Back When You Called Us Devils

I binged this manga over the last week or so and I regret doing so In this manga we have the story of a "Devil" a man that committed such heinous crimes (SA, extortion, extreme violence etc) in middle school and his life and the consequences after the fact. The manga tries to tackle the redeemability of such a person when they have lost their memories of these crimes and a story of penance with the guilt and weight of them. The manga was interesting enough to finish reading online but after finishing it I cant say id recommend it. I feel like the story never reallyfigures out where it wants to go and for the length of the story doesnt really have any redeeming pay off that its worth investing thought or time into. The psychology is very base level and the writing can be quite predictable and bad with the author often giving extremely obvious clues and repetitive storylines. I wouldnt say there was ever a "oh wow that was kinda cool" moment. The story just slogs on without any direction other that the overall plot of if the MC is worth forgiving. The ending feels extremely anti-climatic and gives you explanations and continuations to things you really dont care about. The art is decently good and I do feel like it fits the story. The characters are okay but dont ever develop and I do feel like they were written from a extremely male perspective. There is multiple female characters that instantly fall in love with the MC even though he is a terrible person, and often times he has perpetrated crimes (especially of a sexual nature) against them. I also really didnt like the stories stance regarding the crimes and the forgiveness of them. I dont feel like the MC is ever forgivable and the way the story handles it borders on apologist BS. The story really seems to struggle with if we're supposed to like/forgive the MC or if we are supposed to be against him. Overall a depressing story with no real direction or payoff, I wouldnt recommend wasting your time with this one.

tl;dr: A manga that is full of terrible writing but can still be surprisingly deep at times. This manga is about a devil of a person who ceases being a devil. Yusuke was a complete monster throughout middle school that performed a long string of vile acts just for the fun of it. However, soon upon entering high school he lost the memories of the past fifteen years of his life, and comes out a pretty normal and reasonably nice guy. But it’s not like the crimes he’s committed have gone away. As such, this is a story of him trying to find some sort oflife he can accept living despite the evil of his past. The manga deals with a number of related themes and manages to make some profound statements about the human condition, but these are essentially just short glimmers in a sea of nonsensical writing. The first arc which takes up the first third or so of the manga, involves him just trying to survive not having any of the memories of his past and others taking advantage of that. There’s a mystery of sorts involving his past that he’s trying to solve, but it’s mostly just him going around haphazardly until he triggers memories. It involves exploring how he acted as a devil and his relationships with his victims. Characters aren’t fleshed out very well and there’s a lot of aspects that feel really forced. It’s also not particularly well paced. It tries to make some overarching statements about how sins never go away and how one can atone for them, but it feels pretty superficial. The second arc is pretty distinct from the first arc and takes up the majority of the rest of the manga. The core of the first half of the second arc is supposed to be somewhat of a thriller where it isn’t quite clear at all what’s going on. I feel the intent of this was essentially to make the reader question how much they trust the protagonist as that itself somewhat plays into the larger overarching themes in the work in whether someone evil can ever be truly trusted to be good. However, that doesn’t really work in context, because it becomes less a question of whether the reader trust the protagonist and more so whether the reader is willing to believe that the author would completely just drop all the progression that occurred in the first third of the manga. And from that perspective, this portion is overtly slow and not particularly interesting. The second half of the second arc turns into somewhat of a battle of wits. It’s somewhat interesting in that the battle of wits is pretty much entirely oriented around who’s willing to trust in whom. Still, beyond that it’s pretty stupid with none of the twists or moves feeling all that intelligent or particularly well planned. This also touches on themes relating to how people with the best of intentions can cause terrible things to happen and also delves into how good people can be pushed into doing terrible things due to just small nudges here and there and thus that even devils may deserve some sympathy. However, the situations surrounding this were ridiculous to the point it doesn’t really feel like these points landed properly. The epilogue plot wise feels incredibly forced. There’s hinting at it through random cuts to the future in the second arc so it’s not like it wasn’t planned. But despite that it still doesn’t feel cohesive at all. This part is the most direct in trying to try to convey a message to the reader regarding forgiveness and empathy that permeate through the entire work to the point that it gets pretty preachy. Still, I would say that it does a better job than the entire rest of the manga so I would say it works out well as being the conclusion to the work thematically as it’s very clear what the manga was trying to say. Still, that doesn’t change how it doesn’t really fit the flow of the manga at all and plot wise is full of massive gaping holes in logic that it’s attempts to write around don’t really do much to fix. The art in the manga is okay. It fits the atmosphere and type of story it is reasonably well, but it’s pretty rough and it never looks particularly good or well drawn.

“From now on, until the end of your life your past is going to constantly take revenge on you.” I’m going to preface this review with a warning: This manga has the most disturbing things that CAN does indeed happen, and more often then you think. Crimes like rape, bullying, sexual assault, and murder are all seen in this manga. This manga is about a person named Yusuke, a high schooler who is sometimes called a devil, yet cannot remember due to amnesia. When confronted about his past by several old classmates, he finds out he was a heinous person in middle school. During their confrontations helearns that he has consistently victimized and brutalized his old classmates, yet has no recollection of it. During the course of the series, he is faced with the jarring task of remembering all his old memories and coming to terms with the crimes he has done. The story consists of two acts, with the first act is with him recollecting all his memories, and horrific things he has done to his victims. This includes many interactions with his former victims, and the jaw dropping revelations and dialogue that come from it. The second act is about of him living with the consequences of his actions, with him attempting to atone for his sins, using different methods to do so. The reason this manga sets other redemption manga apart from the rest, are the thought-provoking themes that are set into place, and the several jarring questions the manga asks you. Are the human equivalent of ‘devils’ deserving of a second chance? How does one truly atone for one’s actions? What are the effects of nature vs nurture on a person? And does the past define you as a person? The concept of the pursuit of atonement when dealing with horrific crimes is often viewed as one sided affair when it comes to second chances. This manga does a good job of showing the consequences one has to endure, even as far as ten years after the main characters actions. Overall this manga had me genuinely intrigued throughout the whole session of me reading, and has a great conclusion to follow.

'Back When You Called Us Devils' is a story of a person, or to some a devil, called 'Yusuke, Saitou' who has committed a lot of horrible crimes in middle school. Some of the worst types of crimes you can think of. He, however, has lost his memories. The focus of the first part of this story is on him trying to recover said memories. Along the way he encounters the people he's hurt in his past and you see how he deals with these situations. The question 'will he revert to his 'devil'-like self?' hangs in the back of your mind when reading, adding anamount of tension. You also consider whether it's even worth him trying to regain his memories, will he be able to live with himself afterwards? The 'first' part of this story generally can be seen as a bit of a build-up for the 'second part' but I found it very enjoyable and well worth the read. It's hard to describe the 'second part' of this story without spoiling it subtly so I will not. Instead, I'll mention some of the ideas that are tackled, like whether we should allow 'devils' to be forgiven, how a 'devil' can be perceived differently from person to person taking into account their own experiences with the 'devil', and how people can do horrible things or even become 'devils' themselves when armed with justification. It's a strong story on the whole that makes you think quite a bit, has good art and includes quite a satisfying ending.