Hello before we get into the review just wanted to bring to your attention that I also have this review in video format on my channel for those that preffer that format. If you dont feel free to skip this paragraph and jump into the review for those that do you can find it by clicking herehttps://www..com/watch?v=A0atKqs42jI thank you WARNING: Slight spoilers for Bakuman but also Death Note properly spoiled. Yeah. Go figure. Theres this small hill I live in and will probably die in too. Its the hill of people who like Bakuman more than Death Note its a very small hill thats constantly under attack by other people because they like Death Note and because of that one dude that keeps screaming DEATH NOTE SUCKS. Were sorry about that dude he just gets off on that. 220https://i.ur.com/rGouYLT.png Death Note is a monumental work though it serves as the perfect balance of mainstream and nonmainstream. Its a bold manga to have in Shounen Jump being all about mental games and introducing the villain as your Main Character. Its perfect because it can be enjoyed by causal readers newcomers and veterans alike. So its only natural that people were hyped to know that a new work from the duo would come out in 2009. Bakuman at first glance doesnt seem to have anything to do with Death Note and admittedly its a completely new experience far more tame in terms of themes but inside these pages the mental battles continue. Bakuman is the story of Mashiro Takagi Azuki and their dream. Mashiro and Takagi will one day write a manga that will be animated and Azuki will voice the main female lead when that happens and only then will Mashiro and Azuki reunite and get married. I guess this is the perfect segway to talk about the problem in Bakuman which is the romance. It simply isnt that interesting Azuki and Mashiros romance is dumb and it is pointed out time and time again that it is that way but its all good and well because it IS pure. They barely see each other because they want to see their dreams come true. To the mangas credit it does reinforce that they do love each other and their support is shown which helps us keep invested in them as a couple in a way that it wouldnt if this wasnt the case. But the problem is that the romance seems to come out of nowhere. Before the declaration of their dream they didnt really talk sharing only a glance or two they didnt knew each other other than physically but in their first conversation ever they suddenly became engaged. You cant help but think that its just out of nowhere. 400https://static.zerochan.net/BakumanE38082.full.719343.jpg Same with Takagi and his romantic partner Kaya. Now I really like Kaya shes a great character but she and Takagi just start dating just because. Takagi clearly doesnt care much about her in the start of their relationship and Kaya just seems to care about being in a relationship. This seems to be a problem in the girls in this manga. Their motivations seem to be quite... childish when compared to the male counterparts. Kayas first dream is to be a writer because Takagi is one cool then whe she realizes that isnt going anywhere her dream changes to just be there for the duo. Okay. Iwases whole character arc is that all she does is to be better than Takagi which she has a crush on because he scores higher than her in tests. And Iwase is portrait as someone who works hard and has talent but its kinda ruined by the fact that she does it all to annoy her middle school crush. And then Azuki which her dream is the most important out of all the secondary characters since its related to the goal of this story in chapter 2 or so Takagi reveals that she only wants to be a voice actor because thats what young girls wanna be like. Its a whim like that time you looked at the moon and decided you wanted to be an astronaut and also a dinossaur. Even side characters like the duos eventual female assistant only talks about wanting to get married. It really hurts the portait of the female characters with the best written one being Aoki which is the only one that seems to have a genuine drive to write manga. The bad thing is that these problems are on full force at the start of the manga that focuses on Mashiro and Azukis romance as well as Takagi having to choose between Iwase or Kaya not because he loves any of them but because he said the wrong words at the wrong time. Once that is out of the way and the mangas attention starts to focus more on... well... manga things get better. One of the best things that this manga has going for it from the get go is that its made by Death Notes writers. Its made by someone who not only has had experience with Shounen Jumps proccess and editorial department but one that had success with an unorthodox manga. Mashiro and Takagi are very clearly extensions of Obata and Ohba even Takagi admitting to us that he isnt that good with female characters. But admitting a problem doesnt mean the readers should dismiss it. This means that were going to experience a lot of the thought process that went into making Death Note. The manga really kicks off once we get a proper rival in the form of Eiiji Nizuma which is basically the OdaSensei of this manga as well as being introduced to Hattori the duos editor. http://static.comicvine.com/uploads/original/6/67663/2797567eijinizuma.jpg Its really interesting to see them and Hattori discuss about manga and Shounen Jumps methods. The rankings that becomes to focus of this manga and all of that. Its because of this aspect that I think that Bakuman was probably a much bolder manga than Death Note. Bakuman exposes Shounen Jump a lot and of course by being a Jump manga it probably sugarcoats it a bit with the editorial staff of Jump being all full of great personnel with great relationships with the mangakas as long as they are respectful too. But they dont try to hide the struggles that the mangaka suffers nor have any qualms addressing some of the problems that the system had. Not that it had much effect since it seems the system is still the same in 2020. Shounen Jump can be ruthless canceling manga if they dont give immediate results and cancelling manga if they stop doing results as well as trying to convince the successful authors to work on their hit manga for as long as they are giving them money. Its something thats not really hidden out of the 10 manga that started in Shounen Jump in 2019 the only one that reached 2020 that didnt start at the tailgate of the year was Samurai 8 by Narutos mangaka everything else got canceled after a couple of months. This is the environment that Ohba and Obata worked in and this is the environment that is presented in Bakuman giving it all the tension it needs as our duo works chapter per chapter trying their best to stay away from the bottom of the rankings. All the way while Nizuma just ranks on the top 5 immediately. Its in this phase that we start to get introduced to what will eventually be Team Fukuda which Mashiro and Takagi are part of and this is when the series shines the best. These characters are just great first of all it includes the best female character in the whole series Aoki but also the titular Fukuda a pretty cool dude who writes pretty cool manga Nakai which to be honest is the weakest part of this team gtfo pls and my boy Hiramaru. Hiramaru is the highlight of this series comedy wise hes an incredibly lazy bastard that only works because he needs money to survive but by barely trying he writes classic gag manga that get anime and toy and all that. Bakuman works on the strength of its core cast and their friendship/rivalry and how each of them works hard and thinks of ways to overcome the others. 400https://static.zerochan.net/BakumanE38082.full.724714.jpg From doing shorts arcs that end at a crucial period of time to introducing new rivals and villains to using the color pages to their advantage each chapter is full of information about how a mangakas train of thought works week to week chapter to chapter series to series. Its a delight to see the duo evolve too. While at first the idea of a mainstream manga and a giant hit seems impossible with each oneshot and series they do they perfect different parts that will eventually help them reach the final work. A final work that seems too similar to Death Note concept wise. Which in one hand it does seem self congratulating that this is the work that takes Shounen Jump by storm on the other its really fulfilling to finally see them write the kind of work theyve tried to write since the start of the series. One thing worth noticing about this part and maybe its just me reading too much into it but theres a couple of chapters dedicated to the fact that the editors want to continue that work due to its fame despite the fact that the authors already have the finale in mind. Death Note related spoilers About the ending one memory I have reading this back when it was being released was being in college and opening my manga reader and seeing that Bakuman Chapter 176 END note and me and my colleague audibly gasping which caused the teacher to look at us. I wasnt really expecting to end there and I got in my head that the ending had been rushed and came out of nowhere but rereading it this is totally not the case. The last two volumes are all building up to the finale of the series I simply wanted more of it. All in all Bakuman has some flaws with female characters and in the romance part of it but that really doesnt ruin the enjoyment since its not the biggest portion of the manga plus as the manga advances those elements improve as well. If youre a manga fan and if youre a Shounen Jump fan then this is something that you should read its probably not the most accurate in some regards but it does give you a very interesting insight to how a lot of things work both in Shounen Jump as well as inside a mangakas head.