Battle Royale, Vol. 3

Rating:
Summary: Despite Graphic Scenes of Sex, this Volume is still Superb
Review: As everyone has posted on this message board, there are shocking scenes of explicit sex that's definately not for the prudish. I agree with every poster here- the last chapter "Fallen Angel," which documents Mitsuko's past sexual escapades, is needlessly unecessary and exploitive, even for adult magna. It's already established in the earlier volumes that she is a sex-crazed pimp, so why must the authors further elaborate this by having her commit every sexual act in the book, including- blecch!- a urine scene? (I hope that's urine). Thumbs down on "Fallen Angel," but I will defend the chapters dealing with Yoshimi and Yoji- as graphic as their sexual exploits are, it is essential to the story, revealing to us a complex relationship further complicated by their participation in the Program. I find their story touching, and proves how effective "Battle Royale" does in making all it's participants human- we're even refered back to Fumiyo, who died so gracelessly in the first volume and here brought back in the memory of the boy who had a crush on her, Yutaka. "Battle Royale" is more than just an ultrviolent pulp, it's a smart and very suspenseful thriller not seen since the E.C. comics of the early 1950s, ingeniously balancing scenes of horror, romance, and humor (I never laughed as hard as when reading Takako confronting Kazushi in the middle of the book,warning him he "will die a virgin"). Of course, the "Fallen Angel" chapter places the series a step back, but otherwise it does good in its continuation of this great series. I can't give it five stars, but if only I could give it a score of 4.9...

Rating:
Summary: I will NOT continue to purchase this series!!
Review: Having never read any manga before i took a chance with Battle royale. The first two books were interesting and i think for a couple of weeks i became obsessed with wanting to know what was going to happen next. In that time i purchased through AMAZON the korean edition of the battle royale movie, so in two hours i became aware of everything that is going to happen. The books do offer you a lot of background information on the characters, told in flashbacks. Book 3 offers a lot of info on the very evil Mitsuko, while the story was interesting i was shocked by how graphic the book is. Now i'm not a person who is prudish at all, and i'm not easily shocked, yet i was stunned at how graphic the depictions of sex were. Overall it was too much,i already know how the story ends so i'm definetly NOT purchasing book 4. EP

Rating:
Summary: Not so good..........
Review: I loved BR movie and would tell all my friends about it. But this....This is crap. For some reason I just had to read the first 3 books but now I have officialy stoped reading. The character development is very good but one thing that keeps this from being good. ITS WAY TO GRAPHIC FOR ITS TASTE! I know it says Mature on the back but still jeez! I mean you see some much brains and intestince get shot or pulled out. For an example Shuyas orphin brother gets shot in the cheek and you see a graphic picture of him laying on the ground with a huge whole with his tung sticking out. And than the teacher finishes him off by shooting him between the eyes. Its extreamly violent. And when you get to the last chapter on this lets just say if your into Hardcore Pornagraphy than you'll like this. This book went waaay overboard. But its in your taste what you like. All I know Is I've stoped.
The novel and Movie is really good!
BATTLE ROYALE 2 was not that good.
Later.........

Rating:
Summary: Not so good..........
Review: I loved BR movie and would tell all my friends about it. But this....This is crap. For some reason I just had to read the first 3 books but now I have officialy stoped reading. The character development is very good but one thing that keeps this from being good. ITS WAY TO GRAPHIC FOR ITS TASTE! I know it says Mature on the back but still jeez! I mean you see some much brains and intestince get shot or pulled out. For an example Shuyas orphin brother gets shot in the cheek and you see a graphic picture of him laying on the ground with a huge whole with his tung sticking out. And than the teacher finishes him off by shooting him between the eyes. Its extreamly violent. And when you get to the last chapter on this lets just say if your into Hardcore Pornagraphy than you'll like this. This book went waaay overboard. But its in your taste what you like. All I know Is I've stoped.
The novel and Movie is really good!
BATTLE ROYALE 2 was not that good.
Later.........

Rating:
Summary: Decent, but not as good as 1 and 2
Review: This is a decent volume in the series, but it gets bogged down at times by the ungodly amounts of sex, and a lot of overly dramatic dialogue. The dialogue I expected. The sex... not so much. And when I say sex,I mean graphic sex, and when I say graphic, I mean pornographic. Yes, you see everything. And, while normally I would look the other way, this time I was rather mad. Why? Well, for one, the sex was totally pointless (at least for the last section of the story) and at times wholey disgusting (there was, shockingly enough, a urine fetish scene). And for number two, most, if not all, characters involved in those scenes are 15 or younger. Now, they do not appear to be 15. They appear quiet the opposite. They all seem like adults, with very adult features, such as one girls GIGANTIC breasts. And while the first two books only hinted at some adult content, this book shoves it in your face, pees on you, and then leaves you covered in who knows what. And yet, the plot is still good. A bunch of a new characters are brought in to the story, and things do move along. But the sex holds this back from being a five star book.

Rating:
Summary: Decent, but not as good as 1 and 2
Review: This is a decent volume in the series, but it gets bogged down at times by the ungodly amounts of sex, and a lot of overly dramatic dialogue. The dialogue I expected. The sex... not so much. And when I say sex,I mean graphic sex, and when I say graphic, I mean pornographic. Yes, you see everything. And, while normally I would look the other way, this time I was rather mad. Why? Well, for one, the sex was totally pointless (at least for the last section of the story) and at times wholey disgusting (there was, shockingly enough, a urine fetish scene). And for number two, most, if not all, characters involved in those scenes are 15 or younger. Now, they do not appear to be 15. They appear quiet the opposite. They all seem like adults, with very adult features, such as one girls GIGANTIC breasts. And while the first two books only hinted at some adult content, this book shoves it in your face, pees on you, and then leaves you covered in who knows what. And yet, the plot is still good. A bunch of a new characters are brought in to the story, and things do move along. But the sex holds this back from being a five star book.

Rating:
Summary: You are missing the point.
Review: While I agree that some of the sex scenes were gratuitous-they didn't advance the plot, the other ones-the ones with
Yoshimi and her boyfriend were an integral part of the story. As for the explicidness of the scenes, here I totally disagree with the other reviewers-I don't see how they can be any other way. To make them "tastefull" would be totally out of character for the story - the whole point is to show everything unflinchingly, good and bad, all the aspects of the human existence, even the ugliest parts.
Overall, this is a good installment of the story, would have gotten 5 stars if it wasn't for the Mitsuko Souma sex scenes, which are gratuitous.