9: Inglourious Basterds review

Writing the megalithic Gantz review yesterday reminds me that I wrote a review for Inglourious Basterds a few years ago that a handful of people really seemed to enjoy. I don't have the file on my computer anymore, so here, for posterity's sake, is a link to the article on Helium.com.

http://www.helium.com/items/1768513-inglourious-basterds-propaganda

Spoiler alert: Tarantino shows us that, deep down, we're no better than they were.

8: GANTZ

Well, GANTZ is finished. It took 13 years, 37 volumes, and, apparently, the very last drop of patience from creator Hiroya Oku.

Here's a review of the series. Spoiler alert: I end up recommending it anyway despite its flaws. Everything except the last volume. For that, I recommend you buy a sketchpad and finish the story yourself.

Gantz (I'll stop shouting now), was an action series thought up by Oku in high school. He apparently had very specific influences that caused him to come up with this story, but I'm going to go with my intuition and suggest that he played the NES a lot as a kid and really, really wanted to see how Nintendo-based physics would play out in the real world.

Exhibit A: Aliens that look like dinosaurs that shoot fireballs out of their mouths.

Also, he was in high school when he thought up the story, so lots of high school boy-esque sexual fantasies played out in real life. And then there's stuff like this:

Good luck, fella.

Actually, the series worked really well in parts. At first I didn't like it; I thought it was nihilistic and didn't want to support a piece of art that thought humanity as a whole was a piece of shit. I'm not entirely sure that Oku thinks that now, but I'm still not convinced one way or the other. At any rate, one Christmas holiday I got myself hooked back on the series and ended up breezing through some 20+ volumes over the course of a couple of weeks.

So here we go: Kurono Kei (玄野計) is an asshole high schooler, who, along with his much nicer, much more heroic friend from elementary school Kato Masaru (加藤勝), get themselves run over while helping a drunk who's fallen onto the subway tracks under Tokyo. They wake up in a strange room with a strange black sphere and a handful of other apparently recently deceased people, none of whom are quite aware of what the dilly is.

The ball (also known as the plot, also known as GANTZ) sends randomly chosen recently deceased people on "missions" to kill certain monsters. GANTZ provides a bunch of sci-fi weaponry to get the job done, and a little sci-fi insurance (by way of a little bomb implanted in everyone's brains) to make sure the involuntarily recruited recruits perform their duties. If they die during the mission, they're dead-dead, but if they only get injured their injuries are healed at the end of the mission. Just like in Mario, minus the extra lives.

For the first half of the series, the members of these teams and the monsters they fight are invisible, though the damage they cause to the areas they're sent to is permanent. Later on they become visible and widely known to the public, which gives Oku a bunch of chances to show how little he thinks of humanity at large, what with their Internet-based bickering, paranoid finger-pointing, and the like.

Anyways, that's the plot, and it's pretty standard throughout the series. The thing that kept me coming back, though, was the characters. Kei is very unlikeable in the beginning of the series, and he remains unlikeable for a long time. (Maybe not so long? I was reading it in Japanese, which makes any amount of pages seem longer than they would otherwise.) Kei starts out trying to one-up Masaru, but he can't because Masaru is a good guy, and good at what he does. Also, girls like him more, which pisses Kei off. This play between their two very different personalities in these seemingly random life-or-death situations makes for great reading, especially given the weird turns the series takes in later volumes.

I don't want to understate this last point: putting people in life-or-death situations is pretty much the job description of most creative people in Hollywood. This series isn't high literature by any means, but Oku makes a really jerky kid come into his own in a way that doesn't, until the last volume of the series, feel forced. There is Japanese melodrama at play here ("I'll never forget you...!!" "I will return!!"など), but despite that he managed to make Kurono Kei's psychological development realistic and really entertaining in the context of the story.

And that's what it's all about, people.

Kei and Masaru aren't the only two characters of interest, of course. There are new characters with each new mission, and this was really one of Oku's strong points: he built a series that required a lot of Star Trek-esque throwaway good guys, and did a pretty good job of making us actually like those good guys most of the time before he got them kilt in really vicious ways.

