I strongly disagree. You can feel how quickly the axe dropped on the whole thing. Way too much left undeveloped and unanswered, they barely gave any of the characters a send off.
Adriana is barely even a character. They JUST met her, and the entirety of her story is: I can get you out of here, can we trust you, maybe but it's kinda dubious, okay here's the boat, I guess we could, okay we're out, byeee!
What's the deal with Seiran? Who even was that guy at the end? We don't even get to see how that fight played out or hear about it? Alright. But what about the OTHER guy she fought just before that, Onsou? We never see him again after he swims off after the boat. Those guys look similar, are they related at all? Probably. Seiran mentions something about him being here because he's "monitoring that thing." But we'll never know. We don't even know whether or not she lived. We see her standing there looking at the sky, but we don't know whether she suffered mortal wounds from that fight we never saw. She said she lost to the guy before, so it's quite possible.
What about Yakko? She didn't have too much development, just a bit of backstory about why she is the way that she is, but she never got to have her moment, and damn near disappeared from the story entirely towards the end. She still refers to Akari as Onee-chan in the conclusion, so I guess she's never getting fixed.
Nia, similar story as Yakko. We get a little backstory on her, we learn that she's possibly unable to distinguish what's real and what isn't, a lot of the story is driven by her connection to Reidrich, yet in the story conclusion she has exactly zero interaction or resolution with Reidrich. We don't know what to trust about her character and we're just left with a bunch of speculation. Last we see her she's just off riding with Shin somewhere. Why are they still together? Who knows. Probably because they couldn't fit her in anywhere else.
Shin is probably the most complete character. She got to have a bit of an arc, she was present and active throughout, I think there were definitely more to do with her, but probably the most satisfying character overall.
Except for Natasha. I'd say she had a pretty definitive resolution to her story.
Akari never really had the character progression you would expect. He never got to actually do or contribute much to their escape, and his growth is quite flat, especially towards the end. There was clearly supposed to be a moment at some point about him being discovered by the girls to be a man. Otherwise this point of potential conflict really has no purpose because you could've just written him as a girl, and virtually nothing would've changed. But instead there's just this huge wedge looming over them the whole time that never gets driven in.
Then there's problems with the overall story beyond the characters because of the axe. Like, why even bother with the second boat? Basically nothing subtantial happens between them missing the first boat and reaching the second one. They meet Adirana. Whose only purpose in the story is... She has a boat. Okay. You might as well have let them jack that first one and conclude it there.
The main premise of the story, the damn title, is also left discarded. "The seven death row prisoners who survive the 'Killing' will receive amnesty from the country." Okay, so. Clearly this is set up for our cast to be the ones to survive, receive that amnesty and get out. We never see the end of the Killing though, they just escape. So who were the seven characters that would get out even? Presumably: Akari, (Would he even count? He's not actually a prisoner, so it's hard to say. He could just slip off by himself at the end. Maybe they'd just give him amnesty for the crime of breaking into the prison or whatever.) Shin, Yakko, Seiran, Nia, Adriana(?), and... Some seventh character we never met, since Natasha's probably not going home anytime soon. (Unless there's some insane reveal somehow later.) Then possibly an eigth character beyond that which we also never met depending on if Akari is counted among the seven. Then possibly a NINTH character which we ALSO didn't meet in case they had some betrayal arc for Adriana planned that never came to be. Potentially EVEN MORE. Who knows, someone might get killed off along the way.
Everything after they escaped the island was extremely rushed as well. "Oh, suddenly, here's this senator that's been poofed into existence we got out somehow because of the data! Aaand, the warden totally flipped on Reidrich who had him quite firmly under his thumb the whole time. Aaand Reidrich I guess was the guy that Akari was trying to expose the whole time." Which I guess makes sense, but Akari never has any interactions with him beforehand, never namedrops him, and only refers to a vague "elite politician". Would've assumed Reidrich was more just the antagonist of Nia's story, and Akari's whole deal was happening with someone else. But maybe they didn't have enough time to write Akari's antagonist so they quickly rolled Reidrich into his right at the end as well. Does the warden get a punishment? He was kinda the antagonist the whole time and showed himself to be an unnessecarily cruel pile of garbage, even in situations that have nothing to do with Reidrich pressuring him into action. Who knows.
Wait, did we ever even learn the real name of "Akari"? I may have missed it but I don't think we did, all I remember is that Akari is the name of his sister which he used to pretend to be a girl. And their last name is apparently Claus, which seems a bit weird when the sister is named Akari. Are they half-Japanese or something? And who the hell was Peter? He appeared for a total of 2 panels alongside "Akari's" sister and he got a name. But the MC? Completely nameless.
