Wolf's Rain, Vol. 1, 1

by BONES, Keiko Nobumoto, Toshitsugu Iida

Four Wolves on the Road to Paradise Humans thought the wolves died off two centuries ago in this bleak post-apocalyptic wasteland. But some survivors lurk among the humans by mentally cloaking their animal bodies. One white wolf, Kiba, scours the land for the scent of the Lunar Flower that will lead them all to Paradise...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1591165911
• ISBN13: 9781591165910
• Release Date: November 2004
• Publisher: Viz Media
• Length: 184 Pages
• Weight: 0.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.0" x 7.4"

Customer Reviews

Wolf's Rain-o-holic

Since the first episode I watched, I absolutely loved the anime. The music, characters, plot yada yada. I was -am- obsessed. So, naturally when the manga came out and I saw it on the shelf, I practically pounced on it. Overall, I loved the manga too. Considering how many episodes they squeezed into one volume, I thought it was very well done, and will proceed to snatch up the second volume as fast as I did the first. I did have a couple of issues though. 1) The wolves were extremely leggy. In the anime, they were very well proportioned for real wolves, but they were all legs in the manga. (Inouva from Magic Knights Rayearth in his true form comes to mind.) 2) They cut out a couple of bits that I really liked, most noteably the last time Toboe sees Leara. (Notably to me anyway.) Also, the story starts out with Tsume's gang finding Kiba under the tree, instead of with Tsume's gang on a raid. On the otherhand, they also added some bits that didn't appear in the anime, so all is well. 3) The sound effects translations. People have already talked about it, but it really did bother me.

Great!

This book is really cool, I havn't seen the show, I actually desided to read the book to see if it was worth buying the DVDs, and I'm happy to say that because of this book I WILL buy the DVD set! So far my fav character is Toboe, I don't know why though.

amazing art, underwhelming English edition

I've seen all of the Wolfs Rain anime, plus the OAVs. So when I saw the manga, I had to buy it. I was annoyed to see that the English edition was put out by Viz, whose insistance on Anglicizing the sound effects, and even still publishing some of their manga "flipped" (left-to-right, as opposed to right-to-left) is a constant source of frustration to many readers. The art of Wolfs Rain is no less than what I expected from the makers of Cowboy Bebop--indeed, it exceeded my expectations. My only complaint is that some of the action is jumpy, and that the character Leara (a young girl that Toboe tries to befriend, but who rejects him when he reveals his true identity) only appears for three frames, tops. Viz's edtion is...underwhelming. The English sound effects are laugable. For example: in what is arguably the most dramatic point in the manga, Darcia-sama dissapears with a...blip. Yes, a "blip." Also, Viz does not allow the characters to swear, insted cutting them off mid word ("Shi--!"). Finally, Kiba's CONSTANTLY BOLDED DIALOUGE gets irratating after a while. Dispite all this, Wolfs Rain is a good buy for fans of the anime. There are distinct differences between both, but both are worth while.

Wolf's Rain Manga is great

I read this book and pretty much really enjoyed it. Though i've only seen one episode of the anime, i know the story and the manga has pretty much the same things in it. Though the differences are just some of the scenes and some minor characters. What i liked most about this was that they showed where each character gets his personality from and tell something on their background. In the back,they have a section that the authors wrote to tell you about the differences and how the characters were created to suit the manga. If you buy from an actual Waldenbooks or Borders store (for $14.99), you get a box set that comes with Vol.1, and a slot for Vol.2 which comes out in Feb.2005. I hope this review was helpful to you.

A decent, brief effort.

I haven't read all of the Wolf's Rain manga yet, but the first thing that is important to note is that this is the first volume of a two-volume tie-in series to the anime show. Obviously, since the entire manga series is only two volumes long, a lot of the pacing and characterization of the TV show will, by necessity be absent. One of the things I enjoyed so much about the show is that it had a lot of stretched out, low-key sequences used to set a unique, somber yet jazzy mood (unlike Cowboy Bebop, to which this series is frequently connected, which could be just as manic as it was depressive). Instead the manga focuses on action and, more significantly, on the primary characters of the series. If a lot of your interest in the series comes out of the look, feel and music of the series you'd be best served by picking up the DVD's of the show. Still, the manga in itself isn't a bad work. It doesn't strive to be anything above a fairly typical manga outing. Unlike the Cowboy Bebop tie-in manga, this one stays fairly close to a retelling of the series and, most importantly, the art style is very similar to Toshihiro Kawamoto's superb character designs (which was my most primary disappointment in Yutaka Nanten's Cowboy Bebop work). For its' price (only $20 for both books, when the next one is released) you get a pretty decent taste of the series as well as a supplement for fans of the show. While the book didn't exceed my expectations, it is hardly a disappointment. Also, as a nice bonus, in the back of the book you get five pages of character designs with commentary, two full-page pinups, and a page of annotations (which, thankfully, appear to be more common as of late in a lot of manga).