Are there any Manga/Comics like Gunslinger Girl?

I have just finished reading through the Gunslinger Girl Manga for the tenth time and was wondering if there are any similar-styled manga available to read.

I like the depth of the story and the detailed characters, as well as the whole government assassin and/or agency "thing". If you have any anime shows that are worth a mention as well that would be great.

I'm not the big anime/manga fan that Kisk and Piero are. But Canaan would certainly fill the bill in my estimation. So would Psycho-Pass, at least the first season.

Elfen Lied (very gory and sad), Haibane Renmei (very slow and character driven), Your Lie in April (inspiring and emotional)

I remember finding something on MAL, but I forgot the name. Gonna look for it again later.

Thanks for all the great suggestions! I'm going to start reading through them and see which ones I like.

Keep 'em coming. 

I'm reading this manga, which you might like... Though, it might not be your cup of tea since it uses TOO MANY RAPE TROPES. Anyway...

Name of the manga is "Arachnid" and it also has a spin-off called "Caterpillar"

The organization there is simply called "The Organization"

Noir is another good one and also Black Lagoon has some Gunslinger Girl vibes, oh and Casador De Bruja

crazyidiot78 wrote:Noir is another good one and also Black Lagoon has some Gunslinger Girl vibes, oh and Casador De Bruja

Those three sound very interesting! Going to try Black Lagoon first, I think.

If it's a fratello-ish character dynamic you're looking for, there's always (seemingly AWOL) forum member 47ness's Sally Sprocket and Piston Pete comic.

Noir, Madlax, and Cazador de Bruja are studio bee trains girls with guns trio and you will see a lot of similarities between them. They are otherwise their own independent entities. If you liked Hellsing you will like Black Lagoon.

Psycho Pass is another option if you're keen on the dower atmosphere and grey morality side of things.

I can watch Psycho Pass on Netflix.

Sounds really good.

Psycho Pass first season is highly recommended. Don't know how it is after that, but I'd watch Season One again.

PolosElite23 starts to mention is favorite non-GSG manga but quickly realizes most are romantic comedies or slice-of-life...

Now for anime? Let me...go grab my anime watch list....

Darker than BLACK
Puella Magi Madoka Magica (#Feelz)
SoRa No WoTo (K-On! With war and guns...good show)

Those are my high reccommendations that meet the "like-gsg" req. I'd paruse through the anime season threads in gossip. See what everyone liked.

Black Bullet was good I think? So you might like that...but seriously, check those threads. Lots of gems in there and other anime threads in gossip.

Hey, thanks PolosElite! I'll have a read through those threads and see what I can find. Although I'm not sure anything will catch my interest quite as much as Gunslinger Girl did.

I have started the first season of Psycho Pass and am enjoying it.

The weather is freezing here in Victoria, Australia at the moment so besides working there is not much else to do.

Thescarredman wrote:Psycho Pass first season is highly recommended. Don't know how it is after that, but I'd watch Season One again.

I actually preferred the second season, it ditched the breaks to explain how the world worked as taken care of in the first instalment to focus on the story instead, and was much tighter and together as a result. Movie wasn't bad either.

Didn't really finish Psycho Pass. It was good, but I dropped it around ep. 5 or 6.

If you just want something that's on Netflix that's really good I highly recommend Yuki Yuna is a Hero!!! It's one of my favorite anime!! (Itsuki is best girl!!!) <3

Triela wrote:If you just want something that's on Netflix that's really good I highly recommend Yuki Yuna is a Hero!!! It's one of my favorite anime!! (Itsuki is best girl!!!) <3

I was planning to watch that. Is it on Netflix? ありがとう、トリエラ−さん。

Yes it is!

I watched Psycho Pass and really enjoyed it!  :dance?:Netflix doesn't have the second season at the moment (I could of sworn that it was on there before ) so I am going to try and find it online somewhere.

Haven't had a lot of time to read lately as I have been working. I am going to try and read/watch Darker than BLACK next I think as it also sounds really interesting. Or maybe Elfen Lied!

