 Today on A Week in Geekdom, we're gonna be taking a look at Junji Ito's manga adaptation of No Longer Human. Welcome back to the channel everybody, Geo here, and that intro was a little bit too optimistic compared to what we're gonna talk about, which is Junji Ito's latest North American release, I should say. No Longer Human. Yeah, all right, this came out December 2019, but it got here a little bit later due to some error on my part with shipping, so now I finally read it in the start of 2020. Okay, so I gotta be completely transparent with all of you guys, with everything that was happening in the news in the month of January, I didn't feel like I was prepared, I should say, to go into this, because I know about the original source material. I know about Osamu Desai's work on sort of what, you know, people like to refer to as his masterpiece, if you will, of No Longer Human. It is a very dark, somber reading about this character going through some horrible situations, and of self-examination on the human condition and humanity's role, or I should say a specific human's role in a society, and sort of a deconstruction of human emotions and sadness, depression, all that stuff, and I didn't want to go into that at the start of the year, if you know what I mean, and you know, the world's already messed up as it is, I didn't want to add another ripple to that on my state of being, plus I like to keep things cheery and optimistic on this channel if you haven't noticed, if you haven't watched my previous videos, and if you're going in for the very first time to this channel, you're probably wondering like, what? It's alright. So, Junji Ito, a couple years ago, decided to adapt, I guess, No Longer Human in manga form, but you know, he is one of the horror manga masters, if you will, or at least in my eyes, because I'm a huge fan of his work. I own most of his collected works on heart cover and all that stuff, so yeah, I'm a big fan of Junji Ito, and I watched countless interviews, and he's an awesome dude. I really like his work and him as a creator, so I was really interested, really excited to see what he could bring to the table, because we've had adaptations before of Desai's No Longer Human, but in my opinion, they were pretty bad. They were not that great. There was a previous manga, and I haven't read it, but I looked through some pages online, and I read a little bit about it, and a lot of people didn't like it, so I was curious if this new manga version would be better. And now, the thing you gotta know about Desai is No Longer Human, it's that he wrote it sort of like, what's the word I'm looking for? Like notebooks. Like notebooks left behind by a character named Oba Yoso, and I believe they're called Memorandums, and in each Memorandums, there's like different parts of this character's upbringing. You're experiencing him growing up and living his life while questioning things, and it can get a little bit dark. So just a heads up, if you're somebody that does not deal with books or graphic editions talking about the subject matter when it comes to death, depression, suicide, or even the body horror that Jujitsu is known for, maybe the book might not be for you. However, if you want to read it, I think, and this is gonna sound strange, but you will be somewhat rewarded with an interesting examination of human life from the perspective of somebody that doesn't seem to view it as the rest of society and wants to break free of those chains and wants to live a life very different and experiences things sort of in a numb state of being, where he confronts it from a nihilistic point of view. There's also addiction problems and the sexuality and political stuff, all that, and how it can shape and sort of deteriorate the human mind. So I say rewarding because from time to time, we'd like to examine things like that. I wish it were all sunshine and rainbows 100% of the time, but sometimes you'd need material like this to fully appreciate your own life and what you go through and the things that you care about, your family, your loved ones, even your pets, whatever it is that you love, at least to me reading a book like this reminds me of all the good things and how we can move forward in life and enjoy them and all that stuff. So with all of that said, going back to Osamu Desai's book and comparing it to Junji Ito's manga adaptation, I gotta admit he did a really good job of taking the core essence of this masterpiece novel, if you will, from the 40s, 1948, and crafting something new where new people can jump in and enjoy, and I say enjoy the story as a neutral point, enjoy the story and get the message that is trying to tell. And for fans of the novel, you can appreciate it from a visual perspective. Now Junji Ito adds a lot of stuff that were not present in the original Memorandums, of course there's a lot of horror imagery which I thought was really well executed. This in my opinion is some of Ito's best work, hands down. At the end of the video I'm going to do the ranking once again, but man, the way that Ito is able to capture all of the human expressions and the anatomy, it's not, it's unlike all his other works. There is a lot of, and I gotta, yeah, there is a lot of gorgeous looking artwork right there where the characters, they're human. Even though the book says no longer human, you feel a rawness and a beauty to the way that these characters are expressing themselves, even when you have solemn, angry scowls and frowns, you still feel it. It's unlike his other books, like Uzumaki or Gio or the Frankenstein adaptation, this is based on real people. The horror imagery might be psychological, might be something else entirely, and it's very scarce through the book. Yes, there are some very horrific images in the book, but what I loved about this adaptation is that it doesn't rely on that. It's telling a story about this character, Obayoso, and when things take a turn for the worse, you see the horror imagery creep in and it works. There's a scene, it would be the equivalent of a jump scare, I guess, in movies, where the characters walking through snow and he sees all these soldiers walking past him, and this sort of reminded me of the original story where it does touch on World War II and stuff, so the soldiers are walking past him and it's a cold, windy, chilly, snowy night. There's a blizzard, I guess, happening and when he looks and turns around, the soldiers look at him and you're not