Back in the day when I was a little kid, the book shop was my world. I read many manga there, even right into the teenage years, as the store had comfy couches and chairs to sit on, so that you could browse and read for an unlimited time. It was here that I found Zombiepowder for the first time, by an author I had only heard a bit about: Tite Kubo, most famous for his series Bleach.

I would later find out in school exchanges and travels outside of Germany that Bleach was actually a huge thing. The internet told me that it was on the level with One Piece and Naruto, the “Big Three” of Shonen Jump, and I was quite surprised. Bleach was never a gigantic thing in Germany, most likely due to the anime not being widely available, especially in the “golden early days”. (One Piece ran since 2003, Naruto since 2006 – in a dreadful version, don’t remind me of the opening, the One Piece one is amazing, watch that instead – both on the big channel RTL II, while Bleach started only in 2010, on a niche channel called Animax.)

And so, in 2008, I held a volume of Zombiepowder in my hands, not knowing about Bleach, and started reading this new series I had never seen before. 10 years later, I revisited it.

Zombiepowder is the story of Gamma Akutabi, a silverhaired hero with a big sword and big heart, in a Wild Western world. He is a “powder hunter”, someone who is on the quest to hunt down the “Rings of Death”. If you collect all twelve rings, you can produce the eponymous “zombie powder”, a substance that brings life: If used on a dead person, that person becomes alive again, and if used on a living person, that person becomes immortal.

Hence, many people are after these rings for different reasons, and so far, no one has managed to gather all twelve into one place. Gamma Akutabi is after it for the immortality, and on his quest three other characters will join: C.T. Smith, his partner in crime, a very upright classy gunslinger complete with suit and bowler hat, Elwood, a young teenage pickpocket, and Wolfina, an energetic paparazzi  lady who fights with forged press releases and a modified tripod.

From left to right: Elwood, Smith, Gamma and Wolfina.

As this manga is quite short, with 27 chapters only before it was cancelled by Shonen Jump, I wish to talk less about the plot and more about the characters and style that Kubo shows us here.

Kubo’s artstyle and linework have always been immensely stylish. Even though I have never seen or read much of Bleach, I can tell you that his design is instantly recognisable and very pleasing to look at. Clothes are wonderfully designed and fitted, characters have sleek shapes and sharp features, and the action makes it all shine with simple to understand panelling and framing.

Simple, clear, and straight to the point.

The tone of the series alternates between “serious” and “goofy” quite easily, and the characters can carry it as well. The more outlandish moments serve as nice breathers between the onslaught of action.

From serious busting through a wall…

…to silly busting through a door.

And there is A LOT of action in Zombiepowder, the series consists of battles pretty much every chapter, and – surprisingly – it works! Characterisation is interwoven with the respective fighting styles of the protagonists, everyone with their own strengths and weaknesses. Cool stuff happening with cool people, nice.

Gamma Akutabi’s design, the silver hair and coat, together with his chainsaw sword and later magic use was a design I particularly loved, and sadly it had to go too soon. He could have been a classic Shonen protagonist to stand alongside others, even with the slight accusations of Kubo taking too much visual inspiration of Trigun and Western/Mad Max settings à la Fist of the North Star and Battle Angel Alita.

That’s rad.

While I recommend reading Zombiepowder to everyone, it’s going to be interesting what you take away from it.

It’s pre-Bleach, opening itself up to comparison, but it’s also its own thing of a young upcoming artist trying to find his voice.

It’s also a short Shonen riddled with strange decisions, as Kubo says in the behind-the-scenes: This was his first work in the magazine Shonen Jump, and he was under “great emotional trauma” while drawing Zombiepowder – due to the crushing workload of having to produce a chapter each week, and due to him not knowing how to communicate with his editor, sometimes taking decisions he didn’t want to, accepting them without discussion.

The manga ends abruptly as well, it manages to round off its first arc, and then suddenly introduces three finishing chapters with many new characters and a sort of style-breaking feeling. While I was not a fan of how it leads to the ending – it leaves two protagonists behind in an uncertain path and has some questionable character designs – it does leave on a nice, if short bitter-sweet note.

If you wish to read Zombiepowder, I will recommend the physical release in 4 volumes, as it comes with a lot of making-ofs, other early Tite Kubo manga (which are all worth of analysis as well), special artwork and even a playlist of music for every character in the manga. Hey, I didn’t knew Kubo liked Rhapsody, an Italian powermetal band, one of my absolute favourites!

Conclusion

Essentially, this manga is a great stepping stone into a genre that Kubo would help to shape, and a short fun romp by someone who would later on do great things. To my personal shame, I must confess that Zombiepowder was the reason I put off Bleach for a decade: Gamma Akutabi and his gang were so energetic and fun, that Ichigo Kurosaki and his friends paled for me in comparison. Given, of course, that I had only read the first volume of Bleach, but alas, I was having more fun with this Wacky Western than Supernatural Highschool.

10 years later, it’s still very fun, even if a bit wonky in retrospect, and I will check out Bleach soon, it’s about time I reckon. And while I do that, walk the path into the other direction, and check out Zombiepowder, and see how you will like it. It may not be your new favourite, but it will be a powerful time capsule to rediscover.

The End.

Sources: Zombiepowder Wikipedia, Zombiepowder making-ofs (Physical Release, Tokyopop)