Black Angels

Black Angels is probably one of the most obscure Long Running Battle Shounen from 80s Weekly Shounen Jump, it also happens to predate by a few years a lot of the flagship series during that time, although it did run alongside the several popular series at the time (i.e Fist of the North Star, Kinnikuman and Dragon Ball) and was similar yet different enough to stand on it's own and be extremely unique. Story: Well the story started out pretty simple with mini-arcs that were resolved in one or two chapters, they were decent enough and entertaining and did a pretty good job of introducing thecharacters, but the story truly starts when Yukito gets his backstory arc, that where concepts of the "Black Angels" and their enemy "The Dragonsfang Syndicate" with their doomsday plan got introduced, that's where the series basically becomes a very insane battle shounen with the different wacky enemeis Dragonsfang sends their way and the several weird martial arts techniques that are worthy of being in Sakigake!! Otokojuku's Minmei Publishing Company Books, after that arc and a pretty surprising twist the series pretty much goes into a Post-Apocalyptic arc where several warlods are fighting over some important mcgufinn, the following and last arc is the White Angels arc which pretty much turns the series over it's head, introducing weird superpowers and a new group of villains the main character have to fight, and it's a alright arc, it's weird and convoluted plot points really takes away from it but it works, the ending is fine but it could've been way better and more impactful but it wasn't, but the actual ending is ok and nothing that will take you out of the experience. 7/10 Art: Shinji Harimatsu's artwork is good, nothing that i'd say is amazing or will blow you away but it looks good and he draws some incredible action scenes, he kinda was the mentor of Saruwatari Tetsuya (author of Tough and Riki-Oh) so you'll definitly find some similarities between their artworks, especially when drawing big ugly dudes, overall the art is good and stylish and can deliver some pretty good action. 8/10 Characters: The main 5 characters Yukito, Matsuda, Judy and Reira are pretty good i really love how their relationship grows over time and it really makes you feel for some characters solely for the fact you see their friendship build up, they are probably the best characters in the series, the other Black Angels are also pretty cool but i found them to be somewhat unmemorable, after the Black Beasts arc ends and some characters end up passing away they had some new characters, but the most important ones are probably Kiba amd Asuka, Kiba pissed me off at first since he was a look alike of a previous character, had pretty much the same personality and even in universe character acknowledge that he is just like the previous character who died but he did grow onto his own character and a pretty good one at that, the other one is Asuka, he is a character i liked from the get go, he had a very cool fighting style with his deadly poker cards, and he is just oozing with style, the villains are definition of ok, none of them really stand out aside from the final ones, some of them aren't even fighters and just rich bigshots, or they are just fodder made for the main characters to kill. 8/10 Overall: It's a very enjoyable series if you are one of the few people on the western world interested in checking it out, if you are a fan of Fist of the North Star, Saint Seiya, Riki-Oh and Sakigake!! Otokojuku this series is def up you alley, good art, manly and likeable main characters and overall great action that most would enjoy, this series really deserves more attention given that it predates a lot of series and is a classic most have forgotten despite it's undeniable qualities. 8/10