Naoki Urasawa

Anyone else a fan of this awesome man? I haven't read as much manga as I have seen anime, but so far I haven't come across anyone who can can weave together a really in-depth, vast narrative better than he can, and for my money no one else touches him when it comes to characters; whether it be the huge, diverse main cast or the people that are only there for a few chapters, he's able to make them extremely believable and realatable - they all have fleshed out motivations and backstory, even if they're not instrumental to the main plot.

So what's your favorite of Urasawa's work and character/s?

I haven't read much of his earlier stuff, but of his later, most popular works I'd have to say Monster. I think it shows him at his absolute best character-wise, with Grimmer being my favorite of the bunch. Discovering the real person behind the constantly smiling, lanky guy was one unforgettable experience, as was discovering his tragic past.

20th Century Boys is a very close second though - I give the edge to Monster because I found the cast more interesting and the last third was a lot more solid; there were several story elements in 20CB that just didn't really go anywhere and it didn't seem as well thought out as the rest of the story.

Pluto was also really good, but I just didn't find it as engaging as his other works for some reason. The ending, particularly the last two pages, just kinda left me going 'Huh?' as well.

I can understand where you're coming from on 20th Centruy Boys. I had the same issue at first with Monster where it kept introducing all these new characters and spending so much time with them right when the main plot had really kicked off (I'm speaking of the beginning of the Munich arc with Schuwald, Karl,etc if anyone here has read it). I actually put it down for a while because I just couldn't see why these people mattered so much and wanted to get back to Tenma. But then all the elements and characters slowly started to come together, and it resulted in one of the most gripping, climatic conclusions of the whole series. Not only that, but every single one of the characters actually came back to play important roles again later in the series.

Once he proved to me that all his minor characters weren't just there to be an intermission from the big story, I didn't have any issues with it afterwards and actually waelcomed it. My memory isn't perfect on 20th Century Boys but I remember it being like Monster in that virtually no one gets forgotten about and end up playing very relevant roles down the road. The 22 volume-length is daunting but his cliffhangers are so damn good that I ended up going through it pretty fast. I can't imagine what the torture it must be to read his work as it's being published (His current work, Billy Bat, sounds absolutely insane in a great way, so I can't wait until that's finished).

Thanks for the recommendations, I'll check out Tadano, and I suppose I should stop shaming myself and read some Tezuka at some point, too.