The rules are simple, arm yourself with pen and paper and mark the titles that will pique your curiosity the most. A group of unfortunate people, more or less common, find themselves embroiled in a deadly game. Their own survival is based on the death of others, welcome to the world of survival anime: a genre that now has millions of fans around the world. The main secret of its success lies in the fact that it places its characters in extreme contexts, so as to drop every social mask and represent human nature as it is.
Btooom!
Btooom!, by Jun’ya Inoue, is one of the most crude and violent survival comics, not only for the scenes that appear before the reader’s eyes page after page, but also for the backgrounds of the characters that will be discovered during the reading.
The protagonist is a nerd and hikikomori: he doesn’t work and spends the whole day playing an online game called Btooom, in which he is one of the best players. Suddenly, he finds himself on an island with other people, who must fight among themselves to survive, in what turns out to be the real version of the video game.
Together with him, a fundamental character of the story will be Himiko, a troubled young woman who, after escaping two attempts at rape, has developed a certain distrust towards the male gender. Between her and Sakamoto will be born a strong bond facing extreme situations, which will allow him to embark on a path of personal growth. Their relationship will seem to be the last glimmer of humanity left in an environment that will gradually appear more and more cruel.
Apart from the psychological component even the game itself makes the manga unique. The uniqueness of the gameplay (if you can call it that even in real life) can give rise to gimmicks and strategies completely original. Even more admirable is the fact that this result is achieved without intricate regulations that the reader would struggle to remember in the course of the series, which is by no means short. In fact, players are entrusted with a chip that acts as a radar and allows them to detect opponents only under certain conditions (for example, if a person is motionless, they are not detected). Moreover, the competitors do not use firearms to fight, but MIBs: bombs of various types with different functions and mechanisms.
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Danganronpa: The Animation
Danganronpa is a 2013 animated series written by Makoto Uezu and directed by Seiji Kishi. Here, too, we find a group of students, each with a particular talent, who think they are getting into a prestigious school. Instead, they find themselves trapped in the institution, with a tormentor in the shape of a black and white bear. He goes by the name of Monokuma, is a bit sadistic and explains to the kids that in order to get out of the school they must get a diploma, which can only be earned by killing one of their classmates and proving innocent during the trial.
In essence, Danganronpa is a critique of contemporary society that instead of pushing young minds to ethical and correct behavior, inculcates modus operandi that consist of being incorrect and then getting away with it.
The survival theme is then mixed with the modes of the detective story, so much so that each murder is then solved by bringing together all the suspects in one room to question them and corner them. This is the process, directed by Makoto Naegi, the protagonist of the series, entered the institute thanks to a lottery win. In the school instead of the role of a murderer will wear those of a detective. The paradox is that his actions will only lead to the death of other people, if your guilt is proven in fact you are killed instantly.
Cult scene of each episode will be the execution of the guilty, perpetrated by the crazy bear in different ways, all very colorful and imaginative. It also remains the best moment from the point of view of direction, the viewer will almost seem to be one of those guys who crowded the Parisian post-revolutionary squares when they guillotined people.
Deadman wonderland
Written by Jinsei Kataoka and illustrated by Kazuma Kondou, published in 2007. The title refers to a private Japanese prison, in which the story is set, where death row inmates from all over the country converge. In addition to being a prison, Deadman Wonderland is also an amusement park, where tourists from all over the world pay admission to watch cruel survival games in which the inmates are forced to participate.
Inside the prison, in secret, another game called Carnival Corpse takes place, reserved only for the richest customers: an event in which a small circle of inmates, who have been given a particular power called “Sin Branch”, challenge each other one against one in an arena. Thanks to their power they are able to control their blood and turn it into blades, bullets and more.
The protagonist of the story is Ganta Igarashi, a boy locked up because he was blamed for killing all his classmates. The massacre was carried out by a mysterious “red man” and his identity, as well as the link he has with Ganta and with the Branch of Sin, is one of the main themes of the series. Another important and mysterious character is Shiro, an albino girl who will bond a lot with Ganta. She is not a normal prisoner, in fact she doesn’t participate in the games but she seems to have always lived in that place, which she knows very well. Also, in the prison there is a computer called Mother Goose, which plays a lullaby that only she can hear.
Despite the long and complex plot and the countless characters, the most interesting feature of the manga remains the prison itself. Its existence in fact is justified by the fact that it raises money for the reconstruction of Tokyo, which was swept away by a major earthquake. The work thus attempts to warn us of the atrocities that can be committed and justified by men, in the name of a greater good.
Limit
Limit is a manga written and drawn by Keiko Suenobu in 2009. The events tell of a class of girls heading by bus to a campsite in the mountains. The bus, however, falls into a ravine, causing the protagonist Konno and her surviving classmates to find themselves in a hostile environment, in which survival is difficult and interpersonal relationships take a violent and predatory turn.
In Limit a theme dear to the author is addressed, namely bullying. The extreme condition will only exacerbate behavioral tendencies that were already there. A bullying victim, however, in such a borderline situation also finds an opportunity to take revenge. Konno, on the other hand, as a superficial and selfish girl, begins to question the way of relating to others that she had until then.
The peculiarity of this survival is that it is completely female and realistic. There are no dystopian scenarios, alternative realities, fantasy or science fiction elements. There is no entity that orchestrates it all. It is clearly inspired by Lord of the Flies, although the themes addressed remain different. All these uniqueness make Limit a survival series that surely can’t be missed on the shelves of lovers of the genre.
Battle Royale
Manga inspired by the homonymous best-selling novel, written by Koushun Takami (also scriptwriter of the manga that instead sees Masayuki Taguki at the drawings) in 1996, set in a dystopian reality (not futuristic, but current). In which is in force the “program”, a kind of law that provides that a class of Japanese eighth grade is taken to a desert island to participate in a deadly game until there will be only one survivor. If anyone tries to escape the device around their neck will explode, while if no one dies within three days, everyone’s head will be blown off, effectively nullifying any attempt to rebel against the rules of the game.
Battle Royale is still considered the best survival title and has certainly been a source of inspiration for other stories in the genre (not only in Japan). In addition to the many violent scenes, described with boards really worthy, to entertain the reader there will also be the discovery of why the program exists and, above all, in what way and how it is functional to the dystopian reality in which the protagonists live.
According to its author, Battle Royale wants to be a metaphor of a society (the Japanese one) too competitive, which ends up being based on the destruction of others in favor of the affirmation of self. In fact, the participants are divided in two: those who decide to abide by the rules and act alone against everyone and those, on the contrary, end up allying themselves with other companions to subvert the established order, in essence to rebel against the government. In the manga we therefore find two modes of action, one supportive and cooperative and another individualistic and competitive. Needless to say for which of the two the author favors.
