Ability

Title: Ability
Year of Release: 2012
Status: Ongoing
Story: Son Jae-ho
Art: Lee Gwang-Su

Some of you may recognize the names of the author and the artist for this series - they're the same two who collaborated to create Noblesse, which I frequently rant and rave about in all of it's glorious awesomeness.
Because this series is ongoing and doesn't appear to be ending anytime soon, I've foregone the review template and will just... talk about it instead.

Ability is a manhwa, hosted on Naver, that follows the exploits of Han Yu-Hwa, a cafe owner/unlikely hero who has the power to regenerate wounds extremely fast (at least, in comparison to a standard human). In the setting for the series, the world is shared between humans and beings referred to as Anothers. Anothers are monsters that live among humans but conceal their true forms and just appear as regular people to ordinary humans. For whatever unexplained reason, Han Yu-Hwa can see their true appearance, regardless of whether they are concealing it or not. It's a little difficult initially getting into the series when you have to stop and re-read the occasional speech bubble because it reads as "an Another," or "Another," depending on who translated it. Translators mix up the context once in a while, which makes for a little less of an easy read. Otherwise, the series is pretty well done. The illustrations are just as well done as Noblesse is, although the series just seems to be lacking the extra fuck yeah! that Noblesse manages to keep producing. Don't misunderstand, though. The series is well worth the read, it's just like a 1/2 step below where Noblesse sits in my preferences. Hell, you might even like Ability more than Noblesse. Nobody's judging you.

There are quite a few similarities between Ability and Noblesse that I picked up on immediately - aside from the creators being the same people, both feature monsters in a human-dominated society. They both feature heavy action scenes throughout the series. They both feature secret government organizations that work behind the scenes to achieve world domination/destruction. Both feature highly unlikely heroes, and even less likely enemies. Both borrow quite heavily from myth/folklore. Both feature strange alliances. There are more comparisons I can offer, but you can discover them for yourself if you feel so inclined to do so.

One of my favourite things about Ability is the humor they've incorporated into the series. Ability, much like Noblesse, carries some very heavy subjects within it's story and it's always refreshing to see some silliness mixed in with the depressing stuff. Example:

                                                
Han Yu-Hwa is about to get his ass handed to him, but they still get some funny lines in before he's beaten to death by an Another.

As the series progresses, there are new people introduced that make previous characters seem like a bunch of bitches, and much like Bleach, there are training montages and characters getting stronger so they can fight the good fight. However, unlike Bleach, Ability gets this all done without wasting 26 extra hours of your life waiting for anything worthwhile to happen.

[rant] I must say, in anime and manga, one of my biggest pet peeves is when a series tries to hook you in on the story by creating cliffhangers that don't lead anywhere. Take for example... Dragon Ball Z - I love the series dearly, but during the Freeza saga on Namek I waited for almost two goddamn months for Goku to get out of the fucking healing pod to kick some ass. But the way they made it seem was that he was at 99% healed for those 2 months. What the fucking hell took so long?[/rant]

Anywho, you should check that shit out.