Manga Bible Vol. #01 - From Genesis to Revelation

By Ben Leary     January 14, 2008
Release Date: January 15, 2008



Creative Talent
Writer/Artist:Siku
Translated by:
Adapted by:

What They Say
The creation of the earth
The rise and fall of God's chosen people
The mysterious stranger who brought about a new world order
And the ultimate showdown between the forces of good and evil
This is the greatest story ever told . . . as you've never seen it before.

Containing both Old and New Testaments, this is the first ever English "manga" of the most important book of all time.

The Review
The first thing you need to know about The Manga Bible is that in the first place it isn't manga, and and the second, isn't the Bible either. I don't say this as an insult - both are freely admitted by the creative talent involved. It's simply a question of intent. The artist is English and works in an English style. The book quite openly disclaims to be a complete adaptation of the Bible: it is, in its own words, "not meant to tell all the stories or cover all the teaching of the Bible, but is intended to provide a helpful 'first step.'" It's not meant as a replacement or even so much a supplement to the Bible, just a kind of sneak preview to give you an idea of, and an appetite for, the real thing.

Thus forearmed we can approach the book on its own terms and evaluate it for what it is, and not what it ought to have been. This is essential because with a book as well known and widely read as the Bible, it can be difficult to approach any form of adaptation without your own ideas crowding in about how things should be done. I admit I can't lay mine aside completely, either. As thrilled as I am to see the story of Ehud mentioned, it is a bit aggravating to see the really good scene omitted and be left with a picture of his escape, which is almost an anti-climax. Try as I might, I can't help but feel that a great line like "I have a message for you from the Lord," before skewering the evil king Eglon, deserves a fuller representation. While this is outside the book's scope, and therefore can't be strictly called a flaw, I suspect this will be a drawback to a lot of readers who have a working knowledge of the Bible. It may be necessary to ask a reader to leave many years' worth of preconceptions aside in order to give the book a fair hearing, but that doesn't make it any easier. As such I think someone who comes to The Manga Bible with little to no previous knowledge of the source material will have the advantage. And after all, that seems to be the target audience.

A bigger drawback, particularly for manga fans, will probably be the art style. Rough, lean, angular and sparse are the order of the day. I would have said that the pictures look more like concept sketches rather than finished art; and looking at the actual concept sketches included at the back of the book, it's almost astonishing how little difference there is. Backgrounds are minimal; sometimes background characters are reduced almost to stick figures. The style suits the subject matter in some places far better than others. The battles and the wilderness scenes come off best. But the parts that require real beauty or grandeur, such as the garden of Eden, the Ascension, or the new Jerusalem, look pretty terrible. I say all this with reservation, because I am not familiar with any European style of comic art, but I couldn't get beyond my original impression that it was mainly ugly and crude, yet had its moments from time to time.

In a work of this sort selection is everything, and I think on the whole the selection was good. The main complaint will, as I mentioned before, be that a good deal of material is passed over; but the other side of the coin is that the overarching story keeps moving at a good clip and the objective stays in sight more easily. Besides, if you want to know the full version of a story that gets abridged in the adaptation, chapter and verse references are included at appropriate places. As you might expect, text is used extensively, much of it coming from the Bible through paraphrase or direct quotation. When the book sticks to the original it nearly always succeeds. It's the parts where the adaptation becomes freer that you get a mixed bag. In a way I'm very pleased that the material doesn't have a churchy feel to it. This is not a book that steers away from some unpleasant or even outright grisly aspects of the Bible, and for that I commend it. And it's a relief to see an Adam and Eve who don't always stand behind things like they do in Sunday school. No, it's where the book tries to strike out on its own and invent details that it falters. For instance, it's disappointing to learn that when Adam gazed on the two great trees of Eden for the first time, the best he could manage was a resounding "Cool!" And when you see a nightmare-ridden Pharaoh cry "The cows! The cows!" it's difficult to keep a straight face. On the other hand, there's some real imagination shown in the temptation of Christ, where the devil is portrayed as jaded and bland. Satan may be doing the tempting, but you never think for a moment that he's in control of the situation. Another nice touch was playing the book of Jonah as "a comedy short."

I find myself torn in so many directions by The Manga Bible that it's difficult to summarize my feelings about it. I have an awful urge to say "It's not as good as the original" - but that was pretty much a given from the start. So I'll have to fall back on repeating what I said earlier. I think the book is most suited to readers who have little familiarity with the narrative portions of the Bible, especially to readers who know a few of the stories here and there and want to see how they all fit together. It suffers a bit from overcompression, and from misplaced creativity; but in the end I have to say it does what it sets out to do, even if it doesn't always do it as well as I'd like.