Solanin

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Asano Inio's Solanin captures people in a pivotal moment in their lives. The early twenties. That awful precipitous moment of our lives when we are suddenly hit by pangs of self-doubt and uncertainty about our future, our path in life, all the more pangy because we've already been forced to study subjects we may or may not give a shit about and passed college and university and have been pushed into the wide world so there's no going back.

But there is going sideways. Speaking of sideways, Asano's stories feature elements that are so out of left-field it prevents his manga from falling ... into cliché, which is so easy to do because of the subject matter. The early twenties. That awfully awkward moment of our lives when we start consuming counter-culture entertainment like The Matrix and Fight Club endlessly reciting every bit of dialogue, reading Haruki Murakami, writing embarrasing poetry, dabbling in hobbies that could reap lots of fame and riches if we were to seriously pursue them but we don’t because it’s just a hobby that we're mediocre at. You couldn’t possibly make it to the big-time...right?

The character of Meiko is an office lady in this manga and she's at this stage of her life where she's sick of routine so she takes a leap into unknown waters and quits her job. An act that is more courageous in Japan than it is elsewhere, being that the country has such a rigid social order about it. Her losing her job puts pressure and a burden on her part-timer boyfriend who's dabbling in music with two college buddies. Could he pursue his hobby and make it big thus saving the both of them from impending poverty?

Her act of quitting sets in motion a collage of choices and events that propels the two through unknown waters, and although it’s scary it’s still life-affirming as in this century it takes courage to confront your own identity and purpose in life and ask yourself outright: am I happy? Can I change my life?

Asano's stories would drip with cliché and hackneyed nonsense in another author's hands; they are so ripe for rolling your eyes at. But Solanin is fresh, adult, funny, compelling and emotional. It manages to roll up those moments of our early twenties into two volumes of heart-felt drama presented in what is now a typically Asano fashion.

The humour is random and inspired, the dialogue is witty and honest, the story is realistic in scope and execution, the art is fantastic and full of memorable imagery that, again, avoids the easy and lazy route other authors would walk.

Asano's route is straight to your heart and his purpose is to make it sing Solanin. Read the manga with Shugo Tokumaru’s ‘Exit’ album playing and sing out loud.

Having read the 11 volumes of Oyasumi Punpun (by the same author), which I'd easily rate as a 9/10 or 10/10 personally, I decided to read this manga. Unfortunately I found myself disappointed.

Starting out, there wasn't really much in particular that hooked me into story, except for maybe the fact that the main character is somewhat cutely drawn. Regardless, having some awareness that something dramatic will occur later on during the story, I read on with an open mind. Ultimately though, I was disappointed by the twist.

Though the short two-volume format doesn't help matters, apart from the heroine, I feel that the characters were not ... really fleshed out. They had some soliloquy here and there, but in the end I couldn't help but viewing them as shallow background characters. I couldn't even find them likable. Due to this lack of character exposition or development, the main turning point of the story seemed not so much a tragedy, but an unbelievably melodramatic and selfish act of a character that I can't imagine becoming emotionally invested in. I couldn't even take the main romantic relationship of the main character and her boyfriend seriously.

Even if this story did pull at my heart strings. I still don't think I'd be able to describe it as very creative or insightful in the manner of the manner of the author's later work.

Solanin's a seinen coming of age story centered around a couple of now graduated band-mates that aimlessly wander their post-graduation phase in life. To some, this period of time may be difficult to adjust to. The leisurely life you had in college now compels you to work 9 to 5 in a job you don't care about at all, with a degree you just randomly chose after drifting along the first few years of college.

Solanin...captures this to an extent. While I empathize with Meiko and Taneda a little bit, to me, the story wasn't particularly engaging or compelling. The manga is largely slice of ... life and really focuses on character development and their emotions, so the entire foundation of this manga is dependent on the reader empathizing with Meiko, Taneda, and the rest of the bandmates' lives and restlessness.

However, what really grinds my gears is when a manga entirely about slice of life and coming of age comes crashing down with dramatic events. Like yes, these events could have happened, but the fact that this manga that tries to ground itself in reality and these sorts of things happening just doesn't sit well with me.

Not that I enjoyed the manga before that happened, but I definitely would not have finished this series if not for the fact that it was a pretty short 29 chapter run