Ashesofanotherlife wrote:I watched Psycho Pass and really enjoyed it!  :dance?:Netflix doesn't have the second season at the moment (I could of sworn that it was on there before ) so I am going to try and find it online somewhere.

Glad you enjoyed it. Definitely look up the second season (and movie) of Psycho Pass if you can. I actually think the second season was better than the first, if only because (from memory at least) it just assumes you already know how the universe works by that stage, and so dropped the exposition/explanation to focus on the story and characters.

I just finished the anime Joker Game on CrunchyRoll.  It lacks the emotional impact of GSG, but shares a few other traits:

- Episodic, not serial.
- Not linear timeline.  At least one episode is shown earlier in the series but takes place later.
- Spy fiction.
- ZERO 'anime idioms': no mallets, distorted faces, dragonflies flying a dotted line path through the character, etc.
- Has a serious mien the whole time.
- 'Mature' rendering style - no crazy hairstyles, no huge eyes, etc.

I liked the series a great deal, so much so I'm looking for the light novels on which it is based.

taerKitty wrote:I just finished the anime Joker Game on CrunchyRoll.  It lacks the emotional impact of GSG, but shares a few other traits:

- Episodic, not serial.
- Not linear timeline.  At least one episode is shown earlier in the series but takes place later.
- Spy fiction.
- ZERO 'anime idioms': no mallets, distorted faces, dragonflies flying a dotted line path through the character, etc.
- Has a serious mien the whole time.
- 'Mature' rendering style - no crazy hairstyles, no huge eyes, etc.

I liked the series a great deal, so much so I'm looking for the light novels on which it is based.

What is Joker Game about? I sounds really interesting but I couldn't find a lot of information online. Would you be able to give me a synopsis on it. 

Also should I watch the series or read the manga first?

Joker Game centers around a spy agency formed in the late 1930s, during the time of Japanese incursions into Manchuria, but before the US entered the WWII.  It deals with intelligence and counter-intelligence efforts both in Japan and abroad, with each sub-story centering on one of the eight spies, all tied together by a central silver-haired, hawk-nosed, grim-faced spymaster, Col. Yuuki.  

Most story arcs are only one episode, but some span two.  There is no central plot throughout the series, though they do return infrequently to the fact that the Army High Command still has the 'samurai mindset' and views subterfuge and skulduggery of this sort to be beneath the honorable Imperial armed forces.

The series does not glorify espionage. It lays out very early that the spies are fated to solitary lives spent decades away from their homeland, that there will be no recognition and, at best, anonymous ends to their missions, perhaps their lives. There is infrequent violence, and it is often resolved within seconds. Many episodes are resolved with the protagonists revealing a foreign agent or a cause of some act attributed to enemy assets.

The subject matter is rather rare, for it revisits a time that many Japanese would rather forget: when they were undoubtedly the aggressors in a war that has been indoctrinated into them as an act of near-unparalleled evil, a stain on their collective honor.  However, the series does not glorify Japanese actions, nor does it condemn it. The main characters are spies. They are simply tools for the military (and sometimes local constabulary.) 

The writing is taut, the mood tense. There are some cases of deus ex, where the spymaster is so incredibly competent that I feel the author cheated, but they are few and the 'cheats' of low enough disbelief for me to still enjoy the story arc. The biggest difficulty is that the spies are all males and are often hard to tell apart. As spies, they try to downplay any prominent traits, so this is realistic, but a little annoying.

I see the following similarities with GSG:

- It has an ensemble cast. No one character is The Star, aside from Col. Yuuki, the spymaster. Fortunately, he is more a plot device than an actual character, so he neither steals the spotlight nor overpowers the other nine characters.

- Each plot arc centers around one character.

- Violence is the first resort of the incompetent. While GSG has to provide some token violence to satisfy the audience drawn to the title, and to reflect its counter-terrorist aegis, Joker Game eschews violence except in rare and often-justifiable cases.

- It emphasizes intelligence over physical prowess.

- Mood is consistent. No 'comedy breaks.' Characters are soft-spoken. No 'bean mouths.' Pace is slow, contemplative.

