LifE

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It’s rare for a manga to elicit such strong feelings from me, but Seizon-Life succeeds with its ruminations of filial responsibility, love, and the search for truth and understanding, for redemption.

Redemption even if you've only got six months left to live. Takeda is told this and is wracked with fear and guilt. Guilt because his wife died of the same illness in the past and he realises he wasn’t there for her enough at the time. Now that he feels the same unrelenting fear of impending death, he feels disgusted with himself, with his past behaviour to his family, his deceased wife ... and his deceased daughter.

His long-lost daughter has not given up on him however, as once her corpse is found buried under a parking area in Nagano prefecture, the police phone Takeda to inform him, just as he's about to hang himself in despair.

In bearing witness to her skeletal remains and facing head on the shame of his previous inability to be a decent husband and father, Takeda takes it upon himself to use up what little time he has left to find his daughter's killer. There is irony and fate at play, with there being six months left till the statute of limitations on the crime being lifted, the limit being 15 years.

Takeda can’t rely on the police who don’t have the motivation to go all out on a case almost 15 years old with no leads. He begins the long and arduous journey himself by starting in the untouched bedroom of a daughter he never really knew as well as he should have, for clues as to where she disappeared to one day 14 years ago.

During the story, a cop in charge of the soon-to-be closed case serves as a foil to Takeda. Not being an irritable barrier but more like a voice of cool logic that only a seasoned and tired detective could have, he plays devil's advocate to Takeda's discoveries, forcing him to wake up to the idea that simply identifying the killer won’t be enough, he will need concrete proof in order to avenge his daughter. Another cop, Murai, joins Takeda’s mission and provides a good partner as they navigate their way through procedural details to dig underneath clues, lies and red herrings.

Seizon is so brilliant because not only is it another example of the manga form’s wide range of variety by exploring an interesting and worthy theme from the viewpoint of an ordinary character with no cynical manga-selling abilities or traits, but because it’s a great race-against-time thriller. With Takeda's condition deteriorating rapidly, time is crucial, being hospitalised is unacceptable, he must catch the killer before the legal deadline and before he becomes unable to function coherently.

So Takeda in a sense becomes the lead investigator for the most part of the story, retracing his daughter’s steps 14 years ago, following small leads, persisting, following the path she took, to see everything she saw and feel everything she felt.

Takeda's mission to find his daughter's killer is more about getting to know his daughter for the first time in a long while, and in that to find redemption for his neglect of his family in the past. When he begins to interview people about his daughter in the beginning, he feels that they're talking about a stranger, but chapter by chapter he reconnects with her.

So it’s only in the prolonged aftermath of her death that he truly understands who she was. It’s too late naturally, but in a sense it’s not, because dealing with deceased people, giving them funerals and discovering the truth behind their deaths is more to benefit the living. The dead are dead. The living have to live with that. Funerals aren’t for dead people; they're for the ones who are still alive.

Takeda's vengeance is not for his daughter's sake, but for his soul, it’s his final duty as a husband and father. The manga isn’t utterly perfect, as there is an air of predictability about it, which is both fine on one hand and unwanted on the other.

On one hand you can understand one outcome of the story, and on the other you might wish the author had written another outcome a different way. Regardless it’s not enough to detract from the story and it’s consistent with the theme of striving to survive and to keep on living no matter what the odds, as demonstrated courageously by Takeda and his daughter.

The art of the manga is reminiscent of Katsuhiro Otomo in the clean and detailed designs of background settings and characters, none of which look overly cute or beautiful but are grounded in more realistic tones. The main protagonist is just a regular middle-aged man and the story is populated by more characters in their thirties, forties; a wide variety of types overall.

It also feels like a Naoki Urasawa effort, although unlike that excellent author's epic thrillers, Seizon isn’t too convoluted to keep up with, at a lean 3 volumes it proceeds at a good pace and wraps up before becoming too over the top with twists and revelations.

The only revelation you need to know about is Seizon the manga itself.

