Kudan no Gotoshi is the type of story that wants to instill shock and surprises on its readers, but it doesn't know what shock or surprise it wants to focus on.

During a late night drive, 7 college students end up hitting into a large cow. Upon further inspection, the cow had the face of a man, who foretold that they would all die within 7 days. With this mysterious curse, the characters are trying to find a way to prevent their deaths and to escape fate's hand.

That plot might sound slightly interesting, a bit repetitive, having been done in so many stories before. The difference with Kudan no Gotoshi though is that it can't stick to a plot for more then one chapter. The first book stays pretty consistent with it's story, but soon after it spreads into so many twist and turns, and they just make everything an incoherent mess. One moment the issue is all about surviving, then its about someone possibly being the cursed one, then you find out someone else is too, then you start seeing cow ghost, then other people become cursed, then there is now a country-destroying prophecy, then someone becomes psychic after sleeping with a guy, someone becomes pregnant and gives birth to a cow within 8 hours, and all of this happens within one or two books of each-other. Its just... every chapter they try something new and it doesn't add to the story at all, only takes away.

If that wasn't bad enough, just about all of the characters are very unlikable. You won't care about any of their deaths, everyone acts selfishly, and with the story jumping all over the place, it becomes hard to even remember what a character's "arc" really is. A lot of the side characters are very one-note as well; jealous childhood friend, protagonist who wants to save everyone, religious zealot, ect. You seen them in other comics, and you've seen them done better.

This was a series I seen a lot of people drop, and there is a reason for that. What starts off as a standard horror manga turned into a horrible mess of dried up ideas that fail to stick together. Instead of connecting things and keeping the plot leveled, every chapter is just a new turn with very little pay off. And with the bland characters who add nothing to the story either, Its just safe to skip this cow curse all together and to move on to another series instead.