"SHOCKING"
They say genius and madness embody two sides of the same coin. Few manga exemplify this to the extent of Dorohedoro - though its particular make of coin is drenched in mud, sludge, and regurgitated gyoza.
I first was exposed to Dorohedoro through the impressive anime adaptation released by studio MAPPA. Right off the bat, your senses are barraged with a unique, chaotic and often overwhelming visual style and a plot that, on its face, presents as relatively straightforward: in a world where magic users known as sorcerers (the haves) experiment on and brutalize the non-magical humans (the have nots), one man is on a quest to find out who turned his head into that of a lizard. As our protagonists and their accomplices work to unravel the mystery of Caiman's identity, each discovery leads to more and more perplexing questions. The revelations around Caiman's past force the reader to reassess their views of the likeable, gyoza-obsessed, reptilian-headed goofball, having us question: who really are the "bad guys" in the story? Eventually, we begin to wonder if the characters we have come to root for so ardently are better off not knowing the truth.
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I've never been fond of the distinction between "good guys" and "bad guys", so I don't use that phrase lightly. It's become a well worn adage in creative writing that "the best written villains are the heroes of their own story", and I find myself gravitating towards literary works that truly blur the line between what conventionally might be labelled "good" and "bad". Real humans come in brilliant, ugly, complex shades that do not lend themselves easily to binary categorization. An abusive partner can be a dedicated and passionate social activist. A pathological liar can also be a good friend. Good and evil exist not even as a spectrum but as shifting and intangible hazes that ebb and flow depending on the phases in one's life, the culture one finds themselves in, circumstance, epochs, the alignment of the stars.
But legitimately there reached a point in this story where the truths we uncovered around Caiman were so dark and disturbed that I couldn't help but ask myself, have I been unknowingly cheering for the villain of this story? Was Caiman, in his past life, a despicable, ruthless and deranged murderer? The answer is yes...but actually no.
Interestingly, Q Hayashida presents a cutthroat, grimdark world steeped in moral ambiguity from the very outset. When we're introduced to the affable, cheerful Caiman, he is in the middle of violently dicing a relatively innocent sorcerer to bits after subjecting him to the bizarre interrogation method that will help him zero-in on the ones responsible for his disfigurement. It would not be incorrect to label Caiman and Nikaido as murderers - a categorization that almost immediately loses its edge when we better understand the desperate conditions the citizens of the Hole are forced to endure. Sorcerers are shown holding the power in this story and possessing little restraint in exercising that power against humans, who are often seen as barely better than guinea pigs. Under these circumstances, and under the assumption that Caiman himself is a victim of an unknown and seemingly immutable spell cast upon him by the sorcerers he is intent on finding, it's easy to justify his hatred and subsequent killing spree.
However, the sorcerer-human dynamics that are initially presented only form one layer of the intricate sociocultural context of Dorohedoro. As we are introduced to En and his family, Fujita, Ebisu, and eventually the various members of the cross-eyed gang, we see that simply being a sorcerer does not exempt one from marginalization - there are levels to this. A sorcerer's status and security is predicated on what sort of ability they have and how much "smoke" they are able to create (smoke is effectively this universe's mana system). In the food web of Dorohedoro, sorcerers with weak abilities and those with low smoke output are preyed upon by those higher up on the food chain. It is very often these weaker sorcerers who, upon being brutalized by their stronger kin, perpetuate the cycle of violence by venturing into the human world through magic doors and experimenting on unsuspecting citizens of the Hole. Even powerful individuals at the very pinnacle of sorcery, as exemplified in the character En and the eclectic cast of individuals with unique abilities that comprise his family, are not entirely safe. To most of the world, En and his top officials are viewed as untouchable - however, he himself knows better than anyone that there are forces that could easily topple him from the throne he literally clawed out of Hell to claim: namely, the devils and the mysterious leader of the cross-eyed gang.
