The Fable, Manga Recommendation of the Week!

Article at a glance:
The story follows a hitman, Fable, forced to live a normal life without killing for a year, leading to humorous and intriguing situations.
Strong character interactions and development, especially between Fable (Akira) and his “sister” Youko, enhance the narrative.
The manga’s old-school art style effectively complements its humor and crime setting.

I recently found out about this manga. I had no idea that it had an anime adaptation airing right in this season. Haven’t watched the anime adaptation yet but the manga is really good so I may give it a chance. I discovered The Fable through MAL and oh boy, sometimes MAL’s suggestions really are quite good. And this was one of those instances. If you are looking for a gangster/crime manga with a bunch of comedy, this is the manga for you.

So welcome back to another edition of our manga recommendation series. This week we are talking about The Fable! There is a lot to cover so let’s get right into it!

Introduction

The Fable is written and illustrated by Minami Katsuhisa. It was serialized in the Weekly Young Magazine from November 2014 to November 2019. It has 240 chapters compiled into 22 volumes. And it has a sequel manga called “The Second Contact” that ran in the same magazine from July 2021 to July 2023. The Second Contact is just 86 chapters or 9 volumes long. As for the anime, it has been airing since April. However, it is being made by Tezuka Productions so I can’t say what kind of quality you should expect.

Plot

Fable is a famous hitman. He has been successfully completing all tasks assigned to him for ages. But after a recent assignment, he ended up killing a lot of people in a short time drawing attention. So his boss orders him to lay low for about a year to cool things off. His driver will be acting as his sibling and there will be deadly consequences for both of them if Fable kills anyone during this 1 year. They take on the names of Satou Akira and Satou Youko and the manga follows their one-year journey.

You can already see why this premise to so much fun. Asking someone who has been killing people for a living his whole life to lay low and not touch anyone for a whole year is…quite something lol. And what’s worse is that Fable has never lived a “normal” life. So things that are obvious to us aren’t obvious to him. And this leads to some very amusing shenanigans.

Characters

Fable or Akira is an amusing character as is. His character development is nicely tied into the plot. And I won’t reveal what happens but by the time we reach the sequel manga, a lot has changed about him. His dynamic with Youko is also funny as hell, And again, the way their dynamic evolves is very well done. Their dynamic combined with a strong supporting cast consisting of characters like Yamanaoka, Takeshi, Misaki, etc. gives room for awesome character dynamics and interactions.

Art

This manga has a very old-school art style. And it works well for the kind of humor and setting this manga is going for. The art overall is really good and I love it. Again, the old-school art style works wonders for this manga.