A review by dyingotters
Goodbye, Eri by Tatsuki Fujimoto

emotional inspiring reflective sad fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.75

Genuinely enjoy the way Fujimoto write characters in grief because it's so unconventional. Yuta has weird/personal ways of coping that ppl would dismiss as being insensitive (even if it is his own mom).

I also love the dedication to show the story through Yuta's phone recordings. Fujimoto wrote unreliable narration really well because we don't learn about some traits of mom/Eri until way later - we only see them as how Yuta want them remembered. the panelling is so simple it's almost crude if not for the fact that it pushes the idea that we're seeing everything through the recording from a phone screen, plus the way each panel paces itself, like the times when we just see the same panel over and over again save the dialogue that is happening "off screen". it's cinematic and that's what makes this manga panelling genius despite its simplicity.

One thing that almost threw me off was 1. grown up yuta's whole family dying in a car crash 2. Eri being a vampire, BUT 1. He was middle aged atp and thats just how life is, you go through loss and you go through some more. I get it but it was a bit soap opera dramatic in the moment. 2. When I thought more about the vampire thing tbh I understand. The image of him going back to that place all those years later, again suicidal and alone but now old and tired, and Eri's still sitting in the same place looking the same way she did. I guess it's less about her genuinely being a vampire and more about the idea of "dead people". They don't just disappear off the face of earth if you still remember them, but they'll always stay the age of when you met them to when they died, like vampire Eri dying and then coming back to life to relive everything, to die again and to "reincarnate" again. The "vampire" being just the Eri that Yuta remembers.
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