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kradeelavthings i liked about ajin (manga) in no particular order, now that it’s been 6 months and I’m still thinking about it:
- the socio-political response to the ajin/IBM’s? usually when supernatural/horror elements are mixed with modern times it’s so obvious that people don’t react the way they would or it’s forced for Specific Plot Needs. Here, you’ve got everything down to youtube comments about fake (but actually real) vids (!!!!), the weird little cult-y power dynamics that comes when you get a charismatic leader and folks starving for a place to belong, etc.
- a clear emphasis on the difference between ‘villain-coded and raises uncomfortable points but has a decent moral compass once when you hear him out‘ (kei, his mom, etc) and ‘villain coded and genuinely 100% an unredeemable sociopath that needs to go down’ (satou) that doesn’t feel contrived. i still want to legit kiss this manga for allowing such shades of (dark!) grey while still not excusing genuine atrocities, which some media has a tendency to do when you stuff it full of villains. (which makes me … genuinely uncomfortable, at times, believe it or not - there’s sympathy for the ones dripping in blood and bared teeth and then there’s ‘you … do … realize what they did, right’)
- A+ detail on various spec-ops mannerisms - little things like stances, trigger control, sound effects for different firearms, squad layouts - obviously there’s some flubbing of rules when you’re dealing with monsters vs humans, but jfc, i was impressed.
- on that note: the ACTION PACING holy balls. there’s very few people that can do vanilla action alone and then there’s next-level ‘how do you fight someone who’s immortal and has literally friggin thought of every single loophole in his toolbox’ action.
- ajin is probably one of the top two if not the top ‘okay this guy gets how trauma’s going to affect folks’ with the lovely mix of people dying/regenerating everywhere and then all the past experiments (ie Tanaka.) Stockholm syndrome, check, what they hesitate doing vs what they don’t, check ..
- incredibly tight control on long-term plot & character arcs??? usually in manga series i end up only giving a shit about one character and zoning out as it goes on and on, but weirdly enough once when the original writer dropped out and the artist took over - you really could tell it was the artist all along that had a much stronger idea of what the themes and dynamics needed to be. even the minor bodyguards for kei had me clutching my heart at [very specific scene on the top of the skyscraper].
- controversial hot take: i see all of your ‘comics are better with writers-turned-artists’ and raise you ajin.
tldr; fantastic action/thriller/horror series that goes on a limb with the sheer amount of, mmm, psychological/sociological detail? that you don’t normally see re: present-stories with monsters. Probably will end up owning this at some point just for the sheer number of storytelling biases it had for me.
….. and a bonus round of things that r e a l l y shouldn’t be on this list:
