Billy Bat
a review by Sebsus
Sebsus
1 year ago·Jun 2, 2024
100
/ 100
a review by Sebsus
1 year ago·Jun 2, 2024
If you really make a wish, from the bottom of your heart, a real wish... it'll come true.
-Billy Bat
A sentence, that you'll only hear once in Billy Bat, but it’s essentially the driving factor of many sprouting themes and ideas in one of Naoki Urasawa's most critically acclaimed works. The starting quote might suggest an easy read without any uniqueness to it, but the narrative's structure is very clustered, and the number of focused characters and themes is nearly limitless. This amounts to a majority of takes I have on this piece of art. Thus, I decided to write a structured review, in contrast to the disconcerted narrative of Billy Bat. (My ability is simply not of Urasawa's quality).
As I've already mentioned, the tale isn't straightforward. It's, especially at the start, confusing, jumping from place to place, time to time, with nearly no hint of a joint that holds everything together. This burning issue kind of gets fixed towards the end. Nonetheless, there is still a lot of room for one's own interpretations because of the loose explaining and various decisions, so no plot point can't be clarified. Not my favorite type of narrative progression - most of the time they feel like a way for an author to hide their inability to write - but mastered well enough, to not be disliked.
Structuring aside, the wordsmith's ability to face risky decisions is incredible. They don't fear to just throw the most popular characters away or write controversial dialogue. Unexpectedness is the result, but failing to write a compelling cast is another outcome, which I'll further delve into in my Character section, later.
Something I always have a positive impression about - among my favorite writing contributions - is the author's ability to write thought-provoking dialogue in-between. This happens frequently throughout Billy Bat. The first example I grasped is this one:
A phenomenal take on artistic influence.
These sequences happen on various occasions during the tale, due to the tight selection of themes. Honestly my favorite aspect of fiction are perplexing themes. Therefore, I just decided to make it its own headline.
Something I haven't mentioned on purpose yet, is to mention anything in relation to the historical genre that is enlisted on Anilist. The storyline takes place across many centuries, especially during the 20th century. The reason for this decision lies in the decisiveness historical events take upon the topics present in the work. I hate being spoiled even to a minor extent and sporadically also like to read reviews beforehand. Two things that don't go well together. Due to the majority of people like myself only reading the first and last lines of a review, I'll try my best to spoil only a minority of essentials in the introduction and the deep dive happens in the subcategories like now.
During my reading I took notes of themes I perceived. Resulting in more than 10. A general thread running through them is a rather uplifting vibe and detail to reality. Continuing my showcase for thought-provoking dialogue; the portrayals of racism and prostitution tend to provoke the reader to go easier on people suffering from them. The anti-racism line in here is unexpectedly vivid, I didn't anticipate reading in a Japanese comic:
Who cares if you're black or white? If we turn this place into a slaughterhouse...only read blood will run!!
-Diane Goodman
Or the conversation between the MC and a prostitute:
Billy Bat is a story, established writers use as a message to humanity. And I always love that. Examples for that is the novel The World of Yesterday by Stefan Zweig, or the Ghibli movie The Tale of the Princess Kaguya by director Isao Takahata.
Because of the historical fondness of the writer duo, thoughtful dialogue like my examples can happen at the most crucial times history provided. Both moments happened in the 1950s an infamous century for racism, right before the famous speech by Martin Luther King Jr., picked up later in various segments to spread positivity.
The most ambitious subject featured is art. This shouldn't surprise anyone as the protagonist is literally a mangaka. The first page sequence already included artistic values. But it goes way deeper than that. Delving into the influence, importance, or merit of art.
Other themes briefly mentioned in the manga are:
Police Superiority, Peace, War, Time Traveling/Changing, Nazism
The weakest part for me is the character writing. For many Urasawa's best ability. For me in Billy Bat it just isn't. It is still above average, you'll hopefully notice my positivity to it, after I evaluate my POV.
What exactly did I dislike? It was the inconsistency between the characterization of the main cast. None of them were multi-dimensional with one or two out breakers. The formula the authors took was characterizing through one or two crucial life experiences. My favorite example is Chuck Culkin getting saved by Hitler. After that crucial experience he starts to behave like Hitler and inherits his thriving for success and develops narcissism. Due to those trades and Hitler's influence on the market, he becomes one of the biggest figures in buisness. A clear indication of the success of Nazis post WWII, who profited from WWII without punishment - a complex theme, rarely depicted in fiction. Chucklin's character arc is still not perfect - like for many other similar built-up characters - the cause for the development is just not believable enough.
The best character in Billy Bat for me is Oswald - the murderer of JFK. Only present in a fifth of the story. His arc might be short, but is rich of details, full of motives and layered. His persona is surrounded by Nietzsche's Übermensch theory. An Übermensch is a human who has his own morales and possesses a will to power. This might seem like a stretch, but there were evidences I found that indicate the possibility that it was intention. Firstly, his characteristics are perfect for the theory because he tries to find any opportunity to be a hero and fears to hurt anyone - a pacifistic motive. Secondly, the chapter he first appeared in was named Thus Spoke Oswald - a reference to Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra, the philosophical writing, the Übermensch thesis was mentioned in the persona of the character Zarathustra. Thirdly, in chapter 50, Oswald cries about his failure to not reach the same recognition as Napoleon, Caeser and Alexander the Great - three of the most famous Übermensch examples. In this conversation between Oswald and Kevin (protagonist), Kevin denies their greatness, suggesting a negative opinion the authors might've on Nietzsche’s philosophy.
Urasawa is not among the best manga artists. His sense for artistic values is top-notch though. The narrative's structure heavily relies on different use of colored comics - in different art styles, uncolored comics, and graffiti. Character designs tend to be realistic enough, playful enough and unique enough to not feel anything than perfect. Same goes for the amount of dialogue per page or size of panels. Perfect in what it wants to be, but also not flabbergasting.
Ultimately, it is Naoki Urasawa's message to the world, it has its flaws, but despite that, it is simply beautiful.
(In my rating system it is a 4/5, but it can't be compared to the 100 metric system, so I'll just give it a 100, indicating general positivity)
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