Why Oyasumi Punpun is a masterpiece beyond words

A detailed depiction of a cramped Japanese city.

A bell shaped creature with a long nose.

A classroom.


These are the first three panels you are introduced to after you open the book.

You start with the most basic design. A simple bird that seems to be drawn by a 3rd grader, with an equally simple name to accompany it - Punpun. But the simplicity ends right after the first panel, as you're thrown into the eerily realistic backdrop filled with characters almost bordering on the cliffs of the uncanny valley. And before you realise it, you're engrossed in the story.

Inio Asano and his team are brilliant mangakas. And here, their brilliance lies not in the main character designs, but in the extremely well thought out grading and shading choices of the backgrounds in the panels. Whether you read it in stark daylight or huddled under your sheets at night, there is something ever so slightly off-putting about the whole manga that will put your mind in a state of unease, setting the tone for the whole story. It makes you restless, and hold in your breath slightly for the whole while.

And none of it stems from any supernatural elements, or anything out of the ordinary, but rather from the realistic depictions of everyday life.

It's a heavy read, that is true. And it deals with everything from depression, to suicide to immorality to adultery, with jokes that do not make light of the grave situation at hand, and that makes it even closer to reality.

Punpun's family are the main characters, but the excruciating details are not limited to them. Everyone that appears in the story, from schizophrenic children, to a madman on the streets, has tremendous character development, and the effort that the team did to make all of them feel humans and not mere figments of imagination in a main character's saga amalgamates with the brilliant story writing to make a very moving narrative that would change your outlook towards life, or in the least, make you a more self aware person.

In conclusion, Oyasumi Punpun is a masterpiece, a work of art not meant for the faint hearted, and it shall go down in the annals of history as one of the greatest pieces of literature ever written, albeit as a niche underdog, but probably that is for the best.

Punpun stays forever in our hearts, even years after the story has concluded, because of the way Punpun is - sublime, troubled, funny and oh so very human.

Goodnight, Punpun.




















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