favorite manga of all time. Its not like I wasnt expecting to love this and add it to my favorites because I totally was. I had to restrain myself from adding it from chapter 1. This is a war story that doesnt focus on the fighting but the people in it. The people whose lives will be impacted by war. The common people the soldiers the government and the revolutionaries. This isnt just a story about soldiers fighting on the battlefield but the story of ordinary people noble or not who change and evolve to create a time of peace. At the end of the 21st century disaster hit changing the world as we knew it. Japan is now a desert ruled by a tyrant king for generations. However there was a prophecy about the child of destiny who will one day restore Japan and free it from the cruel monarchs. The prophecy was about Sarasas twin brother Tatara but when he is killed by the Red King Sarasa takes her brothers name and mantle as child of destiny to lead the people of Japan to a brighter future while getting revenge on the man who killed her brother. Basara is all about war and its implications. Right from the first handful of volumes the characters must grapple with the loss of loved ones and the idea that your enemy has loved ones as well. Senseless killing only leads to more hatred and desire for revenge. Killing others leaves innocent people without the people they hold dear. The people you fight in wars are just as human as you are. They have their own ambitions families and ways of showing kindness. In the words of Chigusa Im paraphrasing because I dont remember her exact line If you werent fighting the war you might have been friends and neighbors. And that line describes the central romance of Basara. The Red King and Tatara meeting not as their titles but as their true selves Shuri and Sarasa fell in love. They had no idea who the other one was meeting not as enemies but as ordinary people. Both characters have harmed each other and feel hatred for their alterego but when separated from their alternate identities they can accept each other. Sarasa doesnt see the Red King the man who killed her brother but Shuri the confident man she fell in love with. Likewise Shuri only sees Sarasa an independent woman he cares for instead of Tarata the one who killed his best friend and is aiming to remove him from power. And when they are revealed to be each others sworn enemies they dont know what to do. It becomes a battle of feelings. Can they reconcile their romantic feelings with their feelings of rage and their desire to kill? Of course theres also the idea of creating versus destroying. There are those who want to create an ideal world where there is no more violence and there are some who just want to watch Japan and the monarchy burn. The arc about the Suo rebellion perfectly encapsulates this showing a warlord father at odds with his rebellious artist son. One who wants to destroy and take while the other just wants to create and give. A father with so much hate and a son with so much love. I personally loved that arc for a variety of reasons and I feel like it was one of the most impactful for me. Ill mention that my least favorite arc was the prison arc just because I felt like their captors got off too easily. They were torturing people for years and they were just forgiven and didnt have to atone for the atrocities they committed. While what they went through was traumatic and had lasting effects as seen by Wind Owl it doesnt excuse any of what they did. I get that Sarasas whole deal is forgiveness and earning allies through empathy and her general kindness but these guys deserved some sort of punishment. In Basara they make the point of saying that women are the ones who are responsible for building nations since they are the ones who give birth to children. And I have to say that this manga has strong feminist themes. Even the very core of the story the prophecy about Tatara relies on everyone assuming that when the twins were born the chosen one had to be the boy. Basara is set in a patriarchal society and yet there are women with a variety of strengths who can succeed. We have combatants who lead armies like Sarasa and Chacha the female pirate captain in a world where only lowranking women can lead. There are brilliant inventors and spies like Kikune even though shes shamed for her gender. We have Ginko the White King forced to keep her gender a secret and having to rely on people underestimating her as a disabled woman to manipulate others. I was particularly pleased with how in the Suo rebellion arc the rebel leader was a kind and feminine woman who was involved in a newspaper that informed the public of the injustices going on. Theres such diversity among the female cast and it provides so much commentary on how women are treated and viewed in societies like this. Yumi Tamuras series are filled with dozens of multidimensional characters. I could write entire essays on each individual side character and their role in the story. Theyre that complex. As much as Id like to go on about Kikune Ginko Hayato Kazan etc. I have decided to discuss four of the most important characters Sarasa Shuri Ageha and Asagi. Sarasa our protagonist does not begin as a strong confident leader. She was not taught leadership skills how to fight or how to ride a horse. In the beginning shes just clinging to the hope that she can continue to pretend to be her brother and act as a symbol of hope. All she has to spur her on is her hatred of the Red King. Her desire for