How do you follow up the previous volume of One-Punch Man? You just keep pumping out the jams that’s how. In all seriousness, this series is by far one of the most enjoyable manga/comics I’ve ever read. The mixture of humor, action and drama is masterful. It really is. I’m not just throwing that around to fluff up the creators or publisher, it’s the fact that you really have to search and hunt for faults in this story. Even then I think the things that people would find, like the opening of this issue, are actually just breadcrumbs for the reader to follow into later stories. The volume begins with Saitama and Genos at Silver Fang’s dojo as he tries to recruit them. He explains that his school has fallen under hard times when one of his students incapacitated several of the other students. Breadcrumbs my friends, breadcrumbs. The hero agency barges in and alerts Silver Fang and Genos that there’s a mandatory and immediate meeting for all S rank heroes and Saitama decides to go with them.
Later, after more of the S rank characters are introduced we see that there’s a full on alien invasion going on and that city A has been destroyed in one attack. The S rank heroes scramble to take on the invasion, but while most of them tangle with just one dude, Saitama goes inside the ship and beats the living piss out of everyone he runs into until coming face to face with the leader of the ship.
If you’ve seen the anime, then I’ll tell you that its very faithful to the events of this volume. What it doesn’t have though is the bonus material which has one incredible story about a man trying to commit suicide and Saitama saving him in his own unique way. It was a great story with a lot of heart.
The writing from One continues to be as I said, masterful. The pacing, the execution and even how the new characters are introduced to the story is subtly perfect. The humor continues to be one of the best things about this series. I just can’t get enough of Saitama and Geno’s relationship as Geno’s gets everything handed to him and yet he looks up to Saitama more than anyone else in the world. It’s just an odd dynamic that works wonderfully for the story. In particular I enjoyed the way both of them blew of Silver Fang’s recruitment attempt.
The art is of course brilliant. I really can’t think of a book that has this perfect of a balance of story and art. Usually I favor one over the other, but you’d be hard pressed to get me to say such a thing about One-Punch Man. Even in my glowing review for volume five I may have focused on the art, but damn that story was good. This time around the art has everything thrown at it. Aliens of all shapes and sizes, a giant space ship, a destroyed city and several new characters. It’s handled wonderfully and I couldn’t get enough of this eye candy.
The only problem with this volume is that it ends just as it’s getting really, really, really (I could keep going), really good. If you don’t have volume seven in your hand right after finishing this one you’re probably going to be pretty pissed at yourself. Plainly put, One-Punch Man continues to be one of the absolute best manga on the market and I can’t wait to read more.
[button btn_url="" btn_color="primary" btn_size="large" btn_style="default" btn_outlined="no" link_target="blank" link_rel="" icon_left="" icon_right=""]Score: 5/5[/button]
One-Punch Man Vol. 6 Writer: One Artist: Yusuke Murata Publisher: Viz/Shonen Jump Manga Price: $9.99 Release Date: 5/3/16 Format: TPB; Print/Digital