ナチュン

NACUN

MANGA

STATUS
COMPLETE
VOLUMES
6
RELEASE
February 25, 2010
CHAPTERS
44

DESCRIPTION

Near future. A world renowned mathematician/physicist Francis Dullam loses his left brain hemisphere and retires from the hard science to study dolphins. Several years later he comes up with the new thesis (which is essentially a collection of dolphin footage). As the "thesis" is being severly criticized by the media, Ishii Mitsunari (a student living in America) discovers the idea hidden there, that will help to create the true Artifical Intelligence. Motivated to create the AI first, Mitsunari leaves for Okinawa, to follow the footsteps of Dullam.

CHAPTERS

REVIEWS

ReSeinen
76/100
A race to hold the 'casting vote' for the whole world
Set in a near future where humans have developed artificial gills, nacuN opens with our protagonist, Ishii Mitsunari, looking at a video that ran for 2 hours and 51 minutes, exclusively showing footage of a pod of dolphins wandering around the ocean with some random close-ups here and there. Recorded by the world-renowned mathematician Francis Dullam, the video doesn't show anything eye-catching until an idea struck Ishii's head, one that'll make him king of the world. Elated by this discovery, Ishii forgoes living in America and instead sets his sights on working on this project in the northernmost point of the Komiya archipelago. It is here that he'll be faced with a new lifestyle that'll bring many new challenges with it, such as some of the island's bizarre traditions, working together with a local fisherman named Gen, as well as meeting a mysterious mute girl who's interfering with his dolphin research. But perhaps this trouble seems minor in comparison to some of the darker points nacuN manages to reach.

I'll have to say I was pleasantly surprised by this work, especially after reading one of the author's other works, Mushinuyun. The characters in this manga, as well as their mindsets, evolved unlike the former; the concepts were given room to breathe and weren't obfuscated by content that leaned more on the shocking and explicit side of things. The world of this manga expands with each passing chapter until it presents a rather vast array of characters that each have an important role within the story. What begins as a mystery that concerns one specific island escalates into a race that concerns itself with finding God first through the use of a polymind procedure that'll allow humans to create a massive supercomputer which may initially sound like jumping too hard into another narrative altogether but it's something the manga manages to land quite well. The journey Ishii traverses starts off with his goal of world domination seeming childish, but once it shows the lengths he and other people go to apply Dullam's knowledge, the plan appears to be more dangerous. I'd say it's worth the read, especially because of how many interesting questions about the understanding of matters such as religion, God, human cruelty, and suffering it poses. All tied together with a well-rounded cast of characters, where the main character can be absent in chapters without the story losing any steam. My only complaint lies in the story's conclusion; many things felt like they were getting resolved far too quickly near the end of the story, and the last chapter is weak in comparison to some of the better moments of the series. Unlike the other work I mentioned, here the author managed to create a narrative that didn't implement comedy at the expense of unnaturally fitting in the existential themes, here it doesn't take away from the experience, far from it, it's the moments of levity a reader may appreciate after some of the more gut-wrenching moments nacuN has to offer.

To conclude, I'd say to pick up the series on the basis that it presents a lived-in environment that is the island of Makei (with its weird all-female traditions wary of foreigners such as Ishii), as well as the neighboring islands, such as Erabu (with it's historical shipwreck parts displayed at the entrance to the island), which plays a pivotal part in the story's second half. But the scope doesn't stop there; the Vatican, with its supervision of Dullam's ideas, which also has a conflict of interest between conservative and science-defender factions, is also an important participant considering one of the cardinals in line ot be the next Pope, Zephias, is a strong advocate of "finding God" via the polymind method. One of Dullam's students, Zelda, becomes a major player in the story, and the times her subplot intersects with Ishii give way to some of the key moments in nacuN. It's well-fleshed out, with impactful visuals, complex characters, and will give you many themes to reflect upon.

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