One Piece 916: noo, not another hiatus! Still, some fun here – that burger on the cover looks amazing, I loved Luffy’s ‘unbeaten record’ and it was funny to see why Law didn’t intervene!

The Promised Neverland 100: cute having a little sequence with the littluns, complete with a cliffhanger. Getting the main crew to this distant place they’re checking on a whim in a handful of pages was odd, though. The pacing recently has seemed pretty bizarre.

One Piece 915: Nice to see a woman stand up for herself in One Piece. I’m getting on board with this arc!

Haikyuu! 315: ehh, not sure about this one. It felt like they wanted Hinata’s big moment to be both cliffhanger from last time AND conclusion to this chapter so sort of had a fumble and a re-do. It felt clumsy to me.

Dr. Stone 71: Oh, this was more entertaining and clever than I expected. Though having a battery in there was a bit of a cheat. I liked Chrome swallowing his pride and pretending to be primitive. And the cover reminded me that behind all the comedy facial expressions these characters are designed to look pretty cute.

The Promised Neverland 99: hmm, a bit too much is kept mysterious in this chapter, so it’s not very interesting when the characters are off on an expedition to coordinates written in a book without much indication of what will happen there.

Boruto 26: Ah, I see, they’re bringing in Boruto’s version of Sasuke. But while I don’t dislike Kawaki, so far he’s not very interesting.

One Piece 914: Ahh, worth the wait. Some great humour, especially with Tsuru losing her temper, and then the action at the end, the sheer joy of Luffy and Zoro heading into trouble, and Law showing up just for an outraged reaction were all great. This depiction of a Japanese world but with severe deprivation and a pretty ridiculous honour system where everybody keeps refusing to eat others’ food is also more nuanced than I expected.

Haikyuu! 314: Woo! Hinata has his little giant moment. After a lot of build-up, and even without the real pay-off, this was a really nice way to give an emotional climax to the match. Beautiful art too!

 Dr. Stone 70: Hmm, this is getting confused with the telegraphing of Chrome having his own agency to escape. And the idea of a painted layer of carbon being enough to withstand a trained soldier’s spear thrust is a bit dumb.

One Punch Man 94: This mammoth chapter shows that even without Saitama (not counting his little background cameo on the frontispiece), and even without any direct appearance from King, this manga can be incredibly fun. Lots of the S-class got a chance to show what they can really do, and it was well worth trawling through the chapter slowly in Japanese before the translations got out (though as usual the fans have been lightning-quick). This was a filler chapter with lots of new characters showing their stuff, but it was a huge amount of fun. Now the executives are moving, so we’ll be into the best part of the arc very soon. And this chapter also had some great Child Emperor moments, even if he didn’t exactly fight. Not only the frontispiece with that somewhat inscrutable expression, but his adorable doubts about how King sees him too!

One Piece 913: Very funny start to the chapter with Luffy’s idea of how to use a sword. I hope Zoro gets his hands on it soon. And Oda continues to throw everything Japanese-y at this arc, with a sumo wrestler, a teahouse and even a woman who looks like an Utamaro painting. But Hawkins revealing some of his power was the most interesting part of this chapter – even if it seems like he would have trouble getting underlings! Too bad Jump’s on a break next week…

Dr. Stone 69: the pace picked up massively all of a sudden. They’ve not only relocated with their steam traction engine, now they’re planning on using it to attack. Should be an interesting chapter next time.

Haikyuu! 313: I sense next chapter will be Kageyama’s time to shine. There’s no way Karasuno is losing this, so I don’t see it as all that dramatic, and this chapter hinging on slipping in sweat wasn’t all that exciting. But the spikes were very dynamically-drawn!

Kuroshitsuji 142: Not too keen on this whole angle. After that sickening unnecessary flashback, we have lame comedy, lots of standing around doing nothing, and now these superpowered beings stopping their business just because Victorian Scotland Yard pop up with 19^th-century riot shields? And now Lizzie of all people is the one to amp up the tension? Lame. I did laugh one reader’s comment that Ciel’s real name is Armin Tanzarian, though. There’s a similar feeling of betrayal, haha.

The Promised Neverland 98: A bit of intrigue to set up this new arc. Not so engaging, but a nice set-up for another arc, this time up against humans.