 On today's video we're talking the Flowers of Evil from Shuzo Oshimi. Welcome back to the channel everybody, Gio here and finally I get to talk about the Flowers of Evil from Shuzo Oshimi. Super excited. I've had these books for a while and I've been wanting to make a video about it. And this is mostly a spoiler-free review. I will be making a separate video later on, a little bit more spoiler-ific talking about all of Oshimi's work, so stay tuned for that. Yeah, The Flowers of Evil, a very complex, interesting story, this coming-of-age psychological suspense tale. We follow the character of Kazuga, this middle schooler who's a bit of a bookworm. He's fascinated by a book that he has, a collection of poems called The Flowers of Evil. It's from a French author that I'm not going to begin to pronounce because I'm probably going to butcher that. So the character of Kazuga, he is an interesting oddball. He doesn't quite fit in. He is shy and introverted and sort of feels suffocated by the world around him. But at the same time, he's kind of, he kind of has an ego to him in his own way. He sees himself above everybody, especially with the books that he's reading, with The Flowers of Evil, for example. He views himself a little bit more superior because of his reading. And I could somehow relate to that with the fact that growing up, we don't really know what the hell we were doing. So in that area, I chuckled and I found myself relating somewhat to this character. Now Kazuga is a little bit different in that he is obsessed and sort of idolizing this character called Saeki, this young pretty girl in his class, top of the class, super smart, pretty, all that stuff. She's relatively popular and he has a deep fascination with her calling or thinking to himself that she is his muse. He doesn't really have the nerve to let her know and gets quite anxious when the topic comes up with the other kids teasing him like, oh, you have a crush on Saeki. And he's like, nah, I don't, I'm beneath her, I'm not worthy and stuff like that. So Kazuga makes the really foolish decision on a particular afternoon after school. He impulsively finds this gym bag in his class and it belongs to Saeki and it still has her clothing inside. So he foolishly takes it and he gets caught by another character who is super important and central to the themes of the Flowers of Evil and that is the character of Nakamura. She essentially blackmails Kazuga into forming a contract and starts toying with him with the idea that she's going to reveal his secret. He is just shocked and can't believe that it's happening. He took one wrong decision and it just blew up in his face. So he follows along with her plans and her toying with him and all that stuff. Nobody knows. Everybody starts making a fuss like there's this pervert on the loose. We got to watch out. We got to protect the kids and all that stuff. And they don't know that it's one of them, one of their own that did that. And Kazuga is super conflicted. He knows that what he did is wrong but he can't bring himself to confess and return the gym bag and all that stuff. Meanwhile, you have the character of Nakamura who is exploiting this moment and finally sees somebody in her own light. This is a character that is kind of a potty mouth calling everybody shit bugs and stuff like that. She views the world hazily and different from everything else, from everybody else I should say and sort of wants to go to the other side. That's a theme that gets explored later on in the story. She wants to, I guess she's not thrilled with the way things are and wants to experience more out of life to sort of disrupt society and form her own path. While you have the character of Kazuga who is going through somewhat similar feelings and emotions but he doesn't quite know it yet. And by being berated by the character of Nakamura, he sort of starts forming a relationship with her and it's not necessarily romance or love but more of a love of what she represents of what she is, what she's doing for him and making him realize that he sort of wants more out of life. These are characters that aren't satisfied with the day to day activities. Now one of the topics that Shuzo Hashimi wrote about in The Flowers of Evil is perversion. That is one of the main themes in the manga and we see that not in a sexual kind of way, we see that more in Nakamura and Kazuga wanting to experience more out of life and disrupt the flow of society if you will, not to conform to it but to sort of make them and chart their own path in troubled waters. And throughout the course of the story Nakamura makes Kazuga do crazy things that are quite perverse and they do involve some sexual stuff in nature like at some point they plan on stealing some female underwear and vandalizing some things in school and in town and the rest of the cast is shocked. They don't know who's making all of these crazy things but they want to get down to the bottom of things. Now the character of Saeki, she eventually does form a relationship with Kazuga and this mortifies him. He is super conflicted because he doesn't want to reveal what he's done but he wants to but it's difficult and he doesn't want to possibly ruin everything, his relationship with Saeki and with the town and family and what will people think and stuff like that. So at some point during the tale of this manga Nakamura forms this threesome of swords and no it's not what you're thinking I probably shouldn't have said that but let's go with that. This trio of swords and Saeki thinks that Kazuga could be two-timing her with Nakamura but that is further from the case. You have more of Kazuga just wanting to escape this anxious crazy problem that he's put himself in by having to depend on Nakamura not revealing what he did and all that stuff and it plays to that cat and mouse game but at the same time you see the progress of Kazuga as he realizes what he wants out of life or starting to realize and you have the character of Nakamura who finally sees an individual that can stand next to her and understands her plight and her troubles and can see that or they want to see things in a different light and at some point in the story they mentioned going to the other side not just literally leaving the town but metaphorically and stuff like that so the book has some very heavy psychological themes running throughout and at some point during the story during the middle portion something big happens where there is a time skip and so you follow the characters years later we follow Kazuga's journey and the character progression is fantastic an introverted shy kid gets involved into the most unlikely scenario possible forcing him to come out of his shell and that's the point of the story right this extraordinary event shapes and mold somebody into becoming an adult and how we don't really have control and a say over what happens in life however we can react to it and adjust accordingly and grow from the experiences of middle school and high school and becoming an adult and going to college and stuff like that now the character of Saeki she is in a bit of a pickle because she does form this relationship with Kazuga and I'm not spoiling much just by mentioning that that relationship kind of blossoms but she's naive as well she doesn't really know that there's more to life than her first love if you will and this obsession that forms into wanting to not let go of that love and do you conform and go with what the other person is doing at the cost of your own freedom and your own well-being and mental health and all that stuff and you also have the character of Nakamura who is sort of the wild card in all of this this character that isn't sticking to what society says and wants to create her own path and take the character of Kazuga with her on this journey now I haven't talked about the art in the flowers of evil but it is quite excellent I am a huge fan of a shimi's art he is a wonderful talented mangaka and yeah this series just knocks it out of the park it's grounded and realistic the town portrayal is based off of shimi's own childhood town and that it's all rusted out it's a very empty town where everybody knows each other it's small the streets are empty there's a sense of stagnation and you have characters like Kazuga and Nakamura that want to break that mold and want to find more and that's something that I think a lot of people can relate growing up and you're wondering to yourself is there more to life than just repeating the same actions again and again day in and day out what else is there what is there to life and I think that's one of the main themes aside from the whole aspect of um rebelliousness and teen angst and perversion and stuff like that wonderful characters fantastic art a really solid story with a great beginning middle and end I think it does stick the landing like I said and yeah I highly recommend it if you haven't checked it out please do I think you'll enjoy it quite a bit so what about you guys have you read the flowers of evil let me know in the comment section down below and if you haven't read it let me know what are some of your favorite coming of age stories or your favorite oshimi story aside from flowers of evil thank you everybody for liking commenting subscribing and being a part of a week and geek them and truly does mean a whole lot thank you so much god bless stay safe out there I will catch all of you our next video