The Flowers of Evil (惡の華)
is a psychological romance manga by Oshimi Shuzo. The manga was
originally published between 2009 and 2014 and has been compiled into 11
tankoubon. For a more detailed review of this story I have broken it
down into two parts. Part 1 covers tankoubon 1 through 6. Part 2
covers tankoubon 7 through 11.
What follows will spoil some things if you have not read the first 6 tankoubon.
The 7th tankoubon starts off 3 years after the events at the end of the 6th tankoubon. Kasuga and his family have moved away from their small town. He has given up on literature and has become an empty shell, a survivor of the journey to insanity with Nakamura. He goes to school, keeps to himself and comes home to his parents fractures relationship. He has lost any drive at life that he once had and continues along aimlessly, just existing. A chance encounter with a classmate Tokiwa Aya, who also happens to be one of the most sought after girls in school, begins to shift him out of his shell. He finds her at a small book store with a copy of Flowers of Evil in her hands and something inside of him begins to tick. He learns that Tokiwa is an avid reader and she begins to lend him books. Kasuga eagerly falls back into his passion for literature and eagerly accepts anything she loans him.
The unusual relationship though brings complications, things that Kasuga has gone through before. He is the strange outsider and she is the popular girl, who also has a boyfriend. Tokiwa enjoys finding someone else who deeply loves reading and Kasuga is enjoying a return to the good parts of his older self. In a freak encounter the pair run into Saeki and her new boyfriend. Saeki too has moved away from their hometown and has tried to move on with her life. Even though she has tried to put it past her she is still bitter about Nakamura's influence on Kasuga and forces him to question whether he is seeking to use Tokiwa as a replacement for her or both of them. The brief conversation with Saeki shocks Kasuga into fully examining his current mental state and what he really felt about the events from three years in the past. He has to figure out what all three of the girls mean to him and what he wants to do moving forward.
The second half of the story shifts it a little bit and in a really good way. It isn't as psychologically stressful and moves more into a retrospective and self evaluation mode. The story thrusts Kasuga into the role of the main character and forces him to come to terms with the past while dealing with the present. Tokiwa is more of a conglomeration of all three main characters instead of her own unique character, but she works well as a catalyst for real, healthy change in Kasuga.
In the end The Flowers of Evil is an uncomfortable look at the loneliness of being a teenager who doesn't fit in. It's principle players take their manifestations of how the world should work to some extremes and have to deal with the consequences of their actions. Nakamura undoubtedly suffers from mental heath issues and her father hinted that her mother has the same problems. As I have touched on before, Japan is behind America (which isn't that good either) on diagnosing and treating mental health. Nakamura is obviously in need of counseling and medical attention but instead she if being viewed as someone who doesn't repsect authority and is rebelling against the proper order of things. As she struggles with the things in her head she latches onto Kasuga as a way to make sense of her world. Kasuga, weak willed and easily influenced by those around him, becomes wrapped up in Nakamura's issues.
But Nakamura isn't a bad guy, and Kasuga isn't absolved from his own actions. I feel sorry for Nakamura and I really feel sorry for Saeki. Kasuga though, I don't give him as much slack. His indecisiveness caused everyone around him a lot of problems. He goes from being a loner in the corner to being the center of attention between two girls. One which fulfills his physical desires and the other which fulfills his psychological desires. Yet the two aspects, incapable of sharing him, cause friction and mental duress on everyone involved. Tokiwa said it the best when Kasuga told her about the events that caused him to leave his home town. She told him that he put too much of a mental burden on her with the story, that she needed time to absorb it all and what it meant for her relationship with him. Tokiwa is both an amalgam of the traits Kasuga sought from Nakamura and Saeki and a representation of the reader and probably the author as well. She is the outsider who is in the middle of everything and has a hard time understanding the reasoning behind the actions.
The story is deep and oppressive at times. You know it will never end well for anyone involved and a lot of damage is done along the way. The author even wonders if its conflicts and suppositions are superfluous, like Kasuga thinking he is better than his peers because he claims to understand the novels he is reading. Kasuga questions how bright and unique he really is at one point, admitting that much of his reading is to show off to others.
The artwork as with the first volumes isn't bad, it isn't anything spectacular. The backgrounds are the better aspects of the work, well detailed and based on real settings. There are other moments when the characters have incredible expressions and actions that greatly heighten the story telling. In the end it works very well with the story by not distracting you from what is being said, instead enhancing those critical moments. At other times though it is awkward, just as the characters are, but I don't think that was intentional.
