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138 chapters total
Please Save My Earth
ぼくの地球を守って
8.10(3K votes)
Ranked #674Popularity #1701chapters
138
volumes
21
Status
Finished
Published
1987 to 1994
Authors:Hiwatari, Saki
DramaFantasy
Worth Reading? — Global Verdict
8.2/10
Average Review Score
80%
Recommend It
5
Reviews Worldwide
International Reviews
KingKatsura
Recommended
10
Please Save My Earth is a manga about the complexity of human relationships and the seemingly insurmountable burden of sin. A group of high school students, and one younger boy, suddenly begin to experience strange dreams alluding to their past lives as alien scientists stationed on a secret moon base. This sounds like an audacious and almost absurd premise, and it really is audacious, but never once did it strike me as such after I started reading in earnest, which is a testament to the organic storytelling. Over time, these dreamlike memories unravel more and more of an epic tragedy, while also threatening to scrapeaway at the characters' current selves. At first glance, the character introductions may seem a bit overwhelming, and likewise, the story is admittedly hard to follow, but once you wrap your head around the gist of it all, everything starts to flow together seamlessly to the point you that you can't peel your eyes away. As you delve further and further into Saki Hiwatari's rabbit hole of peculiar storytelling devices and such accompanying various interlocking and intertwining twists and turns that would seem capable of confusing even the most astute of readers, the story's essence all at once begins to take a tangible shape, and what was at first bewildering suddenly becomes both unexpectedly congruent and consequential. In accordance, the science fiction world-building is put forth at a tepid but proper pace, and as with the other plot elements, couldn't be more deceptively appropriate to the grander story at hand. With time, you gradually learn the mechanics and intricacies of a complex alien society. However, the fulcrum of PSME's story is a much more isolated and intimate event, which has a profound impact on each of the scientists' lives, and in turn comes to torment the students' who inherited their memories. It's perhaps a bit difficult to describe because nothing else I've read or seen is quite like it in terms of inordinate narrative structure and layering. The cast is rich with depth and nuances that drive the series forward. Rin, Alice, and Jinpachi, in particular, along with their past lives, undergo extreme character development as they struggle to come to terms with their mysterious pasts and the overbearing sense of guilt inhabiting their inherited psyches. The flashbacks are layered in PSME, as the story frequently shifts between the characters' current selves, their lives on the moon base, and their upbringings in a distant alien society before becoming scientists destined to study the Earth from its lunar accompaniment. All of these experiences contribute to a perfect storm of complex human interactions that test the boundaries of morality and self-identity. The retroactive approach to unveiling the aforementioned "critical event", and the emotional and societal conditions that precursed it, depict a hauntingly visceral coalescence of love, loathing and regret. The most integral motif of PSME, or rather, the motif most present and to blame for in this "critical event", is of the encumbrance of loneliness. One of the scientists, Shion, is a war orphan who shuns others out of spite for their innocence. Another, Mokuren, is something of an angelic deity blessed with a supernatural power as well as natural beauty and brilliance. Her immense value to society forces her to lead an isolated childhood, where she struggles to form meaningful interpersonal relationships in a world where she is viewed as a perfect object more than she is a human girl. To Shion, Mokuren embodies everything he hates in the world, and to Mokuren, his coldness towards her is precious proof that she is but a regular woman and not the doll others' perceive her to be. And thus, with this mutual shared loneliness, along with precarious environmental circumstances, the two's fates become intertwined forever. Along with the rest of the cast, these are extremely flawed characters with realistic complexes and coping mechanisms, but that's part of what makes PSME so inherently human. Hiwatari's core characters constantly struggle between magnanimity and transgression under the duress of a moral crucible, and in her narrative artistry, the reader bears witness to both decay and rebirth in a cathartic defiance of the oppressive and incorrigible gravity of the story at large. It should be noted that the art is a bit dated, and sometimes lacking in the same level of detail present in most modern manga, but it's overwhelmingly artsy and effective at conveying the visuals necessary to complement the entrancing narrative. PSME is an unrelenting emotional roller-coaster lovingly adorned with intricate detail and profound psychological examination of the human sense of self and belonging. It's almost so utterly and inescapably grounded in psychological realism that the sci-fi exterior morphs into something more like a pretense rather than a premise in itself. Upon the most graceful possible descent from this pretense unfurls a majestic and indefatigably heart-wrenching tale of love and loss. It's in this deconstruction and constant blurring of traditional genre lines, tropes and narrative sequencing that PSME's brilliance manifests most strikingly. Hiwatari's highly calculated ensemble of thematic and narrative chaos is spellbinding. Under this anarchic context of a dauntingly large-scale epic of alien civilizations and the fate of the Earth, PSME simultaneously solicits both cutting emotional resonance and deeply philosophical propositions, yet through it all, never loses sight of what it means to be human, and perhaps more intrinsically, and in the authoress's own words, what makes our world so maddeningly beloved.