21st Century Boys - Vol. 2 Ch. 16

[absinthe]

if there’s anything about Urasawa is that he knows how to write a hell of an ending.
Also, I feel like a lot of people don’t realize that the author doesn’t have to and really SHOULDNT give away every detail of the story. Katsumata’s mystery is prob intentional and adds more thrill to the story. Mysteries keep a story alive after it’s finished. It’s not a bad thing unless you see it as one.
20/21CB and FMA are my only 10/10 manga.

 

[WeebWeeberWeebest]

My first ever manga completed... awesome... mangas are so much better than animes man... I was missing out on a lot.
But I'll re-read it since being a simpleton many things and themes went over my head. I knew they were there, but I couldn't exactly point them out.

 

[Robinisback]

There's no closure for Kenji and Kanna? Seriously? They are the main characters in the series and not even a proper talk? I'm crying.

 

[Meireen0307]

Ah, I have a high expectation. But, at least my Kanna-Shohei (seems) sailed.

 

[ThatGuy42]

really cool to end this manga with the song

Bob Lennon (20th Century Boys)​

 

[Bean_Soup]

There's no closure for Kenji and Kanna? Seriously? They are the main characters in the series and not even a proper talk? I'm crying.

This is the only real element of this ending I have a problem with. Like another commenter said earlier, the author shouldn't have to disclose every single detail to leave no thread unaddressed, but the last major interaction they have between the two is Kanna's apparent conception that Kenji's disappointed in her. I waited for that to be brought up to be revealed as some form of misconception or room for dialogue, but the fact they don't address it at all seems incredibly disjointed to me- a major disappointment given that the relationship between the two was one of the core themes that kept me interested throughout the read.

 

[storkwalker]

very confusing ending but nonetheless damn I can't believe the story's over

 

[Ahab19]

Idk I found the manga to be underwhelming, so many plot conveniences or reveals that don't really matter, good few plot points that go no where, no real overarching themes I could pick up on. The author really liked doing this thing where he'd have several groups of characters all come to the same conclusions around the same time and then drag out the reveal over the next 10 or so chapters all felt redundant and unnecessary. The characters where all really well written for the most part at least, but the final battle was pretty bad, the robot wasn't created by friend and the twins didn't seem to have anything to do with friend by that point so having the bomb be set off by the robot he didn't know existed or have the controls to until the professor died was just bad. I'd give it a 7/10.

 

[its_scamer_]

Why the 3 kids at the last page have boner 😂

 

[biznizz]

Anyone know the perfect edition ending?

Come on. What the hell happened with Katsumata?

Okay, so just for the record, the Perfect Edition has clarified a few things.

1. Fukibei died when he tried to perform the miracle in the science lab as a kid. That's why Donkey ran away and why he was killed: he knew that the person pretending to be Fukubei couldn't possibly be him. Also, the fact that he would have seen through the false assassination attempt.

2. Friend is, and always has been, Katsumata. He committed to living out Fukubei's dream of world domination, then allowed "him" to die so that he could live out Katsu's dream of destroying it. He's the father of Kanna, and Kenji told us in the Perfect Edition ending that he figured things out.

Apparently, this was always supposed to have been the idea, but Urasawa messed up in the implication of Fuku's death as a kid in the original version.

 

[JinZong]

what

 

[eirianrobotto]

that's it folks.
see y'all in 22nd century boys.

 

[YW_Rokakaka]

I'm going to be honest here, this has to be one of the most overrated mangas i've ever seen. Don't get me wrong, is not bad or anything, it's pretty good, but man does it feel like a half assed job. The 2 most underwhelming things are, the characters and the way mysteries and conflicts are resolved.
Now, the characters that are good are really great, but there's so many characters who just kind of exist and that's about it, have a couple lines, do a couple things, but have no character arc or try to tell anything at all.
I also feel like eventually the story became "Friend has done something" "A character pulls out a new prophecy out of their ass" "They investigate until Kanna gets a divine revelation and the conflict is solved in a confrontation that lasts a grand total of 3 panels" "Repeat" (exaggerated for comedic effect, but you get the idea).

But I don't want people to think this manga is bad or anything, in fact most of the problems come from halfways of the manga forward, and I think it has to do with Urasawa not giving proper closure to everything he wanted to do, and it seems like my hunch was correct, as apparently there's another more complete edition of the manga that was made later and hasn't been translated yet, that seems to fix a lot of things that weren't properly explained, and even fixes the closure of Friend by confirming that Fukubei died and Katsumata was always Friend, which is nice.

Even then, I can understand if this is someone's favorite manga, there's plenty to love, but It didn't really do it for me.
Can't love everything I guess.

 

[Salmonskin]

I'm just going to say reading 20th Century Boys was an amazing experience, especially with how Urasawa intricately weaves the story timeline between the 1970s, 2000s, and 2014. Then reading 21st Century Boys, it feels like there was a lot of ass pulling going on here.

Also, the "end of the world" thing is a bit overdone. I was definitely expecting there to be no more end-of-the-world scenario and just focus on solving the mystery of who's Friend copy.