Er, I have a few. Genshiken, Kare Kano, and Eyeshield 21.

 

Priest

My favorite manga series is Priest, its set in the American old west and the main character is a zombie priest that was hung for falling in love with his adopted sister and he frequently goes on homcidal killing sprees

 

I haven't downloaded manga in two years, and with a few 2nd hand bookshop exceptions I haven't bought any since then either.

Still... I can remember some good manga:

Anne Freaks - You gotta love it when the protagonist kills his mum in the first chapter, and then gets tips on body disposal from the titular character. It gets weirder.

Appleseed - A socio-political scifi action thriller. Set in a seemingly utopian post-WWIII city. Forget the anime ever happened.

Berserk - Hard core. But 2 to 3 years ago the manga (English scanslations) went pussy. Gats was being followed by a couple of kids, and a little witch apprentice who lived in a house in a tree or something. I hope it got better. I never expected Berserk to go cutesy.

Bleach - Wannabe rebel school kid can see spirits. Not bad until it hits a tournament/multi-person show down/series of challengers phase. Whenever this happens in a manga I know the writer has run out of plot and is just coasting. Read no further. HxH, Naruto, Flame of Recca - I'm looking at you.

Fire Candy - Started off strong, but I didn't see much of it. Focussed on a group of genetically-modified, disaffected teens who use the drug Fire Candy for thrillz. Unfortunately it can make you spontaneously combust.

Gantz - More excellent hardcore action. I didn't see enough of this series to tell if they were forced into playing a deadly game by freaky aliens or not. I might have to pick it up and find out.

Lone Wolf and Cub - Samurai. Samurai. Samurai. Feudal Japan.

Nausicaa - A fantastic post-apocalypse story. Human nature never changes, though Nausicaa tries... War is war.

Gunnm aka Battle Angel Alita - A scrapped female robot is rescued from the rubbish heap by an enterprising robot-doctor. The robot has no memory of her past, but she can fight! An excellent series.

Monster - An up-and-coming young surgeon saves a very young sociopath, Johan. There are serious repercussions and the doctor travels the globe in pursuit of Johan while uncovering his past and present. It's an intricate and compelling tale.

There's a lot more... but that'll do.

Yak.

 

On the moment my favorite manga is Xxholic, I love the crossoverelements with Tsubasa Resevoir Chronicle. It's about the dimention witch Yuuko and a shop that makes wishes true but for a price. The serie was made by clamp and it's somewhat mystery with a few horror element but nothing to get nightmares of .

 

Elfen Lied ftw.

Cute chick tearing people apart? How can you lose?

 

I'm not a big fan of the little witch and never have found Ishidoro that funny (He and Puck play the comic relief role I guess) however berserk isn't what I would call 'cutesy'

A couple chapters after the witch house, Gutts confronts Slan which is pretty cool though he does get severely wounded, goes into another berserker rage and wrecks shit. Then you have the war between the Kushans and Midland etc etc. You also see how Emperor Ganishka breeds demons which is rather grisly even by Berserk standards.

Flora and her witch house get burnt to the ground btw. But yeah I wasn't the biggest fan of that particular part of the story ..

 

Perhaps cutesy is too strong a word, but I do think that the tone of the manga became a lot softer and yes, cuter, than it was before.

I searched for some reviews to see if things had got back on track. I found this: http://mangahelpers.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-1575.html "What do you think of Berserk then and now?"

I know that trotting out other peoples opinions isn't any way to argue the worthiness of the new volumes I haven't read, but these observations do line up with where I felt the series was going. Especially about it just being another violent shounen manga (ala Rurouni Kenshin etc) rather than the dark adult fantasy series it was before.

I'm going to have to read it myself of course. But this means I probably won't be in any rush.

Of course if the sidekicks start getting killed off then I'll be in like Flynn.

Yak