Monsters: Unedited Audio and Recording Notes

Manga Details

• Author: Eiichiro Oda
• Author’s other works:
  • Lmao
• Run dates: October 30, 1994
• Chapters/Volumes: 45 pages

About the Manga

• Plot
  • Ryuma is a wandering samurai crawling through the desert dying of thirst until he is found by Flare, a young girl who works at a tavern. She feeds him, putting the samurai in her debt despite her own protests. Years ago Flare was saved from her destroyed town by the noble swordsman Cyrano when a dragon attacked. Although Cyrano was able to defeat the dragon she was the only survivor. He’s currently at her tavern and is delighted to see her well, but unfortunately his sheath touches Ryuma’s, which means they must duel to the death. Ryuma loses and is spared but not before he slices a solid copper statue in half.
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  • Ryuma speaks to one of the bartenders who recounts the story of how Cyrano defeated the dragon and saved Flare, saying that Cyrano must be second only to the great swordsman king. Ryuma says he wants to fight the king one day but doesn’t know what he looks like. Ryuma leaves but when a shitty swordsman named D.R. Knocks sheathes with him he gets ready for a challenge, only for D.R. To pretend to have been stabbed by him. This gets the townsfolk’s attention who see D.R. Pull out a dragon’s horn which can be used to control and summon dragons, which he does before breaking it. The townsfolk freak out, blaming Ryuma and evacuating, except for Cyrano, Ryuma, and Flare who refuse to leave for Cyrano’s sake.
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  • Flare is furious at Ryuma until she spots Cyrano looting the town with D.R. He does the bad guy thing where he loudly describes how he caused the dragon massacre years ago and actually directly stabbed Flares parents. He only saved her for clout. Ryuma hops in and defeats Cyrano in a sword duel but D.R. Reveals that while the previous horn was a fake, he does have the real one and blows it, summoning a dragon for realsies. Ryuma just slices it’s head off though and leaves town. The people return and the bartender suddenly remembers that the king of swordsmen’s name is Ryuma and that the title of king was given to him by people he saved after he left so he probably has no idea that it was him
• Characters
  • Ryuma
    • Yep the one from OP as well
    • Very honorable
    • Takes his sword seriously
    • Actually the swordsman king but doesn’t know it
  • Cyrano
    • Master swordsman
      • Proto mihawk?
    • Thief
    • Sidekick is D.R.
  • Flare
    • Runs the tavern
    • Village destroyed by dragon
    • Nice girl but strict - proto nami but not greedy

Why it failed

• Panelling is very plain
• The explanation panels are always kind of lame
• The plot is kind of lazy done to get to the action, it really doesn’t breathe at all with the dragons horn like yes I get it’s supposed to feel frantic
• Art can be a bit undetailed
• I wish it had better conveyed a dragon is actually coming like show it responding to the horn
• I get the dragon slaying panel is cool but the logic of it is weird he’s head on but cuts the neck from the side

What it did well

• I like the use of dialogue to establish relationships between characters in a causal way
• Man it’s funny
• Some very nice art at times
• Him killing BR offscreen was well shown just showing his corpse

Where it could have gone

• Lol I mean it turned into one piece so can you really say anything else
• You can really just see the OP influence like the designs feel like something out of baroque works, the whole con feels like something an east blue villain would have done
• 
  

Misc Thoughts

• This whole time I thought it was set in a proto wano but I guess not
• Flare has conqueror haki, clearly

Final Verdict

• Six Word summary
  • David: how’s this cannon to One Piece
  • Jordan: just wanted to kill a dragon
  • Guest:  Powerful full page spread, weak plot.
• Flop or not
  • If flop, what they could read instead
  • If not, how it compares to Chainsaw Man