Mirai Nikki

I first head about this series only recently, while reading one of Dustin’s posts on Yin no Piano. He was discussing his thoughts on the character Yuno from the series. Intrigued by this, I decided to begin read the series, and to my delight I found it to be fantastic.

At its barest, I would tag MN as a psychological action-based drama with a little romance (and some ecchi-ness) thrown in, and it’s certainly a graphic series; some of the fight scenes go into fair detail about Yuno with a knife. None-the-less, the plot is quite gripping, and it twists and turns with so many unexpected outcomes that your left reeling, wondering what the hell just happened and eagerly reading on to find out.

Basically the story goes like this:
Yukiteru is a student at Sakurami City high; all throughout his life he has always been a bystander and one day, without realizing, he began to keep track of the events he saw in a diary on his phone, recording everything from a bystanders point of view. Due to this habit, Yuki lacks friends in the physical world; however, he maintains a friendship with the imaginary beings in his mind: DUES. EX. MACHINA – the Lord of Time and Space, and Murumuru – DUES’s servant.

After returning home one day and entering the “Imaginary” lair of DUES, Yuki is questioned by Murumuru as to why he writes things in his diary. To this Yuki reply’s that he has no reason, he just writes the [time] [incident] and [place] of the occurrence, it makes no real difference to the world – A No-Difference Diary. Returning to the real world, Yuki is asked by DUES if he is feeling lonely, and that if he was given the chance would he change the situation? Maintaining the belief that it’s all his imagination, Yuki asks how DUES would achieve this; to which he replies “I shall entrust the [future] to you”, and hands Yuki what appears to be his phone… but what is now actually a [Future Diary]. “What are you scheming?” asks Yuki, “An interesting game.” replies DUES.

And the story continues on from there; I’m not gonna give away too much now am I?

I find the characters to be rather well put together too:

Yukiteru reminds me very much of Shinji from Evangelion, the reluctant “hero” who is seemingly dragged into a world completely different to his own; though Yuki is only slightly less of an emotional wreck than Shinji, he still manages to pull of some incredible moments of individuality and leadership.

Yuno on the other hand, well, I have NEVER come across a character like her so far: strong-willed, intelligent, calculating and insanely in love with the protagonist. In fact, so ridiculously obsessive is her love, that she will go to any lengths to stay by his side, even so far as to kidnap and chain him up! On a side note, though she may be totally nuts, when you first see her she’s so cute it’s almost painful.

DUES is well, DUES – coming up with a life-or-death game for fun is what a god does in their spare time. Whilst he may seem to be a “friend” to Yuki, he still holds many secrets, quite a few of which are incredibly plot-bending, and his interactions with the characters tend to add extra dimensions into the plot as his various secrets and how they affect the other characters comes to light.

Murumuru is the comic relief, kind of. When she does pop up, most of the time it’s for a quick laugh; however there is a serious side to this chibi-like character, and she can be just as cunning as DUES himself.

There are plenty of other characters but I’ll refrain from explaining every one, I’m sure you’ll be able to develop your own opinions on them.

So there you have it. Should you wish to take a peak at the series, it’s released monthly on One Manga.com, also a great site for manga in general. Well until next time, I leave you with this little shot:

Ah Yuno, so cute yet so evil at the same time...

See ya!

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