What's the deal with Seiran? Who even was that guy at the end? We don't even get to see how that fight played out or hear about it? Alright. But what about the OTHER guy she fought just before that, Onsou? We never see him again after he swims off after the boat. Those guys look similar, are they related at all? Probably. Seiran mentions something about him being here because he's "monitoring that thing." But we'll never know. We don't even know whether or not she lived. We see her standing there looking at the sky, but we don't know whether she suffered mortal wounds from that fight we never saw. She said she lost to the guy before, so it's quite possible.
What about Yakko? She didn't have too much development, just a bit of backstory about why she is the way that she is, but she never got to have her moment, and damn near disappeared from the story entirely towards the end. She still refers to Akari as Onee-chan in the conclusion, so I guess she's never getting fixed.
Nia, similar story as Yakko. We get a little backstory on her, we learn that she's possibly unable to distinguish what's real and what isn't, a lot of the story is driven by her connection to Reidrich, yet in the story conclusion she has exactly zero interaction or resolution with Reidrich. We don't know what to trust about her character and we're just left with a bunch of speculation. Last we see her she's just off riding with Shin somewhere. Why are they still together? Who knows. Probably because they couldn't fit her in anywhere else.
Shin is probably the most complete character. She got to have a bit of an arc, she was present and active throughout, I think there were definitely more to do with her, but probably the most satisfying character overall.
Except for Natasha. I'd say she had a pretty definitive resolution to her story.
Akari never really had the character progression you would expect. He never got to actually do or contribute much to their escape, and his growth is quite flat, especially towards the end. There was clearly supposed to be a moment at some point about him being discovered by the girls to be a man. Otherwise this point of potential conflict really has no purpose because you could've just written him as a girl, and virtually nothing would've changed. But instead there's just this huge wedge looming over them the whole time that never gets driven in.
Then there's problems with the overall story beyond the characters because of the axe. Like, why even bother with the second boat? Basically nothing subtantial happens between them missing the first boat and reaching the second one. They meet Adirana. Whose only purpose in the story is... She has a boat. Okay. You might as well have let them jack that first one and conclude it there.
The main premise of the story, the damn title, is also left discarded. "The seven death row prisoners who survive the 'Killing' will receive amnesty from the country." Okay, so. Clearly this is set up for our cast to be the ones to survive, receive that amnesty and get out. We never see the end of the Killing though, they just escape. So who were the seven characters that would get out even? Presumably: Akari, (Would he even count? He's not actually a prisoner, so it's hard to say. He could just slip off by himself at the end. Maybe they'd just give him amnesty for the crime of breaking into the prison or whatever.) Shin, Yakko, Seiran, Nia, Adriana(?), and... Some seventh character we never met, since Natasha's probably not going home anytime soon. (Unless there's some insane reveal somehow later.) Then possibly an eigth character beyond that which we also never met depending on if Akari is counted among the seven. Then possibly a NINTH character which we ALSO didn't meet in case they had some betrayal arc for Adriana planned that never came to be. Potentially EVEN MORE. Who knows, someone might get killed off along the way.
Everything after they escaped the island was extremely rushed as well. "Oh, suddenly, here's this senator that's been poofed into existence we got out somehow because of the data! Aaand, the warden totally flipped on Reidrich who had him quite firmly under his thumb the whole time. Aaand Reidrich I guess was the guy that Akari was trying to expose the whole time." Which I guess makes sense, but Akari never has any interactions with him beforehand, never namedrops him, and only refers to a vague "elite politician". Would've assumed Reidrich was more just the antagonist of Nia's story, and Akari's whole deal was happening with someone else. But maybe they didn't have enough time to write Akari's antagonist so they quickly rolled Reidrich into his right at the end as well. Does the warden get a punishment? He was kinda the antagonist the whole time and showed himself to be an unnessecarily cruel pile of garbage, even in situations that have nothing to do with Reidrich pressuring him into action. Who knows.
Wait, did we ever even learn the real name of "Akari"? I may have missed it but I don't think we did, all I remember is that Akari is the name of his sister which he used to pretend to be a girl. And their last name is apparently Claus, which seems a bit weird when the sister is named Akari. Are they half-Japanese or something? And who the hell was Peter? He appeared for a total of 2 panels alongside "Akari's" sister and he got a name. But the MC? Completely nameless.
Man, it's so frustrating. I was really engaged with this one and it so abruptly ground to a halt. I'd honestly rather a series just not have an ending than a rushed ending. It at least leaves you able to imagine what happens afterwards. Instead of trying to tie up as many loose ends as possible, resulting in a wholly unsatisfying end that tells you all these question marks don't have an answer. It's not that the story didn't get continued to answer them, it's that the story stops there. Conflicts "resolved" and potential denied.
I get that mangakas are probably doing the best they can in these situations, and they obviously intended for so much more, but it always really sucks. Ideally, I wish they could just write the final chapters of the story as they would've written it if the manga was allowed to continue, and announce the discontinuation of it.