Gantz has a bunch of loose ends that, if Oku had had the time (he didn't), he could have expanded the story even more to explore and wrap up a handful of plot points, but due to his need to put out around a dozen pages per week in Young Jump, some potentially very interesting character development was sacrificed in the name of titties and 'sploded heads. Alas, 'tis a problem American comics and Hollywood movies have suffered from for decades now. If only the French were interested in paying Oku to take his time and flesh out the series properly, we might have had an action-manga epic to take the 青年 title of A Perfect Representative Story. (I like to do this with movies. Other examples of PRSs include Dragonball for 少年 manga, Watchmen or Flex Mentallo for superhero comics, or Before Sunrise for romance movies.)

In hindsight, the series culminates with the penultimate storyline that takes place in Osaka (which doesn't feature Kei at all, come to think of it). The last story arc, Katastrophe, had so much potential that  it seems to have scared the piss out of Oku himself who wrapped up in 10 volumes a storyline that could have lasted twice that, if not longer.

And now for a heartier breakdown of Katastrophe, replete with spoilers.

Katastrophe is the codename for an apocalyptic event foreseen by the organization behind GANTZ. A race of humanoid, intelligent aliens invades planet Earth to mine it (and us) for resources.

That's the plot: the plot is genius. Here's why.

Up until now the Gantz teams around the world have been given apparently random missions to annihilate monsters--which we later find out are actually aliens--for seemingly no purpose other than the challenge of staying alive and earning points to either leave the game or level up. Now it's revealed to us that the Gantz technology was given to humanity by an extremely advanced, godlike alien race in order to prepare us for the invasion of the Katastrophe race--a race very much like humans, but...bigger:

The very first monster killed by the Gantz team was a ネギ性 child. The team members had no idea what was going on, except they knew that if they didn't kill this kid, there'd be trouble. So they killed it, and it was awful and nihilistic. Then the ネギ性 dad shows up and kills most everyone, and we as readers are kind of rooting for the dad because, you know, these random guys just showed up at his door and blew his boy into a bloody pulp. Even the dad's eventual death is sad: he's crying and staring defiantly at Masaru, who knows he's being an asshole as he blows the innocent alien's head off his shoulders.

This theme is repeated in a number of different ways throughout the series. My personal favorite is when the team gets sent into the Buddhist temple to clean house. They slay a bunch of statue-monsters, but then they get put up against the Last Boss (ラスボス), who in the space of a few pages kills a bunch of really likable main characters and cuts the legs off of Kurono Kei, who loses all hope and begs for Kato Masaru to kill him before the monster does. Kato, in the final battle with this monster, begs to be let alone with his friends, but the monster says "Why? You're the one who came to our house and started shooting at us. Now we're all dead except me. No, I'm going to kill you."

--And you get this feeling that yeah, even though we as readers like Kato and Kurono, they deserve to die. They're the bad guys here, and the only reason we're rooting for them is because the narrative follows them, not the aliens.

But the aliens didn't do anything. The Gantz teams aren't like the Ghostbusters who show up only when there's a problem. They're not even like the X-Men, who save the world from evil but the world doesn't thank them for it. The Gantz teams are the bad guys; they're forced into it, to be sure, but to save their own lives they have to go out and kill aliens that were up until they were marked for termination making no problems for nobody. I don't know if Oku was trying to make an elaborate "Nazis were just normal people caught up in a situation beyond their control" kind of metaphor, but it is perhaps telling that the Gantz factory and the godlike alien race's avatar were in Germany.

Speculation aside: Katastrophe throws all this on its head. With Osaka being the last "normal type" mission (and after the killcrazy bonus round in Rome), the Gantz teams are transformed from mercenaries into proper soldiers, gathered by the mysterious organization in charge to execute missions against the invading giants. These giants are now in the position the Gantz teams were in before: they're just doing their job and don't want any trouble. They're an advanced civilization whose home planet has long ago ran out of natural resources; now they travel the galaxy looking for life-rich planets in order to refuel and keep from going extinct. The human race is no threat to them, and shortly after their dramatic arrival they begin harvesting us for food.

