漫畫介紹: 淺野一二O 惡魔的破壞 An Introduction to Dead Dead Demon dededede Destruction (DeDeDeDe)

Imagine waking up one day, a giant spaceship is hovering in the sky. Occasionally, smaller ships will dispatch from the mothership and fly around. “Is it the end of the world?” you are wondering. You further confirmed your previous conjecture as the news is reporting incidents of spaceships crashing on populated areas and have caused thousands of deaths. You are glad that you didn’t finish your summer homework. But then, a strange thing happens, the aliens didn’t attack the humans in any intentional way. We simply couldn’t communicate with them. We panicked at the possibility of a catastrophe, and raged at the innocent lives taken by these aliens from the crash of the spaceships. We attacked the the mothership with a nuclear bomb, hoping to eliminate it once and for all. Unfortunately, the attempt failed. Neither we learned more about the aliens, nor eradicated them from the earth to guarantee the safety of humankind. We lived together in an awkwardly peaceful way…..

想像一下，一天你起床後，望向屋外時，一艘巨大的太空船出現在半空。 它陸續派出小型的太空船飛來飛去。你心想：「要世界未日了嗎…？」有些太空船在平民區墜落，造成大量死亡，這證實了你之前的猜想。 你很慶幸你沒有做完你的暑期作業。但是呢， 奇怪的事情發生了：外星人壓根沒有攻擊人類的意圖；它們沒有跟人類兵戎相見，但是我們跟他們語言不通。 恐慌情緒籠罩了東京，人民害怕災難的到來；同時敵視造成大量死亡的外星人。美國介入，投下了大規模殺傷武器「A彈」，重創了太空船，但是它沒有墜落… 我們沒有加深對外星人的瞭解；也沒有根除它們。 《惡魔的破壞》描寫了人與外星人和平但暗藏危機的生活。 

This is the setting of the dystopian world illustrated by the mangaka Inio, Asano (淺野一二O). He is famous in the manga field for drawing realistic backgrounds and telling deep, engaging and depressing stories. He published “Solanin”, “Oyasumi PunPun” and “Tempest” in the past, and they were very successful. I personally like “Oyasumi PunPun” very much because I find it addicting in the way Asano tells the story, but I don’t recommend it to anyone who gets depressed easily as the tone of the manga is very dark and uncomfortable.

You might be reading the title and asking “Why is the title of this manga so complicated?” I totally agree with you, but we should judge the book by its cover, let’s abbreviate “Dead Dead Demon's Destruction” as “DeDeDeDe” for the sake of convenience. “DeDeDeDe” has been announced to be animated, which made me thrilled when I heard the news. But I feel that the story of the manga could be hard for some to accept once it is aired. After all, the humor and sarcasm towards societal and political problems in our daily life are not appreciated by everyone, yet I believe this is not the only reason for anyone to enjoy this manga. In the following paragraph, I will introduce 3 aspects of the manga that you might find interesting, and hopefully motivate you to check out this manga before it’s anime is released. 

The Well Balance Between Realism and Unrealism

To illustrate the uniqueness of DeDeDeDe, I must start with the realistic background that Asano has always incorporated in his manga. When you turn over the page which shows the giant alien spaceship in the background, I am sure that you will be amazed. The details in the background impressed me. It almost feels like it was in real life, which helps me immerse myself in the fictional world that Asano portrayed. Yet, the characters are generally drawn in a cute, cartoon way, exaggerating their particular traits for emphasizing their characteristics. For example, Asano used to draw the character Aiko in detail, showing her nasal and a longer face. While most of the characters in “DeDeDeDe” are simplified and cheerful. This change has relieved the stress and sadness from the already absurd, dark and realistic storytelling. 

A Distinct Illustration of Characters and their Interactions 

One of the most interesting parts of this manga is the goofy interaction amongst characters. The protagonists “Kadode” and “Ouran” have been good friends since primary school. “Kadode” was bullied because of her name (Kadode in Kanji looks like Demon spelled backwards), and “Ouran” was still willing to make friends with her. They are very different in personality, Kadode is the humble girl that is always in blue, but Ouran is very loud and energetic. They went into the same high school together and do pretty much everything together. Ouran is always trying to cheer Kodode up when something bad happens in many goofy ways. Their daily interaction is funny in a weird but humorous way. 

There was a part in the manga which tells the story of how Ouran genuinely supports Kadode’s romance and tries to help her to confess her love. I know Ouran loves her best friend so much that she is mad at her for failing to confess. In the later chapters, it will reveal the reason why their relationship is so deep and inseparable. 

The chemistry of this pair is well and heart-warming. 

Asking The Question “How Shall We Live?”

In the later part of the story, One of Kadode’s friends has died because of another crash of an alien's ship. But this time, the JSDF have used their latest weapon to attack the ship before it crashed. As we have discussed in the beginning of the story, these aliens didn’t even attempt to harm any human before the attack. 

These aliens are labeled by the government as “shinryakusha” (intruder), so naturally, the public didn’t really blame the JSDF for even shooting the ship down in the first place, because it was the alien’s fault who came to Tokyo in the first place. 

Another important pair of characters has arrived at Tokyo to attend university. Futaba and Makoto. Futaba is an enthusiastic activist who wants to figure out whether the aliens are treated justly by the government. She came to tokyo to witness the brutality of the JSDF acting on the aliens, and later joined the anti-government organization “SHIP”. 

Despite how idealistic her ideology is, an incident revealed a side of Futaba that is similar to most of us. After she argued with her dad for the last time about going to Tokyo or not, she departed anyway. Not long before landing at the airport in Tokyo, an alien ship appeared. Again, there are no clear signs of attack, yet Futaba looks fearful of the situation. After the JSDF shot down the alien ship, Futaba confessed that she felt insignificant about herself, no matter how noble her idea was, it couldn’t help her cope with the fear of the unknown. She still has to rely on the JSDF or she could be dead. 

I like this part of the story, because Asano didn’t attempt to convince you that the government is bad alone. He tried to describe the social problem in contemporary society in a sarcastic way, trying to unify the goofy tone of the story on the one hand, and avoid being annoying by lecturing you on the other. You can really think through the problem on your own, and get to your own conclusion. This is one of the themes of the manga that fascinates me. 

Check out the manga on Amazon!