The Flowers of Evil Complete Manga Omnibus Volume 4 by Shuzo Oshimi (a Neo-Tokyo 2099 Manga Review)

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 Omnibus”!

MANGA TITLE: The Flowers of Evil Complete Manga Omnibus Volume 4

Story and Art by Shuzo Oshimi

FIRST PUBLISHED IN JAPAN: Kodansha Ltd.

PUBLISHED IN USA BY: Vertical Comics

RATED: T for Teen

US RELEASE DATE: October 23, 2018

After his grandfather falls ill, Kasuga goes with his parents back to Gunma—his first trip back to his hometown ever since the incident with Nakamura—and Kasuga must confront the friends and family he hurt in the past. A former classmate gives him a tip regarding Nakamura’s current whereabouts, but will he have the courage to track her down and ask her the question that has haunted him since that day?

In this final installment, time passes and people grow, change and heal, and we get a glimpse into the first fateful encounter between Nakamura and Kasuga, from her point of view…

NOTE: Reviews were done back then with first name/last name back then…

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 began 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 Takao go through with it? And how far will his feeling of guilt change him?

Needless to say, the story would eventually lead to Takao and Nakamura doing terrible things, getting busted in police and for the most part, the lives of Takao, Nanako and Sawa would never be the same again.

Fastforward to “The Flowers of Evil Complete Manga Omnibus” vol. 4, which focuses on the final chapters of the series.

Years have past and Kasuga Takao and his family are returning back to Gunma to visit his dying grandfather.

The family has not been back to Gunma since the incident involving Kasuga and the families return back home is met with a look of “we really don’t want you here” and the younger members even tell Kasuga to his face that the family blames him for the death of his grandfather.

At the funeral, the entire family gets weird looks from everyone who is visiting, no doubt uncomfortable that Kasuga and his family returned back after all the trouble Kasuga had caused.

While at the funeral, Kasuga sees Kinoshita, Nanako Saeki’s best friend. Afterward the two meet and discuss life, Kasuga not knowing what happened Nakamura Sawa but Kinoshita has not seen her best friend in a long while. Kasuga tells her that he saw her with her boyfriend in Omiya and that she’s living in Utsunomiya.

Kinoshita begins to cry because she felt that she was left behind. When Kinoshita asks about Nakamura, Kasuga said he hasn’t heard or seen of her. But Kinoshita knows of her whereabouts and gives the information to him.

Meanwhile, when Kasuga returns, he reunites to the girls that loves him, Tokiwa, who has written a novel and wants Kasuga to read it. But he tells her he can’t because of the way he is. He then tells her his story of what happened when he lived in Gunma and that he doesn’t want to run away anymore. He received a note of Nakamura’s whereabouts and he can’t’ put her behind him. But he must see her again.

Tokiwa is disappointed, angered but she wants Kasuga to kiss her and then she tells him that if he’s going to see Nakamura, she will go with him.

What type of person will Nakamura be when Kasuga and Tokiwa goes to find her?

“The Flowers of Evil” has come to an end.

It’s been a wicked wild ride but the story has come full circle, hopefully putting closure to a storyline which I’m sure will leave people content, but yet enough to make one feel a bit uneasy.

From the initial storyline which was a bit wicked, about Kasuga, 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.

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.

Vol. 4 signifies the characters having grown older, everyone has grown, Kasuga has been away from trouble, started a new life but he’s stuck in the past. His thoughts of Nakamura won’t leave him.

And the only way to confront those emotions is for the older him to meet with the Nakamura Sawa today, in hopes to find closure.

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 a creative type as well.

The only thing is that while it would have been nice to see the Kasuga’s thought process be the ending, the ending of “The Flowers of Evil” ends with Nakamura. We start to see the perspective of Nakamura back then, how she was against normal society. Everything around her, was bleak and black. Until she met Kasuga. While a lot of this was covered in early chapters and we know how she tormented and corrupted Kasuga, it will no doubt give people the opportunity to think of the characters in a different light.

Some people like myself who may analyze it a bit much and probably equate it to how evil people are able to turn good, yet weak people and make them become accomplices and conform to their mindset.

In a sense, the whole story of “The Flowers of Evil” was like a roller coaster of emotions that show us characters that were really changed forever and after reading it, depending on your mindset, how you feel the characters will turnout in the end considering how messed up their lives were. Can one escape the past? For the characters involved, I would like to hope so.

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 Omnibus”!

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