”Look at some stupid memes online and calm down!”
Creative Staff
Story & Art: Inio Asano
Translation: John Werry
What They Say
Three years ago the aliens invaded Tokyo. Nothing was ever the same again. But after a while, even impending doom starts to feel ordinary.
The alien menace has been hovering over Tokyo for years, but the invaders aren’t content to just sit back and loom. One of them has taken to the streets of the city in human disguise in order to observe the locals. He may not be the first, and he certainly won’t be the last. meanwhile, Kadode Koyama and her friends continue to deal with the peril of upcoming college entrance exams as the stress of studying under the constant threat of annihilation sends some running to safer cities. At least it’s almost Christmas!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Inio Asano is a master at his craft. His writing perfectly captures the very specific brand of contentment in the face of absolute terror and woe. And his artwork is able to express that subtle emotion just as well—able to transition between bored high schoolers to mass hysteria on a dime.
With Asano’s previous works having a laser-targeted focus on character introspection, it’s interesting to see his writing shift to something more action-oriented, if only slightly. Like its previous volume, Dededededestruction volume 2 treats an alien invasion like it would any foreign affair—dense and boring, but you think you have a vague idea of the major bullet points and that’s enough to get you caught up. Characters will check their news feeds and leave the television running to the tune of walls of text and talking heads giving shallow condolences to any loss of life on the battlefields. And it’s in this manner that you’re able to parse bits and pieces of information from all the noise into a single narrative. It’s still not enough for you to give a solid explanation on things, but at the least you know a couple hype-words, and that should be enough.
It’s here that Asano begins to pick apart television versus the internet and how both are equally harmful when it comes to current events. We live in a time where we get such a massive influx of information at one time, that the only means of processing and coping with it is to either turn it into an internet meme, or sugar-coat it with niceties and cut out any vital information to make it easier to digest. It reaches the point that even with all the information in front of us, Asano consciously presents it in such an obnoxious and unappealing manner, that we want to skim through it and flip to the next page—much like real-life news events.
Meanwhile, the actual story begins to unfold independent of the media outlets. Shifting focus to the escaped invader, we see that he’s been living among humans for three years at this point, and has adjusted to the lifestyle pretty well. Likewise, the oddball cast of Ontan, Kadode, and the rest of their friends continue life in high school, doing their best to live life to the fullest—at least within the confines of what being a teenager allows of them. Their interactions always feel convincingly real, no matter how bizarre they act at times, and work as the perfect vehicle to drive the narrative of the story—high school girls figuring out how to spend the last moments of their senior year all to the tune of the world around them slowly coming to ruin.
In Summary:
Dead Dead Demon’s Dededededestruction continues along nicely, using the premise of cute girls living a cute high school life to deconstruct our crappy society perfectly. Moments of do-nothing splendor are juxtaposed with walls of text spelling out impending doom, and yet everybody’s too preoccupied just living their life to do anything about it. Everything is so familiarly, comically true-to-life, and yet it’s for that same reason that the manga itself is a joy to read.
Content Grade: A
Art Grade: A+
Packaging Grade: A
Text/Translation Grade: A
Age Rating: Mature
Released By: Viz Media
Release Date: July 17th, 2018
MSRP: $14.99
