Yuukoku no Moriarty
Moriarty the Patriot

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To start off Sherlock, the original Sherlock Holmes stories are held true to my heart. It’s quite difficult to find an adaptation of Sherlock that stays true to the characters while also taking a unique approach, that’s where Yuukoku No Moriarty comes in.

Having a story from Moriarty’s point of view is deeply fascinating, I am fascinated both by this and the concept that accompanies it as the story addresses the fundamental problems with corruption within the upper class and the police enforcement.

For me this concept helps me draw away from my growing frustration of
“really another story in the Victorian Era?”
because the ... author is actually doing something /with/ the setting rather than just have it be that, a setting.

Despite the initial premise of the series it doesn’t get too formulaic, the characters have a deep motivation whether seen as “evil” or “good” the interpersonal relationships between the main cast fuels the story for me, their development away from their characters as we the audience knows them from Conan Doyle’s stories.

Yes, they’re different but they’re also familiar in a way thats inviting.

Along with that is the rivalry between Sherlock and Moriarty which is the most interesting part of the series, this take on the two shows them as flawed people, as humans. We see Sherlock outside his act as the “Master Detective” and Moriarty outside his “Master Manipulator” act.

It’s a refreshing iteration of beloved characters and I’m honestly in awe that this series isn’t more popular.

I like the Sherlock Holmes novels, with the exception of The Sign of the Four.
It is an intriging idea to show it from the perspective of Moriarty. Of course Moriarty is way older in the original and has not that much screentime. But I am not a purist, so who cares?

It would have been way better if they had shown only the perspective of Moriarty. Sherlock's appearances should have been something special that triggers strong emotions, like when Johann appears in Monster: Short but intense. But some chapters have more "Sherly" than "Liam".

The art style is terrible. The characters all look almost ... the same. It is especially a problem when a character, for plot reasons, is supposed to be beautiful. The characters all look beautiful. No one stands out relatively.

I like crime stories with a well defined crowd of people, who could have done the deed, and one can guess while reading. Where, after the conclusion, one will see the foreshadowing that was done from the beginning on. That is so far not the case here. The first time we see the culprits is often when they are caught.

The depiction of the nobility is just absurd. Of course they had contempt for peasants, as moderen Ivy League americans have for average Trump voters. But it is never so direct. The upper class sees itself as noble and just. They beat down on deplorables in a more subtle ways. Paternalize them and so on.They do not go hunting them literally. Atleast not that scale.

An astounding waste of potential.

I was rooting for this manga to work, really. I started with the first anime season (that I watched three times in a row), then read the manga because everyone was hyping it up... and everything went downhill from there.
Don't believe people who tell you that it's an "eat the rich" story, because it's not.


The good:
- the art (it's pretty much carrying the manga at this point)
- the first three volumes

...
The bad:
- our protagonists are hypocritical criminals who protect and contribute to colonialism despite claiming to destroy social injustice in the British empire.
- no characters of colour (despite the story taking place mostly in London, and having a whole arc in India).
- sooooo much retconning.
- there is no chemistry between the characters. At all. They completely loose any facial expressions after a few volumes too, so their interactions feel even more flat.
- the author apparently never heard of the common writing advice of "show, don't tell" because he keeps making his characters *say* things instead of showing them more subtly through the story. It's not because a genius like Mycroft is saying things that we are going to believe it.
- conflicts are avoided at all costs. No, seriously. Characters never really disagree. Everyone can be talked out of their bad beliefs (unless they're a mustache twirling villain without any redeeming quality who is just here to get killed off).
- the "main villain" of the series is a complete idiot, which completely ruins any tension the manga had left for its climax arc.
- absurdly unrealistic despite being a crime/mystery story. The number of things you have to ignore to have the plot "make sense" is incredible. And plot holes. So many plot holes.
- The way the female characters are written is just sad. The ACD novels were more progressive towards women than this.
- Incredibly ableist towards all of its disabled characters.
- Queerbaiting lol
- The entirety of the Final Problem arc.

It's so bad that both the stage/musical adaptations *and* the anime adaptations had to change things for them to make more sense (at least on an emotional level, because the plot is screwed no matter how you look at it).

If you want a psychological thriller actually dealing with the complex failures of the system and its violence towards marginalized people (especially in a system as brutal as the Victorian British empire's), then go read something else.