Dragons Rioting

nathandouglasdavis Jun 12, 2020

4

The first chapter is pretty interesting, and it feels like the manga has potential to do some fun stuff. Rintaro has Hentai Syndrome--when fe gets aroused, it puts a strain on feir heart. Fe uses martial arts to clear feir mind of lecherous thoughts and superhumanly avoid the sources of temptation. It's pretty funny. But it quickly becomes apparent (by chapter two) that the progression of the story is weaksauce. Fe decides not to transfer out of this school which consists of a 99% female population. Fe agrees to train Ayane in martial arts (because acting to try to preserve feir own life is too self-centered or something). And then fe gets dragged into various confrontations and fighting tournaments with other students. The biggest problem with these is that there is often a bit of a build-up before each main confrontation, but that main confrontation ends up feeling anticlimactic. These culminating fights are with Mell (ch. 9), Kyoka (ch. 14), Marokichi (ch. 18-19), Saizo (ch. 24), Ren and Mell (ch. 29), Ema (ch. 33-34), and Saizo (ch. 41-42). There are also many other fights along the way. Most of the fight scenes don't last more than a single chapter, like the author wanted to keep them short and condensed. Several of the fights involve powering up and special moves, the stupidest of which involves Rintaro ogling girls to increase feir reaction time. There's also no motive for these destructive engagements beyond testing one's strength against powerful opponents (which is stupid). For most of the manga, it's assumed that it would culminate with Rintaro fighting the Dragons--the strongest students--and coming out on top. In fact, the title of the manga itself emphasizes the Dragons, so it's a bit strange that by the end the Dragons end up feeling like supporting characters rather than final bosses. The clothes hug tight into the breasts in that weird way that some manga does. They like having Rintaro make funny faces, badly drawn on purpose. They also include quite a few pop culture references, often within the special moves which Rintaro pulls off to avoid lucky lecher moments. As the series dragged on, I started getting more peeved at these lazy gags--where it's only "funny" because it's recognized. There are too many characters, with new characters being introduced all the time.