This is really exciting. I mean, most people don't have the balls for something like that. You get the idea that not only was this saga well named, but that Oku's whole plan is to end the world--and the series--on a bang, and potentially even a hopeless ending. I know I said I hated nihilistic literature before, but this would be different. This would be a sci-fi epic about humans arrogantly snuffing out life forms that they have no clear interest in or understanding of, and then being wiped out by a life form that has no interest in or understanding of us. That's not nihilism, that's irony. And really good irony at that.

But alas, he wasn't and he didn't, and that's sad. The only thing more disappointing than not ending the series on a things-will-never-be-the-same-ha-HA note was the way he actually ended it, but we'll get to that later. First, a synopsis of the major plot points:

Basically, the aliens invade, Tokyo and everywhere else are decimated, the American military (and probably all the other ones, too) is wiped out, and before the end of a single day one might guess that fully half of the population of cities around the world has been killed. Aliens start herding the remaining humans into cages to be cleaned, killed, and made into food. A handful of Gantz people make it into some of these cages and, escaping the neutralization station in the alien ship, make their way with a number of rescued humans into other areas of the ship. They find a very normal looking city inside, full of normal looking (albeit giant, alien) people. These people are shopping, eating at cafes, hunting stray humans for sport--living a normal life. From there the plot splits into a number of branches, following the split-up Gantz members through their many hijinks in the giant city above Tokyo. People die, people cry, and there are volumes and volumes of Kei chasing after his girlfriend Tae.

I don't know about anyone else, but this was always the part about Katastrophe that I looked most forward to reading. That, and Kei #2's relationship with Leika. An unfortunate side-effect of these plotlines was that there was almost no time to devote to the rest of the supporting cast, who were killed off randomly or embarrassingly swept to the sidelines. This was especially sad with regards to Kato, the hero of Osaka, since we had spent most of the series getting to like him and Kei equally. Again, if Oku had had more time and had been in less of an obvious rush to finish the series there would have been more space to give Kato a plotline of his own so that, by the climactic battle, we would give a damn about his decision to enter the fray.

And that, I think, brings me to volume 37: the Big Fart.

Briefly, the plot leading up to this final volume was as follows: during a so-called final mission, the Gantz team members were given ginormous walking ships that rivaled the giants' own walking ships. They were pointed in the direction of a big column and told to blow it up. Kei got so far as to damage it, but then Tae, his lady love, convinced him to give up on account of not wanting to destroy the entire race. After this the two of them go home, on the way realizing that the giant mothership has begun to retreat, leaving many Gantz members stranded on the ship, increasingly further away from Earth.

In another area of the ship, Kato and Kei#2 are transported to a room (I like to call it, "The Room of Tied-Up Loose Ends") with about as much plot structure as The Room, where they meet a faceless, infinitely faced being who explains the whole backstory to them, and apparently solves the mystery of why that one random German guy ten volumes previous had godlike powers. This godlike being also tells everyone that there's no god, except there is a soul, and reincarnation exists, so like, no worries. (Ballsless, Oku. Ballsless.)

Back to reality, Kato's group gets transported back to the giant alien ship, find out they're in orbit, panic, and find one last Gantz ball that's working to transport everyone back to Earth. As they're queuing up, they watch the American team take on big giant soldiers one by one, slaying them with apparent ease. Apparent until the big white leader-looking one that has been pestering everyone for the past nine or so volumes decides to step into the fray. Cue end of volume 36.