The devils present yet another interesting layer to the culture of this universe. These are a race of immortals with unfathomable strength, near indestructible bodies, and powers that put the likes of En's family to shame. Almost all devils are former sorcerers with extraordinarily unique abilities or smoke output that qualified them for access to the devil exam: a grueling process that, if successfully endured, allows one to transform into a devil. The process tends to warp the candidate's personality and tastes towards a greater degree of sadism and arrogance. The first and only true devil, Chidaruma, is indisputably the strongest being in all of Dorohedoro and a de-facto god. It was he who created the realms of Hell and of Magic Users, as well as magic users themselves; it was he who discovered humans and later the Hole (which he granted its name). He also allowed for the ascension of certain favoured magic users to the status of devil through the aforementioned devil exam. This is also where the change in personality stems from - all devils are fashioned in Chidaruma's likeness, thus adopting some facets of his rotten, twisted nature and his ghoulish sense of humour.
Despite the devils sitting at the pinnacle of this universe, they are not completely infallible - Chidaruma reserves the right to revoke a devil's status through a brutal and near lethal process, reverting them back to sorcerers, albeit with much less skin than they possessed prior to taking the devil exam. In this, we see that all the way from the top to the bottom of the social hierarchy in Dorohedoro, fear of displacement perpetuates violence and distrust - tyranny trickles down from above and mutiny constantly threatens to percolate from below.
In such an environment, good and evil ceases to hold meaning - characters are better assessed and understood through their motivations and their justifications therein. En and his cleaners are presented as the antagonistic force to our main duo, while En himself is a deeply feared and revered figure in the Magic Realm due to his control or influence over virtually every business venture (illicit or otherwise) in the sorcerer world. Yet as we become increasingly exposed to the interactions within the family, as we better understand Shin and Noi's close bond, Fujita and Ebisu's sibling-like squabbling, Chota's unhinged obsession with En and the strained, begrudging tolerance he receives in return; the carefree and pampered lifestyle of Kikurage and the way En dotes upon her, even later introductions like Shou - who, funnily enough, was one of the oldest and most dependable members of the family - all of these serve to humanize and endear a group of characters that mostly stand in opposition to our protagonists. En may be a narcissistic crime boss that rules with an iron fist, yet he also is patient, thoughtful, willing to apologize and reflect on his mistakes, and, above all, deeply devoted to his family. This devotion, paired with an inveterate fear of his empire toppling, forms the justifications for his two principal preoccupations: finding sorcerers with powerful magic to add to his family (primarily a sorcerer with time magic) and uncovering the identity of the cross-eyed gang's boss.
Here we return to the main conceit of Dorohedoro - who is this mysterious leader of the cross-eyed gang, a group of weak sorcerers who have banded together to reclaim some modicum of position in a society that deems them worthless? Who is Caiman, this magic-immune, hulking amnesiac who houses an unknown spectre within his mouth that, strangely, holds a vital clue to his predicament? Would you believe that both questions have the same answers? Indeed, answers plural, for there is more than one correct answer to each question - a fact that adds to the layered complexity of this seemingly straightforward story. Piece by piece, the puzzle of Caiman's identity falls into place; within him exists three distinct characters. He was once Ai Coleman, a human born of the Hole who would do anything to become a sorcerer, even going so far as to jump into the pits of toxic sludge and filth and to have a deadly, borderline insane experiment performed on himself. He is Kai, the cross-eyed gang's sadistic and elusive boss, with an insatiable desire to kill powerful sorcerers whether they be friend or foe and steal their magic via their devil tumors; he is Aikawa, a happy-go-lucky, third rank magic user who stood up for Risu and became his best friend (and ultimately the instrument of his demise). These three are fundamentally tragic characters, used as tools to further the twisted agenda of the entity only known as the Hole: a malevolent godlike force that took up residence within Ai, created from the accumulated pain and suffering of generations of humans murdered by magic users, mixed with the toxins from sorcerers' smoke. The Hole's sole desire is to kill all sorcerers, which may in part explain both Kai and Caiman's natural animosity towards magic users and the degree to which they enact violence upon them. In a world filled with morally ambiguous characters, where even our heroes could be rightly classified as disturbed and deranged, only the entity known as the Hole truly embodies the abyss we might call evil.
