The Climber vol. 1

Shin’ichi Sakamoto was introduced to American audiences via the handsomely detailed period epic “Innocent” and the striking Bram Stoker reinvention “#DRCL.”  Both marked him as an immensely talented artist not just in terms of raw detail, but in visual invention when it came to telling their stories.  Such talent does not emerge fully-formed, however, and in “The Climber” we get to see a portrait of the artist when he was just starting out and just illustrating his stories as opposed to writing them as well.  In that regard, it’s better to try enjoying the story on its own terms rather than trying to draw a line between it and his later works.

Buntaro Mori has just transferred to a new high school and already the staff feels like he’s going to be a problem.  Not because he’s some kind of loudmouthed punk, but because he’s a withdrawn, closed-off kid who barely acknowledges the world around him.  That doesn’t sit well with his class’ actual loud-mouthed punk, Miyamoto, who decides to have some fun with the new kid.  Being a climber himself, he challenges Mori to scale a side of the school he hasn’t been able to do yet with the promise he’ll leave the new kid alone if he does.  While that reward proves irresistible to Mori, the challenge awakens something as climbing promises to deliver him the solitude that he’s always craved.

“The Climber” comes from Viz’s Signature imprint, the home of all of their manga aimed at older readers like “Monster,” “Vagabond,” and “Golden Kamuy” to name a few.  I bring this up because this series might be mistaken at first glance for being a shonen title.  You’ve got the distinctive protagonist who’s clearly going to be the best at “X,” his rival who is the opposite of the protagonist personality-wise, and an episodic structure to the first few volumes (this is a two-in-one omnibus edition) that show his slow and gradual improvement.  Toss in the thinly-drawn female character and occasional propensity for exaggerated facial expressions if you want to as well.

A few things do set it apart from your average shonen title, however.  There’s the fact that everything in this story is portrayed in a relatively serious manner with not a lot of overt comic relief.  That could have made this first volume a slog to read, but it’s saved through the detail invested in the art of climbing here as Sakamoto and writers Yoshio Nabeta and Hiroshi Takano introduce us to the kinds of equipment used, concepts like “onsite climbing,” and various techniques used to scale mountains.  For someone who isn’t versed in this hobby at all, this was all interesting to read about.

Mori also makes for an interesting protagonist at this stage in the story.  Due to a vaguely explained  trauma in his past, he’s not looking to make nice with anyone around him.  It leads him to pursue solitude and initially reject any and all attempts for the supporting cast to make nice with him.  That we’ve got a protagonist who is actively looking not to make friends feels interestingly at odds with how these kinds of stories usually play out and I’m curious to see how far the series will pursue Mori’s mindset in that regard.  Not too far is my guess, because there’s already the feeling that our protagonist will eventually make nice with the supporting cast and learn that the real mountain he climbed was the friends he made along the way.

As for the supporting cast, not many of them make an impression in this volume.  There’s Ohnishi the good teacher who’s also into mountain climbing and does his best to try and encourage good habits in his troubled student.  Shirai is the aforementioned thinly-drawn main female character who feels like she’s here because the story demands it, which still puts her in a better place than Fukumoto who is just the other guy here.  We do get introduced to a couple of scheming tabloid reporters who are looking to exploit Mori’s adventures for headlines, and they at least make an impression by being the most overtly villainous characters here.

The exception to all of this is Miyamoto who is demonstrated to have zero chill throughout this volume.  He’s introduced as a violent loudmouth “pinch gripping” a random student in class, and after his attempt to intimidate Mori backfires, he quickly sees the new kid as a frenemy.  Someone who he deeply wants to show up, yet appears to recognize on some level that competing against him makes Miyamoto a better climber along the way.  I’d probably be able to take him more seriously if Sakamoto didn’t feel the need to give him the most rage faces out of any other character in the series so far.

Speaking of the art, it’s good, if lacking in the detail that has defined Sakamoto’s later works.  I realize that’s an unfair comparison, but the art here is generally solid for what it’s trying to do.  The artist captures his characters’ emotions well, maybe too well in Miyamoto’s case, and is able to invest the climbing scenes with a welcome amount of drama.  This is particularly true of the one competition we see as, even though it’s in a public setting with all the safety precautions you could want, it still manages to be engaging as we see Mori and Miyamoto’s differing approaches to climbing and how far it takes them, respectively.

How to sum up the first volume of “The Climber?”  Let me just say that thanks to a major reorganization in my room I have the room for it on my shelves.  Yet with there being a finite amount of space here, I’m also left wondering if it might be better given over to a series that’s more compelling than this first volume is.  It does a lot of stuff right, and even some stuff differently, but it also feels very familiar in its storytelling and characterization at this point.  I’m actually left wondering if I should’ve just bought this digitally instead of shelling out for a physical product.  I’ll keep reading to see how the story progresses, but its fate feels far less assured than that of Mori trying to climb whatever’s in front of him.