Beastars, Volume 20
BEASTARS, Vol. 20 by Paru Itagaki
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
The twentieth volume of Paru Itagaki's Beastars manga opens, like its precursors, with a synopsis of recent events and visuals of the main characters. The opening action features gray wolf Legoshi defining the term "tableclothing" as when the snouts of beasts wrinkle and they lose control of their emotions, as he is during his training with the rabbit Kyu. Legoshi had felt the same way when battling the bear Riz, now in an attempt to stop Kyu from rebreaking a giraffe's neck in a cast, which she feels is essential to his training.
During his pursuit, Legoshi gets Kyu's head into his jaws, having removed his dentures before doing so, with the rabbit feeling close to death, remembering when her parents had sold her to the black market. Fasting is also a final component in the wolf's training. Furthermore, he wishes Kyu to command him to "stay" as a human in real life would a domestic dog, and she agrees. Meanwhile, Legoshi's apartment neighbor, Sagwan the spotted seal, tries checking on his friend, he and the sheep Seven, another resident, worrying about him.
Seven deals with a carnivorous client, with his gesture of a handshake frowned upon by others, alongside his openly mentioning the black market. Legoshi and the half-leopard, half-gazelle Melon plan to duel on Happy Meat Day, which is also the Rexmas holiday, where beasts honor a tyrannosaurus rex that received wings after the extinction of the dinosaurs and rejuvenating the world. Haru, the Netherland dwarf rabbit, walks the city streets alone, which is seen as dangerous since the carnivores are showing delinquent behavior, and she can only converse with her love interest Legoshi through his apartment door.
Legoshi continues to train in his apartment, scratching the floor with his claws and understanding that many beasts in winter can survive for extended periods w/o food or drink, with Haru being his source of sustenance. After he leaves, police investigate his apartment, now bloodstained with red deer blood, with Louis, the cervine fitting the bill, believed murdered. On the eve of his forthcoming duel, Melon has nightmares about his mother and notices that his leopard spots have greatly multiplied, attempting to gouge them as the black market turf wars officially commence.
Contrary to what the police and media believe, Louis is alive and begins to speak at his first press conference as head of the Horns Conglomerate with the cover story that he gave blood for charity and wishes to talk about the black market, which has received a giant blockading gate due to the danger posed by the turf wars. Legoshi enters the black market battles proper and begins by fighting the Doku-gumi, consisting of Komodo dragons, which last until the end of the volume. A visualization of a typical Rexmas celebration comes after the main chapters.
Overall, this is another enjoyable volume of the Beastars manga, with its characters continuing to be endearing and satisfactorily concluding Legoshi's training under Kyu, which diverges from what he had received under the giant panda Gohin. However, some elements abound that only Japanese readers would understand, like herbivores seeing the River Sanzu when close to death, and Itagaki, as before, overlooks the gray area between carnivorous and herbivorous diets called omnivorism. Regardless, the manga's action intensifies with this installment, and I recommend it to those who have enjoyed its precursors.
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