HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

''Monster'' (stylized as 🢒M⊙NS†ER🢐) is a Japanese
manga Manga (Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art. The term ''manga'' is used ...
series written and illustrated by
Naoki Urasawa is a Japanese manga artist and musician. He has been drawing manga since he was four years old, and for most of his professional career has created two series simultaneously. The stories to many of these were co-written in collaboration with his ...
. It was published by
Shogakukan is a Japanese publisher of dictionaries, literature, comics (manga), non-fiction, DVDs, and other media in Japan. Shogakukan founded Shueisha, which also founded Hakusensha. These are three separate companies, but are together called the Hito ...
in their ''seinen'' manga magazine ''
Big Comic Original is a Japanese ''seinen'' manga magazine published by Shogakukan, aimed at an older adult and mostly male audience. It is a sister magazine to '' Big Comic'', the biggest difference being that it goes on sale twice a month in the weeks ''Big Comi ...
'' between 1994 and 2001, with the chapters collected in eighteen ''
tankōbon is the Japanese term for a book that is not part of an anthology or corpus. In modern Japanese, the term is most often used in reference to individual volumes of a manga series: most series first appear as individual chapters in a weekly or mon ...
'' volumes. The story revolves around Kenzo Tenma, a Japanese surgeon living in
Düsseldorf Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian language, Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second- ...
, Germany whose life enters turmoil after getting himself involved with Johan Liebert, one of his former patients, who is revealed to be a dangerous serial killer. Urasawa later wrote and illustrated the novel ''Another Monster'', a story detailing the events of the manga from an investigative reporter's point of view, which was published in 2002. The manga was adapted by Madhouse into a seventy-four episode
anime is hand-drawn and computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japanese, (a term derived from a shortening o ...
television series, which aired on
Nippon TV JOAX-DTV (channel 4), branded as , is the flagship station of the Nippon News Network and the Nippon Television Network System, owned-and-operated by the which is a subsidiary of the certified broadcasting holding company , itself a listed s ...
from April 2004 to September 2005. The manga and anime were both licensed by
Viz Media VIZ Media LLC is an American manga publisher, anime distributor and entertainment company headquartered in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1986 as VIZ LLC. In 2005, VIZ LLC and ShoPro Entertainment merged to form the current VIZ M ...
for English releases in North America, and the anime was broadcast on several television channels. In 2013,
Siren Visual This is a list of anime industry companies involved in the production or distribution of anime. Japan-based companies Animation studios There are over 500 animation studios in Japan. Below are those notable enough to have an article. * 3Hz ...
licensed the anime for Australia. ''Monster'' was Urasawa's first work to receive international acclaim and success; the manga has sold over 20 million copies, making it one of the best-selling manga series in history. The manga has won several awards, and its anime adaptation has been called one of the best of its decade.


Plot

Dr. Kenzo Tenma is a young Japanese brain surgeon, working at Eisler Memorial Hospital in
Düsseldorf Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian language, Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second- ...
,
West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 ...
. Tenma is dissatisfied with the political bias of the hospital in treating patients, and seizes the chance to change things after a massacre brings fraternal twins Johan and Anna Liebert into the hospital. Johan has a gunshot wound to his head, and Anna mutters about killing; Tenma operates on Johan instead of the mayor, who arrived later. Johan is saved, but Mayor Roedecker dies; Tenma loses his social standing. Director Heinemann and the other doctors in Tenma's way are mysteriously murdered, and both children disappear from the hospital. The police suspect Tenma, but they have no evidence and can only question him. Nine years later, Tenma is Chief of Surgery at Eisler Memorial. After saving a criminal named Adolf Junkers, Junkers mutters about a "monster." Tenma returns with a clock for Junkers, he finds the guard in front of Junkers' room dead and Junkers gone. Following the trail to the construction site of a half-finished building near the hospital, Tenma finds Junkers held at gunpoint. Junkers warns him against coming closer and pleads with him to run away. Tenma refuses, and the man holding the gun is revealed to be Johan Liebert. Despite Tenma's attempts to reason with him, Johan shoots Junkers. Telling Tenma he could never kill the man who saved his life, he walks off into the night, with Tenma too shocked to stop him. Tenma is suspected by the police, particularly BKA Inspector Lunge, and he tries to find more information about Johan. He soon discovers that the boy's sister is living a happy life as an adopted daughter; the only traces of her terrible past are a few nightmares. Tenma finds Anna, who was subsequently named Nina by her foster parents, on her birthday; he keeps her from Johan, but is too late to stop him from murdering her foster parents. Tenma eventually learns the origins of this "monster": from the former
East Germany East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In t ...
's attempt to use a secret
orphanage An orphanage is a residential institution, total institution or group home, devoted to the care of orphans and children who, for various reasons, cannot be cared for by their biological families. The parents may be deceased, absent, or a ...
known as "511 Kinderheim" to create perfect soldiers through psychological reprogramming, to the author of children's books used in a
eugenics Eugenics ( ; ) is a fringe set of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter human gene pools by excluding people and groups judged to be inferior o ...
experiment in the former
Czechoslovakia , rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי, , common_name = Czechoslovakia , life_span = 1918–19391945–1992 , p1 = Austria-Hungary , image_p1 ...
. Tenma learns the scope of the atrocities committed by this "monster", and vows to fix the mistake he made by saving Johan's life.


