Tsutomu Takahashi - Jiraishin

How about some tasty reading? It has truly been a while. Dunno why really. Must be the times (forgot most of my sources for manga).

Jiraishin right off the bat might seem a little too "tough guy" to be taken seriously. The main character can be a little stiff and sometimes the plot might be too absurd but once you get used to this world it's actually a really fun read. The manga went on from 1992 to 1999 making most of the volumes (and chapters) episodic with an overarching plot lurking somewhere behind. The stories themselves vary a lot and some are outright absurd while some are excellent thriller dramas and murder intrigues. When the story works it really works great. Luckily for the most part it works. The characters themselves are very distant from what you would find in a mainstream manga. They're very sombre and nihilistic at times and they act out much like slimebags act in real life. The main character after who the manga is called is a ruthless murdering detective who only cares about reaching his goal. I think he's a bit comparable with the Punisher.

The setting is another very bright point in this saga as well. Artstyle is very noir like and it's absolutely gorgeous to look at with a lot of double page scenery. Characters themselves as the volumes progress from looking mediocre to better and better but at the start they might seem a little too stiff. At least that's the impression which I got. Another interesting fact to point out is that apparently Nihei (of Blame! fame) worked as an intern or something like that for Takahashi and honestly you can really see how this influenced his later works. He helped only with art though (most visibly with the buildings I think).

Overall this is a very good detective saga. It never really got stale for me despite the plot being weak here and there. So I would recommend it to anyone who is looking for something more serious and longer to read.

vol. 1 to vol. 5
vol. 6 to vol. 10
vol. 11 to vol. 14
vol. 15 to vol 19

I did some separation so that each link contains only volumes indicated, you can just download the first link if you feel like only checking this out to see how it looks. You don't need to combine all the links is what I'm trying to say.