Beast Children: Unedited Audio and Recording Notes (Patreon)

Manga Details

• Author: Kento Terasaka
  • The author played the lock position in school rugby.
• Author’s other works:
  • RINGO (2016, 4 chapter, Jump GIGA) - also rugby, MC has a similar design
  • I’m Arm (2020, one-shot, Jump GIGA) - It’s about arm wrestling
  • Gain (2022, one-shot, Weekly Shonen Jump) - golf, has vomic
  • 
    
• Run dates: May 27, 2019 to Dec 2, 2019
  • Series it replaced:
    • Teenage Renaissance! David by Yushin Kuroki
  • Series that replaced it:
    • Agravity Boys by Atsushi Nakamura
  • Series from the same serialisation round:
    • Samurai 8 by Masashi Kishimoto & Akira Okubo
    • Double Taisei by Kentaro Fukuda
    • Tokyo Shinobi Squad by Yuki Tanaka, Kento Matsuura
• Chapters/Volumes: 27 / 3

About the Manga

• Plot
  • Onotoro Nikki, aka Mr. Beast, is one of the greatest rugby players ever, declares that his kid will be even better, and that he left all his treasure in one piece before suddenly dying on field. Sakura Shishigaya was in the stands directly in front of him at the time and it encouraged him to dedicate himself to rugby, which is why he calls Mr Beast his master from here on. Sakura became obsessed with the idea of tackling and crashing into big strong men, but no one else at his middle school wants to play rugby with him. His buddy Sora, an absolute bro, is supporting him even tho he’s just a filthy gamer. One day Sakura meets a rugby player at his middle school named Yukio and becomes obsessed with him, begging him to just crash his body into him real hard, but Yukio gets really annoyed with him and refuses but challenges him to a game of tag to get Sakura to shut up. Yukio loses and gets mad but is also impressed.
  • 
    
  • Then Sora does some googling and leads that Yukio is Mr Beast’s child and Sakura starts really trying to find out what high school he’s going to. After taking pity on him, Yukio writes down Hyakkengaya high school. Sakura then decides to go there only find that Yukio goes to a totally different school. That’s ok tho because their rugby team used to be coached by Mr Beast. They are “the beast’s children” if you will, headed up by Shin Kujira who is the “heart” of the team. Shin got an email from Yukito who told him Sakura has promise, and he proceeds to just be the most supportive guy ever to him, bringing him into a game when he’s untested because Sakura is just crazy fast. A lot of poorly described rugby happens and they win because Sakura scored a try. After learning that Yukito’s school, Ryuso, is competing in a tournament of “sevens” aka rugby with seven guys instead of the usual 15, Sakura wants to put his own sevens team together to compete. He gathers together the best guys he can and they just barely lose to Ryuso but everyone is impressed by Sakura.
  • 
    
  • Next it’s summer break and time for strength training camp with a whole new group of first years including Sora and a guy who’s -gasp- black! His name is Bebellamacina and Sora is nervous around him because he’s “not Japanese.” Typical fucking gamer. The third years challenge the first years to defeat them in a scrum which has been poorly explained in this rugby manga, and Sakura demands to be a part of it. Sora manages to put aside his racism and Sakura learns how to do his position well enough to eventually win the scrum. Sakura flashes back to when he met Mr. Beast and got permission to call him master in a scene that is very hard to place chronologically.
• Characters
  • Sakura shishigaya
    • Loves rugby
    • Is an idiot
    • Kinda looks like naruto - especially as a kid
  • Sora kasumi
    • A real one
    • How do I help my idiot son
  • Yukito Ikki
    • Mr badass rugby man
    • Doesn't want this manga bs in his life
    • Doesn't play by shonen protag rules
  • Shin Kujirs
    • Mr beast
    • Naked kinda
    • Captain

Why it failed

• This art is not good but man we have seen much worse
• So absolutely cramped with text
• This feels like it kinda steals a good bit from eyesheild 21 but without the fun
• They don't play Rugby why did they skip it in the third chapter I still don't know why Rugby is interesting
• I hate when a series shows someone getting hit but somehow it missed
• Sakura makes no sense how does he know so little about the rules?
• This doesn't explain rugby very well
• They spent way too long on the 7s march

What it did well

• Sora
• Broken glass metaphors are actually cool
• I like the initial ideas of isolation in the first chapter
• You have to respect the author probably tried his best
• This actually was a solid first chapter
• Overall the characters around sora are decent
• The post game chat was fun and felt like real people
• 
  

Where it could have gone

• Oh make Sora the MC, kinda like how do I support my weird friend and his rugby dreams
• Fuck it make it eyesheild 21 rugby version
• Honestly a sports manga with a gay protagonist be interesting
• Sakura gets a horrible head injury and has to rehab
• It's kinda lame how the protag is got the same special ability as the eyeshield guy
• Do things not about rugby like none of these characters have actual lives
• Just make it only about sevens you can't have 15 characters and have it be interesting
• Why does the ending chapters actually show the rugby training stuff with context

Misc Thoughts

• So much crying
• The forced diversity could have been worse?
• Maxy Bee thoughts:
  • This is one of like… three rugby comics Weekly Shonen Jump has ever had. They are:
    • Scrum (1982, 1 vol) by Koji Koseki
    • No Side (1987, 2 vols) by Taku Chiba
    • Beast Children (2019, 3 vols) by Kento Terasaka
  • Logically this means we can one day look forward to a FOURTH rugby manga that lasts four volumes one day. Pattern recognition!
  • Would this have gotten serialised without the influence of the Rugby World Cup? You decide!
  • Beast Children’s failure, and lack of any other viable candidates, meant that when Haikyu!! ended the following year we had a Weekly Shonen Jump without any sports series for what I think was the first time EVER, in just over 50 years of publication. They blew the streak!
  • Volume extra pages include
    • Character profiles
    • Equipment explanations
    • Technique explanations
    • Rules explanations
    • Small bonus comics
    • Little personal messages and anecdotes from the author
  • Rugby’s a good sport, watch it. Play it, even.

Final Verdict

• Six Word summary
  • Community
    • Tucker:
    • Maxybee: ‘No side’ for a decent debut
    • Portal Man: I wanted BEAST children, not this | This manga doesn’t have a GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL!!
    • Lord Anubis: Sports manga are dead in Jump | American Football is Rugby, uncultured swines
    • Thores: Not Perfect, but Terasaka Loves Rugby
    • Resident Warhammer Nerd: Insert Clip Art Of A 6WS
    • Chudley: Ctrl + C. Ctrl + V.
    • Duderocks: Sora is great rest is mid
    • Riel: Has heart, but not much substance
  • David: Sora is really the best part | Rugby has tries this author doesn’t
  • Jordan: Aw it’s just trying its best
    • Yaoi rugby still in the closet