The Promised Neverland was never going to be like other shonen manga. When it first made its debut in popular manga magazine Weekly Shonen Jump on August 1, 2016, it quickly broke all the rules. It continued to stand out amongst its popular counterparts, showing manga readers the world over that what it took to be called a shonen did not have to be so cut and dry.
What makes a shonen manga? This comes down to its very definition: the young teenage male audience in which the story is targeted to. Typically aiming for the thirteen-seventeen year old demographic, these epic tales often center around boys of a similar age engaging in high action adventures and fights. The Promised Neverland instantly marked itself as different from the get go in its very first arc. Featuring a young and cheerful protagonist, Emma, the small scale setting of the Grace Field House orphanage, and suspenseful and violent twists, The Promised Neverland is very much set apart from the other manga-filled pages of Weekly Shonen Jump.
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There is such an amazing commitment to eerie dread and mystery in the first chapters of the story that is not often seen in shonen. The plot has a long, slow, uneasy suspense to it. Whereas other shonen contemporaries are eager to jump into the action or build up to some sort of fight, The Promised Neverland holds off on its typical shonen action until later arcs. Instead, it lures in its readers with intriguing world building and destabilizing atmosphere. It takes quite a few chapters to get to some true action and does not disappoint when it gets there.
The author, Kaiu Shirai, admitted in an interview that if he hadn’t pushed for it, the dark story would likely have been placed in a seinen, or eighteen and older, magazine. While the plot is extremely dark and quite shocking at times, it does adhere to typical shonen themes such as young protagonists rebelling against oppressive adults. Shirai has also stated that he would have liked to read that kind of story in his teenage years, and it’s clear other readers feel the same way. Additionally, the cute, stylized direction of The Promised Neverland‘s art gives it more of a younger-audience appeal.
Emma is not the first female lead to take center stage in a shonen. Hopefully she will not be the last either. The Promised Neverland proves that the coveted teenage boy demographic will eagerly follow along, feeling as connected to a female lead as they would any other male shonen protagonist. Emma has all the qualities of a shonen lead: a drive, a devotion to a cause/friends/family, and the desire to better the world and herself. Ultimately, she offers the “promise” of new stories to come that bend the typical expectations and stereotypes of beloved manga genres.
