Comics / Manga

Aya Kanno's Soul Rescue: Volume 1

By Leroy Douresseaux
December 30, 2006 - 13:49

In the mythology of Soul Rescue, all angels are Heaven's messengers who epitomize love and mercy.  Renji is not like that.  He is the battalion leader of Heaven's battle forces, the "Sword of God," and he is overly violent.  Offended by Renji's predilection for violence, God dampens Renji's powers and banishes him to Earth.  Renji can only find redemption by saving 10,000 souls, and to do this, God has given him a new power - Soul Rescue.  God sends another angel, Kaito, the "Eye of God" to watch over Renji.  Kaito, however, isn't the only one watching Renji.  Two demons named Toi and Vinny are also on Renji's trail, and they're trying to damn as many souls as Renji saves.

Manga-ka Aya Kanno has a unique view of heaven in his manga Soul Rescue.  It's all cyberpunk and industrial.  God wears a head set with goggles that could be wire and cables-heavy version of Professor X's device Cerebro in the Uncanny X-Men.  Other than that, the other visually distinctive thing about Kanno's art is the use of heavy blacks and toning to suggest physical, mental, and spiritual states.

Renji and Kaito attempt to rescue three individuals this volume, and the most intriguing thing about this is trying to figure out the secrets of those who need to be saved.  Soul Rescue starts off slowly, but by the end of this volume, it hits a stride.  I suspect future volumes will be much better than this one.

5/10

Thanks to barnesandnoble.com for the images.

 

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12