Whether you’re holly jolly, a grinch, or indifferent to the holidays, there’s one thing that unites most people, and that is a bunch of free time. So, when you’re winding down on a cold night or looking for something to do, look no further than my suggestions for manga to read over the holidays!
Who am I to dictate? I’m Sho, the main editor of Kongbakpao. Whilst this site has a core focus on anime-inspired games, I typically enjoy source material such as manga to pass the time. So, get cosy under some blankets, get a hot drink, and let’s get into my top picks for this season.
Manga To Read Over The Holidays
Spoiler: they’re not very Christmas-related.
Chainsaw Man
I’m somewhere in the middle of part 2, so I can’t say much about where I’m at without spoiling. However, watching the Reze Arc in cinemas was nothing short of a spectacle. What a gorgeous movie.
I highly recommend getting stuck into Chainsaw Man if the Reze Arc hype hasn’t yet convinced you. The characters are so well-written and interesting, and the plot, fights, and interactions are so tense and hype.
Chainsaw Man follows a boy named Denji, who, from youth, was wrangled into slavery to take down devils to pay off the debt of his late father. After an unexpected encounter with a devil much more powerful than himself, Denji’s pet devil, Pochita, the Chainsaw Devil. Fused with his heart to reanimate him as the new Chainsaw Devil.
Enlisted into Public Safety under the suspicious Makima, Denji finds himself fighting all new enemies, uncovering disturbing truths, and constantly battling with his life on the line despite dreaming of a simple life of eating good food and touching boobs.
I promise Chainsaw Man is good. Part 2 is insane and, dare I say, even better than Part 1.
Steel Ball Run/JJBA
STEEL BALL RUN ANIMATED NEXT YEAR!
If you haven’t read or watched Jojo’s yet, you’re missing out big time. Granted, I need to lock in with Part 6 before reading Steel Ball Run, but I think it’s safe to put this down as an entry since I’ll be reading SBR over the holidays. I have serious fomo and don’t want to miss out on peak reading.
Since I don’t know how to summarise SBR, I’ll try and summarise Jojos as a whole. Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure has the perfect title as it is truly bizarre, adventurous, and follows a Jojo relative.
Each part is insanely unique, hilarious, and stylised, with no shortage of aurafarming, iconic quotes, drama, and fights. It’s just so peak… Absolute cinema.
Like, have you ever seen an anime before where a dangerous intruder on a boat has his severed head pinned by his fishhooked eyelid whilst the sun scorchers his sclera and three weirdos on the boat play a funky beat and do a torture dance? No? Ok, well, you’re missing out.
All this yapping and I haven’t even scratched the surface of Stands. It’s just peak trust me.
Golden Kamuy
Saving the best till last! Golden Kamuy is my most favourite manga of all time, so I had to feature it here despite it being completed as of 2022. I lucked out and got all 31 volumes this year, so I’m looking forward to rereading it physically over the holidays.
This manga is nuts. It’s hard to summarise into a neat little paragraph, given that its genre coverage is so diverse. It’s tense, it’s dramatic, it’s hilarious, it’s historical, cultural, political, war-themed, crude, kind of a yaoi, gory, and a cooking show. To be honest, I’m probably missing a few descriptors.
The story follows Sugimoto, a war veteran who is trying to make money shortly after the Russo-Japanese War. Whilst panning for gold in a river, a drunk tells him a tale of 20 Kan worth of gold hidden by the Ainu, with the only code to its location being tattooed on several Abashiri Prisoners, who need skinning to align the code correctly.
Sometime later, Sugimoto partners up with an Ainu girl who believes the tale of the gold, as her father was a victim of its existence. Asirpa teaches Sugimoto about Ainu culture and heritage as they traverse Japan in search of the convicts. Shenanigans ensue, and other bizarre weirdos join the gold rush race, causing conflict, divides, and unusual alliances until the very end.
This section is getting incredibly long, and I haven’t really explained my love for this series all too well. So, I’d like to redirect you to Captain Mack’s perfectly detailed YouTube video on How Golden Kamuy Does Everything Right.
