No Major Spoilers. Beet The Vandel Buster is an interesting piece of work. On one hand, this manga has been in serialization since 2002, before some of the modern gems like Black Clover that give a similar feeling. On the other hand, it has only around 50 or so chapters available in English after almost 20 years due to constant hiatus and serialization changing. To put it bluntly, this is a weird manga in terms of production. But despite that, this little shonen has a lot of charm under its basic exterior. A seemingly normal shonen world that harbors a plethora of action and potential todelve into.

The plot is very basic, sometimes infuriatingly so, but it does slowly get more immersive and interesting. The world isn’t just thrust onto you with tons of exposition or information drops. The series takes it’s time to let you know how things work and doesn’t rush its worldbuilding too much even if the story itself moves at a breakneck pace. We get introduced to the concept of Busters right away, and from there we learn more naturally as the plot begins to move. Instead of the system just being explained to us, information comes naturally as the story moves forward. Broad Busters are brought into the fold when the situation calls for a buster being hunted, that being a buster we are acquainted with at the time. Vandels and their society are given considerable attention when our motley crew of busters begin making a name for themselves taking out bigshot Vandels. The situation the characters are caught in at the given time progresses not just the story, but the world and our understanding of how it works. Each story beat (not sorry for that joke) flows naturally into the next… at least after Kissu is introduced.

Before Kissu comes into play, the story was prone to taking some sharp turns that felt partially rushed and unrefined. This is most noticeable with Slade’s abrupt introduction and exit. It gives the feeling that the manga was going to end somewhere around the 20 chapter mark initially, but picked up enough traction to stay off the axe. This also leads to a lack of foreshadowing for certain plot elements introduced later, which is not necessarily a bad thing overall, heck it works to the story’s advantage at a few points later, such as with the Vandel society and the seven-star Vandels. However it still brings down the presentation and makes the pacing move too fast.

The cast begins as simply serviceable for a shonen manga, but becomes more intricate and capable as the manga goes on. Each character initially fits the basic archetype that has become the standard for the genre. Beet is the somewhat naive, but kind hero who wants to save the world. He idolized the Zenon Warriors since childhood for their heroics and skill, and takes it upon himself to follow in their footsteps to end the Dark Century. Unlike most protagonists of the time, he is not entirely dense when it comes to romance, with a deep affection for Poala he knows is returned and constantly asks her to be his wife. The different roles each member of the cast fill are expanded upon quickly after their introduction, giving them more than what would be expected from the bog standard of shonen. Despite the weak first impressions, the development of the cast is strong up to the current chapters. Even so, this doesn’t excuse the clearly two-dimensional personalities of some characters such as Slade, who is portrayed as the typical rival character for Beet to compete and banter with. Attention is obviously focused on the main trio (and Milfa to an extent) and their development, but the lack of representation towards a proper supporting cast does cause some problems. Thankfully recent chapters are rectifying this issue, but the problem stands for the majority of content thus far.

The villains on the other hand range from interesting, to plain, to boring as all hell. Beltoze as the main antagonist is clearly the ‘Absolute Evil’ character archetype you would find in antagonists like Frieza, only much more one-dimensional due to his lack of appearances in the story proper. This normally is not an issue if the antagonist has solid build-up beforehand and a decent amount of history to explore, like Knives from Trigun, but Beltoze doesn’t have much aside from his encounter with the Zenon Warriors. Grunide is a much more engrossing villain with his interesting personality and relationship with his underlings, not to mention a simple, yet good character design that brings out his odd traits. Later chapters introduce other high-level Vandels that are pretty hit or miss. Sir Baron is a clear standout while Garonewt is like a copypaste of Beltoze in personality. Despite these problems, nearly every Vandel has a clearly defined and unique set of abilities and powers for busters to challenge, which keeps the action constantly interesting due to the way the series handles power scaling.

A huge problem with both old and modern shonen is power scaling. Dragon Ball and Naruto are easily the worst offenders of this, but this series takes a different and refreshing approach to it. Instead of going from being able to blow up islands to countries or just increasing the power output, battles are fought based on the equipment and powers of each character. Busters don’t just get more powerful with physical training, they need to train their saigas and personal abilities to combat the powers different Vandels possess. If they are at a disadvantage, then work together. The manga places a considerable emphasis on teamwork, but not in the ‘power of friendship’ sort of way. Different busters are encouraged to form teams and work together as groups, using their different unique abilities to synergize with each other to overcome Vandels. In Beet’s case, he has 5 saigas, so he can fight well on his own. But when working together with the rest of his team, the individual weaknesses of his saigas are less cumbersome and he can fight more naturally. The same with Kissu and his lack of a saiga, or Poala with her equipment.

The art is pleasing to look at with some stand out panels here and there, but it fails to bring that extra something that you see in manga like One Piece and Slam Dunk. Koji Inada previously worked on “Dragon Quest: The Adventure Of Dai." I have not read that manga yet myself, so compare as you will. The fight scenes play out well and feel developed in the page appropriately, but sometimes the framing is slightly difficult to follow from panel to panel. This is particularly noticeable in earlier chapters where it felt like the perspective just abruptly cut, but it sharpens with the progression of the series and is almost unnoticeable about halfway in right now.

The character designs feel like that out of a JRPG fantasy game, which given Inada’s work on Dragon Quest is the right feeling to get here. The colors used for each of the main cast compliment their personalities well. Beet is eager to move and fight, strong and confident with a bright red color scheme, while Poala is less forceful but still ready to go at a moments notice, a lighter but prominent orange along with light blue hair. Kissu is different with a clearly more reserved and analytic personality, and his somewhat cowardly nature is brought out by his blue clothes and yellow hair. Milfa is more relaxed and composed with an underlying passion in her darker red. Slade is a mix of black and white, being a dark loner with a good heart. The saiga designs are detailed well with an interesting mix of sleek and bulky. Thinner weapons go for the less is more approach while bigger more impactful types make use of their larger bodies to add more detail and complexities to their appearance and functions, like the Boltic Axe and Crown Shield.

All of this together makes an interesting shonen manga that, despite its fast and over simplistic beginning, finds its footing before it becomes a killing factor. Still, the lack of consistent chapters can make it somewhat difficult to get into for people. You will end up waiting a while once you are caught up, but to me, it is more than worth it to see where this series goes. I only hope it might rise to more prominence one day.