Vinland Saga has released its final Chapter

[Retros_x]

The final chapter of Vinland Saga was released yesterday in Japan and the English fan translation today. It feels a bit weird to me, because I was invested in this story for almost 6 years when I watched the 14th episode of the first season of the anime adaptation and realized that I was experiencing something special. After the season finished I immediately started continuing reading the story up to the current chapter and from there on was a vivid reader of the monthly released new chapters. The second season was my TV series event of the year when it was released and I can't wait for the next season.

This story is without a doubt one of the most important story that I ever consumed and had a real emotional impact on me. It has one of the best main character developments I have EVER witnessed on TV. It starts as a revenge story in a viking setting but despite the historical setting it is more a modern reflection and exploration of themes like the horror of war, the nature of violence, the economy of slavery, but also redemption, forgiveness to yourself and to others, healing, finding meaning and conviction in your live. Its about growing up to become a responsible adult and what that even means. Self-Discovery, the human condition, the full package, its all there bedded in beautiful artwork and written in great character work and dialogue.


What are your experiences with the manga or the anime adaption? Are you caught up and if yes, how did you like the finale?

Spoiler: Here are some great panels/pages from the manga):

 

[Hriston]

As someone who's never read the manga but really enjoyed watching the anime, I'm impressed at how faithful the anime is to the artwork in these panels. Thanks!

 

[Retros_x]

As someone who's never read the manga but really enjoyed watching the anime, I'm impressed at how faithful the anime is to the artwork in these panels. Thanks!

The anime is definitely quite faithful! Although the detailed texturing and linework of the manga cannot be fully adapted it really takes care to use the panel compositions and bring them into animated form.

One difference that some manga fans did not like that much about the anime is that it took out a lot of the humor. Vinland Saga is at its core of course a serious story, but the manga uses definitely a bit more comic relief than the anime and its part of the charm. I think even in dire conditions human make jokes and seek to lift some of the weight of their situation by it. But I am not mad about it, I think its fine the anime went into a direction with less comic relief.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The anime is extremely strong, particularly the second season.

I did appreciate that a certain character from the first season shared my pretty unreasonable and undying hatred for the filthy Saxon and Angle invaders as well as the Norse ones, which I thought was maybe just me! And for a Japanese guy to think of that is impressive to me, though perhaps he just read the same histories and the same reaction to them! And the focus on this promise of a better world, free from violence and strife was striking and unusual and made me think there'd be more to this, even with the fairly prosaic revenge story at the core.

But the second season's far less outwardly dramatic exploration of life as a thrall in Viking Denmark is much more powerful and frankly elevates considerably above the level of which even most good anime and hell most decent TV operates on. Very rarely do we even think about the lives of those people, how forms of slavery more direct than serfdom absolutely existed in Europe at times we pretend it didn't, very rarely do we acknowledge so how truly disempowered and without real hope so many people were. I think most English-speaking cultures and perhaps most European ones lack the ability to be really honest about certain periods of European history, so maybe only somewhere Japan could originate a story like this.

I'm up to the end of S2 of the anime, hopefully S3 will release in 2026 as people are expecting.