Children

Children is a rough around the edges attempt at murder-based shock value. While the initial premise of the main character being sent to a daycare only to find that its actually a slaughterhouse is interesting, that intrigue only lasts for a couple of chapters resulting in a very soulless read for the most part. While there is a twist at the midpoint of the manga, the transformation of the main character is far too drastic which kills any immersion in the story. From there, Children finishes off with more shock and murder tied up in a fairly clean ending.

While this manga is a very quick read (approx. 30mins), I can't say that it's worth it unless you enjoy casual murder stories where the insanity of the characters is on full display and don't require decent story or characters. Either that or you have half an hour to spare and your standards aren't too high, then this is a passable way to kill that time.

Story: The story has some nuance to it which stops the manga from being a waste of time and there is enough mystery to give you a good enough reason to keep reading.
Art: The art of this manga won't be for everyone, as it's of a more unique style than you would usually see. That being said, the art is still good and suits the content of the manga very well.
Character: The characters in this are not good. While they are actually quite nuanced and have some decent character dynamics, the way the characters are written, with shock-value first and story consideration second, makes it difficult to care too much. There is also the issue of simply not having much time with the characters so the huge shift midway through just doesn't work well.

TLDR: Mediocre murder manga that's good for killing half an hour, just don't go into it expecting too much.

I have never reviewed any manga or anime, so this is just a first experience. Im a Brazilian user in Myanimelist, so, sorry for any english mistakes.


How far can the gore go?

In my searches for manga, one interested me a lot: Children. This cover image and synopsis interested me instantly, since horror would be the main focus of the story. Until then, I had never tried such a genre in a manga, where suspense and plot work differently from animes. It was in this reading that I thought: “Does the work deserve all this criticism? ”. And my conclusion was: “Yes, it does, but on the positive side”.

Anyway, this review may contain considerable spoilers, so be aware of it.

As I have never reviewed here before, I believe that verbalizing is better than taking everything to the technical level.
I liked the story. The opposition to which Tooru (protagonist) was subjected marked the work right away. A lot of psychopathic children killing adults, while Tooru finds a way to escape and at the same time save children's minds, manipulated by parental traumas.
And the returning characters represented that consistently and fairly. I admit that, although it is the weakest factor in the manga, it has remained reasonable throughout the development of history.
The final part (volume 2), in my opinion, was weaker than the rest. While the first volume focuses on setting the daycare center with the protagonist, this second one already tries to complete the plot, without seeming too fast, which is a pity, as it still felt. Since Mirai's death, I imagined that a tragedy would happen, but I never thought it would involve a couple of people who already knew the darker details of the nursery, and yet, who wanted to destroy the place out of pure vengeance. I found such an objective empty of them. I couldn't feel anything about the subsequent deaths because what was in focus now was not the most adult pair, but the resolution of a massacre, practically thrown at the reader. What is saved here is the construction that history needed to build right in the opening chapters. If that was badly done too, Children would surely be a horrible and unfounded manga.

In conclusion, the manga is not the best thing I have ever experienced, but it was not a complete disappointment. There were bloody and fun moments at the same time, which attracted me. Of course, it is not possible to save the accelerated ending, nor the final objectives (however logical they may seem). I believe that if the secondary characters would take better advantage and evolve them during the work with the protagonists, the work would be much better (more chapters would already solve the problem).

Story: 6/10 - Good at the beginning, but partially lost at the end, with the objectives. It is the famous “without feelings” or “emptiness” that is fundamentally part of the work.

Art: 6/10 - Average, nothing big.

Characters: 5/10 - Weak. Some are disposable and others are not very interesting.

Score: 5/10 - The end sacrificed part of the story, but it pays off as quick entertainment (for those who sympathize with blood and psychological).

This review may content spoilers

"A story that starts badly usually ends in carnage."
I'm not saying that, the author herself wrote this, word for word, or at least what the translation tried to make me understand on the back of the second volume (Because I bought them, like any human being ). I am impressed of how honest she was by writing this, seeing how disgusting this manga was. As her first manga, maybe she could put it forward, but nope: devalued, depressed, desperate, all what it sadly deserved. But why tho? How did I get to read this and falling in some kind of traps full of despair. Why did I disliked it?

What a stupid question to ask myself, because what was I expecting? One of the main reasons I wanted to read Children was for the charming, bloody art style on the cover and also because I saw Happy Sugar Life and U-12 in the recommendations, which mostly focused on HSL. It's the story of an adult named Toru Igarashi, looking for a place to make a lot of money. After a random recommendation, he goes to an orphanage where he will meet Sakurako Shimizu, the "mother" of the many orphans living here. Keep in mind I really want to quote "mother", she's actually a murderer, manipulating her orphans and teaching them to kill in the worst way possible, passing by passers-by to yakuza.

