Bokurano:Ours really is a 'the manga is better' snob's wet dream; not in the least because the director dislikes the series himself. We're talking rewritten characters, reworked plots, and an ending leaves me about one dead character short of satisfaction. Complete with a tone that is 4kids level of lighter and you have quite the conundrum. Yet different doesn't necessarily mean bad, and thus the question is posed—is Bokurano worth watching?
Bokurano is 2003 manga by Mohiro Kitoh which was latter adapted into a 2007 anime with about four out of the total eleven volumes left unpublished. It follows the tale of a group of fifteen teens who after stumbling into a typical Konami workplace, are instructed to sign a contract in order to play a new experimental game. A game where you and your friends pilot a giant robot and fight aliens.
The twist is that if you lose you die in real life...because this is real life. No worries though since a clean victory also nets you a one way trip to the grave. Realistically, you're less a pilot and more a living battery. A loss means that your entire universe goes tumbling down the drain, so at least there's that. Also not getting in the fucking robot isn't an option; either you're teleported back to the machine or you stall for forty-eight hours and the universe still ends. On the bright side, there's no always-on DRM, but day-one dlc is present—so if you end up with a crapshoot giant mech, you only have yourself to blame.
As well as serving as fuel for the Ferrari F12berlinetta of the giant mech world, the characters are what drive the story. Each has their own reasons to fight in the machine; some do it to protect the ones they love, others use it as a tool of revenge and one doesn't do anything at all. What's so refreshing about the approach is that both you and the characters are completely certain of their inevitable fate. Unlike many other dark series, the work is not about trying to survive in a world where the chances of you not dying a grisly death are right up there with hitting it big with Mega Millions and more about confronting certain death.
When I say that the plot is formulaic I want to stress that I don't mean to a attach a negative connotation to the phrase. Like Eva or Raxephon (to a much lesser extent) the anime is a dark twist on the monster-of-the-week style super robot shows of days past. A typical arc usually begins with the death of the previous pilot after which a voice is heard by the next pilot. Most of the remaining time will be spent letting the viewer/reader get acquainted with the pilot, as well as giving us insight into how this person deals with their fate. While not all of the arcs got me totally invested in the pilot, enough did that I would've cried a river if I wasn't so jaded by Ideon.
So is Bokurano worth reading/watching? Without a doubt. The real question is which one to go with. There are a number of factors, but most of them come from my heavy manga-leaning bias (seriously if you are going with the anime, go back and read ch 46-48 for the best fight in the series) That basically boils down to one question; how dark do you want it? On the scale of things, the anime is more of a light roast moccaccino while the manga is more a black dark roast. Some characters are rewritten to make them more sympathetic or lighten things up a little. While the general consensus is that the manga is better, I will say that the fights in the anime are a sight to behold and personally I found them easier to follow.
Whatever the case, thanks for reading! Here's your reward.Unlike aforementioned mech, I don't run on your lives, but favorites, likes and follows all help stave off the hunger.
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