tl;dr: A thriller that is not smart at all, but is still pretty fun. This manga is about a forensic portrait artist named Hakaru that ends up on the run with a girl named Hoshiko as both of them are being targeted by a killer known simply as This Man. ‘This Man’ is a real life urban legend about how people from all over the world dreamed about the same strange man despite never having actually seen the man. In actuality, it was a hoax intentionally created by an artist, but the myth persists. As far as this manga goes, the usage of This Man isbasically just a quirky hook to pull in readers, and there’s no connection other than the face of the murderer being the same as the man in the legend. Rather, the story is more centered around Hakaru’s past and his group of childhood friends, all of whom end up connected to the truth behind the murders.

Overall, this is a braindead thriller. There’s more of a focus on twists and turns than in having a coherent and logical plot. The twists are either completely abrupt with little foreshadowing or build up, or incredibly predictable and not surprising in the least. Still, things move fast and there’s always something crazy happening. You’re constantly expecting twists so they’re never really all that shocking, but there’s enough variety to the twists that things are still exciting. One of the main themes in this manga is youtubers that feel justified in doing whatever they want as long as it’ll be entertaining and get them views. The manga doesn’t really do anything all that deep with it, but it was interesting to see this explored in the context of a thriller. The cast is also flat, but Hakaru and Hoshiko still come out as likable characters and that’s enough to get invested in them and the story. Ultimately, the manga is the type where you’re supposed to just turn off your brain and speed through. And in that context I thought it was an enjoyable read and I’m satisfied with it.

The art was good and the character designs are good within the context of the down to earth modern setting. The scanlation is good for most of the manga, but the translations in the second half of volume 4 and volume 5 unfortunately are so awkward that they’re hard to understand at times.