May contain light spoilers:
Himizu is a story of hopelessness and ultimatums. It gives you a third person view on the compromises we make to ourselves and how it affects our outlet on life. Reading Himizu reminded me more about reality than I would have liked. You will find no fantasies or dreams in Himizu, only the cold hard truth.
The story of Himizu is about Sumida, a teenage boy in his third year of middle school. He has no passions or goals, and only wishes to live a normal life without being bothered or bothering others. But sometimes life isn't that simple. With his parents
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 Alternative TitlesJapanese: ヒミズ InformationType: Manga
Volumes: 4
Chapters: 43
Status: Finished
Published: Jan 29, 2001 to Mar 11, 2002
Genre:
Drama
Theme:
Psychological
Demographic:
Seinen
Serialization:
Young Magazine (Weekly) Authors:
Furuya, Minoru (Story & Art) Statistics Ranked: #37812 2 based on the top manga page. Please note that 'R18+' titles are excluded. Popularity: #1280
Members: 15,975
Favorites: 291 Resources | Reviews
Filtered Results: 8 / 10
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Feb 19, 2010
"Wouldn't it be awful if all dreams came true? If all 15,000 eggs that came from one crab hatched. Wouldn't that be awful? The world would be full of crabs!". This is Himizu. The darkest, most depressing comedic manga there ever was, and probably ever will be.
STORY: 9/10 The story is brilliantly simple. We follow Sumida, a 3rd year middle schooler, who's only goal in life is to be as normal as possible. That's easier said than done. Sumida is constantly put into situations that are anything but normal. And how he reacts to these situations makes Himizu one of the best manga I've ever read. ... 
Oct 13, 2015
Himizu is a hard manga to describe, but I think it is essentially a manga dedicated to deconstruction. What is it deconstructing? Seemingly the idea of ‘a dream’ and what it means to chase it.
On the surface, it seems to be about juxtaposition of someone who desires to live a normal life vs those fighting to achieve a grand dream and what each are going through in order to achieve their respective desires. Underneath? Well, that’s debatable, but all is not as it seems. But how is the actual manga? The plotline moves along in a slow pace seeming to say little to nothing at times, but ... 
Sep 6, 2020
Himizu, we could quite fairly say, is a mature slice-of-life manga but with a dark setting and focusing more on the evils of society, rather than the flowery elements that a lot of people are privileged to have.
It follows the story of Sumida Yuuichi, a teenager boy who was bestowed by the worst of parents, which in turn made him want to grow up to be a good, decent person without much ambition in life but just to achieve the seemingly easiest task of being someone who wouldn’t ever harm anybody. All he ever wished to do was lazily spend out his life like ... 
Dec 28, 2015
It struck while reading Himizu that it is in many ways the archetypal seinen manga, at least as far as public perception is concerned.
The shounen demographic at large focuses on power fantasies and more simplistic, idealized characters and values and in the case of battle shounen, more of a focus on action (shounen jump's motto is, after all, "friendship, effort, and victory"). The seinen demographic, however, tends to have a far more cynical outlook on life, unafraid to show the raw ugliness of human beings and a higher focus on the psychology and flaws of the characters, and tends to be a bit TOO liberal ... 
Dec 28, 2022
I don't really know how to feel about this manga.
It's really a low mental state messed up manga, feels like the mc has Schizophrenia or Bipolar Disorder with the creatures he sees. Which may not be the only "mental illness/disorder" he has. Its both a mind numbing (Not in a boring way, moreso a dissociative way) read and also thought provoking at points. Kinda makes you question the headspace the mangaka was in during the writing of this. I'd recommend as I enjoyed but also maybe I'm just in a weird state at this moment afyer reading it. Definitely not for everyone, but if you enjoy works like Homonculus and ... 
Dec 28, 2020
I'm going to avoid doing a large summary; the story is extremely straightforward and basically goes the way you expect it to.
As a seinen, everything that happens is expected to happen. There are no surprises here and maybe that's for the best. But for the sake of enjoyment, it isn't worth too much more than any other seinen. The story and characters are pitiful, even when the main character despises being pitied (in my eyes at least, it doesn't seem like something he would enjoy). Most of the characters are strongly unlikeable, but I do believe that's all apart of the story, so it ... 
Jan 5, 2025
If Oyasumi Punpun was a bad manga, it would be Himizu.
If you read Punpun, I don't have to elaborate much more, however MAL doesn't allow me to post a 1 sentence review. In fact, I didn't know that until writing this. So, I will summarize even more: Story - Not interesting for the most part, it has glimpses of something good, but that's it. Since Himizu is a short manga, it is actually surprising how there is so many discarded characters and plots. I have the impression that 25% or something of the chapters are irrelevant when you reach the end. Characters - Sumida is as edgy ... |
