Manga Recommendation of the Week – Grand Blue

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Welcome back guys, it is the 17th edition of our weekly manga recommendation series. This week, we have the source material for one of my all-time favorite animes. I recently picked this manga up after noticing that it is still ongoing. Man, I really wish that the anime gets a season 2 because the manga has not lost its comedy touch one bit even after all this time.

You have read the title; you know we are talking about Grand Blue this week. I caught up to the manga and man I love it. Before we begin, remember that this is a recommendation so there won’t be any scores and I won’t be pointing out any negatives. So let’s start.

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Introduction

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Grand Blue is a slice of life/comedy manga about college life and sea diving. It started serialization on 7th April 2017 in Kodansha’s Good! Afternoon magazine and is still ongoing. It currently has 17 volumes. Grand Blue is written by Inoue Kenji and illustrated by Kimitake Yoshioka. It is the 8th highest-rated manga on MAL.

Grand Blue is one of those mangas that you just forget your worries and enjoy. It is easy to get lost while reading this manga. The really good comedy combined with the well-placed serious parts makes this manga very immersive. The manga is very relatable in quite a few parts to me because I am a student myself.

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Plot

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Grand Blue’s plot is very simple. It is pretty much what you’d expect from a slice of life/comedy manga. Grand Blue follows the daily life of Kitahara Iori who is basically forced to join the diving club of his college. He hates water at first but, over time he grows to love diving.

The plot is pretty much only meant as a setup for the occasional character development and all of the great comedy. You don’t even need to think about the plot. I will say this though if you are a student too this manga will be very relatable for you in multiple sections.

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Characters

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There are very few characters in Grand Blue but, they are really well done. Most of them remain the same pretty much throughout the series but, you do get to see Iori grow up from time to time. The characters in grand blue have a really good sense of humor that’s for sure. Also, you can’t help but enjoy the dynamic they have between them. I mean the mutual understanding between the characters is just fantastic. This dynamic adds quite a bit of realism to their relationship.

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Art

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The art is always subjective but, Grand Blue does have some pretty decent art. The backgrounds are mostly simplistic but the characters are drawn really well. Some scenes really exaggerate the expressions and I love those scenes. Some of the comedy/meme faces in Grand Blue clearly take inspiration from Attack on Titan and they fit surprisingly well in the scenes. Overall though, the art feels very “clean”.

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Why you should read Grand Blue?

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Here are some quick pointers on why you should read this manga

• Simple minimalistic plot
• Really really funny
• Good art
• Fairly decent characters
• Really relatable (at least to me)

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Conclusion

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That is it for now. Let me know your thoughts and recommendations down in the comments. Stay tuned for more content, I have some good stuff coming up and yeah, I will take my leave here. See ya!

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