This has been on my bucketlist for a while because it was such a transparent case to me.
As in, sometimes you have comics more or less explicit in showing their inspiration, their model to copy and emulate, happens a lot in shonen manga but it’s not always what one would assume
Sometimes it can be just a conflation of this kind of comics being very iterative and built (like most books and movies, for that matter) on clichès, on proven formats, time-tested formula, so similarities are often more coincidence than deliberate emulation of a specific series among the sea of many similar ones, expecially when in turn they influence each other as they go, and in time are themselves taken as examplse to follow.
But once i laid eyes on this manwha (a “korean manga”) by Ko Jin-Ho, Jack Frost: The Amityville, aimed at basically the same demographic of an edgy Shonen Jump series, then red the first volume, i was kinda happy in how immediatly obvious it was to me what this wanted to be.
As in, a more shonen take on Hellsing, the renowed pulp classic by Kohta Hirano about vampires, guns bigger than people, religious freaks with knives that double as lances and undead nazi cyborg monsters.
And i do mean this as a good thing, i personally LOVE Hellsing… shame Jack Frost: The Amytivelle doesn’t really want to full on committ to being a grand guignol exploitation delight of gore, nazis and insanity, since it also wants the “school battle manga” proceedings, character dynamics and so there can be some humour and school romance.
Speaking of, the plot. Noh-A Joo, the new transfer student of Amytiville High School, realizes immediatly that their school is not what it appears to be, and she finds herself caught up in the middle of a war amongst vampires, monsters and all kinds of other undead creatures, as she’s the “Mirror Image”, someone who died but yet became immortal, with her blood having the ability to heal people being just the bare minimum extent of her powers.
She then becomes an object of contention among the four school districts/factions Amytiville High School is made of, and happens to be taken under the protection of Jack Frost, a feared fiend loyal to the North faction-section of the school, though that doesn’t stop him from regularly decapite her on many occasions.
Many mysteries also surround the Amytiville School itself, big as a country and actually a sort of limbo, where the souls residing are removed from the cycle of death and reincarnation, so if they die they suffer a “final death”, but is rumored the Mirror Image might be able to change that…
Jack is basically Alucard, as he acts as “bodyguard” for the unwillingly female protagonist, he reports to a spectactled “iron lady” called Helmina (the “Integra Hellsing” stand-in) despite allegedly being far more powerful than her, a chained monster, Jack himself get shredded, skewered and pierced, but its immesurably more powerful and just refuses to die, Jack is basically a sort of “hands me down” from Noh-A’s father too, there’s a sniper character that references Weber’s classical opera piece Der Freischütz (The Hunter/The Marksman).. i think you get the picture.
And just in case you’d think i’m exaggerating as describing this as “Hellsing but for the shonen-ecchi crowd”…. some panels are almost perfect replicas of Hellsing, like even the hand position, shading of Jack Frost preparing to unleash some beastly power are verbatim how Alucard uses some magical incantations, and ignoring the whole stylization and the overabundant use of shadow.
This is not to say it looks bad, it does look fairly good, composition is solid work, it knows what it wants to be and look like, as in very pulp. Okay, not THAT pulp, i guess to not turn off the more general manga or teen comic book audiences they roped in with the abundant gore and some nudity, but the character designs are just okay, and could have used some work to stand out a bit more even ignoring the obvious deside to emulate Hellsing flavor and look.
Speaking of nudity, in a way this manwha channels Hirano’s pre-Hellsing career as a hentai artist, and by that i mean it just has some fanservice via the protagonist accidentally flashing people by accident, her or the other female characters rando pantyshots, or stuff like “NOT Integra Hellsing Wingate” at times just uncaring she’s showing off the fancy underpants, because pantaloons are for the weak, i guess.
Eventually the tone down the upskirt-pantsu jokes, there’s still some fanservice thrown in there, but it mostly subsides after the first 2-3 volumes.
The lore becomes as convoluted as you’d expect, with absurd explanations about the worldbuilding, the rules of the Amytiville dimension-realm, some really cringey terms too, but it’s mostly about the kind of nonsense you would expect when you try to rope in vampires, monsters, zombies, undead, supernatural urban legends, a school setting and a supernatural war in limbo, and also tie in the Amytiville urban legend in name only, since it’s a copyright free one. At least there is no evil lamp here?
Not sure if its for better or worse, as it’s not THAT crazy, all things considered,
To be honest i’d say it’s still a decent read, trashy but proudly, unabashedly so, that ironically could have been better if it spent less time trying to also appeal to more common shonen manga rules and archetypes (it’s a manwha, but it sure as hell doesn’t really feel or look any different from a manga series, not even in terms of dialogue).. and well, tried to be Hellsing as it obviously wants to be that.
I say this because a more shonen friendly Hellsing is a weird pitch that i’m not sure most people will even buy into, or want, especially when it trades any religion bashing (most likely to avoid controversy, which is kinda silly in a way) and good ol’ christian in-fighting for some very mild teen romance, but if you do it’s a decent time, and it’s not too long, just 11 volumes.
Though it’s the kinda series that could have used being a bit shorter, since at the end of the day there’s not much plot to go on (though there are no gaping plot holes or forgotten subplots, by the end the story does make some sense, absurd as it is), the ending is kinda anticlimactic and sure as hell it doesn’t help how pretty every character is mostly a one-note affair, which isn’t surprising as this indeed a series that is far more style than substance, though remains entertaining and not annoying since it’s trying to be exactly what it looks like and wants to.
I will just say that if it had received an anime adaptation there would have been at least dozens of AMV putting the various battles to the tune of Rammstein or System Of A Down songs.
I mean, if you want more extreme stuff you can go for weird shit like Tokyo Red Hood (which isn’t even that extreme) or if you want some primo horny pulp trash there is the manga series Murcièlago, a favourite of mine.
While i like Jack Frost: The Amytiville for what it is, it feels like a decent offer born of a compromise i’m not sure needed to be made in the first place, even if i do have a soft spot for it.
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