Tekkonkinkreet: Black & White

Matsumoto's art style is wonderfully unique, that of an auteur, and Tekkonkinkreet exemplifies that with page after page of vibrant, highly detailed illustrations, eccentric characters and an interesting narrative. Shiro & Kuro are brothers in their native Treasure Town, a sprawling Japanese city where gangs lurk and the police seem to have little say in who controls the streets. One brother, Kuro, is street-smart, violent and protective, the other, Shiro, dependent, naive but highly intelligent (autistic perhaps). Together they face up to a sinister group moving in to change Treasure Town forever, but the real story is the strain on their brotherly bond. The narrative is very much focused on boyhood and manhood, and on violence. There is a noticeable absence of female characters, and in that regard the picture of this universe is perhaps a little narrow, hampered by a masculine tunnel vision harking back to old fashioned crime movies where women were always in the peripheral. The dialogue rarely touches upon the deeper history of the town and its characters, too, so you don't necessarily get the level of narrative depth to leave you fully satisfied. But there's still plenty here to love, and in a time where Japanese manga/anime is painfully homogenous, Tekkonkinkreet's bold, confident art style is enough of a reason to read this. I also highly recommend the film adaptation, which in some respects exceeds the graphic novel.I bought the paperback version, which is a hefty tome (624 pages!), very nicely printed (most images in black and white) and certainly value for money at under £10.

Really amazing manga! A beautifully realised synecdoche of it's subject matter. The art style is loose and full of life, much closer to observational drawing than the precise lines and tones of mainstream manga.For those who have seen the film, the plot is pretty much the same but the tone entirely different. I found reading this after watching the movie I kept on thinking about what happened to the city and the point of what they did and if it caused any change, and if so was it actually detrimental?This is great and really worth a read. A great author to get started on.

Amazing graphic novel. Beautifully presented. Made a great present but had to read it first.

After watching the movie I was completely enamoured with the story and was really excited to read the manga. It gives fans of the film even more detail to enjoy. The art style is kooky but beautiful. The book itself is massive, but it's like reading crack so it takes you no time to get through it at all. I'd recommend it to absolutely anyone because it's such an enchanting story. Also, it was delivered ahead of it's estimated time so I wasn't waiting too long for it.

I watched the film and loved it, so I bought this and love it just as much. It is slightly different to the film, but that doesn't take away anything from the story.I really love Taiyo Matsumoto's art style, it's not really traditional Japanese and that's one of the reasons that drew me too it.I purchased it because I loved the film and saw that it was a manga too and though "At this price, why not?". I'm really glad I did!