id like to preface this review by saying im not the most grammer proficient person on the planet and that im relatively new to doing extensive reviews or analysis like this so please bare with me if you will 220https://wallpaperaccess.com/download/homunculusmanga5312295 homunculus is one of my favorite pieces of media ever no seriously despite its flaws which well get into later it i think it tells an extremely important story that is both touching tragic and also totally fucking terrifying and twisted. i think its important to note that my take on the series is just that my take i think alot of homunculus is to your interpretation but i also think theres an equal amount of it that isnt and is yamamotos view of the world which can sometimes be wrong again ill talk about it when we get into the flaws but im sure you probably know what it is already i feel like the same can be said for alot of these kinds of stories its not only important that you get something from the narrative but that you get something from the author themselves thats the whole beauty of it. homunculus starts off with our main character nokoshi in his car sucking his thumb while sleeping in a fetal position weird guy huh? we the audience are immediately hit with one if its central themes the want to return to childhood innocence but what does this mean exactly? i think we can all unfortunately relate to a time in our life where our actions werent exactly the best where we did things to people or to ourselves that we now regret often times when we come to this realization we naturally have the want to be a better person to say sorry to those we wronged to stop carrying our guilt everywhere we go run away from our problems and to return to a time when we had our childlike innocence and looked upon the world with a big smile and cheerful eyes or simply put to be our former selves again. nokoshis strange ritual of sleep is in part his form of doing this as well as a form of symbolism for this point in the narrative and is one of the many things i think homunculus does wonderfully in just its introduction alone. i feel like its important to talk about this before we continue to do a deep dive into nokoshis character as the first part of the review but i feel as though alot of the discourse ive seen online about him is either a little misguided or at worst plain wrong. its my belief that i dont think were supposed to really like or hate nokoshi at least not until the end his character as is itos serves the purpose of being an embodiment of the narratives themes hes not a fundamentally bad guy hes flawed equal parts good and bad. part of the reason why so many people i think misinterpret his character has to do with the one real problem in this story the as i like to call it nightmare therapy rape scene is indictive of some yamamotos more problematic world beliefs that i think is honestly best ignored and completely out of character for nokoshi at that point in the story imo it just makes no fucking sense to me atleast anyways nokoshi throughout the course of the story is struggling with a battle hes having with himself his former job almost completely dehumanized not only him so far as to see himself as a literal robot less then human but the people around him too. seeing others as nothing but numbers as he played with peoples entire lively hoods just working a simple office job of all things. this isnt just a problem with nokoshi its a fundamental problem with capitalism and how it dehumanizes people and after confronting one of the many people whos lives he ruined he finally comes to the realization that hes just as much of monster as everyone else and immediately runs away from his former life realizing he had become the very thing he feared the great twist in this story though is that this isnt the first time he does this or the last. nokoshis past is kept hidden throughout the course of the story we at first believe its nothing more then what he did at his banking job but a huge narrative climax happens in which nokoshi confronts the true source of his trauma his forgotten past. this is actually brilliantly foreshadowed by ito in earlier volumes. alot of the time we try our best to forget the worst things that happen to us sometimes we even do this unintentionally and in the case of nokoshi hes not only completely forgotten his past but what his true face even was. throughout the story through the homunculi nokoshi sees this is hinted subtly although we arent able to truly make sense of it until the end. when nokoshi begins to truly remember everything that happened theres a fantastic scene in which ken tells nakoshi about how he has no right to look at the ground as he walks from to place trying to avoid society laying around not doing anything just waiting to finally stop existing and wallow away. whats said in this moment is absolutely spot on and it is horrible habit people fall into everyday that can literally destroy lives but theres a process to it a reason for people picking up that behavior wether it be because their homeless or struggling with their own form of body dysphoria as told in the story but it all leads to the same feeling of alienation from society a feeling of utter worthlessness and disconnection from the world around you because you cant fit in. whats important is that the story doesnt say this is okay but rather that your not alone in your struggle and destroying your own identity isnt the solution if people dont