In Big Order, the arrival of wish-augmented humans called Orders presaged the near-extinction of human history, and human culture’s survival hinged less on our pluck and fortitude than the fact that a plenipotent being named Daisy–crossing the whimsy of a fairy godmother with the malice of a Satanic genie–hadn’t had her fun with us. Now it is ten years later, and Eiji Hoshimiya conceals the secret that it was his wish for Armageddon that irrevocably altered human life. This Yen Press two-in-one volume details Eiji’s ascension to power, though the ten Orders behind him intend for him to be nothing more than a figurehead to advance their own agenda.
Along the way, it’s revealed that Eiji’s wish was inspired by Evil Ranger, a funnybook supervillain, and when Eiji makes an Evil Ranger-ish wish to rule the world–which he mis-remembers as a wish for apocalypse–he gains the power of Domain Expansion, which gives him power to command all things. While this is a god-like power that you would think could never be opposed–he uses it, for instance, to turn his greatest enemy into his staunchest ally, as well as to make an uncrossable barrier out of the air itself–the powers of other Orders are equally obnoxious, and if Eiji did not have his wits about him, he would not find his power of command inviolable.
Eiji’s main partner-in-crime in this volume, the pink-haired Rin Kurenai, transfers into his class at school, only to be exposed as a revenge-driven Order that gained her power of Regeneration Flames in the same fire that killed her action hero parents during the disaster that resulted from Eiji’s poorly worded wish. Understandably, she blames Eiji, so she comes at him with all the swordsmanship that she inherited from her mother, and all the karate that she learned from her father, as well as her useful gift of rebounding from any injury. While Eiji is a little bland, it’s hard not to feel a little bit of empathy for Rin, who can’t let a day go by without being mortally wounded or bursting into flame.
As I can hear you running down to the bookstore to add this to your collection, I should mention that this post-apocalyptic world is less Walking Dead anarchy and more bourgeois mallrat. Only ten years later, the survivors of Eiji’s wish have schools, hospitals, internet, cheap hair-dyes, and multimedia.
Also, while the content and plot of the manga is dark, the pacing is slapstick, drawing more off the structure of action comedies like ONE’s One-Punch Man or Mob Psycho 100, or even a little from Kill Bill, with the kind of ultrasonic story progression that ruined the film version of Scott Pilgrim for fans of the books. Now, I’m a huge fan of everything that I just mentioned, but in the case of Big Order, the comical tone undermines a dark story that is trying to find a few points of gravity to anchor its narrative. If Big Order had found those dark moments, then it could have layered on the comedy with a trowel and I’d have eaten it up and asked for more.
While I found Big Order to be more pleasant than not, I remain uninvested in Big Order, as its cast introduction and exposition of premise seem less world-building than game tutorial, its themes feel prepackaged, and Eiji’s story, the main arc, is not emotionally affecting. Additionally, this story, which owes much to other stories in the growing canon of what I call White Event Superhero Stories (named after Marvel’s New Universe comics), such as G. R. R. Martin’s Wild Cards, Marvel’s New Universe, NBC’s Heroes, or My Hero Academia, doesn’t even try to advance the genre, so that at times it feels like an also-ran of something better. Big Order’s superpowered setting could evolve as the manga’s resident Mr. Mxyzptlk, Daisy, is developed
Big Order Vol. 1 arrived in stores on January, 2017, and if you find it sold out, you can buy it directly through Yen press.
Yen Press sent the review copy.