Seizon - LifE – Spoiler Free – Recommended

TLDR
Story – 8/10 – 8 x 0.275 = 2,2
Art – 8/10 – 8 x 0.2 = 1,6
Characters – 7/10 – 7 x 0.225 = 1,575
Enjoyment – 8/10 – 8 x 0.3 = 2,4
Total: 7,775 -> 8

Story – 8/10
... Seizon – LifE (or LifE, for short) is a hidden gem. It is not that well known, and it certainly packs a punch.
The premise of the story is anything but light, as it mentions cancer, loss of loved ones, hopelessness, and suicide. It is a manga that, from the get-going, proposes to tell a heavy story – although not complex –, and it succeeds in doing so.
Verily, we feel the despair of Takeda (the main character), we feel that time is running out for justice to be served, and we feel lost (in a good sense) in trying to fit the puzzle in. This manga certainly does a great job when it comes to telling an emotional story, as the sorrow of a grieving father who has nothing to lose is all too real. His emotions are conveyed precisely as they should, and they help tell the story and add a sense of urgency.
Through small hints, Takeda uncovers more and more elements of the crime. Nevertheless, it suffers from an illness that is all too common in this type of story: the last-minute-necessary-proof that changes everything. This happens more than once in a three-volume manga. It is, nevertheless, a great thriller.
There is also a discussion in the late stage of the manga that drags on for more than it should.
There is also the ending, which is unnecessarily happy for some unknown reason (when it comes to a specific plot point I won’t spoil). The rest of the story is comprehensible and fulfils readers' expectations, although predictable.

Art – 8/10
The art style of LifE is highly functional. It tells a good story with the precise emotional elements that it needs: emotions are depicted very well, and it definitely helps as a tool in storytelling. The cadence of the panels is also pristine, making it very easy to follow along LifE. The character design is good enough for characters to be easily told apart. The backgrounds and the landscapes are detailed enough and quite good. There are no awe-inspiring panels, but the base art is enjoyable.

Characters – 7/10
There aren’t many characters in LifE, for it is a three-volume manga. Other than the antagonist and Takeda, the rest are almost only filling up the cast to make the story work, although they are well done and fulfil their purpose. However, the aforementioned characters are very well depicted, have firm personalities and motives, and act according to logic. Characters are also very believable: we empathise with them – especially Takeda – in his efforts to avenge his daughter and to die in peace.

Enjoyment – 8/10
Enjoyment can only be high for LifE: it is a thriller packed with emotions in a setting that makes anyone feel the desperation in the air. It is a page-turner that doesn’t let anyone down. Moreover, it is a quick read and truly a hidden gem. The fact that it is short also prevents it from dragging that much. Definitely deserving of a recommendation.

I’m a sucker for emotional farewells, revenge stories, and mystery solving. Is it any wonder then that I like Seizon-Life? It hits all the points.

Takeda is a man who succeeded greatly at his career, but he lost just about everything else. He lost his daughter over a decade ago, he then lost his wife to a disease, and now he himself seems on the verge of losing his own life to cancer in six months. He admits, though, that even before he lost those things, he didn’t really care for them. All he ever cared for was his job.

Just when he was about to give ... up and throw even his life away, he receives news that his daughter’s corpse had been found and that the statue of limitations on her murder will expire in six months. Believing that this is a heavenly signal from his daughter, he decides to go look for her murderer when even the police had given up. In the process, he might learn more than just about the murder.

Seizon-Life’s strongest point is that it’s an exciting read made all the stronger by its short length – meaning it doesn’t drag on and the progress moves at a steady pace which easily keeps readers’ interest.

It does require a significant suspension of disbelief, especially when you consider that the crime was committed 14 years ago yet the primary method Takeda used to search is to ask people for information from their memories.

Nonetheless, the story’s mystery aspect helps to keep you interest and Takeda does come to be endearing and one sympathizes with him. Thanks to that, an already short but exciting story becomes that much more short and exciting because I found that, by the end, I didn't really wanted it to end just yet.