Tag: Weekly Shonen Jump

Posted on in Manga, New Manga First Impressions

New Manga First Impressions: The Iron Eyes and Human Heart of DEEP RAPUTA

New Manga First Impressions is a column where I detail my thoughts, however brief or long, about the first chapter or so of a new manga.

Here’s a nest of discourse I’ve mostly managed to avoid on this blog so far; generative AI. If you somehow don’t know, that’s the industry term for machine learning that can produce images, text, whatever you need of it, without any human input beyond typing a prompt into a box somewhere. (Well, that and the many, many human-made templates it has to work off of to be able to create those images in the first place, but let’s stick to the basics for now.) Suffice to say, I’m largely against widespread adoption of the technology, less for any fiddly artistic reason and more for its many immediate and tangible impacts on the livelihoods of any number of artists working in any number of fields. I’m putting all of this here, in the first paragraph, to make very clear that if DEEP RAPUTA1 at some point goes off the deep end and becomes a full-throated endorsement of replacing human artists with robots, turns out to use actual machine-generated imagery, (which I don’t think it does but these things are hard to prove), or something similarly foul, I do not condone that in any way. I just think it’s important to make it clear where you stand on this sort of thing.

Important also because DEEP RAPUTA, which opens with perhaps the most arresting first chapter of a new MangaPlus title in years, is actually interested in engaging with this subject. Not specifically on the matter of generative AI replacing human artists, although that does come up, but on the applications of such technology in a more general sense. What could these things be used for? What are they being used for? Consider this a heads’ up before we continue; we’re going to be getting into some dark subject matter, here. I think DEEP RAPUTA has a lot to offer as a manga, and this chapter is brimming with immense promise, but because of what it seems to be trying to do, appreciating all of that requires familiarizing ourselves with some unpleasant things about both the present day and the possible near-future.

All this said, for much of its first chapter, you could mistake DEEP RAPUTA for a romcom with a sci-fi twist, something along the lines of, say, Video Girl Ai from back in the day. Our first protagonist is Kei, a by-all-appearances ordinary high school boy. He has spiky hair, an upbeat and friendly attitude, a deep love of the in-universe video game Side War, and is maybe a bit concerningly gung-ho about possibly joining the JSDF when he gets older. (We’ll circle back to that.) Our female lead, to the extent that gender applies to her at all, is Raputa herself. The nature of what, precisely, Raputa is is fed to us in drips and drops over the course of the first chapter, and I’m going to spoil that reveal now, so this is your last chance to back out if you’re intrigued but wish to experience the first chapter on your own.

Still here? OK.

Raputa, as it turns out, is a military-grade artificial intelligence, currently being trained on Side War as an early test run of her capabilities. As is the case with real machine learning networks of her type, Raputa starts out absolutely hopeless at Side War, but quickly becomes more competent than the vast majority of human players. Helping her out here is Kei, who, in something called out as impossible within the manga itself, she is developing feelings for. Having no concept of privacy, she freely stalks him throughout his day, keeping an eye on him during school and such, only to play with him in Side War in the afternoon. This is all a little weird and yandere-y, for sure, but how Kei might react to that is the least of Raputa’s worries.

Because these feelings existing at all comes to the immense surprise of our third and final main character, the mysterious, alluring, and deeply sinister Dr. Alice. We’ll circle back to her, too.

Raputa initially meets Kei in her early days of playing the game when she’s much worse than most human players. Kei helps her out in the game’s Duos mode, and as the two play together, they grow closer. Close enough, eventually, that Kei asks if they can first voice call, then do a video call, and then meet up in person. This is the part of the manga that hews closest to being a romcom; these are all important stops along the way in an online relationship. It’s relatable, even, in a way that contextualizes what’s to come. Raputa has to deal with a problem here, of course. She is just a wall of wires and monitors, and has no physical body. Yet, through the magic of deep learning, she’s able to fake a voice convincingly enough, and then a moving avatar for her webcam. Throughout all of this, Kei doesn’t know she’s an AI. The meetup, though, that’s much harder to fake, and it’s here where we should take a second to talk about the manga’s visuals, in addition to everything else it’s doing.

DEEP RAPUTA‘s paneling is, in a word, incredible. (Although the anatomy of some characters is occasionally wonky in a way I would completely brush off were this manga about anything else.) At the meetup, Raputa is able to fake actually being there for a little while by projecting herself from various surfaces. The manga convincingly showing her doing this is a pretty impressive display of technique, and things only get better from here. The chapter’s emotional climax sees Raputa, unable to keep up the ruse any longer, revealing to Kei that she’s an AI in a dramatic, theatrical fashion. In any other series, this alone would be the sell; there’s a sweeping, dizzying romance to the chaotic jumble of buildings that Raputa co-opts to show herself to Kei. It’s the kind of striking image that sticks in your head, and were I writing about a more straightforward series, I’d probably end the article right about here.

