How Good Is Juvenile Offender As A Sequel To Viral Hit?
Now that Viral Hit has ended, I needed something to fill the hole that the series had left in me. What better series would suffice than something that not only takes place in the same universe as Viral Hit, but even features the main character as well? As of this post, the manhwa is ongoing and so far, I am loving it.
It has everything that I love most: realistic combat, a compelling story and even a few nods to another series I adore. Most importantly, it feels like it has real justice in it. As a huge fan of revenge stories, there is nothing I loathe more than when the villains don’t get what they deserve. How many times have you seen shows where the hero doesn’t want to hurt them because ‘it would make them as bad as the villain’. This really is not a series about forgiveness or mercy.
The flow of the story is similar to Viral Hit. Most of the opponents will have a unique way of fighting and the main character will have prepared a certain technique or strategy for countering it. It is not quite as ‘spelled out’ as Viral Hit, but at a baseline, the fights have a near identical format.
One key difference from Viral Hit is that, there really isn’t any comedic aspect to the series. The tone is much more serious due to the nature of the preluding events.
What is Juvenile Offender about?
The story follows Yunseong Lee. A victim of intense school bullying. This bullying goes further than stealing lunch money or giving him a standard beating. These bullies are monsters, absolute psychopaths who relished in destroying his life. Even blowing up his apartment and framing him for it. This ends up leading to his grandmother's death and leaving him with a severe burn mark on his face.
Other devious acts commited by these bullies include: making him drink urine, bankrupting his family, tearing it apart and nearly driving him to the point of suicide. That’s just a couple of the things that they have done. Scarily, that’s not even the worst that some of them do to poor Yunseong.
Despite their heinous acts, they all got off lightly. Instead of being heavily punished for their actions, they get nothing more than slaps on wrists. The law had failed.
Yunseong is filled with vengeance and learns the art of fighting. He then tracks down every single person that had wronged him and breaks them, showing no mercy. Yunseong has no restraint, whether it be tearing the ligaments in their legs, beating their face into a pulp or destroying their lives. Yunseong means business.
What impact does Viral Hit have on Juvenile Offender?
Yunseong was a weak loser. So how is he beating up these bullies, especially since many of them are proficient fighters? Well, his fighting prowess is a result of the teachings of none other than Hobin Yoo. While Hobin does not have much ‘screen time’ in this manhwa, he still plays an integral role as Yunseong’s teacher.
He acts similarly to how Samdak did to Hobin. But unlike in Viral Hit, it is implied that he was directly taught by Hobin, instead of through Newtube videos.
While we never get to properly see these lessons, we do get to see short flashbacks of Yunseong asking how to defeat certain opponents. I really enjoyed getting to see how Hobin gives advice to our new main character, showing how much he has grown since the beginning of Viral Hit.
While he is not quite at the same level of Hobin, he is definitely a terrifying fighter. He is able to completely toy with some of his opponents and remain cool-headed even in the direst situations.
Do we get to see realistic techniques?
Just like in Viral hit, pretty much every technique used is perfectly viable for a real altercation. I would even argue that the fighting that we get to see is a better replication of a street fight than the majority of Viral Hit. Yunseong is far more brutal and unhinged than Hobin ever was. He has no issue with permanently maiming his opponents and is happy to use tools to assist him in combat, unlike Hobin. Some of the techniques used are for more than just winning a fight. They are used to humiliate and torture these bullies. If the thought of someone’s fingers and ankles being snapped makes you squeamish, some scenes in this series might be a bit too much for you.
The first proper technique we see is the heel hook. You might recall that this was used on Hobin by Jisu Ju. The heel hook is known for being one of the most devastating submissions in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. Not only can it severely damage the opponents ankle, but it can tear the ligaments in their knees to shreds. If having that done to one leg sounds bad, imagine having that done to both of them. Well, that’s the fate of the bully we encounter in the first chapter. And trust me, it gets more brutal from here.
I think that the use of tools by Yunseong adds a lot more to the series. It did somewhat annoy me that despite the focus of Viral Hit being street fighting, he rarely ever used weapons. Not very effectively anyway. The truth is that in street fights, lots of people are either going to be armed, or at least prepared to arm themselves with whatever is in the vicinity. I’m really glad that we get to see this aspect explored more and shown how Yunseong has been trained to handle such opponents.
In just the third chapter of Juvenile Offender, we get to see Yunseong use an aerosol spray to blind his opponent to set up for the rest of his combinations. I thought the brutality of this made for a pleasant change and has definitely made the series more interesting.
Should you read it?
Although I have talked about its similarities to Viral Hit, readers should note that the series does carry itself quite differently. Firstly, while Viral Hit has many sombre and grave moments, it is very frequently broken up with goofy and comedic moments. If that is a key component of what you liked about the manhwa, you may be a bit disappointed with Juvenile Offender. With the main character suffering to such a horrid extent, it makes sense that it would lack this aspect. It would feel inappropriate. Instead, this series focusses much more on the theme of revenge and brutality. It is definitely a few levels of violence higher.
Secondly, something you may want to consider is that while the fights flow in a similar manner to Viral Hit, it focusses a lot less on individual techniques. For me, I really loved how it emphasised the one or two new techniques that Hobin had learned for each fight. Juvenile Offender allows the fights to flow more naturally. It doesn’t walk you through how to do each technique. I personally liked how Viral Hit did it and it is something I wish was done more in this series.
Thirdly, there are fewer recurring characters. Another thing I loved about Viral Hit was the diverse roster of characters that we would see helping Hobin fight. On the other hand, Yunseong mostly fights alone. With that being said, it is still in relatively early stages, so there is certainly room for more characters to be introduced to help him.
Having a protagonist that is more of an anti-hero was a breath of fresh air. While it can be said that Yunseong is justified in his actions, many would argue that there were far less sadistic ways to achieve what he needed. Especially since most of the bullies were underage. Despite his violence, he never comes across as an evil person. So far, this has been one of the most enjoyable revenge stories I have read, and I would strongly recommend you to give it a try.
Thank you so much for reading! Check out this article if you want to see the top 5 techniques used by Hobin in Viral Hit! Or this one, if you want to see the members of Hobin’s team ranked from weakest to strongest!
Disclaimer: this post does not condone the use of martial arts as a way to harm others. Please use your skills responsibly 🐱
