BLAME! MASTER EDITION 1: 03/11/20

BLAME! MASTER EDITION 1 by Tsutomu Nihei is the first omnibus in a six volume manga series. This volume is nearly wordless especially for the first half. It follows Kyrii as he climbs upwards through the levels of a city so large and old that no one remembers what land is or even the city's history.

The architecturally centered artwork reminds me of Girls' Last Tour (少女終末旅行) but at a time when there are more than just a handful of people left. There are also robots and cyborgs and these take the role of vengeful spirits, hunting for humans and fighting amongst themselves.

Kyrii in his climb is looking for humans who have the Net Terminal Gene. Presumably he wants or needs it to access the computer or AI left running the city unchecked. Anyone else, anyone not human, he kills using a rare graviton beam emitter.

While this is a Japanese work, it, like many Japanese pieces I've read or watched, fits into the road narrative spectrum.

Looking at Kyrii as a traveler, his aloneness and his ability to travel through different distinct areas despite the danger, implies that he is an orphan (FF).

The vast, potentially Earth sized, city, is something beyond the ken of the present or past landscape. Although the area covered is on Earth, it is an unrecognizable, unknown landscape. More broadly speaking, Kyrii's destination is utopia (FF).

While the landscape he's traveling through is known as a city, the vastness of it and the way it is constantly changing makes the route a maze (CC). The changes come through decay, through war between different groups, and from automatic processes left unattended. The maze, too, reflects the danger

Kyrii is facing while traveling.

All together, BLAME! MASTER EDITION 1 by Tsutomu Nihei is an orphan's tale through utopia via an ever changing maze (FFFFCC).

Five stars

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