We eventually learn that Caiman is also Caiman: the two years he spent without his former memories and partnering with Nikaido allowed him to develop into his own person, as seen when his decapitated head is fully revived as an individual separate from the K-Ai-Kawa complex. It is often said that people are ultimately the sum of their experiences, and Caiman's experiences of life with Nikaido, Dr. Vaux, Dr. Kasukabe, and the other denizens of the Hole shaped him into someone who embodies elements of each of Kai, Ai, and Aikawa, while maintaining his distinct personhood. He ends up becoming the one who rises up to the challenge of defeating the final antagonist after being bestowed with the Great Gyoza King Magic Wand, a magic ability of unparalleled power fueled by an endless love for gyoza made manifest. In doing so, he reclaims his mantle as our protagonist, completing a psychological Hero's Journey and affirming his identity as his own.
One other point of brilliance in which Dorohedoro shines is in its cross-sex platonic relationships. As seen in Nikaido and Caiman, Shin and Noi, and even Fujita and Ebisu, the story is chockful of believable, endearing hetero pairings that never skirt the line into "will they, won't they" territory. It's a breath of fresh air to see a manga that can cultivate and maintain a deep love between two characters of the opposite sex, without that affection venturing into the well worn trope of friends to lovers. The dynamics between each member of the three aforementioned cross-sex relationships also remains extremely unique. Nikaido and Caiman's bond is heartfelt without ever coming across as a carbon copy of that shared between Noi and Shin. Even when other characters comment on these connections and insinuate that there might be something more than friendship present, this is quickly dismissed by either or both parties, with both members of each pair repeatedly affirming the platonic nature of their friendships. While Fujita and Ebisu do not display the depths of affection seen between the other two pairs, their relationship is akin to siblings - despite the bickering, fighting, and hurled insults, they both possess a tremendous amount of care for each other. Fujita on numerous occasions risks his life to ensure Ebisu's safety, and he remains the only one who treats her like a fully fledged member of the family. Ebisu takes on a little sister role, constantly stepping on Fujita's toes, yet she often seeks to aid him like when she accompanied him to the baseball match in the Hole, and showers him with gifts such as the new shoes she bought him towards the end of the series.
I'd also like to shout out the normalization of trans identity through the character of Turkey. She is introduced without any gender-specificity, which is made possible through the widespread use of masks in the Dorohedoro universe which serve both to anonymize individuals and boost their magic output. Turkey, in line with her name, wears a mask in the shape of a full roasted dinner turkey, thus obscuring her face and features until the very end of the story when she fed her mask to Kikurage in order to resurrect Shou. While she is not as prominent a member of En's family as others we've come to know such as Shin and Noi, she is a valued member of the team whose abilities greatly contribute to solving key mysteries and moving the plot along, as seen when she helped retrieve Risu's head by way of her living doll magic, or when she supported in the retrieval of En's head by the same means. Her face reveal also sets the stage for her "coming out" to the family as transgender - she previously was seen socially as male, but had used a powerful spell to physically transition into a woman. While the family reacted with initial shock, each member took Turkey's proclamation of her gender identity in stride and immediately turned to the pressing matter at hand: ensuring they weren't digested within the stomach of the Hole. It was refreshing to see how Turkey's transness was accepted by En's family as a whole - she had already ingratiated herself as a vital recurring member within the group, a fact which remained constant through her transition and coming out. I'm sure certain readers actually even became more fond of her due to this characterization - a testament to how well Q Hayashida handled the introduction of a trans family member into the story.
As this review draws to a close, it is impressed upon me how difficult writing a good ending can be - especially in manga. Dorohedoro was a wild and unforgettable ride, with many sprawling plotlines, twists and turns, and a deluge of memorable, unique characters. Even as zany as the plot sometimes became, not once did it feel like Hayashida ever lost grip on the reins of her story. Each plot thread was resolved, at worst, sufficiently, and at best spectacularly. Wrapping up this macabre story rife with gore, mass murders, consistent decapitations and oodles of universal suffering with a happy ending might seem like a tall order; doing so with a happy ending that feels like a well earned, natural conclusion to the story that precedes it seems nigh impossible. Yet despite it all, that is exactly what was achieved with Dorohedoro. Caiman may not have cured himself of his lizard head, but ultimately he didn't need to. His quest of self discovery brought him right back to where he had begun - this time with a newfound awareness that he already had everything he needed. He also learned how to make his own gyoza, as tasty as Nikaido's, thanks to the tutelage of the most underrated character in the series: gyoza boy.
Often, it takes searching for happiness in all the wrong places to realize it was always just within reach.