Violence has been with humanity longer than beer. Its shaped our history our lives and our entertainment. Violence serves no real purpose as its just mindless cruelty that weakens us humans and drives us apart. Yet so many tales poems books movies TV shows anime and manga focus on violence. Why? Why do so many people enjoy the depictions and portrayals of violence? Well the answer to that is its just so much fun to watch 480https://64.media.tumblr.com/b8bf6f8e7be10541e2006e5f1c10dfbf/85a06415076d99dcdb/s1280x1920/f0ed6452c1b2f8259e35f3301d89071a8af01fca.png Deathco is written and illustrated by Atsushi Kaneko. A mangaka who isnt particularly a fan of anime or manga but wants to use the format of a manga to tell you a story that can only be told in this format. While his other works such as SOIL and Wet Moon are more thematic and focus more on how people perceive the world around them Deathco is a story that is mostly as straightforward and blunt as a steel pipe to the head. In the world of Deathco there is a mysterious guild of assassins that is simply named The Guild. The Guild is made up of both highly trained killers and your average person trying to make ends meet. They dress up in costumes put on masks put on face paint call themselves Reapers and rush out to kill their target which is known as a head. We see glimpses of various people within The Guild and see what motivates them. Some do it for the money to support themselves or loved ones some do it for glory and some do it simply because they just love the act of killing. 480https://64.media.tumblr.com/0f4349901d3928e873572dd5b8efed21/e4fecb36725ebf9edd/s1280x1920/d8b8880c227ddacdb3ada3b40cfc94e0ffa07c82.png Our titular character Deathco is a young girl who hates everything lies about everything and is incapable of doing anything except killing other people. Deathco is a member of this guild where she excels at the act of killing using both shoddily made traps and weapons and with her own agile movements. As a protagonist shes empty and lacks any type of depth or character. The only emotions she experiences in the story are anger hostility euphoria and an odd amount of selfpity. 480https://64.media.tumblr.com/e326493766dab87d59510516ff5193b4/29a8847c1d9e257759/s1280x1920/98d8ae2abb5132b3b549e491d7d1d3a6d02c17a1.png What Deathco as both a manga and character excel as it is violence. Its fun to watch a bunch of dorks dressed in Halloween costumes get gunned down by organized criminals who spend the entire time laughing at the idiots wielding scythes and hatchets. Its fun to witness the sheer absurdity of Deathcos tools of murder and her general hooligan attitude to it all. This isnt violence and gore to seem mature or complex. This manga is just pure gruesome fun. 220https://64.media.tumblr.com/ff2fe17923be6cb4af857322440005cd/80cf88a185ba1bd300/s540x810/8e35ea6e6eb0a2b712df22d3b34f7f047e07b253.png The artwork to Deathco is what makes it all work completely. The western comic book art style helps elevate every slash every cut and every dismemberment to look so ugly yet so smooth and stylish. Couple that with how each character in this manga has a unique look both facial and costume wise and youve got something that easily sets itself apart visually. 260https://64.media.tumblr.com/978549895a7c9fc2a43f277e2bf77742/29a8847c1d9e25773f/s500x750/4328c59873dfdf7cc2fb91cbe0d232ff15ec3af4.png While Deathco is our main character the story will cut between the various other Reapers primarily Deathcos caretakers Madame M the Queen of Reapers and her personal getaway driver Li. Madame M has eaten herself into severe obesity and Li is a masochist who absolutely despises Deathco. Theres no wholesome nuclear family dynamic here. Madame M supplies Deathco with her tools of trade while Li has to rescue Deathco after she completes her mission. The only thing Madame M seeks in Deathco is the shallowness of her soul and her skills as a Reaper. Deathco as a character has no real motivation aspirations or actual goals outside of just killing other highly trained murderers. She is nothing more than an attack dog looking for a quick rush of euphoria before losing it and going after the next target sent her way. 220https://64.media.tumblr.com/bc955b740ce6cbf63ab389a96b1e0f18/747e4682326990bb82/s540x810/3a988ed6767766fc9d400eac3bcd16dabecd0a0e.png Every line of dialogue that comes out of Deathcos mouth is a lie but the one thing she does honestly love is killing. Many of the Reapers in the story like to pretty up their reasons for being killers. Either for money in order to survive in the world a desire to hone ones own skill or kill out of some twisted vision of justice but those are all just excuses. The only reason you would become a Reaper dressing up in a tacky Halloween costume is because you want to murder someone. Sadly for the reapers a grand majority of them end up dying before they can truly realize what they want out of life. And what do people want in life? We all live hoping to find the answer to that before we expire from this world but since few can truly find that answer we just live hoping to have some fun and get some quick thrills. Deathco isnt a long read. It provides its cheap and quick thrills for you but with the writing characters and artwork youve got something that really stands out far and beyond most other manga.