seeing their faces and I might be, it's not technically a spoiler, it's just a scary scene. You see the faces of these soldiers and their skeleton decomposed faces and it does its job, it spooks you, because there's not a whole lot of focus on the horror elements that when it does happen, you feel it and you are able to appreciate how great his artwork is and why a lot of people consider him one of the modern horror masters when it comes to manga and graphic novels and stuff. So in that regard, I thought, you know, the character expressions and, you know, character expressions and there's a lot of people in this book, they all look distinct. You're never confused. There is a meta moment near the end that confused me a little bit. If you've read the book and you know what I'm referring to, then I got confused. I'm like, wait, what? But overall, it's a solid, fantastic manga and there are some really, really depressing and messed up stuff that happens in this book. I cannot go too into detail because I don't know how YouTube works these days, but maybe the subject matter and stuff might alert something. I don't know. Also, shout out to color pages because I love colored pages in manga. It makes the scene extra special and the opening is in color and it's sadly and I'm going to, well, it's not technically a spoiler either. If you've read, if you know about Osamu Desai, no longer human was his last published work, if I remember correctly, because he ended up taking his own life and the beginning of the book starts with that and it goes into his thoughts about writing no longer human and the adaptation and we start seeing the characters and all that stuff. There is a lot of alcoholism, sex and violence throughout the book because of what the characters are going through, because of what they're doing, which might disappoint some readers because they're not expecting it, but just be aware that that is a central theme throughout the story and Yozo's descent into madness and his state of being and ever since he was a kid, ever since the character first starts, he's questioning about life, about his role in society and about how he's living this dual life, how he's sort of not showing his true colors to people and how he's afraid of them finding out about his true self and that exponentially grows into a much larger and more dangerous problem as the story goes on, as his life goes on. I think it was handled really well and Ito's able to get to the core of the book and how his nihilistic views and suicidal thoughts shaped this man into an incomprehensible mess because at the end of the book you do realize that a lot of these things could have been prevented, but unfortunately life has a way of molding you into shapes and forms that you do not expect and you have to be grateful when you do have the opportunity to meet people that can stir you into the right direction and give you all the love and attention and humility and humbleness that we deserve and crave for as a human species. No longer human, in my opinion, I would rank it as easily one of Ito's best manga. It's a little bit troubling because it's technically not an original work, it's an adaptation, but still just like with the Frankenstein book he's able to mold it into his own fantastic, beautiful artwork. The horrific scenery is just breathtaking as usual if you're into that sort of thing and his character work is top notch. All his characters are distinct, they look fantastic, the backgrounds are exquisite in nature and you really feel like you're sucked into the story about this man trying to find his, you know, this troubled man trying to find meaning in life and what he wants to do and how the characters around him, his support system if you react to that and move forward I guess and the ending packs a punch. It is a well done ending which I really enjoyed and if I were to rank this book in my Ito stuff I would honestly, I would place it a solid third or second place as one of Ito's best work. I really enjoyed reading No Longer Human even though the subject matter is really dark, really I mean just on the cover alone if we take the slip off and you can see it can get you know kind of spooky looking but I guess the real horror nature of it is what we as humans can actually do and be so in that regard the imagery isn't as scary as what humanity can do and how we lose that humanity. So yeah if I were to rank it like I just said second or third place maybe I still hold a special soft spot for Uzumaki simply because of the originalness of it and the horror elements and the plot and how it devolves into something very uh lovecraftian even. So yeah Junji Ito is no longer human like I said if you're into this sort of thing if you want to read something like that a little bit more mature this was a solid I'm a slow reader so this was a solid what hour and a half two hours that I sunk into this book because it's pretty massive it's a it's a thick boy if you will I think you're gonna like it I think it is a worthy addition to your Ito library plus come on who doesn't love hardcover technically not oversized but hardcover manga I wish it were a little bit bigger like the rest of his books but still fantastic work I wholeheartedly recommend it if you're an Ito fan and if you want to read a different sort of take on uh no longer human from desire because when I say different I mean he exaggerated a few things and added some elements that go into the depression or into the sexiness or into the horror stuff it just amped up I guess but overall fantastic reading I do recommend it what about you guys what do you think about no longer human what do you think about this adaptation how would you rank it in the Ito bibliography is that the right word I don't know but yeah how would you rank it is it your favorite is it somewhere in the middle did you hate it let me know in the comment section down below I'm very interested in finding out guys as always thank you so much for supporting this channel it really does mean the world to me to see this channel grow and and it's special and I don't take it for granted and my phone's going off for some reason so yeah that means that probably means I got to go follow me on your favorite social media platform we can keep the conversation going over there as well thank you again for liking commenting subscribing also hit the bell icon so you know when new videos pop up I've got to go I will catch all of you on our next video