Spoiler scans: Mugen no Junin #177
The next few chapters of MnJ are bloody indeed. Just so you know. :) Here's a link to the previous chapter's spoiler posting. Click on the 'spoiler scans' tag on this post to find all of the chapters I've spoilered here.
http://madame-manga.livejournal.com/114431.html
Actually, the art in this section is truly gorgeous, as if Samura had been saving up resources for this grand finale (it seems like). Since I'm not able to read the dialog and can only look at the pictures... I have to say that some of the sanguinary excess seems gratuitous. The series is getting down to brass tacks again, but I'm not entirely feeling it any more, no matter how beautifully drawn and composed the pages are.
The Shira/Manji showdown has been cooking for a very long time, and it needed to be impressive, and it is... but it's also noticeably extended and focused on mutilations and dismemberments for their own sake. We get many, many direct shots of severed appendages, gaping wounds, bones sticking through the flesh, etc., (the title page doesn't lie) and it gets a little same-old-same-old. I had a similar reaction to Anotsu's invasion of Edo Castle; it was admirably done but started reminding me of Berserk or Hellsing, which have their moments but whose mangaka can get so bogged down in never-ending high-body-count massacres that I just start flipping pages until something actually happens. I was thinking, "Less is more" about halfway through this battle even though I was looking at the chapters one per month instead of all together. If I could read the text, perhaps I'd revise that opinion. You're free to disagree! As it is, and being badly behind on posting these anyway, I'm going to skate quickly through the mayhem without a whole lot of comment...
The spectators can only get out of the way of the approaching collision...
WHAM.
Rin is alive, though not in the best of shape...
Hamburger Hill: these bad boys truly take delight in their mutual butchery now that it's commenced.
Fast upon the heels of this chapter, the next will be posted -- they form a continuous sequence.