Eniale & Dewiela – Manga First Impression

So lately I’ve been ordering a lot of manga. I’m in the mood to discover my next big manga love story. I’ve also not been reading as much webcomics. At least not family-friendly ones. As such, I figured I would switch my webtoon recommendations for manga first impressions until I build up a nice stock of webtoons to recommend once again. And get ready for a iwicked good time with Eniale & Dewiela

Why I Picked up Eniale & Dewiela

Good Omens is one of my very favourite books and the summary sounded a lot like it. And once again, I liked the cover. I’m very superficial in my manga choices.

Official Summary

Angels and demons aren’t known for getting along, but their shared enthusiasm for designer labels and luxury items has drawn angel Eniale and demon Dewiela into a tempestuous friendship…which has a tendency to dissolve into conflict. With the powers of Heaven and Hell behind them, even a minor fashion disaster can have near-apocalyptic consequences for the people of Earth!

My First Impression

This is like good omens. And a lot of it is great but something’s missing.

What I liked

Honestly, the premise is fantastic and the manga does attempt to approach it from many different angles in order to get as much out of it as possible.

As it is more or less a slice of life, or slice of crazy adventure, only Eniale and Dewiela get to come back every chapter, but the supporting characters are nevertheless really well developed. It’s impressive how much you can get to know someone in 3 pages.

There is a lot of weirdness here. Out of nowhere, Diewela summons her hell hound which is a gigantic manicured french poodle, just because they needed to get to high ground. Wha? And it’s full of these nonsequitur moments which really add to the atmosphere and fun.

Any drawbacks?

Something’s missing. Considering the premise and characters, Eniale & Dewiela should be a shoo-in for one of my favourite manga ever, but it isn’t. It’s not bad by any means, yet I don’t find myself desperate to read what happens next, and I’m not sure why.

I think one of the reasons may be Eniale and Dewiela themselves. I like both of them a lot, and I think they are the right character types for the roles. But ironically, I find them less developed than many of the supporting characters. The first volume also has a general sense of aimlessness but the chapters are too long to work as a 4 koma comic.

This said, the entire series is only 3 volumes and I will get them all. Eniale & Dewiela is too great in principle to pass over, despite the hiccups in execution. Also, these very odd and disjointed stories often come together only once you’ve taken the entire thing in. Or sometimes they just fall further apart.

If any of you have read Eniale & Dewiela, what did you think? It is better than a lot of manga I have read. Pretty too!