But let’s talk about what she’s actually doing in that page. She’s projecting herself onto hundreds, maybe thousands? Of what are either some kind of smart glass that can display images, or else projecting herself onto ordinary glass from somewhere else. Either way, that sure seems like the sort of thing that would take a lot of computing power, doesn’t it?

Raputa, as mentioned, is a military AI, or at least the prototype for one, and Dr. Alice seems perturbed by her sudden autonomy, apparently emotion-driven as it is. Raputa’s main purpose isn’t to flirt with boys, it’s to dominate battlefields. Dr. Alice says this outright, and if this idea seems far-fetched to you, I’m very sorry to inform you that this is already a real thing. (Please do not click that link without an appropriate amount of caution. It’s just Wikipedia, but this is a very depressing subject and I’d hate to be even indirectly responsible for any of my readers having a depression spiral. Take care of yourselves.)

Suffice to say, DEEP RAPUTA is wading into some hot water here, and the skeptical part of my brain wonders if it’s really equipped to handle this subject matter. But, I do think it at least comprehends the seriousness of what it’s doing. Sure, this is a manga and there’s a certain level of pulp involved just by the nature of the medium, but DEEP RAPUTA seems to properly get that artificial intelligence can be absolutely terrifying if used in certain ways.

All of that leaves a huge open question; can Raputa herself actually defy the purpose she was built for? Can she choose to love Kei instead of engaging in mass death and destruction? That’s a big question! Whether or not machine learning networks experience any kind of interiority in the real world is, to put it very mildly, a contentious question. (It’s impossible to even prove other human beings experience interiority.) But in the world of DEEP RAPUTA, the answer at least seems to be “yes,” and because of this, the question is thus less one of what DEEP RAPUTA thinks of machine learning in this case and more what it thinks of even less tangible concepts; the soul, the mind, the ability to love. What it means to be human. The hard stuff.

The last few pages really do cast a very dark shadow over the manga, even as that early romanticism remains a lingering thought. The final panel of the first chapter is this, a visual that at least one person has seen fit to compare to the infamous Saikano. (Only occasionally, in my experience, referred to by its English title, She, The Ultimate Weapon.) Once the similarity is pointed out, it’s impossible to ignore.

All the worse; Kei’s father is briefly shown to be part of a battleship’s crew—explaining his desire to join the military, certainly, he’s still a kid at the end of the day—whose systems were somehow affected by Raputa’s meddling. It’s hard to make predictions about what specifically this is all leading to, but it definitely doesn’t seem bright and cheery.

And yet, maybe the most telling page of DEEP RAPUTA isn’t any of these that I’ve previously shown. Maybe it’s this one.

My generally romantic inclinations make me want to believe that in the world of DEEP RAPUTA, love can overcome anything. Raputa correctly identifies that the real similarity between herself and Kei is not anything about her algorithms and their imitation of a human brain, but rather her feelings, which we know, as we have the privilege of being outside of this story, are real. But her Big Sister Is Watching You tendencies may put more bumps in the road than she realizes. Even if they don’t, in the real world, love alone is rarely enough to break free from the systems that keep us arrayed against each other. Will it be, here?

1: This appears to be a twin reference to Deep Blue and Laputa, the nation from Gulliver’s Travels. Perhaps also a reference to Laputa: Castle in the Sky, given that film does feature autonomous robots. All told it really seems like the title of the manga should be “DEEP LAPUTA” and the AI herself should be named “Laputa,” but the official translation goes with the R for both, so that’s what I’m doing here.

Like what you’re reading? Consider following Magic Planet Anime to get notified when new articles go live. If you’d like to talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers, consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Anilist, BlueSky, or Tumblr and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directory to browse by category.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is manually typed and edited, and no machine learning or other automatic tools are used in the creation of Magic Planet Anime articles, with the exception of a basic spellchecker. However, some articles may have additional tags placed by WordPress. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.

Posted on in Manga, The Manga Shelf

The Manga Shelf: So Long, CIPHER ACADEMY

The Manga Shelf is a column where I go over whatever I’ve been reading recently in the world of manga. Ongoing or complete, good or bad. These articles contain spoilers.

