By Kim Young-Oh
Dark Horse, 176 pp.
Rating: 16+

If you like your manhwa with a healthy dose of pow! and splat!, then Banya The Explosive Delivery Man is for you. This shamelessly entertaining story plays like a cross between Dune, Mad Max, and Lord of the Rings, blending fantasy and sci-fi elements with plenty of butt-kicking action sequences. Kim Young-Oh’s artwork grabs us from the very first panel, tossing us headlong into a desert battle between human soldiers and a horde of Tolkein-esque monsters called Torren. Out of this chaos a lone figure emerges: a scruffy young mail carrier named Banya. We see him outwit the Torren, vault over the walls of a fortress, and deliver a letter to the besieged general within. We’re then treated to a bit of comic business as Banya informs the general that it will cost him “100 batt for standard, 180 batt for priority, 250 batt for express” with “an additional charge of 100 batt for danger” to send a reply. (No word on whether Saturday delivery is an extra charge.)

As his delivery spiel suggests, Banya is a hero in the classic shonen mold: brash, gifted, self-interested, and quick with the one-liners. Like all good shonen heroes, he has a posse that includes a feisty female foil and a comic-relief sidekick. Mei, the posse’s estrogen-bearer and conscience, is an especially appealing character. Not only is she brave and strong, she’s also cunning, resourceful, fiercely moral, and loyal—Mei delivers a mean karate chop and a healthy dose of motherly scolding without pausing to worry about her bra size or Banya’s feelings towards her.

Banya is the debut title in Dark Horse’s new manhwa line, and its action-oriented storytelling fits perfectly into the Dark Horse catalog of manly-man manga. Like Samurai Executioner and Reiko the Zombie Shop, Banya benefits from top-notch production values: slick cover design, snappy translation, quality paper stock. More importantly, however, the content lives up to the packaging. The story is expertly told with bold, kinetic images and minimal editorial intervention from the author. Banya is one of the first manga/manwha I’ve read in ages that doesn’t saddle the reader with a prologue (”Once upon a time, humans and Torren lived in harmony…”) or long patches of expository dialogue (”Gosh, how long has it been since the Torren first started the war with the humans?” “It all began with the incident at X nearly 150 years ago…”). Instead, we experience the story through the heroes’ eyes as a group of apolitical, slightly mercenary folk who profit from their derring-do in a time of monsters and military conflict.

The bottom line: Banya delivers. (Groan all you want, but it’s true.)