Sakamoto Days is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yuto Suzuki. It has been serialized in Shueisha’s Weekly Shōnen Jump since November 2020. It is Simu-published in English by Viz Media and the Manga Plus online platform.
On my quest to read new manga I’ve started delving into comedy realm of Shōnen JUMP. And I found a few I like first one on the menu is Sakamoto Days.
Synopsis
The name of the strongest hitman was Taro Sakamoto. He was feared by all the villains-a longing for all the hitmen …but one day- he fell in love!!! Retirement, marriage, childbirth. And- Sakamoto is fat!! A plump man who runs a store. But he still retains his former hitman senses. We meet Shin – a psychic- who can read minds. He is sent to kill Sakamoto but realizes that he is the handyman of the town, could not do it originally but tries again but gets defeated easily.
When his family treats him well, he refuses to kill him and begs for the boss not to kill him, but he gets betrayed by his gang and has to fight his way through, but Sakamoto saves the day and offers him a job in his retail store. We later find out there is a bounty on Sakamoto’s head and how both will deal with it.
Thoughts
The art is decent with some dynamic action scenes from time to time. I liked Sakamoto and Shin as characters. Sakamoto is kind of like John Wick in a sense. He is a legendary hitman who retired from the job for his family and is forced back into it to save them. There’s also this page of him going into a weapons room which reminded me oh Wick’s basement scene (but less dramatic) and it is fun to see others still revere him as the god of hitmen just like John Wick. I do not know if the parallels are intentional or not but they do not take away from the story at all. While I do think there’s not much they can do with the premise for long. If written well it can be a good short comedy story.
Conclusion
I think it is a fine comedy series on Shonen Jump but with a great influx of comedies in Shonen recently I don’t think it’ll leave a lasting impression down the line like One Punch Man or Great Teacher Onizuka but I think it is worth a read if you want to pass your time with a light-hearted comedy action manga.
You can read Sakamoto days on Manga Plus by Shueisha or Sakamoto Days on VIZ
Next, I am going to talk about another comedy series which has crushed it’s competition in Shonen JUMP pages so stay tuned for that.
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