Now, despite the occasional plot hole, inexplicable loose end, or hurried ending to a plotline, there was a lot of potential leading into volume 37. I didn't know beforehand that it would be the final volume of the entire series; I can't imagine anyone that did know was comforted. Here's what I was expecting to happen, in a vague open-ended kind of way:

• the last boss fight would happen between the Big White Giant and the remaining several dozen Gantz members, including and especially the Tokyo team
• Kei and Tae would be watching the whole thing from Tokyo, very sad since during the course of the fight most of the Tokyo team would be killed, probably including Kato
• eventually (after two or three volumes) the big guy would go down, but would probably not be killed
• through a mutual, warrior-like agreement, the aliens would continue their retreat and the Gantz members that remained (including maybe a few sidelined Tokyo characters) would be transported back home
• and then, maybe by volume 39 or 40, there would be a few chapters of falling action, showing how the world was left after the Katastrophe and how our principal characters start their new lives, Gantzless.
• ZE ENT.

This, however, is what we got:

• The big white giant (let's call him the last boss) kills a few members of the American team, and in response the whole bloodthirsty, highly skilled American team surround him in an effort to take him down as a unit. He's surrounded and definitely fucked.
• The camera pans to Tokyo and New York City, showing the faces of the people watching the fight on TV.
• The camera pans back, where, get this, the whole American team has been dispatched.
• (This is a technique known as fucking around. Oku used it because he had no idea how to realistically show the giant getting out of that situation.)
• Then the boss starts calling out Kurono Kei's name, explaining that his race is beat, and that their only other option is to crash their mother ship into Earth. They'd do it unless Kei came and beat the last boss by himself.
• (This is not their only option. They could just leave. It had been explained earlier by the godlike alien that the giants had been turned away from their planet, so retreat, it would seem, is an option for these people.)
• Kei goes to fight the last boss and--get this--beats him.
• Despite being demonstrably less experienced and less skilled than almost everyone else in the room.
• Despite being alone and with no weapons.
• But--but--he had heart. You see, he promised his girlfriend he'd be back.

There were two or three panels when the Last Boss looks really surprised that Kei managed to land a hit on him. You're not the only one, buddy.

After the last boss is killed, Kei asks the lone remaining giant warrior to stop the war and to leave. Instead of leaving, he kills himself.

And then the ship explodes and Kurono and Kato escape in windowless Gantz bike-ships, even though they're in deep space.

(The falling action so far is like the end of the first Metroid game, except in Metroid you have to escape by going up, not down, and the exploding facility upon the death of the last boss makes sense, not no-sense.)

And then--literally on the next page--they're floating in the ocean "two days later," talking about how they're about to die.

And then--again, on the following page--they wash up on a beach where a bunch of people are shouting "Thank you!!" They collapse in their girlfriend's (Kei) and brother's (Masaru) arms.

THE END.

That's right: Hiroya Oku somehow managed to make a fall to Earth from space happen faster than your average reader could conceivably appreciate that the falling action of the story had even started. It broke speed records, but it really sucked.

The overriding feeling from the whole last volume was that the whole time he was drawing it, Oku was thinking, Jesus, I really want to be finished with this damn comic already. Unfortunately, he got his wish, but he sort of ensured that I won't ever read anything from him ever again. A story's value isn't cumulatively contained in its ending, but this was such a bad ending that it borders on professional irresponsibility. I appreciate all the good points of Gantz, and I still recommend the series up until the end of the Osaka saga to anyone, but Katastrophe is a perfect example of a project that became too big and too unwieldy for an artist, who eventually lost interest and blew through to the end, probably for contractual reasons. Joe Madureira did the same thing with Battle Chasers, except that he didn't make it a dozen issues before he threw in the towel--and he had an entire creative team behind him to get most of the post-production work done.

In the end, Gantz was a filthy, fun sci-fi epic with a handful of really memorable characters who at various times throughout the series were underutilized or ignored, probably due to time budgets more than any creative lull on the part of the creator. The final story arc, even though it was something like 2000 pages, was rushed into absurdity over the final few volumes. If you want to give the series a try I recommend it, but maybe stop at volume 34 and just imagine yourself an ending. It's better than living with the stain of volume 37 on your conscience.