Monster

Dr. Kenzou Tenma, an elite neurosurgeon recently engaged to his hospital director's daughter, is well on his way to ascending the hospital hierarchy. That is until one night, a seemingly small event changes Dr. Tenma's life forever. While preparing to perform surgery on someone, he gets a call from the hospital director telling him to switch patients and instead perform life-saving brain surgery on a famous performer. His fellow doctors, fiancée, and the hospital director applaud his accomplishment; but because of the switch, a poor immigrant worker is dead, causing Dr. Tenma to have a crisis of conscience.

So when a similar situation arises, Dr. Tenma stands his ground and chooses to perform surgery on the young boy Johan Liebert instead of the town's mayor. Unfortunately, this choice leads to serious ramifications for Dr. Tenma—losing his social standing being one of them. However, with the mysterious death of the director and two other doctors, Dr. Tenma's position is restored. With no evidence to convict him, he is released and goes on to attain the position of hospital director.

Nine years later when Dr. Tenma saves the life of a criminal, his past comes back to haunt him—once again, he comes face to face with the monster he operated on. He must now embark on a quest of pursuit to make amends for the havoc spread by the one he saved.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Liebert, Johan Main

Sasaki, Nozomu Japanese

Tenma, Kenzou Main

Kiuchi, Hidenobu Japanese

Liebert, Anna Main

Noto, Mamiko Japanese

Grimmer, Wolfgang Supporting

Tanaka, Hideyuki Japanese

Lunge, Heinrich Supporting

Isobe, Tsutomu Japanese

Heinemann, Eva Supporting

Koyama, Mami Japanese

Dieter Supporting

Takeuchi, Junko Japanese

Reest, Martin Supporting

Ikeda, Shuuichi Japanese

Reichwein, Julius Supporting

Nagai, Ichiro Japanese

Roberto Supporting

Katsube, Nobuyuki Japanese

Maruyama, Masao Producer

Tamura, Manabu Producer

Nakamoto, Kenji Producer

Kobayashi, Mikiko Assistant Producer

Reviews

Aug 12, 2024

mohppp077

Recommended

This is truly a masterpiece of the psych-thriller/crime genre. It's an extremely gripping story about a good doctor that is challenged to make hard decisions, and is forced to question his moral beliefs, as he is thrown into a situation created unintentionally by his own goodness and compassion (I wont elaborate, watch is yourself). There are several different characters who each have their very own intricate story that links together like a puzzle in order to form a conclusion, which interpretation is dependant on the audiences perspective as well as the actual story. The main antagonist, Johan Liebert rarely makes an appearance, but don't mistake ... this as a weakness in the plotline, rather, instead of lacking, the rare appearance of Johan is a special moment leaving you anticipating more. Urasawa gradually reveals information in small bits, not revealing enough for the audience to form a solid prediction, but only enough to allow us to make mere assumptions about each character. Each minute revelation potentially changing or affirming the audience's own perspective on the behaviours, actions and motivations of each character.
Many people regard this is the best anime ever created, and I am forced to agree, you are not watching a show, you are experiencing a special journey.

TLDR: watch it highly recommend :)

Reviewer’s Rating: 10

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Jun 14, 2024

deathofnagoya

Mixed Feelings

This show is definitely something. It has a lot of redeeming qualities as well as ones that can harm the plot and overall progression of the story. I have not read Naoki Urusawa's other works so i went in blind to what he is capable of as a writer.

To start, the story delves into deep themes such as morality and what can lead someone to lose said morality. Kenzo Tenma is the perfect protagonist who truly portrays an objectively ''good'' person who always tries to do the right thing until it backfires on him so that leads him to question everything he stands for while ... his boundaries are being pushed of what he is truly capable of. The characters he meets throughout his journey present different moral questions and I can really appreciate that since this anime is trying something different.

Next, the pacing. One of the weakest points of this show is the pacing which leads me to believe that this story was not meant to be adapted and is one of those works that should've stayed as a manga. The overall story takes leaps and dives throughout It's duration which can throw people off from willing to continue watching. The amount of truly useless and abundant flashbacks in this show as well as focusing on irrelevant characters really hurts the pacing of this show. The amount of characters this show wants you to remember let alone care about is absurd. What's most annoying about the number of flashbacks is how this show still leaves you with many questions due to how vague the writing can be. So don't expect all yours questions to be answered by the end, as the ending is open ended in an already vague show.

At last, Johan. I believe this antagonist has influenced many characters in animanga. His sheer presence or in a way the lack of it is truly menacing and you can feel it. The way he executes his plans is always interesting but never mind blowing in my opinion. That's where my praise ends for him though because i believe he is a very overrated character. People compare him to the likes of Askeladd and Griffith and i don't get it. His motivations are very nonsensical and he's constantly fluctuating between goals. He's just a vagabond causing mayhem without any true purpose it seems. His motivations remain vague as everyone has different interpretations of what his goal was in the end but i think i have understood it but this type of writing is annoying because when you aren't completely sure what his true goal was it makes you feel like you are missing a key point to understand the essence of the story.

In the end i believe that this show has its place in this community and will continue to be referenced and revered by many. Naoki Urusawa has definitely made something unique that could not be replicated to this extent but only time will tell.

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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Apr 11, 2024

JUBBB

Not Recommended

Funny

Never seen a show so highly regarded and begin with a solid premise only to waste at least 80% of its runtime on episodic BS, splitting up the characters for no reason, pointless external conflicts, red herrings and distractions that endlessly delay the actual plot. You had 74 episodes to weave a meaningful murder thriller story, and very few of these episodes are actually interested in anything of the sort.

If the plot isn't moving forward, are we developing the characters? No, like I said, arbitrary external conflicts or the characters just up and leaving instead of having conversations always leads the characters to being pawns ... of the plot. They never have clear motivations or goals in terms of how the story treats them--they just do things and react to Johan, Tenma's actions and movements. Emotions and feelings are never expressed that show deep character movement or progression. They just look sad, forlorn about 'oh no I have to kill Johan', humanity is bad, murder make me sadge, cri cri. The rest of the time is just filled with recap of prior events (that are also not meaningful).

Is it realistic? In some ways, yes, in many ways no--it has plenty of contrivances, conveniences or deus ex machinas that any story often has. It's realistic sometimes but actively obstructs its plot and mutes its character motivations when the writer hasn't decided what to do yet.

Mid at best, often worse than mediocre, waste of time.

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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