DESCRIPTION

CAST

CHAPTERS

ANIME ComedyBECK

REVIEWS

• 

  Deox

  100/100
  A masterfully-written musical with great characters and beautiful art

  To begin with this "review", I just want to make two things clear. Firstly, I'll try to spoil as little as possible, but I can't promise too much. And secondly, this is not a review, just some general thoughts and my opinion about this manga.
  Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad is a manga made by Harold Sakuishi that revolves around Yukio Tanaka (from now on Koyuki) the main character of the manga. Koyuki is introduced as a shy character with no musical prowess but with one gift, which is his voice. Koyuki cross paths with Ryusuke Minami and his dog, Beck. Ryusuke is a troublesome sixteen years old from America that made Koyuki discover his musical talent and form a band with him, naming it Beck. The band is formed by Chiba, the main vocalist of the band (who I'll talk more about it later on), Taira, who is the bass guitarist of the band, Saku the drummer and Koyuki's best friend, Ray the lead guitarist and, of course, Koyuki the guitarist and vocalist of the band.
  Beck's focus is mainly on the struggle of succeeding in the music industry, which turns out to be far more difficult from what they have had imagined at first. However, Beck also gives the reader one of the best character development I've ever read, as well as memorable moments that can make you cry.

  How it's done.

  Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad is a manga published by Kodansha in its Monthly Shōnen Magazine from 1999 to its May 2008 issue. This manga might surprise a lot of people because the first chapter has 86 pages. Regardless of that, this manga ends up being a really good experience and something you can read with no difficulty.

  Story

  The story Sakuishi presents us here, is by far one of the most coherent and well-paced stories I've ever read. The mangaka makes the most of every detail, even if it's the most superficial thing ever he'll try to connect that to the storyline and make it important to the plot. Some may say this manga gets repetitive, and to an extent, I have to agree. However, the author continues to surprise the reader with unexpected problems within the band. The reader learns that every word the characters say is vital to the story, which makes it, unlike any other manga. If you're, let's say, halfway through and you think that the author overlooked some parts then I'd recommend you to just finish it because you'll realize that Sakuishi doesn't do that. I also want to point out that the storyline doesn't take place in just one year, the story evolves with the characters and with its own personal problems and it takes its time to fully develop its characters.

  Art

  This is the most subjective part so I'll keep it short and mention a few things. The backgrounds are well detailed and look appealing, especially when Beck is performing on stage. You can see the audience screaming and encouraging the band. But what I love most is the difficult task the mangaka manages to excel at - through the art, you can pick up every emotion of the members perfectly, which is hard to do, knowing that this is not an anime and we can't hear their voices of the characters. Another thing I loved about this manga is that at the beginning of each chapter the author makes some alternative version of world-famous album covers, which added a lot to the enjoyment of this manga.

  
  Characters
  This is by far the best thing about the manga. As I said before, Sakuishi takes his sweet time to develop each character of this manga. Yes, even side characters. Even those characters that were at the beginning and because of the plot they were slowly fading away? Yes, even those characters. The mangaka introduces us to a lot of characters throughout the manga and all of them have an impact on the members of Beck, individually and as a band. All of the characters are solid and complex on their own, evolving during the story, which doesn't make them unidimensional. What makes the characters feel real are their emotions and how they interact with the rest of the characters.
  Chiba is my favorite character of the manga. Chiba is a dedicated person and has a loud personality. He constantly gets into fights, but deep inside him, he is really sensitive. Chiba is the soul of the band - his charisma and personality makes Beck what it is But that's not everything about Chiba. As I said, he is in fact sensitive and he takes it all to heart which causes Chiba to think that he is insufficient to the band and that Koyuki should be the main vocalist of Beck. This makes Chiba try to find his own path going to underground rap competitions and showing the rest of the members that he isn't only the vocalist of an indie rock band, that he is way more than that, that he has everything a vocalist needs to be successful.

  Personal Enjoyment and Final Thoughts

  What else can I say? I love music, and even though I'm not the number one fan of the Rock genre I still loved this manga. And I'm not saying that you should know about music to understand this masterpiece because I would be lying. This manga is one of the most pleasant, entertaining, fun, heartbreaking, breathtaking and interesting experiences I've ever had reading manga until now. I would read this manga countless times again just because of the last 20 chapters, which are probably the best chapters I've read until now. And I'd love to say more about those last chapters, but I'll be mentioning a lot of spoilers that will ruin your experience and believe me, you don't want to be spoilered.
  Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad is one of my favorite manga. It is so much more than just what it appears to be. Beck: MCS makes you realize that fame and money aren't the only things in the world, and if you're planning on getting them, you'll likely lose yourself and everything else around you. In the end, they are not the most important things in life

  
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• 

  GGShang

  80/100
  An enthralling read that has its flaws

  I went into Beck thinking that it was going to be just another 'run of the mill' music series about a group of no-bodies eventually getting noticed and becoming famous... and I wasn't wrong. A lot of the plot points in Beck can be guessed from an initial viewing of its description but that's not to say that it is bad. Far from it, I believe that Beck does prove to be a really strong story, albeit with a few flaws here and there. And let me tell you why

