TITLE: The Flowers of Evil Complete Manga Omnibus Volume 2
YEAR: February 2018 (US Release Date)
COMPANY: Vertical Comics
Story & Art by Shuzo Oshimi
In 2009, Shuzo Oshimi wrote and illustrated the manga series “Aku no Hana” (The Flowers of Evil).
The manga was nominated at the fifth Manga Taisho and received an anime adaptation courtesy of Zexcs back in 2013.
With a total of 11 graphic novels published and having been released in America previously, Vertical Comics is re-releasing the manga series as an omnibus (three manga graphic novels in one thick book).
The story begins with an introduction to a middle school student named Takao Kasuga. He is a guy who loves reading books, especially Charles Baudelaire’s “The Flowers of Evil” (Les Fleurs du Mal) and he is attracted to his classmate Nanako Saeki. Meanwhile in class, there is a student who tends to get in trouble and her name is Sawa Nakamura. She shocks her class by calling her teacher a “shit-bug” in front of everyone after the teacher outs her for getting a zero on her homework.
One day, Takao realizes that he left his book in class and when he goes to retrieve it, he sees Nanako’s gym shirt and bloomer shorts. Because it belongs to Nanako, he takes it and brings it home.
Meanwhile, the following morning, Nanako is in tears because someone stole her gym shirt/shorts out of her gym bag. As her classmates feel bad for her, Takao can’t help but feel bad that Nanako is distressed by what happened but keeps it to himself that he is responsible.
When Takao rides his bike back home after school, Sawa calls him and she tells him that she saw him steal Nanako Saeki’s gym clothes.
And from then on, she makes Takao take part in a contract. She won’t tell anyone what he did, but she must do everything she says.
And the things she will make Takao as part of this contract, how far will Tako go through with it? And how far will his feeling of guilt change him?
After reading “The Flowers of Evil Complete Manga Omnibus” vol. 2, I couldn’t help but realize how f’d up each of the primary three characters are. And if you thought volume 1 showed us how far, Takao has sunk. This second volume shows us how things got worse. Way worse.
Not just him but also the pure Nanako Saeki. Things change but in this case, a bit drastic.
First, let’s rehash about “The Flowers of Evil”. The story is a bit wicked, a boy who liked a girl and finds the opportunity to steal her gym shirt and bloomer shorts, at first I thought it would be the fall from grace of this book-loving intellect.
But in someways, it’s of how far this dark, intense girl named Sawa go to break him or to mold him to a person unlike others. A person that is more or less broken from the inside.
Sawa has this control over Takao in a way that I find shocking. When Takao gets the guts to ask Nanako Saeki out for a date, when he sees Sawa watch the two of them together, he begins to sense intense fear. And he should because immediately, Sawa makes him wear Nanako’s clothes while he’s out on a date, goes as far to get him wet to reveal that he’s wearing her clothes and Sawa is like a twisted individual who thinks she can have his way towards Takao. May it be hitting him, calling him degrading things and making him do the most messed up things, he does it.
At first you wonder why he does it. At first, you can understand that it may be fear but somehow over the course of various chapters, you start to realize that Sawa has changed him for the worse. And there is something twisted in the fact that perhaps Takao is getting a kick from the fact that she is bringing him out of his shell and having him discover his true self, or perhaps he is being broken to the point of being brainwashed.
It’s a bit shocking, unnerving and fascinating because we see how these three individuals transition after Takao’s misdeed.
In vol. 2, it seems rather a sadist and masochistic storyline as Takao is no doubt a masochist, he actually somehow finds himself addicted to Sawa’s mistreatment, no matter how badly she treats him.
Saeki on the other hand can’t understand what Takao enjoys about Sawa and in the process, through being with Takao and seeing him being mistreated and liking the girl that mistreats him, it brings out the bad girl within her, who is willing to give up her body to him.
And you would think Takao would feel some enjoyment but somehow all he thinks about is Sawa.
After how the last volume ended with the three getting caught by police, Takao is now finding himself wanting more Sawa, even though the two have been keeping a distance from each other.
His parents want him to stop his bad behavior but in truth, Takao is so far gone that he wants Sawa’s attention and will lie in order to see Sawa in some place he built where the two can meet and she can treat him more like crap.
But wanting to prove how much of a “sh*tbug” he is to Sawa, he ends up stealing all the panties of all the female students while they were out in gym with the exception of Saeki.
And Saeki and her friend know the truth. And while her friend wants them to tell the police, unfortunately Saeki has a hard time understanding why he didn’t steal hers and why she loves someone as bad as Sawa.
And what happens after that…let’s just say things get even darker as Saeki does the unthinkable, Takao and Sawa plan to do something terrible and needless to say, things are never going to be the same with these three ever again!
I discussed the title “The Flowers of Evil” in my last review. The original book that Takao was hooked on, was written by Charles Baudelaire.
But for those familiar with Baudelaire’s work, his poetry was a rebel. He wrote criticisms of 19th century French modernism during a time when Emperor Napoleon III directed his prefect of the Seine, Georges-Eugene Haussmann to plan for the demolition of medieval neighborhoods that were overcrowded and unhealthy and bring France into modernism. Baudelaire was against this and felt estranged from the city he lived in and his poets were inspired by the beggars, the blind, the gamblers, the prostitute, the elderly and those who were victimized by imperialism. He was anti-bourgeois.
In connection with this series, Takao is a huge fan of Baudelaire’s work, which is a major hint to those familiar with Baudelaire’s work that within Takao, there is a rebel. An anti-conformist, who but to weak to speak for himself. But Sawa is the true anti-conformist. She doesn’t want to be like everyone else, so she speaks her mind and is blunt about not wanting to be like everyone else.
So, it’s a very interesting dynamic and a fascinating story. Shuzo Oshimi in someways, because of his inspirations and thought process as featured in throughout the omnibus, makes me realize he is of the creative type as well.
Overall, I absolutely enjoyed “The Flowers of Evil” but I know it’s not going to be for everyone. It’s a bit dark, twisted, audacious but it’s also original and captivating. And I highly recommend “The Flowers of Evil Complete” Manga Omnibus 1 & 2!