Review of Parasyte: The Maxim

"Kiseijuu, Sei no Kakuritsu" , is the anime adaptation from 2014 based on the manga of the same name, which had its first edition in 1988! We are dealing with a very old and beautiful specimen, which made it through several generations and received an adaptation in ours. Personally, I wasn't particularly skeptical about this anime from the beginning, as it should have a thread similar to that of the American film "The Thing" "The Thing from Another World". The concept itself, of course, took a different path, but the parasites themselves seemed to be very similar, especially when it came to deforming and taking overthe body. However, Kiseijuu was initially subject to a powerful "hype" which deterred me from looking at him immediately, since this well-known "hype" does not always focus on the masterpieces, but also on real nonsense animes that only make good progress in the mainstream horde.

Be warned, this work may not suit everyone. It's a little deep and needs to be understood rather than just looked at. Anyone expecting gore, action, or likeable characters is wrong here.

And truly, this is exactly what I want and expect, nothing more.

First and foremost, the introduction to this story was very solid and interesting. The type of narration was also excellent and appealing.
The atmosphere was mostly right and only fluctuated slightly. This kept the seriousness of the episodes as well as the tension. The protagonist didn't ruin the whole thing. On the contrary, he had an interesting psyche and a subtle development over the course of the series.
And last but not least, the implementation was impressive. I haven't read the manga and don't know if there were any deviations or improvements. However, the quality of this work is clearly out.

Clearly, the best aspect of the work is the structure of individual scenarios. The representation of the events and the ulterior motive behind many scenes. Towards the end, this work became interestingly profound and had various human themes and approaches that can certainly divide discussions. I especially liked the ending, a very worthy finale with an interesting irony.

As nice as it all sounds, unfortunately, the work was not perfect. It also had unnecessary plot armor in many of the scenes that could have been clearly avoided just by rewriting the scenes better. One of the other hype moments would be lost or endangered. The supporting characters also lacked meaning. The story lost tension in some episodes as some scenes were dragged out.
Finally, I clearly missed explanations regarding the whole thing. The alien race, their origin, their reason for existence were only a big question mark until the end. It's hard to really explain something like that in a solid way and I get it. However, the whole plot loses meaning if not even the author can convey to you what the purpose of this whole story was.

The main story itself ended up being pretty simple, despite the good implementation. At least it wasn't clearly linear, due to some deviating scenarios that made the story a bit curvy. The plot had an existing surprise effect, but only up to the moment of surprise. You know the feeling. One is surprised and carried away by something, but afterwards notices that this was actually overrated or that it does not help the plot any further.
The greatest strength here was clearly the introduction to the story as well as the conclusion. The only thing missing was the essential content of the middle section in the explanation and story.

The characters here were mostly disappointing. The protagonist has definitely been written to be commendable and interesting. I especially liked his monologues and development. Otherwise, there was only Miggi and the antagonist. Both had sympathy in their role and partly understandable motives. However, they lacked personality, which is actually nothing negative in that sense. After all, they cannot have any real personality. The supporting characters in the work were just cannon fodder and fillers to make the series appear lively. They hardly felt any real purpose in the series and were only necessary for building the protagonist.

Musically the work is quite appealing. It has a lot of different soundtracks that support the scenes very well and an intro that I'm not sure what it should be.

Most of the time, animations were extremely fluid. They actually had moments of brilliance that even surpassed themselves. I find the change of scene, the presentation, and how the atmosphere was made particularly noteworthy. I'm usually not used to such an advanced presentation. In most of the works, it is kept very simple.

In the end, "Parasyte" is a high-quality title, no question about it. He has his weaknesses that I would have liked to improve on, but unfortunately, there is nothing more that can be done about them. However, it definitely does not suit everyone's taste. The series is aimed at the older audience and has topics that you should let yourself melt in your mouth instead of just looking at them bluntly. To be honest, if I had seen this title back in my youth, I am sure I would not have liked it. From my perspective today, I am grateful for such works that raise the bar.

Story - 5
Art - 9
Sound - 8
Character - 6
Enjoyment - 8
Overall - 8