Production

Urasawa revealed that he pitched the idea of writing a manga about the medical field around 1986, but could tell his editor was not enjoying the idea. So he jokingly proposed a story about women's judo, and that lead to his first solo work ''
Yawara! ''Yawara!'' (also stylized as ''YAWARA!'') is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Naoki Urasawa. It was serialized in '' Big Comic Spirits'' from 1986 to 1993, with the chapters collected into 29 '' tankōbon'' volumes by ...
'' (1986–1993). The original idea for ''Monster'' came from the 1960s American television series '' The Fugitive'', which had a strong impact on Urasawa when he saw it at the age of eight. In the story, a doctor is wrongfully convicted of murder, but escapes and searches for the real killer while on the run from the police. He said that his editor was adamant that the series would not do well, and tried to stop him from creating it. The Japanese medical industry was strongly influenced by the professional practices in Germany, thus it seemed natural to the author to set ''Monster'' in Germany.
Post-war In Western usage, the phrase post-war era (or postwar era) usually refers to the time since the end of World War II. More broadly, a post-war period (or postwar period) is the interval immediately following the end of a war. A post-war period ...
Germany was chosen so that the
neo-Nazi Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and racial supremacy (often white supremacy), attack r ...
movement could be included in the story. When he started the semimonthly ''Monster'' at the end of 1994, Urasawa was already writing '' Happy!'' weekly and continued to serialize both at the same time. When ''Happy!'' ended in 1999, he began the weekly ''
20th Century Boys is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Naoki Urasawa. It was originally serialized in Shogakukan's ''seinen'' manga magazine ''Big Comic Spirits'' from 1999 to 2006, with the 249 chapters published into 22 ''tankōbon' ...
''. Writing both ''Monster'' and ''20th Century Boys'' at the same time caused him to be briefly hospitalized for exhaustion.


Media


Manga

Written and illustrated by
Naoki Urasawa is a Japanese manga artist and musician. He has been drawing manga since he was four years old, and for most of his professional career has created two series simultaneously. The stories to many of these were co-written in collaboration with his ...
, ''Monster'' was serialized in
Shogakukan is a Japanese publisher of dictionaries, literature, comics (manga), non-fiction, DVDs, and other media in Japan. Shogakukan founded Shueisha, which also founded Hakusensha. These are three separate companies, but are together called the Hito ...
's ''seinen'' manga magazine ''
Big Comic Original is a Japanese ''seinen'' manga magazine published by Shogakukan, aimed at an older adult and mostly male audience. It is a sister magazine to '' Big Comic'', the biggest difference being that it goes on sale twice a month in the weeks ''Big Comi ...
'' from December 1994 to December 2001. Shogakukan collected its 162 chapters into 18 ''
tankōbon is the Japanese term for a book that is not part of an anthology or corpus. In modern Japanese, the term is most often used in reference to individual volumes of a manga series: most series first appear as individual chapters in a weekly or mon ...
'' volumes released from 30 June 1995 to 28 February 2002. Takashi Nagasaki is credited as "co-producer" of the manga's story. ''Monster'' received a nine-volume '' kanzenban'' re-release between 30 January and 29 August 2008. ''Monster'' was licensed in North America by
Viz Media VIZ Media LLC is an American manga publisher, anime distributor and entertainment company headquartered in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1986 as VIZ LLC. In 2005, VIZ LLC and ShoPro Entertainment merged to form the current VIZ M ...
, who published all 18 volumes between 21 February 2006 and 16 December 2008. They released the ''kanzenban'' version of the series, titled ''Monster: The Perfect Edition'', between 15 July 2014 and 19 July 2016.