  With every aspect of the story of Beck I find myself seeing problems yet ultimately deciding that they don't necessarily ruin my experience with the story. Take the plot for instance: the band gets a show, people start to notice, they get booked for another show but then problems occur. They then overcome these problems and put on a good show, and the process repeats itself. It's simple and straight forward, but in a lot of ways I feel like I should get tired of it by the third or fourth arc of the story. Yet why didn't I? Well I think the reason is because there is a lot more complexity lying beneath the plot than you might notice at first. A big contributor to this is the fact that while the conflict and resolution remain mostly the same from arc to arc, the path up to the climax shifts each time. Beck uses the character development moments of the lead characters to create the problems so the climax of each arc feels genuinely unique when reading. Beck is also great at upping the ante with each consecutive gig in a realistic way. People the band have clashed with in the beginning of the story exercise their force later on down the line so that the more popular Beck gets, the more backlash the industry has against them. Every surprise blessing the band is able to come by there is an equally strong curse to meet them. And all of it comes to a head near the ending of the story, which is where I think Beck really shines. This is a story that starts off slow but becomes better and better the longer you read on. And here's an underrated part of the story that I think should gain a lot of credit: the balance between serious drama and comedic relief is done very well here. This also goes a long way towards making the story feel fresh.
  Now that's not to say that the plot of Beck was perfect. There were quite a few plot threads that felt very unfulfilling throughout the story. These pertain mostly to anything relating to romance and with the relationship the band has with their peers. In a lot of ways I feel like the mangaka didn't want to add any romance but was kinda forced to do so with how poorly a lot of was done. And while the mangaka tried to make it feel like there was a strong sense of camaraderie amongst bands, it never really felt that way unfortunately. These ultimately were all just side plots for the main story but it would have been nice to see them come into fruition more. Also, an even bigger fault with this manga is that so many conflicts get resolved really quickly. This is, once again, especially true for anything involving romance. Some things, like the idea of family, are mentioned frequently but are never really talked about either, which is once again just a little disappointing. If you aren't going to develop plot threads then don't introduce them and throw them out moments later.

  The thing that I find myself most puzzled by is the character writing in this manga. On one hand I really enjoyed how the characters meshed within the story, with each having their own history, goals and relationships both inside and outside the group, but on the other hand I'm hesitant to say that I'll remember any one of them in the near future. I think the best example to explain this confusion I have is Taira, the bass player. I like the way he is introduced and shown to be a natural leader without anyone explicitly saying that he has these types of skills. He frequently takes charge when the band runs into trouble, he goes to learn new skills the band needs on his own and he is consistently there when some other characters aren't. And I honestly really enjoy that type of characterization. But the thing is, I don't think he's that interesting since I feel that he never grew as a character. If you look at the Taira from chapter 20 and the Taira from chapter 100, I'm not sure if I could tell you anything different about them. I don't know any characteristics about him other than that he's a groovy bass player, that he's a leader and that he likes the band. He gets some more character development in literally the last chapter of the manga and that's about all I can remember. And this goes for a lot of the characters. Yukio, our main, and Chiba, the singer, are exempt from this criticism though (and maybe Ryusuke). I think they both have really nice character arcs of change truly become multi-dimensional. This criticism may just be a me thing though, so if you don't put strong character development on a pedestal then you'll be fine with this manga.
  A slightly bigger problem I have with the manga is the characterization of the antagonists. I've always believed that antagonists that are evil just to be evil tend to be pretty lacking in general, and the main antagonist and his lackeys are basically just this. It's unfortunate that this is the case, since Leon was showing signs of being a good, multi-dimensional villain.
  Just another small thing about characters though, I'm kinda sad that they don't use Maho more in the story. She's supposed to be the girlfriend of the main character and she doesn't do anything except for causing useless romance drama and occasionally showing up to shows. It's a shame but what can you do.

  Everything else about Beck was fine to good though. The art was kinda weird for me to look at at first but I got used to the style later on and the pacing is pretty on point for the most part. The references are on point, the comedy usually lands and it is thematically consistent. I didn't really touch on themes here because there isn't much to talk about really (they're what you would expect). This is also the music manga that had me the most invested into any performance scene through it's dynamic artwork when compared to other music manga.

  So if I were to sum up how I feel about Beck, I'd probably say that it is a manga that can easily get me invested, but struggles to have staying power in my mind. I was sucked into everything that was going on in the moment, but when I step back from it I don't foresee myself reminiscing upon this manga.
  So is this manga good? Yeah.
  Should you go read it? If you want a fun experience, then sure.
  Will I be recommending this to my friends or rereading it anytime soon? Probably not, but don't let that stop you from having a good time.

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• 

  dopeykun

  85/100
  A new addition to my favorites, with a few things that I hate. (Non-spoiler review plus rant)

  Non-Spoilers

  Beck is an amazing and very fun manga from the get-go. The story is as simple as it gets. Guy learns guitar to impress his crush. It then evolves into a story about teenagers exploring their love for playing music.