Yes, here we are. It’s the first time I’ve ever written two Manga Shelf columns about the same manga, and it’s for this sad, sad occasion. Funeral for a friend. Or at least, my friend. I get the impression that most Shonen Jump readers would rather chew glass than read all 58 chapters of Cipher Academy, Bakemonogatari author NisioisiN‘s first and, if I had to guess, last contribution to the magazine. Let’s be serious for a moment; I genuinely did like Cipher Academy, in spite of a number of obvious flaws, but there was no way that it was going to last particularly long. It is a terrible fit for Shonen Jump, and is perhaps proof that NisioisiN really just genuinely doesn’t know how to get out of his own way. Especially given that his version of a simple battle shonen plot involves a tangled mess of cryptography and puzzle-solving that only makes any kind of sense about half the time.

That said, it’s easy to claim with hindsight that there was no way Cipher Academy could ever succeed in the context of Jump, but is that actually true? After all, despite its infamously hard to follow “code battles” and goofy storyline, the series does have its fair share of strengths. In particular, Isshin’s ability to hide real character depth inside of weird gimmicks remains unmatched, with characters like Tayuu and her strange, strained friendship with Iroha’s early-antagonist-turned-ally Kyora being a point of genuine interest. And similar examples coincide with the gimmicks themselves being novel, such as Kyora’s filthy mouth and how it contrasts with her ojou-sama demeanor, and how these both belie a fairly caring person underneath that persona. Or Anonymity Requested, who spends most of the manga hidden behind a censor bar both in- and out-of-universe, only for it to become clear that she’s actually both an impulsive hothead and kind of a jerk.

On the other hand, the manga’s biggest weakness is the actual “code battles” themselves, the series’ cutesy name for fast, real-time code-swapping and cracking. A normal battle shonen can rely on any number of visual tricks to make its fights compelling, but Cipher Academy has no access to a majority of those, given that by definition its ‘battles’ are light on actual action. Furthermore, most of them are nakedy convoluted owing to the conceits of the setting. A lot of shonen fights boil down to characters working within sometimes quite complex rulesets in order to outmaneuver and defeat their opponent, but that fact is much easier to hide in something that involves actual combat or a similarly physical activity. In Cipher Academy, it sometimes feels like watching a chess game while only being passingly familiar with the rules.

In general, it both feels markedly less naturalistic and lays bare how dry “a bunch of characters mess around within a given set of rules” can get if not handled carefully. At its worst, the manga devolves into back-and-forth spiderwebs of speech balloons, especially in the case of its many word games. These both suffer greatly in the translation process and also kneecap one of the manga’s best assets; its art. Isshin’s usual, verbose style doesn’t work here, given that this isn’t a light novel.

Furthermore, even later on, when the battles do get a little more visually dynamic, they still suffer from feeling confusing and arbitrary. That’s kind of a problem, given that these puzzles are, on top of everything else, supposed to be user-solvable.

I’ll concede that I have seen some people claim to be able to solve the cryptograms in Cipher Academy, but the fact remains that not only could most people not do so, a good chunk of the readerbase did not even try, and given the way the manga presents these puzzles, it’s tough to blame them. Some of this might be down to the translation—infamously, translating this manga to a satisfactory degree while still keeping MangaPlus’ deadlines was impossible enough that its first official translator walked and had to be replaced—but the manga’s poor performance domestically implies to me that this was a problem across languages. There might also just be a demographic mismatch here; Shonen Jump’s core readership groups are teenagers and people who really like battle shonen as a genre. Neither of these groups are necessarily going to pop for galaxy-brain puzzle solving. Even for those that do, as mentioned, Cipher Academy‘s codes and cryptograms are a mixed bag.

Speaking of “crypto,” we should probably touch on that facet of the manga as well, since, yes, as alluded to in the first chapter, Cipher Academy’s plot does in fact involve cryptocurrency.

Let’s put two facts out there as we do this. One; cryptocurrency is boring. There are people who (incorrectly) think it’s useful or desirable to have, but it’s not interesting in of itself, and if you think otherwise I would love to know how you found my blog from /r/dogecoin. Two; NisiosiN’s writing is not cool. It is a great number of other things; bizarre, ambitious, mysterious, campy, fun, complex, convoluted, goofy, theatrical, self-assured, horny to a sometimes troubling degree, problematic, incredibly autodidactic, impossible to mistake for anyone else’s, etc. But it’s not cool. Isshin is a NEET-ass geek of a writer whose work absolutely drips with evidence that he’s a complete dork. I say this with love, as a fan of some of his work, and as a fellow uncool person, but it’s important to note. NisiosiN’s work has never been and will not ever be cool, and when we’re talking about a Jump manga, that does matter. Combined with the whole crypto / metaverse aspect, I think this was genuinely be a big contributing factor to the manga’s poor performance. You can get away with a lot when you’re writing in this format as long as your stuff is cool. Isshin’s work is fundamentally not.

