Sixth graders are usually concerned with doing homework and hanging out with their friends.
However, not twelve-year-old Yuta Ito in Tatsuki Fujimoto’s manga, Goodbye Eri, as he was busy filming the death of his own mother. His parents had given him a smartphone for his birthday. His mother requested that he film her final moments before she succumbed to her incurable illness.
After the death of his mom, Yuta gathers up the footage for a movie that he submits as a school project. However, his film was poorly received by his peers who were shocked at both the morbidity of the topic he made a movie on and the “pinch of fantasy” he added at the end.
In the midst of his sadness, Yuta met the only person who enjoyed his movie: a mysterious girl named Eri. Eri takes him to an abandoned building where she makes him watch movies with her because she wants him to learn more about filmmaking so he could make a better movie. The pair continue to bond over their mutual love of movies until Eri reveals a dark secret that changes their lives forever.
Goodbye, Eri is as well-written as it is insane. Fujimoto greatly fits the title of “mad genius”, given to him in the manga’s back blurb. Despite the depressing tone of the story, the characters have both complex and quirky personalities that stand out especially when they get to interact with each other. The manga’s plot also contains many twists and turns that will leave a reader in shock–if you think you know where the story is going, you don’t.
The manga shows what it’s like to create something. When Eri and Yuta’s father are discussing if Yuta should make another movie or not due to his negative response to the backlash to his first one, his father provides valuable advice, saying, “Creation is all about getting into the audience’s problems to make them laugh and cry…it wouldn’t be fair if creators don’t get hurt too.”
Additionally, through Yuta’s films, Fujimoto shows how social media can impact how someone is viewed by other people. This is especially relevant today as many people feel jealousy towards their peers due to how they present themselves online, even though what they see is a small fraction of someone’s life.
Reading Goodbye, Eri is an emotional rollercoaster. I was left in awe multiple times when I first experienced it. I highly recommend that you give this manga masterpiece a chance.
