Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End is an adventure fantasy manga written by Kanehito Yamada and illustrated by Tsukasa Abe. It centres around the titular character Frieren, an Elf mage who has lived a life numbering in the millennia. At the start of the story, she and a group of adventurers are at the end of their 10-year journey, having fulfilled their mission of slaying the Demon King. They then, after celebrating, separate. The ensuing story follows Frieren as the years pass, she even gets an apprentice Fern. While her past comrades fall to their mortality, she lives on to try understanding the meaning of their short adventures relative to her unending life.

The art style is good. It does not standout much and as this is a dialogue heavy manga it does not need to. The characters do not emote often which feels strange, but it makes the moments when they do stick out all the more. The panel layouts are good and it’s easy to read panel to panel. The general serenity of the art style really causes the double spreads to be very impactful. Abe’s spreads are detailed and beautiful. You can really feel the emotions that are being conveyed through them.

The is story is very good. Starting at the end of the journey to kill the Demon King is an interesting choice that really made the beginning of this manga stick out. I found that this got me very engaged with the story. The pacing is slow and meandering, and this works to the story’s benefit. This enables the reader to get in depth to Frieren’s emotions, and the emotions Yamada seeks to provoke as the story moves along. The choice to have decades pass at the beginning was well done as it enabled me to see Frieren’s subtle change as she loses comrades and meets new people.

Frieren’s character is good. I found her to be likeable and her competence really comes through well. It’s easy to see the maturity she has due to her age, as well as some of her deep-rooted quirks as well. Her relationships with the other characters are well done and stand out. I found her apprentice, Fern, to be interesting as well. We see her grow, quite literally, into a young adult as years pass. She’s also very likeable, although I’d have liked her to feel more distinct.

The theme I found explored in this manga was centred around grief and moving on, which I thought was well executed.

The strong point of this manga is its story. It is very good and maintains a sombre melancholic tone throughout the volume, which I found fitting. The characters and their relationships are also very strong. One caveat however is that they are very muted expression-wise, which while making the moments of strong emotion impactful, can be a bit dull, though this did not bother me very much. The dialogue is very well written, which serves to enhance the plot.

I’d compare this manga to My Broken Mariko, with the theme on grief. I think that persons who would enjoy fantasy would enjoy this manga, as well as persons who like a lot of character focus. Persons who are looking for action and high paced story telling would not enjoy this much I believe.

To sum up, this is an excellent first volume. I found that I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and am looking forward to reviewing volume 2. I’d give it a 4.8/5.

You can check out Frieren volume 1 on Amazon at my affiliate link here