  It's a really funny manga, especially early on when we haven't gotten into the meat of the story yet. The comedy helps in getting you hooked into the story. One thing I really liked about Beck was how grounded the characters were. Many of the scenes felt real, especially when depicting the struggles of an indie band.

  Some people might be turned off by a music-centered manga. Obviously, being a manga, you can't really listen to the music. This doesn't really bother me. I can just imagine them to be playing whatever I want. This made it easier for me to buy into people's reactions towards their music, as I couldn't form my own opinions on them. I found that when I actually listened to the music from the anime, I found myself a bit underwhelmed. Plus, the musical performances were always so well-drawn in the manga that you could basically imagine what it must actually be like to be there.

  Oddly enough, despite being a fan of rock music and even having played in bands, my favorite aspect of the manga isn't really the music. The thing that got me most invested was the relationship between Koyuki and his eventual significant other (I won't say the name as Koyuki is faced with a few love interest options early on). The romance isn't particularly special, but it felt very real and grounded. I could easily see myself in many of their interactions, and I found myself extremely invested in their relationship. I got so invested that I would silently scream every time a wrench was thrown into their relationship.

  There are some negatives too though. It suffers from a few common 2000's manga tropes. Notably, the abundance of shots focussing on certain female body parts. I didn't mind it too much early on, especially when it's from Koyuki's point of view as there was focus on him being a regular horny teenager during the early parts of the story. It does get annoying sometimes. It's just par for the course I guess for many manga especially from this era.

  The manga also has some plot points and characters that just don't work. Some plot points are just not interesting or fun. They don't even affect the main plot. There's a character or a plot point that appears briefly every once in a while that feel really out of place. It's only after a few chapters that you figure out why they kept focussing on a particular character, and sometimes the pay off would be underwhelming. Some characters just disappear after they served their purpose for a particular plot point. This felt very weird, since they would sometimes to be built up to seem more important.

  Overall, I think Beck could have been trimmed down a bit. In exchange, more focus could have been given to the development of the main characters. Nonetheless, I think It's a very good manga and has quickly become one of my favorites.

  ---

  Spoiler-y Rant

  Despite enjoying the manga a lot (or maybe because I enjoyed it so much), I have a few grievances which I can't really talk about at length without spoiling the story.

  The uninteresting subplot I mentioned earlier was Saitou and Momoko's relationship. Honestly I thought that should have just ended when they got engaged. Afterwards maybe we could see them together every now and then. But no, the manga decides to have Momoko cheat on him, which they drag out over several chapters by the way. And it just kinda temporarily ends when Saitou finds out. They don't even have a confrontation. Then later on she comes back and reveals that she had been bad-mouthing him by spreading rumors that he was peeping on middle school girls? Bitch what? It seemed like the manga wanted me to root for them to get together but I just couldn't. What the fuck's wrong with Momoko?

  This subplot reaches its climax when Saitou interrupts Momoko's wedding and they kiss in the pool. Again, I was not really rooting for them. Aside from that, we already had a power couple with a lot of drama and passion that I was more invested in. If the manga really wanted to explore romance outside of Koyuki and Maho, they could have just gone with Saku and Hiromi. Maybe we could see a contrast between the drama of Koyuki and Maho's relationship, and the stability of Saku and Hiromi's.

  This might seem like a weird comparison, but I think Friends did this well. We had Ross and Rachel's relationship which had a lot of heat and drama, and we had Monica and Chandler who were more stable and cozy. I think it would have been great to take a breather from Koyuki and Maho's drama by showing Saku and Hiromi's comfier relationship.

  Another thing that annoyed me was how the manga tended to spread out certain plot points too much. During the whole England tour, when there was so much drama between Koyuki and Maho, I just couldn't care less about anything else that was happening. Like I said, I was most invested in their relationship. I hated seeing other plot points play out while I was aching to see what happens next with them. I was just praying to God, Satan and anyone else who'd listen that these two would make it through everything.

  Building off of this point, the manga loves to throw wrenches into Koyuki and Maho's relationship. At times, it felt like I was being punished for being so invested. The moment Maho leaves foe England suddenly another girl shows up? Fuck off! I jus kept on hoping that Koyuki wouldn't do anything stupid. That girl (I cant remember her name) was just so unnecessary. She even completely disappears after serving her purpose of getting Maho jealous. This manga loves to tease (or in my case, torture) the reader with love triangles and I fucking hated it.

  Being so invested in the romance, my favorite character was Maho. Though my grievance with her is that she didn't really had much to do or had much development outside of her relationship with Koyuki. Earlier in the manga, it seemed that she was gonna go places. We see her singing in a venue, and then as a model. I understand that she didn't really want to go through with either of those things, but I wish we could have found out what she did want to do. I mean, she was going to England to study. What for? What are her dreams? What does she want to do? It's really weird that we don't really get to know any of that. Her only real role in the story is to be Koyuki's love interest and I think that's a huge disservice to such a fun character.

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