- Character design is 'mature' and 'realistic.' No huge eyes, no spiky hair. It's a Production I.G. offering, and it shows their attention to detail throughout.

- A character in the field has very little support. They are outnumbered, outgunned, and sometimes start the scenario already in serious trouble.

- There is some question about the viability of the Agency. In the GSG anime, it's touched upon, but not really explored. This is how I felt it was also included in JG. (In the GSG manga, it does play a key part in the much later chapters.)

In many ways, it's very similar to the Elsa and Lauro GSG plot arc, where the focus isn't on the action, but instead the who, how, and why.

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I echo others' recommendations for Psycho Pass (which you've already seen) and give a guarded recommendation for Black Bullet. The latter is definitely rule-of-cool over-the-top action anime, but it at least attempts the fratello dynamic of pairing a tykebomb character (if memory serves, always female) with an adult who has a better understanding of the strategic theater. Additionally, the murder midgets do have a limited lifespan, though that plot device isn't ever explored after the initial reveal.

However, it is very shounen and splashy. It has comic relief breaks, unrealistically-rendered characters, occasional fanservice, anime/manga idioms, etc. It's a monster-buster anime, so, while the protagonists are outgunned, the plot allows for much more deus ex asspulling.  It has some feelzbomb moments, but the aftertaste left me feeling they were a little forced and manipulative.

At its best moments, this show captures the action feel of GSG. The final battle scene is how I think the New Trino reactor assault would have felt to me: an all-out fight for survival.

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For a limited-lifespan feelzbomb series with a fratello dynamic, I also recommend Plastic Memories. It plays what I call the "Time Enough for Love" gambit. In both the series and Robert A. Heinlein's anthology (at least the first half is essentially an anthology, an excellent reversal of the Scheherazade predicament), the creator states point-blank, "See this character? She's going to die. This isn't a spoiler because I want you to know ahead of time that she's going to die, and you're going to be crushed in spite of knowing that fact."

And, sure enough, that's what happened to me. Now, I'll be honest: I found so much of the series to be barely tolerable. There's fanservice, there are blatantly clumsy rom-com wastes-of-time, there are so many plot arcs I felt were filler and fluff. That latter part is actually the magic of the show; it's how you become invested in the characters, how you start to fully appreciate the tragedy they face, and admire the tenacity and inner strength with which they stride forward.

The show's concept is that it is about what are essentially Maytag repo men. A company leases replicants to customers for a set period of time, at which point the minds degrade and the replicants become a danger to self and others. The protagonists keep track of the various replicants' expiration dates and collect them before time. However, they must do so with the customer's consent; this is not Blade Runner. Most of the time, the customers agree, after a period of making their own respective peace with this inevitable conclusion to their lease contract.

The repo teams consist of one human and one replicant. Unlike GSG and BB, in this case, the human is a hapless newb. Of course, the replicant is nearing her expiry, so the positions are reversed: she is the old hand and he is the ... well, he's primarily there because company policy dictates that repo teams have to have a human. You get to see him grow and learn.

This show is a powerhouse in terms of character development. There's even a subtle Easter Egg in the OP to that extent. There is one shot, not even a second's duration, where you see her expression change over the course of the series. (I missed it. Someone posted this gem to one of the reviews, else I wouldn't have caught it.)

Yes, my heart was in pain, my eyes were deep pools of tears when she died. More importantly, in mulling over the actual heart-stab moment, I did not feel played, cheated, or manipulated. I actually feel happy that I lived their lives alongside them, that I saw them meet her end with grace and poise. I felt I saw a life fully lived.

This show captures the sorrow I felt for Angie when she passed.

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Someone else here recommended Your Lie in April. It's a musical competition anime. I feel it may be an excellent show in some eyes, but for me it doesn't have enough in common with GSG to satisfy the OP's request. It is an excellent study in PTSD, however.

Thanks for that! I love the extra suggestions. I will definitely watch Joker Game and see what I think.

I might as well. Kitty makes a very good case for it, and I've never gone wrong with a recommendation this strong from him.