Anime

The manga series was adapted into an anime by Madhouse, which aired between 7 April 2004 and 28 September 2005 on
Nippon TV JOAX-DTV (channel 4), branded as , is the flagship station of the Nippon News Network and the Nippon Television Network System, owned-and-operated by the which is a subsidiary of the certified broadcasting holding company , itself a listed s ...
. Directed by
Masayuki Kojima is a Japanese animator, storyboard artist, and director, best known for directing the acclaimed anime series ''Monster'' and '' Made in Abyss''. He was born on March 11, 1961 in Yamanashi, Yamanashi, Japan. Career Kojima first got his start in th ...
and written by Tatsuhiko Urahata, it features original character designs by long-time
Studio Ghibli is a Japanese animation studio headquartered in Koganei, Tokyo."Studio Ghibli Collection - Madman Entertainment". ''Studio Ghibli Collection - Madman Entertainment''. Retrieved 2020-12-14. It is best known for its animated feature films, and ...
animator Kitarō Kōsaka which were adapted for the anime by Shigeru Fujita. The anime includes an instrumental theme by the Chilean folk music group
Quilapayún Quilapayún () are a folk music group from Chile and among the longest lasting and most influential ambassadors of the ''Nueva Canción Chilena'' movement and genre. Formed during the mid-1960s, the group became inseparable with the revolution th ...
, "Transiente", which originally appeared on their 1984 album ''Tralalí Tralalá''.
David Sylvian David Sylvian (born David Alan Batt, 23 February 1958) is an English musician, singer and songwriter who came to prominence in the late 1970s as frontman and principal songwriter of the band Japan. The band's androgynous look and increasingly ...
was commissioned to write the ending theme, "For the Love of Life", on which he collaborated with Haishima Kuniaki. In the cover notes to the official soundtrack he said, "I was attracted to the ''Monster'' material by the moral dilemma faced by its central character. The calm surface of the music giving way to darker undercurrents, signifying the conscience of the lead protagonist and the themes of morality, fate, resignation, and free will." An English dub of ''Monster'' was produced by Salami Studios for
Viz Media VIZ Media LLC is an American manga publisher, anime distributor and entertainment company headquartered in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1986 as VIZ LLC. In 2005, VIZ LLC and ShoPro Entertainment merged to form the current VIZ M ...
, which had the North American license to the anime. The show aired on
Syfy Syfy (formerly Sci-Fi Channel, later shortened to Sci Fi; stylized as SYFY) is an American basic cable channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. Lau ...
's Ani-Mondays with two episodes back-to-back each Monday night at 11:00 pm EST, beginning 12 October 2009, as well as on its sister network
Chiller A chiller is a machine that removes heat from a liquid coolant via a vapor-compression, adsorption refrigeration, or absorption refrigeration cycles. This liquid can then be circulated through a heat exchanger to cool equipment, or another pr ...
. A DVD box set of the series, containing the first 15 episodes was released 8 December 2009. However, due to low sales of the first box set, Viz decided not to continue releasing the remaining episodes on DVD and later dropped the license. ''Monster'' began airing on Canada's Super Channel on 15 March 2010, and on the
Funimation Channel Crunchyroll, LLC, previously known as Funimation from 1994 to 2022, is an American entertainment company owned by Japanese conglomerate Sony as a joint venture between Sony Pictures and Sony Music Entertainment Japan's Aniplex that specializ ...
on 3 April 2010 on weekends at 12:30 am. The series is also available digitally from several internet retailers.
Siren Visual This is a list of anime industry companies involved in the production or distribution of anime. Japan-based companies Animation studios There are over 500 animation studios in Japan. Below are those notable enough to have an article. * 3Hz ...
licensed the series for Australia in 2013, and released it in five DVD volumes beginning in November 2013. The credit sequence features illustrations from the book ''Obluda, Která Nemá Své Jméno'' (The Monster Who Didn't Have A Name) by Emil Scherbe which was published by Shogakukan on 30 September 2008.


