Manga spotlight: Claymore

Claymore, the manga, is still kicking Yoma butt and going strong. A lot of attention was focused on this series back in 2007 when a 26 episode anime adaptation was made of the Nohiro Yagi manga. Arguably, it was one of the slickest anime productions that year, and looked visually unlike anything else in the anime realm. The opening and ending sequence were beautiful and stylish, a lot more rock-and-roll-ish than you expected.

Interest in the series have calmed down somewhat these days. Claymore, the manga, still looks different than anything else on the market. No lolis, no characters overdosing on moe and not much ecchi, at least the type of ecchi that seems to pander to the audience. In an anime-manga landscape where the expected standard is something like Strike Witches, Claymore stays true to its shounen roots.

For those of who are unfamiliar with the manga or the anime, a brief recap. Claymore is set in a medieval world where humans are plagued by Yoma, shape shifting demons that prey upon human flesh. Claymores are human-Yoma hybrids, always women, and armed with large swords used to kill the Yoma that only they can pick out of the human population. Further, only Claymores are strong and quick enough to kill Yoma, so human beings are dependent on these warriors to keep them safe. Nonetheless, Claymores are not openly welcomed in human settlements because of their hybrid nature and the large fees they demand upon the completion of their extermination missions.

In the anime and in the early chapters of the manga, a large group of Claymores are assembled in Pieta, a human settlement in the North, to battle a large army of Awakened Beings (Yoma who are created from Claymores). The battle looks desperate and hopeless since the power scale of the Awakened Beings is far greater than the combined strength of the assembled warriors. Miria, the appointed leader, latches on to a desperate plan for survival. It’s at this point where the anime and manga diverge.

So what’s happened to this series after the climatic battle in Pieta? If you’re familiar with the anime, but not with the manga, you should forget that the last two episodes of the anime ever happened. The last anime episode was an anime-only ending. In the anime, the main protagonist, Claire, and the main villain, Priscilla, square off and fight, giving the series a rushed finality. In the manga, Priscilla and Claire never even meet in Pieta. However, it doesn’t make the manga story line any less interesting; in fact, it makes it better, since the manga story line moved beyond the individual conflict between Claire and Priscilla.

The manga story line now deals with the seven survivors (including Claire) of the Pieta battle and their quest to topple the very organization that created them. In order to face the organization, the survivors had to not only get stronger but also develop means of hiding themselves and the yoki (the demonic energy that powers each Claymore warrior) they possess. These seven survivors are now on a different power scale than the warriors than what you see in the anime and the early manga chapters. The latest chapters reflects their ability to now stand toe to toe with most awakened beings.

Further, the reader discovers that the organization is just one faction of a much larger conflict; a conflict in which the Claymores are essentially research tools to build human weapons for the war. This new twist and the probably factional confrontations that it will engender brings an interesting twist to the Claymore saga, posing a number of unanswered questions and possibilities.

The latest chapter is a bit of cliffhanger as well with Helen and Deneve (two of the other Pieta survivors) facing off against a former, and very powerful, opponent. The hints of the larger conflict intermixed with some hardcore action scenes has proved to be a engaging combination. I’m eagerly awaiting the next chapter, and I highly recommend this series for anyone who’s interested in a no nonsense shounen adventure devoid of the over-moeification that inflicts many other series.

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