AniManga: Kiseijuu (Parasyte)

 



















Movies always speculate on what would happen if an intelligent alien species colonized the Earth. Parasyte, offers a gruesome answer to that question. Kiseijuu (Parasyte) is a horror manga written by Hitoshi Iwaaki that ran from 1988 - 1995. The anime started airing in October-2014 and ended March-2015.

Parasyte's are worm-like creatures that invade the body through the nose or ears and take control of the brain. Once the Parasyte controls the brain, the body is just a host that can change appearance and physical characteristics at the parasites whim. Once a person becomes a Parasyte they no longer retain their personality or human characteristics. 

All Parasyte's eat whatever type of creature their host body is. If a Parasyte invades a dog's brain, they feed on other canines, a cat's brain, they eat cat's, a human brain, they eat humans. When a Parasyte invades the body but cannot take over the brain, then both human and Parasyte share the body but retain their individuality.

The story revolves around a 17 year old teen named Shinichi Izumi. Shinichi lived a normal life in Tokyo with his parents until one night parasites invaded the earth. One Parasite attempted to crawl into Shinichi's ear as he slept, but failed because Shinichi was wearing headphones. The Parasyte was forced to enter through his hand which alerted Shinichi. Who then used the cord from the headphone's to trap the Parasyte in his right hand. Since the Parasyte took over his right hand Shinichi named it "Migi," which is the Japanese word for "right".


Migi and Shinichi form a symbiotic relationship as he learns about the world and tries to find his place in it. Parasyte's have low level psychic abilities which allows them to sense their kind but not what type of host they inhabit. These abilities also allow the Parasyte to assess the emotional state (aggressive, peaceful, nervous, etc...) of other's in their species. As well as the foreign Parasyte's proximity within several hundred meters.  

In the beginning of the relationship Migi protects Shinichi from other Parasyte's. As the story continues Shinichi develops his own power due to suffering a near fatal wound from the Parasyte who killed his mother. Along the way Shinichi gains a few friends and many powerful enemies from a group of organized Parasyte's trying to control mankind.

The story is a twisted reflection of the fear humans have when confronted with meeting other intelligent life. It paints a graphic tale of tragedy, suspense and horror mixed with elements of a normal high school student's life. The anime was incredibly well done! It looks like they used the manga as a storyboard for the animation. 

I recommend watching this series if you're looking for a dark science-fiction animanga that's action-packed to the very end. Check out the clip below.

AniManga: Shin Sekai Yori (From The New World)

 Shin Sekai Yori (From The New World) is a blend of science fiction, horror, and deep insight into the mind of humanity. The story takes place a thousand years in the future. It follows a group of kids who learn some forbidden knowledge about their utopian society.  Six children—Saki, Satoru, Maria, Mamoru, Shun, and Reiko—born and raised in a town, named  Kamisu's 66th district, learn about a plot to wage war against humanity and try to stop it.

In the not to distant future, science proves the existence of PK (Psychokinesis). Once people with PK started appearing around the globe there was a scramble by governments to weaponize the ability. Within 100 years people with PK over powered the humans and controlled society. After a few hundred more years, humans without PK waged war against the PK users. This resulted in all out nuclear warfare which almost destroyed the earth.

From the ashes humanity rebuilt. Top global minds decided that disabling PK users from being able to harm or kill other humans was the solution. They believed genetic modification was the only solution to protect mankind from violence ever occurring again. If someone with PK tried to hurt another human, they would suffer "The death of shame."  This would begin with symptoms of mild discomfort ending in death. In every case where a PK user kills someone the result is death by heart attack. 

With these new restrictions placed on on PK users mankind secretly decided  to develop a way to identify people with abilities from normal humans. Then they genetically cross-bred all PK user humans with the Naked Mole Rat and forced them into servitude. This knowledge and all information related to that part of human history was hidden away and stored as forbidden knowledge.

Since PK users couldn't hurt other users without suffering, they used these hybrid (Mole) humans to carry out their warfare and assassinations. They also created mutant cats that could hunt down children who couldn't control their abilities. Kids who couldn't control their PK were called Ogres and were the most feared. 

The story takes place two hundred years after the last ogre appeared. The hybrid humans learn what happened from a living library and once again wage war on the PK users. The result is one action packed anime that I highly recommend watching.