, also abbreviated as BSD, is a Japanese manga series written by Kafka Asagiri and illustrated by Sango Harukawa, which has been serialized in Kadokawa Shoten's manga magazine Young Ace since 2012. Each character is named after influential authors and writers of the late 19th century to early 20th century and their powers are based on said author's books. The series follows the members of the Armed Detective Agency as they try to protect Yokohama from organizations such as the Port Mafia. The story mainly focuses on the weretiger Atsushi Nakajima, who joins others gifted with supernatural powers to accomplish different tasks including solving mysteries and carrying out missions assigned by the agency.
The manga originated from Asagiri's desire to write famous literary artists as fighters including the famous Osamu Dazai, having become popular thanks to a Nico Nico Douga video. In writing the cast, Asagiri decided to focus on weak characters, deeming Atsushi as a weak hero who needs to be helped by his wise mentor, Dazai. The author read multiple novels in the making of the series to feature as many writers as possible. Meanwhile, Dazai's character was mostly explored in light novels he wrote.
The series inspired a spin-off manga, Bungo Stray Dogs Wan!, as well as multiple light novels, an anime television series adaptation produced by Bones, an anime film, Bungo Stray Dogs: Dead Apple, a spin-off television series adaptation of Bungo Stray Dogs Wan! and a live-action film, Bungo Stray Dogs The Movie: Beast. The manga was a commercial success with 16 million copies in print. Though the manga was critically successful based on the multiple cast presented and the artwork, Atsushi's characterization was often noted to be overshadowed by the supporting cast as the lead's trauma is constantly brought back across the narrative.
Plot
After being kicked out of his orphanage, the young Atsushi Nakajima saves a detective named Osamu Dazai, believing he was drowning in the river while his actual intention was suicide. From Dazai, Atsushi learns he is a gifted with a supernatural ability capable of transforming him into a berserker white tiger. Dazai recruits him into the Agency he works for, the Armed Detective Agency, that handles crimes too dangerous for the police to handle. There, he meets many other ability users as they tackle various cases and events taking place in the city of Yokohama, a place teeming with individuals with Supernatural Abilities. Atsushi becomes the target of Dazai's former pupil Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, who is a member of the criminal organization run by Ōgai Mori known as the Port Mafia. Atsushi also rescues the young mafia member Kyōka Izumi upon learning she is being forced to kill. During Atsushi's fights against the mafia, he also meets Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald, the leader of an organisation named the Guild who placed the bounty on his head. Fitzgerald reveals there is a supernatural book (referred to as The Book) capable of changing reality linked with Atsushi, hence putting a bounty on the black market. Fitzgerald disregards any superficial damage the Guild might bring to Yokohama in exchange for the book, having an airship named "Moby Dick" destroy the city. However, he is nearly killed by Atsushi and Akutagawa once they join forces while Kyōka stops Moby Dick. Kyōka then joins the Agency.
A Russian man, known as Fyodor Dostoevsky sets up a fatal clash between the detectives and the mafia using a virus ability user from the group that he leads, Rats in the House of the Dead. Natsume Sōseki, who is the creator of the collaborative Tripartite Framework, stops the fight. While Atsushi and Akutagawa corner the virus' originator, Dazai manages to arrest Dostoevsky. Pages of The Book that were used by the government for experiments are stolen by Dostoevsky's other group, the terrorist association of five people, called the Decay of the Angel, which uses The Book's powers to frame the Detective Agency for a murder case, during which one of the members of the Decay of the Angel, Nikolai Gogol, murders several politicians then himself too. Dazai is imprisoned for his past crimes and is placed in a cell near Dostoevsky while the government sends its military forces known as the Hunting Dogs to execute the members of the Agency. As the Agency faces defeat, they form an alliance with Fitzgerald and later the mafia. Across the multiple fights, it is revealed there is another person above Dostoevsky, the leader of the Decay of Angels is Ōchi Fukuchi, the leader of the Hunting Dogs and Japan's national war hero.
After facing off both Atsushi and Akutagawa in a fight which ended in Atsushi escaping and Fukuchi killing Akutagawa, Fukuchi brings forward the Decay of the Angel's trump card, the vampiric Ability User Bram Stoker, whose limbs were cut off and his powers were sealed by Fukuchi to incapaciate him, and Fukuchi has him to use his Ability to transform Akutagawa and many others into vampire soldiers to conduct a global terror attack. Meanwhile, Gogol, who is revealed to have survived, teams up with the last member of the Decay of the Angel, the manager of the world's greatest neutral territory, the Sky Casino, a man named Sigma. Together they reach Meursault, the high-security prison where Dazai and Dostoevsky are kept, and Gogol has them compete in a deadly game to escape Meursault in 30 minutes, with Dazai enlisting Sigma's help while Fyodor teams up with the vampirized Port Mafia executive Chuuya, who is Dazai's ex-partner.
