Spoiler warning: though they should be covered by spoiler bars Ill be discussing the entire series plot twists included. Trigger warnings: implications of rape prostitution and if the Red Fog in the title and stereotypical slasher movie splattered red on the title didnt give it away murder and gore. Lots of it. I sincerely hope that anyone who cares to read this review would have an idea of that already but if you didnt well yay blood. From the Red Fog is the story of Rwanda a boy being raised in the basement of his massmurdering mother. When their home is attacked Rwanda runs away taking two things burning in his heart: an obsessive urge to prove his murdering skills to mother dearest bordering on an Oedipus complex and narrator voice a hole that can only be filled... with murder. Bwahahaha. What follows is at least in theory an examination of Rwanda growing as a person while satisfying his murderous desires and finding his identity despite being a criminal. Examination of what makes criminals tick is one of the most widely explored and wellreceived concepts in literature. Agatha Christies And Then There Were None and Mario Puzos The Godfather are some of the best selling novels of all time while Dostoevsys Crime and Punishment is one of the most highly regarded. In manga series such as Gamon Sakurais Ajinhttps://anilist.co/manga/79865/AjinDemiHuman/ or Ohba and Obatas Death Notehttps://anilist.co/manga/30021/DeathNote/ are exceedingly popular and beloved. Combine this fundamental idea with edgelord Oliver Twist and youve got yourself a great manga right? Unfortunately no. Rwanda is nowhere near as interesting a character as it takes to make such a series work and even if the manga didnt dedicate significant time to making him as sick and twisted and oh baby look how EDGY I am as possible the sheer amount it tries to weave into a fairly short period just leads to a convoluted mess. Even if the manga had been more than 5 volumes it would have been a feat to follow even half of its plot threads to a satisfactory conclusion and every volume just keeps throwing in new ones. First off the good parts. From the Red Fog has great art even though it dropped a bit in quality towards the end of its serialization. The characters are distinct without having too weird of designs the scenery feels natural and the action is choreographed exceedingly well. The depiction of a sort of 1800s gothic England is by far the best part of the manga and the atmosphere of each scene is surprisingly strong. The characters that are less edgy such as Ivan are also decent with Ivan in particular having dialogue that fits the whole ruffianboy character to a tee. In short the author does have talent but the pursuit of that deep edgy teen boy vibe and profound meaning combined with way too many plot threads leaves all of the good by the wayside. Id like to see them try some sort of more typical battle shonen or perhaps a sports series something that showcases those pluses but unfortunately From the Red Fog is not it. The first volume is basically a mediocre slasher film crossed with Oliver Twist. A potentially fun premise in theory but in practice its just watching Rwanda slaughter his way through an orphanage and grin creepily while saying stuff like dead bodies are my friends and talking about the murdering filling the hole in his heart and making him feel happy and alive and all those other canned lines you get from bad slasher films. There are constant scenes of him thinking about how much he wants to kill people just cause some of which are almost played as humor in case you dont understand how SICK AND TWISTED HE IS BECAUSE THATS RIGHT HES SICK AND TWISTED. GET IT? GET IT? The mangaka doesnt seem to trust the readers to figure out what kinda person Rwanda is at any given moment and so its spelled out repeatedly. Also Im pretty sure that within a couple chapters therere implications of sexual assault that just kinda get ignored until a random scene in the final few chapters where Rwanda thinks back to it. In short the beginning is gross badly done and sets the stage for the fact that nothing Rwanda does is deep or meaningful. Its also really dumb to me that conveniently nobody decides to go looking for missing children or ever look round the orphanage property or do basically anything that would prevent a bunch of children from being murdered. I guess that sort of brainless slasher is for some people but I personally expect that if a series is edgy and gory it makes the main character at least somewhat interesting or able to be sympathized with. Needless to say From the Red Fog doesnt. Then the next few volumes just kind of toss plot threads on top of each other while doing absolutely nothing to fix the problems it has at the start. I guess its supposed to be developing Rwanda as something more than an edgy psycho but it just doesnt. If anything he becomes less likable which is a feat in and of itself. Fast forward a bit to when I assume the author learned they were getting cancelled and despite that there couldve been a relatively easy conclusion by having Rwanda die slaughter his way out of the organization or come to any sort of selfaware conclusion theres a bunch of info dumped into the story at once instead. Then the final volume rather than being used to conclude the massive amount the author dumped into the story in any satisfactory way... timeskips to a time where Rwanda is no longer an edgy teen and the only explanation for why he changed is apparently that sex with a prostitute was just that good and filled the hole in his heart that well the whole time. Oh and the story makes a point of said prostitute looking like a child for no apparent reason. Yuck. So yeah. Overall interesting concept with great art and a particularly good job of creating the setting and atmosphere. Bad job... pretty much everywhere else. Theres way too much going on in the story the characters are either bland murder targets or psychos the plot twists are abrupt and dont add to the story any look at the psychology of Rwanda the killer which Im fairly sure is what the author wanted to do make it deep and meaningful and all is an utter failure and the ending doesnt do anything besides create more loose ends and hammer home how awful Rwandas character arc is and well thats all folks. Bad slasher thats trying to be too much to salvage whatever crumbs of good stuff are left. That may be fun for some but all I got out of it was the impression of a bloody mess.