Monsters Among Us

What do you do if you save the life of someone who goes on to wreak great evil?

With the tagline: 'The choice you make, the price you pay.', I have been reading the manga Monster by Naoki Urasawa.

I cannot recommend this title enough. It is one of those sorts of stories that doesn't have to be told as a manga (comic) but is absolutely awesome in that medium. There are no giant robots, no superheroes, no psychic powers. This could just as easily been a made-for-TV movie... and in its plot essentials it probably has been.

Set in the mid-80's it's the story of a peerless surgeon, Dr Tenma, who has moved from Japan to practice medicine in Germany. Tenma is talented, kind-hearted, and got into medicine to help people regardless of race, social standing, or the ability to pay. Starting out as a cynical (if somewhat exaggerated) story of hospital politics, Tenma's world comes crashing down when a young boy he saved on the operating table turns out to be a serial killer. And I don't mean 'turns out be' in a few years. I mean, right away. So Tenma's career, conscience, and everything else is in jeopardy as he tries to exact some kind of answer or justice from his situation.

The manga format allows this story to be told in a detailed expansive way that no film would be able to duplicate. Print novels or lengthy anime series could perhaps do it... and of course there has been an anime series which I understand is very good in its own right. But this is the original vision.

In typical manga (or anime) fashion much of the drama is played broadly and 'overacted' in the sense of everything being super-urgent, super-dreadful, or super-tense. Part of that owes to the fact that the chapters in manga books (tankoubon in Japanese) are read one after the other, but in their original print run were serialised weeks apart. So when it looks like characters are reacting as if every chapter is some emotional climax it owes to the cliffhanger nature of the weekly or monthly manga installments. There are eighteen volumes in the series (of which I've read five up to the point of this writing).

Apart from the melodrama, this is a tale for anyone who likes their suspense and plot twists served up in heavy doses. Obviously to justify a tale spanning eighteen paperback book sized volumes there's more to it than just 'doctor tracks down serial killer'. There's a lot of bigger 'conspiracy' things going on, and a lot of sideplots involving the various characters. But all of it is interesting, and almost all of it is directly relevant to the main plot.

Unlike something like Death Note, this manga is pretty well grounded in reality. These are all realistic people, in real towns, doing real things. The plot, with all its twists is not as complicated as Death Note, but the characters are also much more believable. Don't get me wrong, I liked Death Note just fine, but it was peopled by the kind of uber-minds that only exist in fiction... not to mention the supernatural Shinagami themselves. Monster is cast with people you could know in any house or on any street corner... er, if you lived in Germany.

I'm compelled to finish this manga before embarking on the anime. I easily enjoy manga as much as I do any other medium, and I'd like to soak in the creator's unadulterated vision for this thing. It has become fairly common for anime based on suspense-heavy sources to change events or endings from their originals to keep the viewer guessing. If you've watched the live-action Death Note films you know what I'm talking about. It would take A LOT of the steam out of a Monster anime to know all the plot points coming up because you read the manga, so it will be interesting to see how they handle this. Of course I have to avoid all online plot summaries and such at all costs. Spoilers would kill anything having to do with this story!

If you can put up with a lot of dramatic shouting, don't walk, run to pick up this series. What a great change of pace from all the other monsters in comics and movies.

Why My Stereo goes to Eleven

I have a lot of interests, many bordering on passions…. er, too many probably.

Some, like martial arts, are lifestyle choices. Integrated into my weekly schedule, there’s actually set times devoted to practice, so its kind of placed before me on a regular basis and my interest keeps getting renewed through regular involvement. Any reading, practicing or communicating about the martial arts that goes beyond my scheduled sessions is fine, of course, but waxes and wanes like any other interest. Because practice is part of my routine, involvement (if not actual enthusiasm) means that attention to it never really gets to fall away completely.

