22nd November 2011

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Being Absurd Is Beautiful (Arakawa Under The Bridge)

As much as I want Saint Young Men to become licensed in America, there’s another title that Hikaru Nakamura works on that I believe should be picked up (& probably has a better chance of being licensed) and that’s Arakawa Under The Bridge (published in Square Enix’s Young GanGan Magazine). Arakawa is a very humorous manga that focuses on the idea that “common sense” may not always be the right course of action.

The story focuses on a young man named Kou Ichinomiya, who was taught by his father to never be indebted in anyone. One day, he almost drowns in the Arakawa River and is rescued by a girl named Nino. Kou freaks out over having to repay Nino for saving his life. Nino asks him to love her in return. Kou decides to live with her under the Arakawa bridge, where he meets a variety of people who are extremely weird & can be classified as insane to regular folks. 

The manga plays on the idea of “denpa-san”, which is Japanese for a person who is completely out of sync with reality. Pretty much all the residents of the Arakawa community have left society, but have managed to survive. Also, despite living as outcasts, everyone has accepted one another with no problems. For someone like Kou (who’s been spoiled up to now), he doesn’t know how to react to the residents. Face it: how would you react if you saw a guy in a green frog suit proclaiming himself to be a real-life Kappa, a male nun who conducts Sunday mass with machine guns and cookies, and a man who needs to draw white lines on the ground to live? 

What Arakawa teaches us is that life is absurd in so many ways. Even regular things can be absurd. As much as we criticize others for being weird, we probably all have or do something that people will find awkward and we try to defend it. We can be as bad as the ones we poke fun at. 

Case in point is Kou’s father (pictured above), Seki Ichinomiya. He teaches his son to never be indebted to anyone. How can anyone get by without ANY help? Is that even a realistic possibility? Yet, in the story, Seki has shown a desire to get rid of the Arakawa community (despite Kou’s pleas to save it), even though he’s just like them. He’s a person who has a warped idea on how to do things, but without a sense of care when compared to the Arakawa crowd. 

Another thing is that being around absurd people is that it changes your viewpoints about life. If we’re stuck being around the same people and hearing the same things, we might get stagnant in terms of learning. A recent study indicates that people reading stories that are absurd & meaningless increase learning. I do have to admit that reading a manga title like Gintama (which has a bunch of absurdity) has gotten me to learn more about Japanese culture. In Arakawa, Kou has his viewpoints challenged and begins to see a different perspective of life that he would have never gotten if he didn’t decide to live under the Arakawa Bridge. His absurdities are no better than anyone else’s.   

Leave it to Hikaru Nakamura for creating a wacky, yet thought-provoking title. Given that the series had an anime adaptation (which is licensed in North America), live-action drama adaptation, and a upcoming live-action movie adaptation, Arakawa Under The Bridge is one of those titles that will make you laugh at the randomness that goes on, but love the people that make the randomness happen. Absurdity is beautiful in many ways and I think life will be boring without it, wouldn’t you agree? 

(Regarding a particular publisher to pick up Arakawa, it has to be Yen Press. If you don’t know why, take a look at their library of Square Enix manga titles.)

Tagged: Arakawa Under The BridgeKou IchinomiyaNinoSeki Ichinomiyamanga psychologypsychology of absurditySquare EnixYoung GanGanHikaru Nakamura