Illegenes: The Genetic Sodom is a masterfully written manga about genetic engineering and cloning and the issues it holds, it’s a manga that questions what happens when man plays god and ultimately what makes a human - human. In the tradition of the best sci-fi, this manga makes us think about the deep questions of humanity and it is driven both by plot and a strong character.

On a rogue island where genetic engineering takes places against the rest of world community and it is thus called the genetic Sodom because it violates the rules of both God and man. This place controls the black market on genetic engineering and cloning and people thus made are sold as slaves, pleasure and body parts.
It is on this island that our mc Fon Fortinbras attends an elite military academy as the top honor student, think of this as West Point or Sandhurst, or Saint-Cyr meets Joseph Mengele. However Fon plans using this position to take revenge on his parents killed by those running the black market and being inside to bring down the black market.

However there are a lot of mysteries behind everything going on that Fon must unravel.
It also brings to mind questions of what insanity when living in an insane world, or what happens to a good person who must enter an evil environment. Fon sometimes seems like Hamlet.
This is ongoing and I’m trying not to spoiler anything in this.

The art is beautiful at times and gory at times while remaining clean-lined and well drawn. This is a mature manga because of the themes, and parts might be quite disturbing to some readers. Some readers might not like the shounen-ai tone to it as it is set in an all male military school; the cast is handsome European elites; but this is Not a yaoi, it’s a josei actually.
One criticism is that it can get a bit heavy on the existential angst at times.

This manga is ongoing; I wanted to write this to draw attention to this manga which should be better known as it’s a hidden gem. Although it is still ongoing and cannot be fully rated in all areas, personally for me it’s a 10 thus far.