What We Fear
Gunnm is a Science fiction comic by Yukito Kishiro. How could Science fiction and comics be horror? The truth is that horror is an inseparable part of Science fictions since the beginning. Frankenstein, the first book that was considered as a Science fiction book, is a horror story. Science fiction horror could be one of the scariest horrors because Science fiction usually doesn’t create horror by violence and death but by humanity.
Gunnm was first published just after Japan great depression. Just like others, Kishiro had a lot of questions to society and humans’ future. His contradictory thought about these questions made irreconcilable conflicts between characters and made the world he created real. In the comic, the main character Gally experiences the big difference between the trash iron town and Zalem, faces the death and “rebirth” of people she cares, and the final question who she is. |
The comic is still serialize until today. Though the contrast and horror the author create are good, the slowly narrative between chapter 55 and chapter 180 makes readers feel a bit boring. The author tells a lot of story settings during this part, but the main contrast only gets a limit amount deeper and the character growth is very little. The newest chapter is 212, it seems that the author is still trying to tell more settings. Gunnm is work with huge background setting, a huge background can make the story more logical and helps reader substitute into the story better. However, huge background setting is also a big challenge to the author. A balance point between setting and story is the key. It decides if the work can get to a higher level or has no progress.
The author spends a lot of ink on settings in Gummy, that makes the story only had a small process. In chapter 180, readers know that there are two Gally at the same time, one with her real brain and one with her memories. The author could create a climax by letting them met each other, but he chose to avoid that and focus on settings. When two gally meet, readers will face the fear of self-awareness directly: who they really are and what makes them themselves. There are already a lot of works discussed this question many times. The most common result they get is there are two kinds of people, memory personality and receptive personality. People have memory personality think the memory of an experience is more important than the experience itself while people have receptive personality have the opposite opinion. Gunnm makes these two opinions more extreme and outstanding, it seems that each of them is not the real gally. This contradictory feeling makes readers have to think about the question and trembling when they get their own answers.
Science fictions are not stories about an overhead world, they will always be about reflections of our real world. As individuals in human society, people should not only care about how much they got but also what the have lost. Reflection on things and doubt them, that’s what Science fictions teach readers. When readers think about stories like Gunnm, they will have a new understanding of self-awareness and gain the courage to think and face What We Fear.
The author spends a lot of ink on settings in Gummy, that makes the story only had a small process. In chapter 180, readers know that there are two Gally at the same time, one with her real brain and one with her memories. The author could create a climax by letting them met each other, but he chose to avoid that and focus on settings. When two gally meet, readers will face the fear of self-awareness directly: who they really are and what makes them themselves. There are already a lot of works discussed this question many times. The most common result they get is there are two kinds of people, memory personality and receptive personality. People have memory personality think the memory of an experience is more important than the experience itself while people have receptive personality have the opposite opinion. Gunnm makes these two opinions more extreme and outstanding, it seems that each of them is not the real gally. This contradictory feeling makes readers have to think about the question and trembling when they get their own answers.
Science fictions are not stories about an overhead world, they will always be about reflections of our real world. As individuals in human society, people should not only care about how much they got but also what the have lost. Reflection on things and doubt them, that’s what Science fictions teach readers. When readers think about stories like Gunnm, they will have a new understanding of self-awareness and gain the courage to think and face What We Fear.
Gunnm timeline
End days period(around 2100 - 2300):
In the future, the end comes to human beings. Snowstorm covered every inch of land, all governments and civilizations are gone. Vampires get to the top of the food chain. There’s no hope until a female vampire is saved by a human. She witnesses the rebirth of human civilization and the birth of supercomputer Melchizedek. As the protector of this civilization, she holds the key to Melchizedek. Solar system period(starts from around 2300): Melchizedek helps people build Jeru and Zalem. After that, people immigrate to Varus and Jupiter. After 100 years, Melchizedek builds 4 huge spaceships to develop deeper universe. However, Varus people and Jupiter people start a war to stop Jeru from taking potential sources from them. In that war, most spaceships are destroyed. Melchizedek cuts the connection between Zalem and the ground in order to protect ground people. To stop the war, Melchizedek holds a meeting called “ladder”. The story happens in the 26th century. A doctor called Ido finds a head of a transforms girl head in garbages from Zalem. He bring her back and repairs her. The girl loses her memory so Ido gives her a name gally. As the story develop, gally finds out that she is not a normal girl. She choices to go to Zalem and Jeru to finds out the truth. On that way, she faces a lot of test of humanity. |
Places in Gunnm
Jeru&Zalem: Jeru and Zalem are two cities build for space immigration plan. Zalem floats 3 km above the ground and Jeru locates at outer space. They are connected by the Orbital Elevator. Jeru is the port for space immigration and Zalem transports supplies from Earth to Jeru. when two names connect together, it becomes Jeruzalem.
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Trash iron town: Trashes from Zalem have higher technology than ground people have. As more and more people come to pick these trashes, trash iron town formed. The town is full with cyberpunk style.