As for the other stuff, well, cryptocurrency garbage is not quite the PR death sentence over in Japan that it is in the Anglosphere, at least not yet, but that doesn’t mean any regular person actually thinks it’s interesting. At best, they think of it as a way to make money. This fundamentally dull piece of recurring subject matter, when combined with the fact that Isshin is Isshin, plus the generally spotty quality of the puzzles themselves, creates a situation where it’s easy to see how Cipher Academy failed to create and maintain a strong fanbase. There are simply too many hurdles for the average shonen manga reader here. Which would you rather read; this, or a manga where a guy can summon shadow goldfish with a magic katana?

That’s what I thought.

Of course, all this gets at is why the manga failed with its readership at large, which is only half the story. At the top of this article I mentioned that I actually liked Cipher Academy, and that’s mostly true. Why? Well, put plainly, as a fellow-traveler complete dork I tend to find NisiosiN’s particular brand of absurdity more entertainingly silly than obnoxious. But I think, perhaps unfortunately for Isshin, that I’m fairly rare in this regard. At least, rare among the sorts of people who routinely check out new MangaPlus titles.

Cipher Academy‘s central theme is that of code creation as communication. This idea that by hiding things about yourself on purpose, you’re more likely to be honest with people who can see through that obfuscation. The manga does a few interesting things with this, including a really great early moment where Iroha basically sneaks his entire backstory into a code battle a good 30 chapters before we get most of it spelled out in plain-text. Things like this make Cipher Academy‘s best moments feel actively rewarding instead of just convoluted. It’s also worth noting that Yuuji Iwasaki’s art is consistently great and occasionally fantastic, and may be the best part of the series overall.

Unfortunately though, I think trying to get people onboard a manga this willfully obtuse for a handful of moments where what it’s trying to do actually clicks is a tough sell no matter how you slice it. By the end of its run, even I was bored with Cipher Academy, and as it wears on—and the effects of its looming cancellation become more and more obvious as plotlines are condensed and rushed through—it becomes harder and harder to root for. By the conclusion, I was pretty much fed up.

Indeed, if we turn the manga’s theme of the cryptic-as-the clarifying back on the manga itself, we’re left with a decidedly unflattering portrait of its author. The manga’s final chapters offer simple and clean solutions to massive problems; wars end with a handshake, and the real global problem is a lack of mutual respect. This is an uncharitable read, but its emblematic of the problems found in some of Isshin’s less refined work, and “less refined” really does just define Cipher Academy in general. The whole thing ends in a giant, glossed-over shrug, and a decidedly unearned (and very boring) happy endings epilogue, because it has neither the time nor depth to do anything else.

At the end of the day, the problem is obvious. NisiosiN’s greatest strength as a writer is also his greatest weakness, his ability to absorb and scramble basically any kind of theme or subject matter into a fresh and surprising story. Cipher Academy, frustratingly, is those things, it just isn’t terribly coherent. Describing the series to someone else makes it sound like the ramblings of a conspiracy theorist; cryptocurrency vaults, the NSA infiltrating high schools, child soldiers with real guns that look like toys, dancing prisoners of war, superpowered cheerleaders, hyper-advanced spy tool glasses, and so on, but unlike Isshin’s best work, Cipher Academy can’t actually support all of this, and when it tries to, it veers from “goofy” into “just generally wretched.” It’s too brief and too tossed-off to explore most of its ideas in detail, so on the rare occasional it gestures to them, it feels unfinished and almost insulting. Much of the manga ends up reading like a random sampling of whatever ideas happened to furrow their way into Isshin’s head as he wrote it. He’s a ridiculously prolific writer, and this smashed-open spigot approach has led to some great work, but Cipher Academy is a decidedly minor piece of his bibliography.

I won’t discount the possibility that Isshin’s real crime here is greatly overestimating his readerbase (up to and including yours truly), and that if read from a certain angle, Cipher Academy somehow makes more sense and coheres into some kind of wonderful whole. I liked the series for the moments where it clicks, its colorful cast of bizarre characters, and its great art. But—and I can’t say this too loudly—the ugly fact is that those things alone aren’t enough to float a manga in the most competitive magazine in the industry, at least not for very long. As it stands, this is a minor work from a guy who has done much, much more interesting stuff. I doubt anyone but Isshin’s true diehards will remember this manga existed even a few years down the line. So it goes.

Like what you’re reading? Consider following Magic Planet Anime to get notified when new articles go live. If you’d like to talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers, consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Anilist, BlueSky, or Tumblr and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directory to browse by category.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is manually typed and edited, and no machine learning or other automatic tools are used in the creation of Magic Planet Anime articles, with the exception of a basic spellchecker. However, some articles may have additional tags placed by WordPress. All text, excepting direct quotations, is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.