With the upcoming release of the anime's Vinland saga, already known manga drawn by Makoto Yukimura, let's see the themes of the work and some information on the animated series!
I'll be honest: now I look at very few souls, partly because the stories proposed today interest me only marginally, and partly because of the commitments of life. To put it mildly, the last title I actually watched from start to finish was the first season of One Punch Man.
From that first spectacular season, only one other title could have moved me, and this title is Vinland saga.
In this article you will read a short (and without spoiler!) Synopsis of the manga by Makoto Yukimura, followed by some information on the animated series from it comes. Will we see the same atmospheres and the same spectacular fights that we loved on paper?
Two facts about Makoto Yukimura's manga
If you have not yet had the opportunity to read this beautiful manga, I strongly recommend you to recover it!
Vinland saga it's a seinen manga fruit of the Makoto Yukimura, former author of planetes. Started to publish in Japan in 2005, it arrived in Italy in 2010 thanks to Star Comics, with the twenty-first volume expected for July 17th. Published monthly, Vinland saga is a manga that progresses slowly, but each chapter is a delight for the eyes, and worth the wait.
Plot and style of Vinland saga
Makoto Yukimura tells us the story and personal evolution of Thorfinn son of Thors. The story takes place before, during and after the invasion of England, shortly after the year XNUMX, by the Vikings of Sven Barba forked first and of Canute the Great after. During the course of the manga, we will follow Thorfinn in various vicissitudes that will test his vision of the world and force him to confront two different ways of life: that peaceful proposed by his father and what he sees there war like a normal, albeit terrible, lifestyle.
Although it offers daring fights and often exaggerated, actually Vinland saga shows great attention to historicity of the events narrated. In particular, the manga of Yukimura puts great effort in truthfully representing the daily life of the populations overlooking the North Sea around the year XNUMX. This is largely aided by one's beauty and care drawing style clean, but detailed.
War, peace and difficult questions: the themes of Vinland saga
Furthermore, Yukimura is not shy in dealing with complex and delicate subjects such as the war and slavery, approaching these issues with a critical eye and great care. Vinland saga it's not an edgy manga, interested only in showing how life is hard and war is bad: death, pain and misery are shown in the light of the sun, but without morbidity and are always designed to make you reflect on how difficult life choices are.
But above all, Yukimura approaches these issues without ever being paternalistic, but aiming more and more to make people think than to give universal answers (a bit like Brandon Sanderson does!). Although Yukimura pursues a pacifist vision, he does not reject war and violence as absolute evil, but questions how and why people are led to resort to violence. Moreover, it never gives simple or simplistic solutions and his pacifist characters must always clash with a world in which their ideas are alien. And sometimes not even prosecutable.
Vinland saga it's a manga that raise the quality bar for seinen Japanese. We are not at the high literature level (because yes, here we can talk about literature!) Of the Golden Age of Berserk, but we are still at very high levels. Both for history and for drawing.
The anime of Vinland saga: what do we know for the moment?
After almost fifteen years from the publication of the manga, we can finally enjoy the anime of Vinland saga! The time is now ripe for production a series with a medium-high budget, worthy of Yukimura's design and attention to detail.
In fact, the animation studio that gave life to the anime is the White Studio, which has already animated The attack of the Giants.
The anime, however, will not cover a wide narrative arc, but will focus only on the events preceding the actual plot of Vinland saga. That is, it will speak ofThorkill childhood, struggling with the hard life in Iceland and with the life choices of his father Thor, therefore relying on the first and second volumes of the manga. However, come on trailer released and from promotional posters, it is very likely that this first narrative arc is only one prelude!
Indeed, for what will (hopefully) be the first season, four episodes are planned, which will be released on Amazon Prime Video. The first three episodes, in the German and English areas, were released on8 July, while the fourth is scheduled for 17 July.
At the moment, however, Vinland saga is not yet out on the Italian Prime Video, but it is assumed that it will be available one week later airing on English Prime Video. The support of Prime Video has not been able to say if and when Vinland saga it will be available on the Italian platform, so we just have to wait and hope.
In the coming weeks, we will commit to briefly review the individual episodes, as they will be made available on the Italian Amazon Prime Video.