I really enjoyed this manga and was glad to have read it. I first watched the 13 episode anime adaptation that only really covers about half of the story. The anime as well is fantastic and really captures the tone of the story. The entire series was released in North America by Vertical and is readily available. I highly recommend it.
What follows will spoil some things if you have not read the first 6 tankoubon.
The 7th tankoubon starts off 3 years after the events at the end of the 6th tankoubon. Kasuga and his family have moved away from their small town. He has given up on literature and has become an empty shell, a survivor of the journey to insanity with Nakamura. He goes to school, keeps to himself and comes home to his parents fractures relationship. He has lost any drive at life that he once had and continues along aimlessly, just existing. A chance encounter with a classmate Tokiwa Aya, who also happens to be one of the most sought after girls in school, begins to shift him out of his shell. He finds her at a small book store with a copy of Flowers of Evil in her hands and something inside of him begins to tick. He learns that Tokiwa is an avid reader and she begins to lend him books. Kasuga eagerly falls back into his passion for literature and eagerly accepts anything she loans him.
The unusual relationship though brings complications, things that Kasuga has gone through before. He is the strange outsider and she is the popular girl, who also has a boyfriend. Tokiwa enjoys finding someone else who deeply loves reading and Kasuga is enjoying a return to the good parts of his older self. In a freak encounter the pair run into Saeki and her new boyfriend. Saeki too has moved away from their hometown and has tried to move on with her life. Even though she has tried to put it past her she is still bitter about Nakamura's influence on Kasuga and forces him to question whether he is seeking to use Tokiwa as a replacement for her or both of them. The brief conversation with Saeki shocks Kasuga into fully examining his current mental state and what he really felt about the events from three years in the past. He has to figure out what all three of the girls mean to him and what he wants to do moving forward.
The second half of the story shifts it a little bit and in a really good way. It isn't as psychologically stressful and moves more into a retrospective and self evaluation mode. The story thrusts Kasuga into the role of the main character and forces him to come to terms with the past while dealing with the present. Tokiwa is more of a conglomeration of all three main characters instead of her own unique character, but she works well as a catalyst for real, healthy change in Kasuga.
In the end The Flowers of Evil is an uncomfortable look at the loneliness of being a teenager who doesn't fit in. It's principle players take their manifestations of how the world should work to some extremes and have to deal with the consequences of their actions. Nakamura undoubtedly suffers from mental heath issues and her father hinted that her mother has the same problems. As I have touched on before, Japan is behind America (which isn't that good either) on diagnosing and treating mental health. Nakamura is obviously in need of counseling and medical attention but instead she if being viewed as someone who doesn't repsect authority and is rebelling against the proper order of things. As she struggles with the things in her head she latches onto Kasuga as a way to make sense of her world. Kasuga, weak willed and easily influenced by those around him, becomes wrapped up in Nakamura's issues.
But Nakamura isn't a bad guy, and Kasuga isn't absolved from his own actions. I feel sorry for Nakamura and I really feel sorry for Saeki. Kasuga though, I don't give him as much slack. His indecisiveness caused everyone around him a lot of problems. He goes from being a loner in the corner to being the center of attention between two girls. One which fulfills his physical desires and the other which fulfills his psychological desires. Yet the two aspects, incapable of sharing him, cause friction and mental duress on everyone involved. Tokiwa said it the best when Kasuga told her about the events that caused him to leave his home town. She told him that he put too much of a mental burden on her with the story, that she needed time to absorb it all and what it meant for her relationship with him. Tokiwa is both an amalgam of the traits Kasuga sought from Nakamura and Saeki and a representation of the reader and probably the author as well. She is the outsider who is in the middle of everything and has a hard time understanding the reasoning behind the actions.
The story is deep and oppressive at times. You know it will never end well for anyone involved and a lot of damage is done along the way. The author even wonders if its conflicts and suppositions are superfluous, like Kasuga thinking he is better than his peers because he claims to understand the novels he is reading. Kasuga questions how bright and unique he really is at one point, admitting that much of his reading is to show off to others.
The artwork as with the first volumes isn't bad, it isn't anything spectacular. The backgrounds are the better aspects of the work, well detailed and based on real settings. There are other moments when the characters have incredible expressions and actions that greatly heighten the story telling. In the end it works very well with the story by not distracting you from what is being said, instead enhancing those critical moments. At other times though it is awkward, just as the characters are, but I don't think that was intentional.
I really enjoyed this manga and was glad to have read it. I first watched the 13 episode anime adaptation that only really covers about half of the story. The anime as well is fantastic and really captures the tone of the story. The entire series was released in North America by Vertical and is readily available. I highly recommend it.
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