So yeah. Let's put HSL and U-12 in a blender. Was it seriously a good idea?! Clearly not! Unless you're one of these people liking to see other people being tortured and getting their limbs savagely cutted by an axe... Even then, I don't think we could find much enjoyement into that too. None of the character presented into this seemed outstanding, they mostly are developped trough flashback. The story goes way to fast for giving us time to admire and prefers stuffing us more and more of overused clichés to pack the whole thing up, making it a much more unpleasant experience. The drawings are fine, but also confusing to see who does which actions in what time and can sometimes makes the rest of story more obvious and unsurprising with the writing. Seeing a little girl despairly trying to get out of the orphanage despite knowing that she might get killed during the process, 'cause what kind of unlogical horror manga will it be if there wasn't some kind of dark side... Maybe I'd be terrorised if it was in the first manga that I've read, but when you know the clichés, we don't feel anything when these moments happen. We feel empty. Just like the protagonist.

There's not much to complain about Children because of how short it is, I just know that there's other manga that does well their jobs in their storytelling. Go read Happy Sugar Life if you want to live the story of a cute girl wanting to protect an other cute girl like a mom/wife, or go read U-12 if you want cute girls beating the shit out of buffed perverted grown men. You'd feel more accomplished by reading these instead of two volumes of that rushed story labelled "Children".

Ugh.

5/10 for art, 2/10 for the story, character, enjoyment and overall.

This is a gore fest going for dismemberment, torture, extreme violence and general shock value right from the first pages. Honestly, it is best described as stomach churning.

The story... there's not much of story told, as due to manga focusing on gore it largely only gets a two pages or so per chapter to put a hint about this or that character's background. While there's a story progression, due to gore taking most of screen time, by chapter 8 it didn't advance quite far.

The art is average, and characters are not exactly believable, although the don't exactly get a lot of time to properly "unfold" due to most of the pages being dedicated to violence.

Overall... this is quite bad, and not enjoyable in the slightest. Violence approaches guro level, although not quite detailed, and there's nothing good about this manga.

My suggestion is to avoid. It is quite bad, its main gimmick is attempting to shock, so in the end there's nothing worth reading here, and it is not for faint of the heart or weak stomached people either.

Around a month ago, I was randomly browsing through a Discord server just looking to see if anyone had mentioned any good manga or anime, and instead I came across “Children.” I looked at the messages, and was immediately interested because what I understood was that the gore was very bad, and so I was excited to see if it was truly gorey. But, I was unfortunately only 3 chapters in when I realized that it wasn’t as gorey as people make it out to be. And that wasn’t the only flaw of it, either. So, what did I truly think about everything? Let me explain.

Story - 4, or Decent
One of the biggest things I want while reading or watching a horror is a great story, but “Children” had an incredibly weird and confusing story. The story felt as if it was just about a bunch of kids murdering others, and their hatred for adults. Other than that, it felt as if the story went nowhere else. Sure, the plot twist was impressive and I didn’t expect it, but the story was nowhere close to good. It just felt like more things should’ve been explored, such as the backstories. The backstories weren’t interesting at all, and they felt like they could’ve been a thousand times better. The story also felt sort of rushed in some parts, especially when it went from chapter 12 to 13. Of course, it was an interesting idea for a story and it was pretty decent. Like it felt unique compared to what I usually read, but the flaws outweigh the pros, so I personally wouldn’t consider it anything more than decent.

Art - 3, or Poor
Now, the art is something I personally didn’t enjoy. Honestly, if anything scared me while reading “Children” it was the art style. In some scenes, it just looked incredibly weird. The faces were a big part of why I disliked the art. Like, the eyes were incredibly big and they looked kind of odd. Another thing related to the art that annoyed me was that the character designs didn’t really fit the style. For example, the main girl (I forgot her name, but I’m talking about the one on the covers) had a hairstyle that looked odd with the art style. But, there were also some characters like Rinko, Shiiru, and the guy with the gun (I think his name was Natsuhi?)
So I believe the art wasn’t the worst it could be, but it was still pretty bad. Of course, it felt like it was mainly due to the character designs.

Character - 3, or Poor
Once again just another 3, the character development was extremely poor. And as I’ve pointed out before, the designs for some of them were extremely odd. My personal favorites were Rinko, Shiiru, and Natsuhi. Of course, it felt as if they should’ve had way more development, and scenes in general. A lot of the characters felt like they were added just to be killed, and before they even got proper scenes or backstories. It was a shame, because most of the ones I was interested in immediately died. Some of the characters were extremely annoying as well, such as both of the main characters. The two of them were honestly not interesting at all, and I genuinely did not care about them. So, I personally consider everything about the characters poor.

Enjoyment - 2, or Dreadful
I was really hoping to enjoy the story, but everything seemed way too rushed for me to enjoy anything. The gore was extremely poor, and a lot of boring and bland characters died. There were only around 3 deaths that actually got a reaction out of me, 2 of which were sad and the other one was just funny. I was very bored while reading the manga, and I just kept hoping that it would get better. The only 2 chapters that I actually enjoyed were 12 and 13, but they had a really weird transition, which kind of ruined the enjoyment for me a little.

Overall - 3
While I did go into this story excited to see exactly how gorey it could get, or whose death I’d be laughing or crying over, I instead came out extremely disappointed. The story, characters, and art were just not my cup of tea with how badly everything was done. Sure, if it was longer I’m sure it would’ve been done better, but that was not the case. But for now, I’ll be keeping my score a 3.