Others, like video games or genre films, are pastimes that come and go on an almost cyclical basis. I always love this stuff, but interest in this sort of pastime isn’t always at a fever pitch. Currently I’m in video game mode (obviously, given their dominance in this blog), with a fair focus on manga (actually a media form along with anime that is seminal to the development of video games, though my interests don’t normally dovetail them together) as well. Current manga being read: Monster, Yagyu Ninja Scroll, Path of the Assassin, Berserk, and Initial D.

Still other interests are sort of always buzzing in the background. I like to read, so I’ve always got a book or periodical being worked through at any given point. I’m particular towards SF and horror, but I try to work classic literature into my book reading, and various lifestyle publications into my magazine list. At times this sort of interest can rise up to dominate my free time. That usually happens if I discover a new author or series or a favorite author comes out with a new work. Currently reading: Lukashenko’s DayWatch and various H.P. Lovecraft stories. The Lovecraft is of course a revisit. He’s a read-many-times staple author.

I don’t really ignore interests that aren’t currently front-and-center. They just don’t get equal time all the time. I suspect most people are like this. They find an interest, thoroughly work it, then if they don’t lose interest altogether, they at least backburner it for awhile and come back to it down the road when some new inspiration comes. I might be spread a little too thin. Having a lot of things you are interested in (and maybe more importantly, conversant in) makes for a more appealing person, but you’ll never get the most out of anything you do, if you don’t have focus. As with most people, I’ve had my share of interests that I got what I could out of them and then let them go, but I’ve been around long enough to where I’m not really adding any wholly new arenas… just circling around in the ones I already know and love.

This brings me around to music. Specific to me, listening (not playing) heavy music. If there was one interest/pastime/hobby/whatever that could be called my mistress this would probably be it. In this blog I’ve talked about video games (a lot!), martial arts, and racing. I’ve now mentioned film, manga, and books in this entry. I will probably get ‘round to hobby painting/modeling, wargames, anime and even booze. All this stuff... but the one big constant, the wallpaper in the background that is ‘visible in every shot’... is music. Through all the interests that have come and gone, changes in life, and places I’ve lived, I’ve never let my love for music dim.

Oddly, given my love for music, my appearance, and a lot of my lifestyle choices, I’m not actually a musician. I can keep decent time or rhythm, and I have reasonable manual dexterity to where I could probably learn an instrument relatively quickly (given other limitations inherent in trying to learn as an adult). People sometimes think I’m in a band, but more humorously (though tiresome) is the sheer volume of folks that think I look specifically like Peter Steele, vocalist for Type O Negative. I'll detail my opinion on this resemblance at a later date. Anyway folks, I’m not a musician. I’ve never been in a band. My music interest, HAS influenced my dress and style sense. So in expressing myself, I am sort of cultivating the band member look. Part of this comes from the many years I worked for Games Workshop. That company has a very image-conscious, rock and roll, guns and thunder mindset that cultivates ‘creative types’. So when you spend your work hours (the majority of your life) in an environment of cool, where being non-conformist is fine… well, you take it to heart. I didn’t quite grow up in some ways. That’ll maybe explain the hair, the music, the clothes, all my ‘juvenile’ interests, and of course, this blog.

Heavy music? A euphemism. I’m fuckin’ metal. There it is. The heaviest music is still metal. I’d like to think I’m a bit more cultured/cultivated than the stereotype (see Deathklok), and I’ve certainly met my share of metalheads that were not just beefy beerhounds in black t-shirts. Maybe it would be more correct, in a don’t-judge-me stereotype avoidance thing to say ‘rock’, but I have to face facts, ‘rock’ just isn’t specific enough. I DO like other kinds of music too, don’t get me wrong. As in all things, I think a person needs to be well-rounded, having at least some experience in things outside their normal sphere. I listen to the Beatles, Bowie, a lot of goth rock and various forms of industrial music.

But at the end of the day, I’m a metalhead. I’m not sure why I’m coming out of the closet in the blogosphere today—I’m already well out, and a town eccentric after a fashion, in real life. I guess this is the preface to why some blog entries will be dominated by opinions in music when music (metal) isn’t specifically thought of as a fanboy interest. Well, people can be just as geeky about anything. I’ll try to restrain myself on the volume of music entries.