Back in Yokohama, using the vampire infection he created as an excuse, Fukuchi convices the U.N. to release the Ability based doomsday weapon One Order, that gives him complete control of anyone belonging under his jurisdiction, which happens to be all of the world's military thanks to Fukuchi's fame and subsequent influence. The Agency catches wind of this plan, and they infiltrate the airport where the One Order is supposed to be delivered, with the other Hunting Dogs hot on their tails. Although the Agency's director, Yukichi Fukuzawa manages to defeat Fukuchi, Dostoevsky arrives by tricking one of Bram's vampires into killing him, which activates his Ability, that lets him take over the body of anyone who kills him, thus killing Bram and escaping Dazai. Then, he uses Fukuchi, as well as two Ability-based weapons, the Sword of the Silver Cross Soluz Levni, and the space-time blade Shintō Amenogozen to create a three-pronged singularity being by the name of Ame-no-Gozen, which Fyodor can control thanks to the Soluz Levni.
After Ame-no-Gozen defeats and seemingly kills many of the Agency members, including Atsushi, the latter ends up in a fourth-dimensional space where he meets the swordsmith Akinari Ueda, the creator of Shintō Amenogozen, who was sleaed there, since the blades created with his Ability would lose their power had he died. Atsushi manages to return to the outside world with the Agency members and Akinari in tow, who separates Fukuchi from Amenogozen, thus foiling Dosotevsky's plan. Atsushi and Akutagawa manage to corner Dostoevsky, preventing his escape just by a hair multiple times. In the end, Fukuchi beheads Dostoevsky, and subsequently kills himself to prevent the latter taking over his body.
A few days later, Atsushi is aiding with cleaning up the ruins of the airport, when he stumbles upon a part of the Book's page, on which a message inscribed by Dostoevsky transports him to the 18th century London.
Development
After quitting his job as a salaryman, Kafka Asagiri became popular through his video "Yukkuri Youmu and the Really Scary Cthulhu Mythos" released on Nico Nico Douga. The first episode was viewed about 1 million times, much to Asagiri's surprise. Four months after he uploaded the video, Asagiri was approached by the editor-in-chief of Monthly Shonen Ace to bring in three projects in two weeks. The Editorial department has also contacted him.
The manga originated from Asagiri's idea to gather multiple famous late authors and poets and draw them as young adults and teenagers with supernatural powers. He was inspired by Shūsaku Endō's story Ryūgaku. In particular, Osamu Dazai was used as a major character after reading his book No Longer Human; in the story, Dazai expresses his embarrassment involving his entire life which the author found relatable. Impressed with this work, Asagiri decided to make his own take on Osamu Dazai stand out among the readers. After Dazai, the next writer chosen to make a character that often accompanied Dazai was Atsushi Nakajima, the main character. However, he instead needed a third character who acts as an equal to Dazai. This led to the creation of Kunikida. Although Kunikida was hard to come up with, Asagiri did not have writer's block in general as he claims that writing backgrounds takes him between two or four days. He calls this process "mysterious". Kadokawa Shoten approached Asagiri with writing more content for the characters, which led to the production of light novels where the writer decided to explore Dazai's past.
The white tiger from Nakajima's story is something artist Sango Harukawa always wanted to draw. As the manga was starting, Asagiri wrote about four lines of character settings and send it to Harukawa via email. Then, pointing to Atsushi Nakajima's setting drawing, a setting drawing like this comes up. Asagiri purposely decided to make the main character a person with no personality. That way, it would be easier to connect with the unique characters around the reader. In terms of roles, if Atsushi is the hero, Dazai is the sage. Like the role of Merlin to King Arthur. His design is also meant to heavily contrast Ryunosuke Akutagawa.
Among several supernatural elements seen in the series, Asagiri came up with one that everybody wants under the name "The Book". The magic nature of the book was based on Akira Toriyama's wish-granting items from the manga Dragon Ball. A major theme in the narrative of people overcoming themselves; as an example, Kyōka Izumi was written as an assassin who wants to escape from the work from the Port Mafia and instead becomes Atsushi's partner in the Detective Agency. While Kyōka is unable to leave her past behind, she tries to appeal to the readers with her new way of living which was written to be relatable. Villains are often written to be relatable despite their horrible actions too. Francis Scott Fitzgerald from the Guild plans to destroy Yokohama in his story arc but at the end and his next appearances, it is revealed his only desire was protecting his family. Sigma is also another villain written to be relatable though the author made him like that due to his "average" skills when compared to stronger antagonists. Ranpo Edogawa was one of the hardest characters to write due to his superior intelligence when compared with the rest of the characters but still felt that his role in the story would appeal more to the fans once he became more active. As the series progressed, Asagiri reflected although the story is about the battle between justice and terrorism with the arrival of the Decay of Angels and Hunting Dogs, it was more specific about the side of justice and who is on the enemy side of evil. He wanted the reader to do whatever he wanted to do based on whether he was to be included on either side.