Ok, we made it. We did it. Here we are, the final volume of Innocent is done. We’ve released the entire series. It’s been quite a ride. The series started in 2013, and I translated the whole thing. Working with a good number of other folks along the way. Thanks to all those involved that spent so many hours making this scanlation project a reality, and thanks so so much to Sakamoto Shinichi for making such a great series.

So yeah, this has been quite a long project and I really love this series. I really like the direction Sakamoto-sensei took with it, as it definitely seemed like quite a challenge to make a series where it had to span over 40-something years and follow actual historical events, while also focusing on a family of executioners. But he created some really interesting vignettes, some compelling characters, and some good themes. Doing a semi-realistic historical story you need to sometimes just suddenly introduce a character or a complicated political scenario, that’ll be around for a few chapters, and then they disappear. Or they show up and you don’t see them for volumes and then their setup gets a payoff. But it also dramatizes and fictionalized events, puts in events that probably didn’t happen (A lot of the Marie Antoinette stuff is based on the Stefan Zweig book and some of the Sanson stories are based on Henry-Clément Sanson’s probably largely ficticious book of memoirs) the story that got woven I think really worked, and was compelling despite its restrictions. The story is meant to be a “memoirs” of this period of history rather than a story of the entire French Revolution. It’s kind of a story from a couple of smaller perspectives. And through that you’re able to gain a sense of this period of time and how it felt living through it and being part of it. And it’s got some good themes of examining capital punishment, the nature of the French Revolution and it’s causes and ideals VS how things turned out, the divide of the rich and poor, all sorts of great stuff. Also the art’s incredible as everyone knows.

So my plan for now is I’ll probably work on Sakamoto Shinichi’s next series in a similar away, released in volumes, assuming it’s not immediately licensed or I just really hate it for some reason (The volumes are MUCH better quality than the digital or physical magazine for a manga this detailed). Or something else goes on in my life where I couldn’t sacrifice the time to do it. But that probably won’t be for a bit. It was about 2 years between Kokou no Hito ending and Innocent starting. So we’ll see how that goes. Also, everyone check out Archipel’s video interviewing Sakamoto-sensei if you haven’t. It’s great.

Oh, also, please let other folks know about this manga! I know some people may wait till a series is done to read it. But we’re just getting the series translated, we don’t have any sort of marketing. It really only gets spread by word of mouth. So if you like it, let people know!

Anyhow, till next time.

Innocent Rouge Volume 12 (Chapters 80-88)
Zippyshare
Mega
Online Reader (Mangadex)