Lycoris Recoil Manga Captures the Series’ Nuances

Lycoris Recoil and its concept concerning teenage girls acting as assassins isn’t exactly new in manga and anime, as we’ve seen the idea brought up in series like Gunslinger Girl and Tista. While perhaps not as immediately, dark, dramatic, or heartbreaking as its contemporaries, it comes across as something special due to the blend of drama, humor, and insight into people’s abilities and motives. While we’ve already had plenty of opportunities to see as much from the anime adaptation, Yen Press picking up the manga allows us a way to appreciate even more of its nuances. 

Editor’s note: There will be some mild spoilers for the first volume of Lycoris Recoil manga below.

In the case of Lycoris Recoil, we’re introduced to some Direct Attack Lycoris agents in the midst of an incredibly dangerous situation. A group of them are in a stand-off with a criminal organization that captured one of the members. We see a lone Lycoris called in to assist and defuse. Before that can happen, communications are cut and Takina Inoue uses her gun to kill all of the enemy agents. Erika is saved, but the group is dead, her fellow agents are mad at her, and she finds herself being assigned to work alongside another lone agent named Chisato Nishikigi at the LycoReco cafe.

The first part of what makes Lycoris Recoil work so well, immediately from the outset, is the contrasting personalities. Both Chisato and Takina, as members of the Lycoris division, are orphans trained as agents and assassins. Their age is designed to hide the fact that they’re capable individuals able to handle and defuse the most drastic and dangerous situations. Takina is incredibly serious about her job, but we quickly see that she acted to protect her ally and friend even if it broke rules. Chisato is referred to as a prodigy and someone Takina should learn from, but she seems more like an ordinary, extremely congenial and bubbly young woman. Her outreach involves not only working at the cafe — their cover — but also doing work to assist in the community in addition to the government-ordered missions.

But the biggest contrast is their methods. Chisato believes that all lives matter. Even those of the threats she addresses. So once Takina, and by extension the reader, sees her in action for the first time, her rumored status becomes far more believable. Even in the initial volume, we get opportunities to see how here mind is working and there’s more to her. In so doing, we even get an idea that Takina might start to be intrigued by her and her methods. 

Because this is a manga adaptation of Lycoris Recoil, we can better appreciate the subtleties of these sorts of moments. When we first see Chisato properly in action in her first mission with Takina, the art captures her incredible dodging methods. We can more clearly see the things they do in the photo that drew the attention of a criminal group. It makes it easier for us to notice and catch what these agents do. In fact, I think it also helped make it clearer to see what sort of person Yoshimatsu was upon his first appearance. 

It’s just great to see Spider Lily’s story told in another format. Retellings of stories give us chances to perhaps focus on and appreciate things we might have missed before. The manga adaptation of Lycoris Recoil seems like it could be an opportunity to better appreciate the characterizations, as well as understanding what these agents pick up on and how talented they are.

The first volume of the Lycoris Recoil manga will be available in English via Yen Press on October 29, 2024, and the second volume will debut on February 18, 2025. The anime is streaming on Crunchyroll. Yen Press will release the Lycoris Recoil: Ordinary Days light novel on January 21, 2025.