A girl and her blob.
Creative Staff
Author: Haruo Iwamune
Translated by: John Neal
Letterer: Madeleine Jose
What They Say
A girl walks alone in a world without humans. Her mission—to search for survivors and cleanse the land. But is anyone still out there in the lonely, beautiful ruins, waiting to be found?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Japan saw the end, and it lingers on the tongue and in the psyche. When Americans imagine the end of the world it often involves despair and utter destruction. Chalk it up to evangelism or whatever. Rare are the tales of a dying earth that remains hopeful. Japan saw the end… and rebuilt. And their apocalyptic fiction reflects that. Everything is a cycle of death and rebirth.
Basically, we get a lot of post-apocalyptic manga. Some of it is as bleak as it comes, but much of it is just a slow reflection of a species slowly dying out. A peaceful quiet end.
The style of this manga reminds me of a cross between BLAME and Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou. The mood is a mix of those two series as well. The expansive cityscape of never-ending metropolis ruins and near-future technologies left abandoned and desolate. The intricately detailed architecture is heavily shaded and often in shadow. Yet through that wanders a wide-eyed girl and her little friend, finding moments and memories of humanity as the world closes its eyes. Bleak, yet beautiful.
Saya takes her job seriously. She isn’t an android, AI, or robot. She is human, just one designed with survival in mind. A new type of human who can work through the disease and hazards, nigh indestructible. Her little pet Coo also appears to be something man-made, perhaps a model animal of the same stuff. Both need to eat and drink, and like a survival game both move along clearing areas, scavenging for food and supplies, and carrying out the duty assigned to them.
We don’t know why Saya is the only Eternal Child who made it, or what happened to the scientists who created her and gave her a duty. I expect we will get her backstory in a future volume. Likewise, we know very little about the threat that ended the world.
This volume shows how Saya lives her life and carries out her duties as the only living human left to clean up after the end. Like Wall-E, she is working toward being able to clean the hazards of Earth to make way for a return of the species to living. Much like Wall-E, we don’t know if there is any humanity left to prepare for the return of. It certainly doesn’t seem that way. Saya is both a decontaminator and an undertaker. She puts the bodies of the dead to rest and moves on, and in doing so removes the source of the miasma that killed humanity.
Each chapter is a snapshot of an ending scenario. From an artist couple who kept painting till the end, to a theater projectionist who decided to spend eternity watching films, to an AI that was poorly programmed to protect and serve at all costs. Sometimes these encounters end in violence but more often than not they end in small gifts. This volume even ends with a note that there might be survivors, somewhere. If one man can survive then surely others must have.
In Summary
Is there hope of rebirth at the end of the world? Or are we a planet doomed to not even be mourned? The Color of the End doesn’t posit humans as our own destruction, for once, but we are victims nonetheless. With how dark the world is right now, we need a glimmer of hope. Something to remind us that we can overcome our greatest challenges. That we can survive. Failing that, it’s nice to think that someone out there would commit our bodies to the grave with respect. Bleak, but not nihilistic. I wouldn’t fault a reader for turning to fluffier fare in these trying times. However, I want to place my faith in Saya’s mission. The idea that maybe there is a future to hope for.
Content Grade: B +
Art Grade: B +
Packaging Grade: B +
Text/Translation Grade: A –
Age Rating: Older Teen
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: January 28, 2025
MSRP: $15.00 US / $19.50 CAN
