Another popular question in my room is “what is your favourite anime” but truth be told I actually read a hell of a lot more manga. My favourites fluctuate a lot, depending if it’s an on-going scanlation with weekly/monthly chapter releases or if it’s already completed and I’ve already read it. Psyren has been completed for a while now, and full english translated chapters available online. I’m currently re-reading it.
Pysren comes under the category “Shounen” which basically means it’s a boy’s manga. Generally these will be action based, with fighting and a male lead. Romance is often a small side part of shounen stories, and the biggest running theme I’ve noticed in shounen is that the story revolves around the main character “getting stronger” often referring to his fighting abilities.
In this sense, Pysren follows the same story pattern. Our main character Ageha Yoshina is your (fairly) normal high school boy, living alone with his sister. He goes to school and notices this one girl, as high school boys do, and one day she asks for him to “save her” before mysteriously disappearing. Around the same time urban legends have surfaced about “Pysren” a so called-paradise lead by Nemisis Q. A reward of 500 million Yen has been placed to anyone was a “calling card” the key to getting to Pysren.
As you might expect Ageha manages to get his hands on one of the calling cards, and comes face to face with Nemisis Q himself. He is transported to an unknown and hostile land where he find his lady friend, before both are thrown into a battle of survival. And thus the Pysren games begins.
Or at least, that’s the easy plot summery. The story is much more indepth and questions about this mysterious Pysren world and the powers they develop from entering it mount up, before their real mission is revealed. The manga is gripping, and whilst the characters are very cliched, they are also very likeable. The complex story line lends itself to keeping audiences interested and the predictable main characters make you grow attached to the story on an emotional level (sort of).
For those of you who like sci-fi, fantasy, apocalyptic story lines Pysren is a very interesting take on things. The art style is also very traditional shounen, not to overwhelming with the monsters or the special effects or anything like that! Also since the story is complete it’s a good one for any manga novices to try and get into, just remember you’r reading from right to left!
If anyone has read it then please feel free to start a discussion about it in one of my room shows!!!