By Tsutomo Nihei translated by Kumar Sivasubramanian (Vertical)
ISBN: 978-1-935654-80-3
As I’ve often said, these days nobody does hard comics science fiction like the Japanese – although admittedly our own 2000AD and Warren Ellis’ SF are keeping the flag flying ahead of much of even manga’s greatest masters in their own mostly unacknowledged way…
In the tech-obsessed East, the tough, no-nonsense, nuts-and-bolts mystery and refined imagination of star flight have long been blended with more fanciful and romantic futuristic themes to captivate at least four generations since Osamu Tezuka first started the ball rolling in the 1950s, making space commonplace and conceptually comfortable for the Japanese.
We in Western world have been simultaneously enraptured and frantically trying to catch up, ever since some – too few, alas – of these manga tales first began to be translated into English at the end of the 1980s.
One of the most talented and respected proponents of the genre is Tsutomu Nihei whose triumphs have ranged from wholly self-created graphic epics such the stunning cyberpunk thriller Blame!, its prequel NOiSE, and Biomega to impressive stints on major commercial properties such as comics iterations of the video game Halo and the miniseries Wolverine: Snikt! for Marvel.
Born in 1971, the author prefers to let his works speak for him. His latest series Shidonia no Kishi began in 2009, debuting in Kodansha’s Seinen title Bessatsu Shonen Magazine and running to nine volumes so far.
The premise is familiar but evergreen. A thousand years from now Earth is gone. Our solar system was destroyed by unstoppable alien monsters and the survivors of humanity have scattered to the stars in vast self-contained generational vessels as much rock as rocketship. Over a millennium these colonies have hurtled ever outward seeking escape and survival, whilst within them humans have slowly become something different…
The eponymous Knights of Sidonia are the young pilots gifted enough to pilot the colossal humanoid fighter vessels that defend and scavenge interstellar resources for the ever-moving colony our story concerns…
The story begins with ‘Nagate Tanikaze’s Choice’ as an unexpected event occurs. Unknown to all the inhabitants of the hive-like colony ship years ago, an old man took his infant grandson deep into the bowels of the vessel and vanished. Raised in utter isolation with only tapes, a flight simulator/VR trainer and stolen food, the boy grew into a tough, hardy and independent survivor.
When, after three years, Nagate Tanikaze finally accepted that the corpse in the chair was no longer his “grampsâ€, he regretfully headed up in search of food and was soon caught by the incredulous authorities. He is starving and impossibly weak, but adamantly refuses to undergo the commonplace genetic procedure that will enable him to photosynthesise starlight. He might well be the only traditionally human being on Sidonia…
His captors-turned-benefactors accept his idiosyncrasies and welcome him into their austere, oddly passionless society, but some people seem to seethe with hostility at Tanikaze’s presence.
He is assigned quarters at a dorm and is welcomed by Ms. Hiyama, a motherly amalgam of human, bear and cyborg. He spends his time acclimatising by aimlessly wandering the vast labyrinthine cocoon which has patterned itself on an idealised 20th century Japan, but trouble still finds him when he wanders into a female photosynthesis chamber and is beaten up by the outraged girls “feeding†inside…
In the higher echelons of the ship, passive panic is gripping the ship’s leaders. Long range sensors have spotted a Gauna – one of the Brobdingnagian bio-horrors that invaded and destroyed Earth ten centuries past – and with grim fatality the Garde pilots are mobilised.
Tanikaze has been tested and found to be a superb pilot prospect. As the ship goes on alert his actual training begins, converting his years on the simulator into hands-on experience…
‘Nagate Tanikaze’s Maiden Battle’ finds the trainee mecha-rider still experiencing some prejudice but making his first friend in pretty Izana Shinatose, a fellow Garde pilot who adopts the outsider, acting as his guide and social mentor. Izana is warm and welcoming and it’s not too long before Nagate accepts “her†(to him) odd situation as a third-gendered, asexual parthenogenetic hermaphrodite. “She†also seems to be mildly telepathic…
Testing on the latest simulator, the outcast astounds all his classmates by scoring far above the machine’s assessment parameters but the purely physical – and appallingly uncomfortable and embarrassing – aspects of wearing a working spacesuit and dealing with the psychological pressures of working in the limitless void still challenges Tanikaze’s resolve and mental resources.
And even training is deadly work. As two squads of Mecha extract ice from a passing asteroid the simple drill turns into a disaster when a Gauna ambushes the novices…
‘Eiko Yamano’s Starry Heavens’ recalls that cadet’s spurning of the students’ superstitious pre-flight ritual before returning to her present as the star-beast consumes her and adds her DNA to its metamorphic mass, simultaneously gravely damaging Tanikaze’s vessel. The telemetry from his ship indicates he’s near death…
Aboard Sidonia, their superiors can only write off the kids and begin readying their only effective weapon – a Heavy Mass Cannon that should push the nigh-unkillable free-floating carnivore far out of range…
The Sidonians are astonished when Nagate apparently regains consciousness and valiantly confronts the gigantic horror slowly assuming Yamano’s form. Incomprehensibly driving it back, he is dragged away by his comrades just as the huge projectile from the mass cannon devastatingly hits home…
‘Norio Kunato’s Fury’ finds the recovering Nagate plagued by ghastly dreams of Eiko’s death – and particularly her imagined transubstantiation into a Gauna. He should be dead but refuses even to give in to the pace of his own healing and soon drags himself on crutches back to lectures. When Izana sees him leaning on willowy Kunato in moments of dizziness, the outraged asexual storms off in a huff…
The baffled Tanikaze only gets the chance to make amends at the Gravity Festival – an annual function that allows the barbarian boy opportunity to eat as much actual food as he can hold – but is distracted by the attentions of fellow pilot Hoshijiro Shizuka who had brought his wounded Mecha and battered body back to Sidonia after the Gauna ambush. However when haughty Norio Kunato insults and assaults Izana, Nagate goes crazy and jumps the elitist bigot. Their battle wrecks the fair, and the outcast learns that many of his fellow pilot candidates feel he is unworthy to ride the giant guardian mecha…
This first monochrome volume concludes with ‘Mochikuni Akai’s Glory’ as the trainees continue their steep and brutal learning curve. The repelled Gauna is gradually, inexorably approaching Sidonia again. Moreover it’s clear that not all the populace despise the new kid. As the first person to fight – let alone survive – a Gauna attack Tanikaze is apparently held in high regard by the older Guardians.
When hot-shot pilot Akai invites Nagate and Izana to a private paradise of artificial seas and beaches, it is to reveal that he and his fellow officers have been tasked with deflecting the beast’s next attack. Although the party is enjoyable and the surroundings stunning, the cadets can’t help but feel they’re intruders at a Last Supper…
To Be Continued…
Like Robert Heinlein, Larry Niven and other masters of the art form, Tsutomu Nihei frequently works in a notional shared continuity (for instance the monstrous Gauna first appeared in his earlier series Abara), but there’s no sense of having missed anything in this premier instalment of a wonderfully engrossing, gloriously engaging epic of Horatian heroism and Mankind’s Last Stand.
Compelling, subtle, spectacular and even funny, this is a yarn no adventure aficionados or sci-fi fanatics should miss.
This book is printed in the traditional Japanese right to left, back to front format.
© 2013 Tsutomu Nihei. All rights reserved.