accept you for who you are assuming your not a horrible person simply put fuck them. you have no right to stop living your life even more so when your more fortunate then others even by a little bit personally i learned that the hard way. now i know i clearly havent covered all of nokoshis character here but all i wanted to do with this review is cover and analyze my favorite parts of this series so with that said... 220https://3.bp.blogspot.com/Mmvr6JEttgA/V0pI3O0NcI/AAAAAAAAAMM/0HAAa2PDmjkEiudLXdzbZJFWYYbD1EHaQCLcB/s1600/ec7d28336e45278cdf78dc809d98a349506b384497c8f071f7266698.jpg lets talk about ito allow me to preface that im not a trans person and because of this im not going to pretend like i know or understand the struggle trans people often go through everyday but as an LGBT person i believe what yamamoto does with their character is nothing short of one of the best and genuinely sweetest things about homunculus i will also be referring to ito as they/their/them as they dont transition until halfway through the story and also because i believe gender fluidity is a big part of their character. ito comes from a family background that is suffocating not ever being allowed to truly express themselves ito locks their identity away eventually allowing it to become a homunculi but finding compromise in dressing expressively and hiding it from their father. during the sand girl part of the series ito has a fascination with her as she represents a part of them thats been locked away for so long as her struggle with being her own person free from her parents will goes hand in hand with that of itos hidden trans identity. towards the end of the story nokoshi catches onto this and tries to confront their homunculi in one of the most intense scenes ive ever read in a manga. ive often heard from people that nokoshi has a problem with trying to make people face their homunculi before their ready to face it themselves but outside of nannako nokoshi purposely waits until after seeing what ito has to deal with on a daily basis with their father on a trip to the hospital to finally tell them what he sees. its heartbreaking to watch ito strip themselves of whatever true self identity they have left just for the conformity of others and i think nokoshi catches onto that too. the relationship and chemistry between nokoshi and ito despite how hilariously insane it is at times wannabe tyler durden drills a hole into a homeless guys head in the pursuit of self discovery and science dudes rock is entertaining and easily my most favorite part about homunculus. both the opposite yet the same the conversations they have throughout the series are always a treat and serve to further develop their characters and most importantly make the ending all the more impactful. so lets talk about that ending shall we? i know alot of people dont like it but its important to understand nokoshi was never going to have a happy ending time and time again even though it was technically their fault ito told nokoshi what would happen if he became too self absorbed with the trepanation. remember how nokoshi always struggled with feeling like a boring nobody when given his new godlike powers that all changes for him. at the beginning of the series nokoshi is shown to already have a similar ability to not only feel things intricately but even people too. the only reason why the trepanation worked the way it did was because it was basing itself off of something that was already there however nokoshi ultimately failed to realize that and walked down towards his downfall trying to run away with someone whos life he ruined that doesnt even love him anymore because of his new obsession with wanting to be seen by others even though that person was right in front of him the whole fucking time cough cough ito cough the forms thing is going to be the last thing i really wanna talk about with this review because i believe its also the most important homunculus in my opinion goes about this topic i think the best way it can for what it really is just an unfortunate fact of reality. humanitys been like this since almost the beginning of time this is debatable to some folks obviously but people often obsess themselves with the material world and/or themselves. nakoshi realizes this and at first decides the solution is abusing it it isnt and at the conclusion of his journey he decides its desperately looking for others who might look into him even if he hurts them which also doesnt work we cant really blame society for something its been doing since the beginning of time hell most of us do it consciously or not we ourselves are to blame but it doesnt mean we should punish people or even ourselves for it. the best thing we can do is keep living.and not fall into the same pitfalls nokoshi did. we cant avoid or be mad at an issue we cant fix all we can do is find those who see us the way we want them too find those less obsessed with your form and more with who you are and just be happy with that because they do exist and your gonna drive yourself insane thinking they dont or in some cases not realizing your apart of the problem and obsessing yourself too much with it like nokoshi at the end of the story if you somehow made it this far im so sorry why did you read all of this? but seriously thank you this was very much a treat to write tldr: as i said in the review summary this is a story about what it means to he human the good the bad all of it and it totally owns.