Blame! (ブラム! Buramu!), also known as the Adventure-seeker Killy in the Cyber Dungeon quest! in the first edition, is a cyberpunk manga written and illustrated by Tsutomu Nihei. The series follows Killy, a seemingly human individual wielding a powerful gun, as he journeys through a vast futuristic labyrinth known as the City in search of Net Terminal Genes. Along the way, he encounters a wide variety of allies and enemies.
This was Nihei's very first series, and was followed up with a prequel, an unfinished sequel, and a few spin-offs.
Plot[]
Killy, a silent loner possessing an incredibly powerful weapon known as a Gravitational Beam Emitter, wanders a vast technological world known as "The City". He is searching for Net Terminal Gene, a (possibly) extinct genetic marker that allows humans to access the "Netsphere", a sort of computerized control network for The City. The City is an immense volume of artificial structure, separated into massive "floors" by nearly-impenetrable barriers known as "Megastructure". The City is inhabited by scattered human and transhuman tribes as well as hostile cyborgs known as Silicon Creatures. The Net Terminal Genes appear to be the key to halting the unhindered, chaotic expansion of the Megastructure, as well as a way of stopping the murderous robot horde known as the Safeguard from destroying all of humanity.
Along the way, Killy meets and joins forces with a resourceful engineer named Cibo. Their quest is indirectly supported by the City's Authority, which is unable to stop the Safeguard from opposing them. Together, Killy and Cibo meet a young girl named Sanakan and a tribe of human warriors called the Electro-Fishers. Killy's cybernetic abilities are restored after he is attacked by a high-level Safeguard, which turns out to have been Sanakan in disguise. She transforms into her Safeguard form and attacks the Electro-Fishers' village when discovered. Killy and Cibo defend the Electro-Fishers by bringing them to the cylindrical megastructure of Toha Heavy Industries. Here they meet Maiserv, an AI independent from the Administration, and her guardian Seu, a Planter. The megastructure is ultimately destroyed due to attacks by Silicon Life and Sanakan, but Maiserv is able to give Cibo a sample of Seu's DNA. Killy and Cibo next come to a region of the City ruled by a group of Silicon Life, where they ally with a pair of "provisional Safeguards" named Dhomochevsky and Iko. Seu's DNA is stolen by the Silicon leader, Davine Lu Linvega, who uses it to access the Netsphere. Dhomochevsky sacrifices his life to kill Davine, but not before she downloads an extremely powerful Level 9 Safeguard from the Netsphere which manifests in Cibo's body. The Cibo Safeguard destroys the entire region.
14 years later, Killy's body repairs itself from the attack and he continues his journey. He discovers that Cibo, having lost her memory, was eventually rescued by Sanakan, who is now allied with the Authority against the rest of the Safeguard. Cibo's body is incubating a "sphere" which contains her genetic information. Ultimately, Cibo and Sanakan both die in a final confrontation with the Safeguard, but Killy survives and preserves the sphere. An AI he previously met whose body was destroyed is seen in a virtual reality, recalling his quest an unknown amount of time later. Killy finally reaches the edge of the City, where he is shot in the head and incapacitated, but a flood of water carries him to the surface of the City where stars are visible and the sphere begins to hatch. In the final page, Killy is seen fighting in the corridors of the City again, now accompanied by a small child wearing a hazmat suit.
Setting[]
Blame! is set in what is simply known as "The City", a gigantic megastructure now occupying much of what used to be the Solar System. Its exact size is unknown, but Tsutomu Nihei suggested its diameter to be at least that of Jupiter's orbit, or about 1.6 billion kilometers. In the manga, this is also suggested by Killy crossing an empty, spherical room roughly the size of Jupiter, suggesting that the planet had been there but was disassembled as the City grew.
As revealed in the prequel NOiSE, the City began as a much smaller structure on Earth, created by humans with the aid of the robotic "Builders." Humanity controlled the Builders through the Netsphere, a hyper-developed version of the Internet accessible only to those with an identificatory genetic marker known as the Net Terminal Gene. Any humans without the gene who attempted to access the Netsphere were exterminated by a special task force known as the Safeguards. Eventually however, a terrorist cult known as "the Order" released a virus that made all humans lose their Net Terminal Genes, thus cutting off their access to the Netsphere and their control over the Builders. Without specific instructions, the Builders began to build chaotically and indefinitely, while the Safeguards' programming degraded into killing all humans without the Net Terminal Gene whether they wanted to access the Netsphere or not.
By the time of the events of the manga, the City has basically become a series of layered, concentric Dyson spheres filled with haphazard architecture, largely devoid of life. These layers compose the supporting scaffold of the City, known as the Megastructure. The Megastructure is extremely durable, with only a direct blast from a Gravitational Beam Emitter being able to drill through it. In addition, the underside of each Megastructure layer periodically illuminates the overside of the one below to provide a day–night cycle. Traveling between layers is generally challenging due to the City's chaotic layout and the dangerous Safeguard response such endeavor may cause, with the means to do so being either climbing stairs for days or taking elevators that reach relativistic speeds. The buildings on each layer are largely uninhabited, although scattered human tribes, rogue Builders, and hostile Safeguards and Silicon Life can be found throughout the entire City.
Characters[]
Due to the immense size of the city, Killy spends most of his journey isolated from other living organisms, friendly or hostile. Listed below are a few of the more major characters he encounters throughout the series.
Volumes and Chapters[]
- See Also - Blame! - Master's Edition
Blame! spans a grand total of 67 chapters, it's entirety originally compiled into ten tankōbon volumes over the course of its release. Recently, however, Vertical Comics has reprinted and recompiled the series into six larger volumes known as the Master's Edition.
Related Series[]
- Blame (Four Seasons) (Prototype)
- NOiSE (Prequel)
- NSE: Net Sphere Engineer (Sequel)
- Blame!² (Spin-Off)
- Negative Corridor (Spin-Off)
- Blame! The Anthology (Novel)
- Blame! and So On (Art Book)
- Blame! Academy (Parody)
Gallery[]
To be Added
Trivia[]
To be Added
External Links[]
- Purchase Blame! on Amazon
- Blame! on Wikipedia
- Blame! on Anime News Network
- Blame! on Comic Vine
- Blame! on Studio KRuM
- The BlameSphere 2.0 (German Fan Site)