Claymore sounded good in theory. A shounen (actually seinen... whoops) fantasy action-manga about female demon-hunters who are themselves half-demon? It's the sort of thing I usually adore, if done at all well. Think Buffy, Devilman Lady, Vampire Princess Miyu. Good stuff.

Well, that's the theory. Suppose I should have actually taken a look at the art before putting it on order with the 'Swap. It's... damned stiff. The default posture of characters is an alarmed rictus, and they don't generally break out of said rictus unless it's fight-fight time. The fights, the artist can handle - looks a little like Parasyte on an arty day. The backgrounds are not too bad, if a little generic. Speaking of generic, the writing is terribly, terribly schematic. Reads like an outline of a story proposal rather than the story itself, let alone any dialog or narrative portion thereof. There aren't really many characters, for that matter, and we're given little reason to care about any of the three which survive the first volume uneviscerated.

Why should I give the manga a second volume to collect itself? There has to be some reason it was picked up by Viz. It's always possible that it's a first work, and thus needs a couple chapters to loosen up... hmm, the artist seems to have another long-running manga under his belt. In fact, the artist is a sixteen-year veteran. Blech. Have I just talked myself out of this particular waste of money? Maybe.