revenge is all she has to keep her fighting. Shes emotional and needs to rely on the protection of others though she keeps those in her army at arms length. And yet she learns to rely on those who fight alongside her and learns to defend herself. Shes still emotional and empathetic but those are the traits that make her the child of destiny and a hero of the people. They do not make her weak but they are her greatest strengths. Its when she loses sight of her compassion that she becomes dangerous and lost in her own desire for vengeance. Shuri the Red King begins the series as a hot mess. For starters hes a mass murderer and when he and Sarasa first meet and become attracted to each other he was kind of a pushy love interest. Hes arrogant violent and bloodthirsty. And yet hes still human. His father branded him as a slave in the hope his son would not usurp him. He may be arrogant but hes charismatic has people he cares about and can be a charming person. Sarasa fell for the confident charming Shuri who protected her and aided her in battle not the bloodthirsty ruler he was raised as. However its only when he loses everything and experiences the horrible things he made the people he fought endure that he can truly change. Sarasa and his Okinawan friends influences were the seeds but when he loses his kingdom and is humbled he can atone for his sins and make people believe that he might be worthy of forgiveness. His growth is very gradual and natural as changing his ways isnt an overnight process. Even at the very end he still has things he refuses to apologize for no matter how wrong they were. Ageha is a member of a nomadic tribe whose people were sold into slavery. He grew up as a slave enduring horribly traumatic things including being repeatedly raped by his master back when he was a child. He has a complicated relationship with his former masters son battling with his mixed feelings of love and hate. Hes attracted to Shido but he ultimately knows that they can never be equals and will always be seen as below Shido as someone to take pity on. While he serves as Sarasa and Princess Senjus protector and confidant he is far from being a righteous hero. He will take on the mantle of the antihero if necessary. Hes willing to soil his hands in order to aid the Tatara army. He will make the people he cares about confront what holds them back and hes far from gentle about it. His destiny is to find a woman worth dying for and while I wont spoil anything I will remark that while the main character deaths in Basara are remarkably few to the point where it could be considered unrealistic every death has a purpose within the narrative. No death is pointless. The final character I will discuss is Asagi the Blue King. Im not going to mince words. In the beginning he was an obnoxious disgusting little bitch. Im sorry but its true. He is a character who lives for destruction. He and Shuri are two sides of the same coin much like the Greek gods Ares and Athena. Both are gods of war but while Ares represents destruction like Shuri Athena is the strategist like Asagi. He wants to manipulate anyone and everyone with his own personal spy network to bring about destruction so that he can seize power. He hates Shuri since he felt like the two were compared all throughout his childhood despite never meeting. He wants everything that Shuri wants so that he can take it from him. And yet while posing as a guard of the Blue King who wanted to join the Tatara army he begins to change. While at first he was sowing seeds of discord the more time he spent with Sarasa and her crew the more humanity he gained. He developed feelings for Sarasa on his own not just because she was Shuris lover and he wanted to take what Shuri had. He became genuine friends with Sarasas friends despite initially coming off as an untrustworthy useless prettyboy. He becomes one of Sarasas most loyal friends no longer seeing her as an object or someone to manipulate. And he realizes that hes not been living for himself. Hes been living the way Ginko wants him to the way that hurts Shuri the most or the way his mysterious mother wanted him to. But hes never lived the way that would be most fulfilling for himself. While I love Shuris character arc to bits and prefer Shuri to Asagi I actually found Asagis arc to be some of the most interesting and compelling character development in the series. The art improves a lot from the beginning. I remember starting it and thinking that it was much lower in quality than 7SEEDS which makes sense since Basara was written earlier. However as the series continues the art transforms from the rougher more awkward and kind of scribbly style into Yumi Tamuras beautiful signature sketchy flowing pieces. The proportions also get quite a bit better since I remember them being pretty awkward in the beginning. It was kind of reminding me of the jokes I see about the way the men were drawn in early Skip Beat chapters. However the art truly becomes magnificent and I love Yumi Tamuras art with all that I have. I cant help but comment on how Yumi Tamura is a genius in character writing creating huge casts of complicated characters allowing them to grow at natural realistic paces. This manga is simply beautiful in how its written and I cant help but recommend it especially to fans of Yona of the Dawn and other action shoujo series. Even people who dislike Yona might appreciate Basaras more serious and cohesive narrative. Its brilliant and theres a reason its in my top 5 right now.