Doubt (manga)

Doubt (-ダウト-), also known as Rabbit Doubt (ラビット·ダウト), is a shōnen horror manga written and illustrated by Yoshiki Tonogai. The series focuses on the "Rabbit Doubt" cell phone game, in which the players must find the wolf, or killer, amongst their group of rabbits as they are picked off one-by-one. Six players of this game find themselves trapped in a building with one of the group already dead; to avoid the same fate, the remaining five must play a real-life game of "Rabbit Doubt" and find the wolf hiding among them.

The manga was first serialized in Square Enix's Monthly Shōnen Gangan on July 12, 2007 and ended its run on February 12, 2009. Square Enix also released the first volume on December 22, 2007 and released the fourth and final volume on February 12, 2009. A sequel titled Judge (ジャッジ) began serialization in Monthly Shōnen Gangan January 2010.

Plot
Doubt revolves around a fictional cell phone game called "Rabbit Doubt", in which the players are rabbits in a colony; one of these players is randomly chosen to act as a wolf infiltrating the group. Each round, the rabbits guess which is the wolf as the rabbits are eaten one-by-one until none are left.

In the story, four players of the "Rabbit Doubt" game Yū Aikawa, Eiji Hoshi, Haruka Akechi, Rei Hazama and a non player Mitsuki Hōyama meet to relax together.They awaken in an abandoned psychiatric hospital to meet Hajime Komaba and discover Rei hanging dead. The group found Rei's cell phone and realize they were playing a real-life game of "Rabbit Doubt". To survive, the wolf, the liar, must die.

Further into the story, the groups tries to find an exit and the wolf using bar codes found imprinted on their bodies. However, their chances are limited as the bar codes will only open one door. As the story progresses, the "rabbits" one-by-one started to get killed, until Yū discovers that it is Mitsuki who has been killing everyone.

Mitsuki explains she wants to punish all liars to achieve her comatose father's revenge. She does not want to kill Yū after his first lie. Mitsuki had already kills the others for their lies. When Mitsuki leaves, Hajime tells Yū the truth about himself and handed him a scalpel as a weapon.

Yū and Hajime escape from Mitsuki, who falls onto the scalpel, cutting her neck. When Yū tries to open the exit with Mitsuki's bar code, Rei enters the room and reveals herself as the actual wolf. Rei is seeking revenge because the media believed her hypnosis was a sham, causing her parents who supported her to die in a suicide. She then decides to manipulate Mitsuki. However, the love Mitsuki had for Yū sometimes overpowers the hypnosis. Rei releases the surviving players and calls the police to the psychiatric hospital. Mitsuki is accused of the murders. There is no evidence about Rei being there.

At the end of the story, Yū receives a call from Rei, who tricks him into saying a phrase, and causes the comatose Mitsuki to awaken in her "wolf mode". In the last scene, she approaches Yū with a knife.

Media
Written and drawn by Yoshiki Tonogai, the chapters of Doubt have been published in Square Enix's Monthly Shōnen Gangan since its premiere on July 12, 2007. The series ended its run on February 12, 2009 with a total of twenty chapters. One chapter was also serialized in the magazine in May 2009 to commemorate the release of a drama CD adaptation, which was released May 27, 2009. A sequel titled Judge began serialization in Monthly Shōnen Gangan January 2010.

The individual chapters were published in tankōbon by Square Enix. The first volume was released on December 22, 2007. The second volume was released on May 22, 2008 and the third was published on October 22, 2008. The fourth and final volume was released on May 22, 2009. The French language release is licensed by Ki-oon.

Reception
The fourth volume placed fourteenth of thirty in manga in Japan for the week of May 18 to May 22 selling 45,770 copies that week. The next week, from May 25 to May 30, the volume rose to tenth place selling an additional 47,323 copies.