Live-action adaptations

In 2005, it was announced that
New Line Cinema New Line Cinema is an American film production studio owned by Warner Bros. Discovery and is a film label of Warner Bros. It was founded in 1967 by Robert Shaye as an independent film distribution company; later becoming a film studio after a ...
acquired the rights for an American live-action film adaptation of ''Monster''.
Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
-nominated screenwriter Josh Olson (''
A History of Violence ''A History of Violence'' is a 2005 action thriller film directed by David Cronenberg and written by Josh Olson. It is an adaptation of the 1997 graphic novel of the same title by John Wagner and Vince Locke. The film stars Viggo Mortensen, ...
'') was hired to write the screenplay. No new information on the film was released since. In 2013, it was revealed that
Guillermo del Toro Guillermo del Toro Gómez (; born October 9, 1964) is a Mexican filmmaker, author, and actor. He directed the Academy Award–winning fantasy films '' Pan's Labyrinth'' (2006) and ''The Shape of Water'' (2017), winning the Academy Awards for ...
and American
premium television Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, but ...
network
HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television, premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office busi ...
were collaborating on a pilot for a live-action TV series based on ''Monster''. Co-executive producer Stephen Thompson (''
Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series depicts the adventures of a Time Lord called the Doctor, an extraterrestrial being who appears to be human. The Doctor explores the ...
'' and '' Sherlock'') was writing the pilot, while del Toro was to direct it and be an executive producer alongside
Don Murphy Don Murphy (born April 1967) is an American film producer who produced ''Natural Born Killers'', ''Real Steel'', '' Splice'' and many other films, including ''Transformers'' and '' Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen''. Personal background B ...
and
Susan Montford Susan Montford is a Scottish filmmaker living in Los Angeles. She has produced, written and directed movies that range from cult hits to blockbusters. She was born in Glasgow, Scotland. She is related to the Scottish football commentator Arthur ...
. In 2015, del Toro told Latino-Review that HBO had passed on the project and that they were in the process of pitching to other studios.


Reception


Manga

''Monster'' has been critically acclaimed. It won an Excellence Prize in the Manga division at the first
Japan Media Arts Festival The Japan Media Arts Festival is an annual festival held since 1997 by Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs. The festival begins with an open competition and culminates with the awarding of several prizes and an exhibition. Based on judging by a ...
in 1997, the 46th
Shogakukan Manga Award The is one of Japan's major manga Manga (Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Ja ...
in the General category in 2001, Best Series at the Lucca Comics Awards in 2004, and Grand Prize at the 3rd
Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize Named after Osamu Tezuka, the is a yearly manga prize awarded to manga artists or their works that follow the Osamu Tezuka manga approach founded and sponsored by Asahi Shimbun. The prize has been awarded since 1997, in Tokyo, Japan. Current ...
in 2005.
YALSA The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), established in 1957, is a division of the American Library Association. YALSA is a national association of librarians, library workers and advocates whose mission is to expand the capacity of l ...
placed it on their 2007 Great Graphic Novels for Teens list. Viz Media's English release was nominated several times for Eisner Awards, twice in the category Best U.S. Edition of International Material – Japan (2007 and 2009) and three times in Best Continuing Series (2007, 2008, 2009). In 2009, when
Oricon , established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan and Western music. It started as, which was founded by Sōkō Koike in Nov ...
conducted a poll asking which manga series the Japanese people wanted to see adapted into live-action, ''Monster'' came in fifth. At the 2009 Industry Awards held by the Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation, the organizers of
Anime Expo Anime Expo, abbreviated AX, is an American anime convention held in Los Angeles, California and organized by the non-profit Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation (SPJA). The convention is traditionally held annually on the first we ...
, ''Monster'' won the award for Best Drama Manga. The ''Monster'' manga has over 20 million copies in circulation. Writing for ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, t ...
'',
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction is one of the seven American Pulitzer Prizes that are annually awarded for Letters, Drama, and Music. It recognizes distinguished fiction by an American author, preferably dealing with American life, published during ...
winner
Junot Díaz Junot Díaz (; born December 31, 1968) is a Dominican-American writer, creative writing professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and was fiction editor at ''Boston Review''. He also serves on the board of advisers for Freedo ...
praised the manga, proclaiming "Urasawa is a national treasure in Japan, and if you ain't afraid of picture books, you'll see why". About.com's Deb Aoki called ''Monster'' a multi-layered suspense series and satisfying mystery that stands up to repeat readings, although it is sometimes a "little hard to follow". Reviewing the ''Monster'' manga for '' Anime News Network'' (ANN), Carl Kimlinger called Urasawa a master of suspense "effortlessly maintaining the delicate balance of deliberate misinformation and explicit delineation of the dangers facing protagonists that only the finest suspense thrillers ever achieve." He commented that even the stories and characters that had felt unrelated to the greater picture are "eventually drawn together by Johan's grand plan." Kimlinger deemed the art "invisible perfection," never "showy or superfluous," with panels laid out so well that it is easy to forget how much effort is put into each and every page. Though he did not find the characters' physical designs attractive, he praised their expressiveness, writing that the characters "wear their personalities on their faces, communicating changes in their outlooks, psychology, inner thoughts and emotions with shifts in expression that range from barely perceptible to masks of rage, hate and fear." UK Anime Network gave the first volume a perfect score based on the engrossing story, but felt the artwork, while appealing, was not "groundbreaking". On the other hand, ''Active Anime'' felt the art improved across the manga's serialization. A.E. Sparrow of IGN described ''Monster'' as a " Hitchcock film set to manga" and felt its real strength comes from its huge cast of interesting characters, who each have "a unique story and history to relate". Carlo Santos, also for ANN, called ''Monster'' "a one-of-a-kind thriller" and suggests that one of the most overlooked qualities of it is that "amidst all the mystery and horror, there are moments of love and hope and all the good things about humanity." Though she praised the manga for its "cinematically precise" art, never confusing the reader, and making each person visually distinct despite the large cast of characters, Casey Brienza was much more critical in her review of the last three volumes. Finishing up the ANN review, she felt that too much time was spent developing minor characters "who are likely to be dead or forgotten just a few dozen pages later," and that the series' ending "went out with a whimper." Brienza expressed disappointment that "there is nothing satisfactory ever revealed to fully account for ohan'ssupremely scrambled psyche," but concluded that as long as the reader doesn't look for "deep meanings or think too hard about whether or not it all makes sense in the end" they will enjoy it. Leroy Douresseaux of Comic Book Bin, however, praised ''Monster''s finale and wrote that the manga is "worth reading again and again. It's perfection."


