Moriarty the Patriot, Vol. 1

2.75 stars. Overall, this was a decent and fairly enjoyable story that explored class hierarchical oppression during 19th century Great Britain, and one man's quest—alongside the help of his friends and acquaintances—in decimating this oppressive class system. The plot itself was okay enough, but what kept me reading this was the beautiful art style and my inexplicable eagerness to find out where the plot was heading.The art style for this reminded me of the [b:Black Butler 6690979 Black Butler, Vol. 1 (Black Butler, #1) Yana Toboso https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1336691148l/6690979.SX50.jpg 6886418] manga series, Because the main character of this story, William, resembles Sebastian from Black Butler in the best way possible. In general, the art was really well proportioned with clean line art and was pleasant to look at. I also have a fascination with following highly smart and capable protagonists, so having an uber-intelligent protagonist like William was great. This story follows a mystery plotline and knowing that a character as likable and fascinating as William was the one solving these mysteries is likely what made me so eager to continue reading this to find out how the events presented would play out.This manga took the whole eat-the-rich concept to a whole different level, because let's just say (for the sake of avoiding spoilers) that William and his allies go to extremes to ensure that the tyrannical and corrupt nobles learn their lesson. It was shocking to see at first, but I warmed up to it quickly enough because I realized that often in stories—especially in the ones that aren't fantasy—the really bad guys don't get punished to the extent that I'd like them to. So, though initially jarring, seeing this manga stray away from that so heavily became somewhat refreshing as I kept reading this.Though I don't have any strong feelings on this eat-the-rich plotline, what I did find to be a bit unnecessary was the constant heavy-handed reminders of how oppressive this class system in the story is. In the beginning, when we're getting introduced to everything, there are multiple instances of characters having 3 or 4 panels worth of internal monologues reciting how messed up and horrible this class system is. The thing is, we can already see this fact from the actions of the corrupt nobles portrayed throughout the pages, so even though I understand that this is an important and prominent theme of the story, constantly rehashing this same point over and over was redundant and unnecessary. Also, the characters' responses to events regarding this whole oppressive class system situation was sometimes a bit too melodramatic for my tastes as well.The plot itself was a little underwhelming, but perhaps that was my own fault for going into this with really high expectations. It's just that being presented with such an intelligent protagonist made me inclined to believe that I would be reading a story with unexpected but believable twists and turns in the plot, with the protagonist's high intelligence being utilized efficiently. Though William's intelligence is definitely displayed a handful of times, it wasn't to the extent that one would expect with a character who is believed to be comparable to Sherlock Holmes and shown to be intellectually capable enough to be a professor in his early 20's (which he is).So some parts of this were kind of a letdown, but in general this manga was still good enough for me to be interested in picking up the next volumes eventually. But to be honest I think I'll just watch the anime adaption instead since it looks very promising.