I first started reading Solo Leveling quite a few years ago. It came highly recommended so I gave it a shot. I read up until the job quest and got bored of the story around that point so I stopped reading it. After repeated recommendations recently I decided to give it another shot. This time I committed to finishing it. I didn’t have anything to read on the bus, so I figured why not. I’m glad I did. I enjoyed the later half of this story a lot more than I did the first half. So I wanted to quickly give my thoughts on it. If you’re here without having read it, I recommend you skip this post. I’ll be going into spoilers from here on out and if you just want to know if it’s worth your time, I’d say it definitely is. It’s a slow burn, but it pays off pretty well and it answers all the questions it sets up. It’s a completed story that leaves you satisfied and that in and of itself is worth it. Now with that out of the way, let me give my thoughts.
Let’s start with the good things. I think the art in this manga is pretty good. It’s not the best I’ve ever seen, but it’s above average. I like the Webtoon format as well, with the scrolling on a phone being very convenient. There’s lots of Webtoons with great art out there though, so that on its own isn’t enough to convince me. The hook at the start of the story definitely is. Sung JinWoo is the weakest hunter out there and he gets caught up in a double dungeon, leading him to an extremely dangerous place. There he miraculously survives the encounter, waking up in a hospital completely healed. We quickly learn that he’s been put in a game system where he does quests and levels up. No one else seems to be in a system like this, but JinWoo accepts it and uses it to become much stronger. This kind of goes on without any real plot developments until we get to about the class quest, which is where I dropped the first time around. I really was that guy in the mining meme that stops just before he hits gold, because it’s right as that arc ends that the story starts picking up speed.
After leaving this dungeon, we get a reveal that some super strong guy steps out of a dungeon that’s been closed off for a decade. We also start getting more acquainted with the higher ranked hunters that are out there in Korea. JinWoo is starting to get up there in skill level very quickly with his new necromancer’s abilities. We also get a glimpse of something more bubbling below the surface. It turns out monsters have an instinct to kill humans and JinWoo is exempt from that. These mysteries slowly unfold until we find out that JinWoo is actually the Shadow Monarch. This brings me to my first issue with the story. I think the explanation of the monarchs and rulers is a bit convoluted and I definitely found myself lost somewhere in the middle of it. Maybe it’s because I was suffering from a cold while reading this part of the story, but I just felt like I wasn’t really getting it. This could be a problem specific to me though, maybe I’m just dumb.
I did really enjoy the Jeju island arc. Fighting the ants and watching them brutally annihilate the cocky Japanese hunters was very satisfying. This is where we reach the point of the story where JinWoo becomes by far the strongest person around, which is a little bit frustrating. I’m not a big fan of overpowered characters in general, I much prefer characters who have a much slower growth to reach a position like that. JinWoo felt invincible once we got past the ants and that’s less fun than feeling some worry for a character. I also have umbridge with how the story treats his dad. He’s the guy that came out of the dungeon after a decade. He dies right after encountering JinWoo, only protecting him for a moment. It feels very much like a waste of an interesting character, I feel like there was more story that could have been explored.
I was a little bit bored with the final fight. Everyone except JinWoo was useless and JinWoo eventually beat all the bad guys. Not particularly nuanced. But we do get the side stories afterwards, which I was very appreciative of. The side stories explain a lot of things that happen after the story ends. I’m not a big fan of how the final part of this story was handled per se. I don’t like it when stories make big sacrifices and then walk them back. What these side stories do is make it a bit better. There’s closure for some of the characters and we do get some fun ‘what-if’ scenarios that we wouldn’t have had otherwise.
All things considered I can understand why this Webtoon was as popular as it was. It does a lot of things right and although I see issues with some of its story, overall I think it’s very solid. And I haven’t even mentioned how gorgeous some of the character designs are. I do think that without the side stories I would have given this a much more middle of the pack review. Unfortunately we’re onto something a bit more sad. The illustrator of this Webtoon tragically passed away in 2018 while the series was still ongoing. That’s always tough to hear.
But yeah, that’s been my thoughts on Solo Leveling. Please check it out if you haven’t yet, but I hope you have, since this review was full of spoilers. Thanks for reading either way!
Opal Kaharis 