Look at me, look at me! The monster inside me has grown this large!
- The Nameless Monster (Obluda, Která Nemá Své Jméno)

What does a man have to do to become fictitious? How does one make his existence merely fiction? It's dubbed as the "perfect suicide". Kill everyone who has had memories of you, and finally, kill yourself.


Somewhat long summary, or rather, plot introduction:

The plot of Monster revolves around Dr. Tenma, a surgeon with a bright future in his field of work, and engaged to the beautiful and glamorous daughter of one of the medical world's most influential players, his hospital's director, Udo Heinemann.

One day, he is instructed by Udo to abandon a young boy's surgery, who is in critical condition from a bullet wound to his head, and to operate on the Mayor who came in later. Infuriated by the hospital's politics and haunted by his past mistake of giving in to it, he defies his superior's order and operates on the boy, while leaving the Mayor's operation to his colleagues.

The boy survives the operation and Dr. Tenma feels liberated. He did the right thing. As a doctor, he had been fair in his duty, he had saved the life that was to be rightfully saved. But are everyone's lives truly equal?

That's when his reality turns into the most horrifying nightmare he could imagine.

The Mayor dies, Tenma's status is revoked, the director who had taken him under his wing to bring him to the heights of the surgical field casts him away, and his fiancee abandons him.

Consequently, the director dies and the killer is none other than Johan, the boy that Tenma saved. Johan was a mass serial killer, and now that he was brought back to life, goes on a killing rampage, a seemingly mad massacre of countless people.

Agonized, Tenma then sets out to find Johan, and with his own hands that brought this monster back to life, kill him once and for all.


This is a manga that is a true thriller; it's intensely psychological, chillingly creepy, packed with fast-paced action, and builds up the suspense perfectly.

Monster will stay with me as one of the most memorable and impactful mangas I have ever read, not because of the plot and it's expert story-telling (though that is of course what makes it the outstanding manga that it is), but because of the ending.

The ending still creeps me out and it was that moment that made me realise that Monster was, at its heart, a true horror story.

Never before have I experienced a manga that ended at such a bone chilling climax with no trace of closure. This is scarier than those fucked-up horror mangas because at least those have some sort of ending, no matter how warped or disturbing.

I heard the ending is even more creepy in the anime, what with the animation and music. (wow ok I just jumped when I heard a scraping sound outside my room I'm scaring myself shitless writing this) But don't think of watching/reading the ending before even reading the manga, it's only scary if you've read the entire story.



"Tell me, what do you think is the ultimate fear? I thought I'd reached the darkest part of the abyss. But then, ahead of me... There was an even greater darkness."

- Johan Liebert