Battle Angel Alita in printed form sticks pretty closely to the OVAs (from 1 to start of 3)I watched ages ago. It's over-the-top cyberpunk aesthetic that, at first glance seems nothing but aesthetic. Put out in 1990, I think it's pretty impressive. It was trying to tell a much more philosophical and nuanced tale than most of the late 80's cyberpunk media with the exception of Ghost In The Shell, published in 1989.

Luckily there's quite a bit of depth even with the typical manga fan service---at least there isn't the sexual fan service though? It's more typical gender rolls and how male/female interactions are, and it is an older manga. What is great about it is that even with all this, there is still an exploration of interesting questions and the translation has a lot of helpful extra side bars expounding on some of the sparse philosophy drops. Each villain is further contextualized beyond normal manga that is hyper violent like this one, too.

They are always the product of the terrible city they live in, and way of life that allows for them to eek out an existence. The ordinary citizens look up at a city suspended from space, where everything might just be better than the literal massive scrap yard they live in; controlled by factories that have laws that protect the corporation and not its citizens and perpetuating violence by paying people to hunt and kill anyone who breaks these laws. All of which serve their own ends as I've said.

Alita struggles with the perception of her body from outsiders dealing with the stigmatism of being a cyborg, embodiment issues (handled from a very male perspective) and a Cartesian mind/body duality when she is placed in a body of a killer and (as of halfway through vol.3) still doesn't recall her past but does cyborg martial arts, and does it well! Is it her body, or has she always been a weapon? There's some interesting stuff that undeniably makes it better than a lot of the stuff coming out around then. Especially 80's cyberpunk, in general, media wise.

About halfway into vol 3 though, the story takes a bit of a nose dive as Alita wants to be rid of her memories over Yugo, and shed her former body entirely. Also the doctor becomes pretty toxic, in general. It's a lot less satisfying than the first two volumes. Will keep going, though!

A quickly shocking start as after a tragic event, Alita creates something of a new life and finds it in a sport called motorball, and meets new faces and to a lesser extent, old faces. A (100%/Outstanding)

I'm loving this entire series.

The feel of the story changed completely from the first two volumes. I'm not a fan of where it's going.

Not my favorite volume so far, but there was still some fun to be had here. Alita is now a sports star after the death of Hugo and this has become a sports manga with a bit more violence. Like I said, I didn’t hate, it just wasn’t my favorite. The first chapter was the best chapter in this entire volume.

Has Alita met her match(es) in the Motorball rink? Has Ido acted before considering the long term results of those actions? Did you read these with the voice of Rodger Parsons echoing in your head?

Stay tuned as we head into the fourth volume of Battle Angel Alita!

Ok, I just realized I didn't have this series in Goodreads. I think I read them somewhere around 2000 and I *believe* I borrowed them from someone? It's possible it was a pen pal of mine, but I'm really not sure. I AM pretty sure it was the earlier VIZ edition, that flipped the artwork. This series is a little gory for me at times, but I did like it well enough to finish, and when the movie came out a few years ago I was happy to watch that.

Alita drowns her sorrows by immersing herself in the deadly sport of motorball, while Doctor Ido schemes to get her back. First part of a story arc that continues in the next volume.