Anime

'' THEM Anime Reviews'' called the anime adaptation "complex" and "beautiful", stating that it features "sophisticated storytelling and complex plot weaving, memorable characters, godly production values and excellent pacing". Darius Washington of ''
Otaku USA ''Otaku USA'' is a bimonthly magazine published by Sovereign Media, which covers various elements of the "otaku" lifestyle (such as anime, manga, video games, cosplay and Japanese popular music) from an American perspective. The issues were acc ...
'' named ''Monster'' one of the ten best anime of the past decade. Carl Kimlinger enthused that "It cannot be overstated how brilliantly apart from the anime mainstream this unsettling, fiercely intelligent, and ultimately uncategorizable journey into darkness is." He praised Madhouse's animation for not only keeping up the dark "cinematic quality of Urasawa's art" but also improving on it, as well as Kuniaki Haishima's score for adding "immeasurably to the series' hair-raising atmosphere." Though he noted Viz Media's inability to acquire the original ending theme song due to licensing problems, Kimlinger also called their English dub of the series one of the best in recent memory. Kimlinger critiqued the series, however, for "its unhealthy fidelity to Naoki Urasawa's original manga", commenting that "there isn't a scene left out, only a handful added in, and as far as I can tell not a line of dialogue changed or omitted", as well as for its frequent habit of giving the spotlight to newly introduced characters instead of the main cast. He also expressed disappointment in its ending, writing that "We feel vaguely let down when what we should really be doing is glorying in the somewhat messy, yes, but exhilarating final throes of one of last decade's great series." Nonetheless, he considered such disappointment to be expected, since "As ambitious and complicated and just plain huge as ''Monster'' is, no conclusion is going to be entirely satisfactory. Someone is bound to get short-changed, loose ends are bound to be left dangling, and even if they weren't, the simple truth is that no climax could ever live up to the series' build-up."


References


External links

* * * * {{Navboxes, list= {{Naoki Urasawa {{Big Comic Original {{Shogakukan Manga Award - General {{Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize {{Masayuki Kojima {{Madhouse 1994 manga 2002 Japanese novels 2004 anime television series debuts Anime series based on manga Comics set in Germany Crime in anime and manga Fictional criminologists Madhouse (company) Medical anime and manga Mystery anime and manga Naoki Urasawa Nippon TV original programming Odex Philosophical anime and manga Psychological thriller anime and manga Seinen manga Shogakukan manga Fiction about suicide Viz Media anime Viz Media manga Winner of Tezuka Osamu Cultural Prize (Grand Prize) Winners of the Shogakukan Manga Award for general manga Wrongful convictions in fiction