Satoshi Kon’s Opus

Brilliant anime director Satoshi Kon (Paprika, Paranoia Agent, Tokyo Godfathers, Millennium Actress, Perfect Blue) died tragically young in 2010 at the age of forty-six. But before he became a director, he was a manga artist, and Dark Horse is honored to remember Kon with the release of Satoshi Kon’s OPUS,an omnibus collection of a two-volume manga from 1996, created by Kon on the eve of his first film. OPUS contains the mastery of both realism and surrealism that would make Kon famous in Perfect Blue,as a manga artist planning a shocking surprise ending to his story gets literally pulled into his own work—to face for himself what he had planned for his characters!

There is no question that above all else, anime and manga are my biggest love within the geek spectrum.  To have the absolute honor of reading a book like this is a serious treat for me.  It’s been a while since I power read a manga from start to finish.  Being able to do that with Satoshi Kon’s Opus was one well worth doing just that.

This brilliant story sees Chikara, a manga artist on a tight deadline in a rush to finish the last pages of his popular series.  In what he thought at first to be a bizarre dream from lack of sleep, he is transported into the very world he is drawing.  When he realizes it’s not a dream at all, he is caught trying to take responsibility for the lives of the characters he now finds himself interacting with.  The ending is very much in the nature of this kind of fiction, completely throwing readers for a loop.

Anyone who has had any experience with manga should feel very comfortable with the artwork here.  As with virtually all manga, it’s 99.9% in black and white, with a special treatment of the first few in color as they do sometimes.  Even being monochrome though, this in no way takes away from the fantastic art whose powerful illustrations tell the story wonderfully.

I absolutely loved reading this book.  The concept was unique and fascinating, the art was consistently excellent and all of it came from a top mind in the genre.  One thing I particularly appreciated was that we got to see the final chapter that Kon wrote before his untimely death, still in its raw but effective form.  Whether or not you’re a manga fan, this is a magnificent book that everyone should go out and buy.  Manga noobs - don’t worry, there’s instructions inside on how to read it properly.

For more on Satoshi Kon’s Opus or other Dark Horse books, check out Dark Horse Comics.

Satoshi Kon’s Opus will be available 11/26

Geek-o-Rama received a copy of this book for the purpose of this review. All thoughts, comments and opinions are those of the individual reviewer.