Toriko, Vol. 40: あの涙は!!

It's getting... boring. I guess the highlights of this volume are the fights of the “superpowers” (Jirou, Midora, Don Slime), and the revelation of the “God” ingredient. There's also a moment of “plot twist” with Starjun, but it's so out of left field, with completely zero foreshadowing, that it just feels like a retcon setup for something to be introduced further down the line. Side note: Teppei, who was in the middle of a rescue operation, appears to have been completely forgotten and left hanging.

The fights are kinda awesome on the surface but actually kinda lame. It's silly to emphasize how these combatants are all world-destroyers, yet they completely fail at destroying this one world, despite unleashing “100%”. And all three fights follow the exact same formula: the one side unleashes incredible attacks, the other side takes them or absorbs them. In a "twist", the "bad" side wins. The author better seriously explain how you "eat" explosions and how that "golden can" works because as it is, they are plainly just deus ex machina.

Then there's the “God” reveal, which was rather utterly underwhelming. Turns out "God" is just another big ol' monster, a ... giant frog, that was formed by dozens of tadpole-looking things which ... burst out of the ground... I guess I'd be less annoyed if it was hatched from a gigantic egg or womb being incubated within the earth. Things are purely within the realm of “arbitrary” now, without any attempt at rhyme or reason (however silly). It used to be used for comedic effect, but now, it's “just because”.