Dandadan (2022)
[ダンダダン]
Volume 6
Author/Artist: Yokinobu Tatsu
Publisher: Jump Comics+
Synopsis:
Jiji is possessed by the vengeful spirit Evil Eye, who seeks to wipe out humanity.
Story/Characters:
When you saw the pitiful little spirit that Jiji made peace with, the "kill all humanity" bit comes as a bit of a shock, but there's a big ol' grudge that's built up from all the people sacrificed to the Mongolian Death Worm. What's more, Jiji has both a high level of spiritual power and a well-conditioned body to make for perhaps the most dangerous vessel for the spirit in question. Although Evil Eye hates the Mongolian Death Worm, he'll lash out at anyone, to include Momo, which puts him at odds with Okarun and sets up a neat little parallel to Okarun and Jiji's earlier soccer match (only in this case, the soccer ball is the condensed hatred of all the sacrificial victims).
While Okarun and Jiji are slugging it out, Momo applies what she learned about earthworms from Jiji back when they were little to fight against the Mongolian Death Worm. Things proceed to get really wild after that. I don't want to spoil too much, but it becomes really chaotic with the different sides going at each other with unlikely alliances, surprise saves, and more. It's quite the ride.
When things finally settle down, we get a nice big oden party and we discover that there's a Ranma mechanic that's going to be giving us headaches in the future. Oh, what fun.
Art:
Tatsu has never disappointed thus far and seems totally dedicated to one-upping himself. Not only do we have some great hand-to-hand fights in Okarun taking on Evil Eye and the big brawl at the end, but we have some amazing spectacles of large-scale carnage. Integrating Jiji's soccer skills into Evil Eye's fighting style is a neat touch. It really is a feast for the eyes that surpasses even the oden party at the end.
Other:
We get profiles of the mannequins and Evil Eye's form before he possessed Jiji under the dust cover, color illustrations of Okarun and possessed Jiji from the front cover, and a bonus comic of Seiko and Neko Baba talking about snack food.
Conclusion:
The fight sequences in this series have all been impressive so far, but this volume takes it even further. If you're here for the action, you'll be eating well, but Tatsu being the virtuoso he is, the character side of things isn't short-changed in the process. It all comes together beautifully to really close out this arc with a bang. If you've been reading this far, I don't need to tell you that this belongs in your collection.
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