Goodbye Eri is Peak Fiction

[+ILuvHats he/him]

Right off the bat, I'm going to address the lie by omission in the title. Goodbye Eri is not prose, but instead a one shot manga. But wait! Before all you fantasy readers leave, you should know this is one of the best stories I've read in recent memory. There's a reason I'm recommending this on a forum not dedicated to mangas or anime, and that's because I feel like it's one of those pieces of fiction that transcends the medium, and I don't say that lightly. So please throw out any of your preconceived notions about manga. If you simply want to read a great story and you're willing to give the medium a try, Goodbye Eri only takes about an hour to read and it's free to view on Viz (this is the link). 

Here are my thoughts (spoilers!):

Spoiler

While I've read most of Fujimoto's other works, the technical prowess he displays in Goodnight Eri is beyond anything he's done before, especially in terms of plotting. Stories within stories has always been such an interesting literary device; I was fascinated by it when I was introduced to it in The Name of the Wind, and still am today. And Goodnight Eri does it so well, with a movie within a movie within a movie. First, Yuto's initial attempt at a movie was re-contextualized when we saw the video of his mom dying and realized how abusive she was. Suddenly, him ending his first movie with the hospital explosion makes a lot more sense. It's still shows his desire for a fantasy element in the story as well as his inability to think of a good ending, but it also hints at the underlying strain in his relationship with his mom. Initially, I was just as baffled as the students who watched the movie as to why he would disrespect his mother's death like that. But in hindsight it feels like Yuto's use of the explosion was an attempt at seeking catharsis, to alienate himself from his relationship with his mom, which I'm confused him being filled with equal parts love and hate.

Then, after the second movie screening, everything's turned upside down after we learn that Eri perfectly mirrors Yuto's mom in that they are both very selfish and temperamental people who are portrayed as their ideal selves through Yuto's editing. Eri's reveal is especially impactful as we find out she normally wears glasses and a retainer, only taking them off for shots going into the movie. And if you look back through the panels, she is never wearing glasses. So Yuto's suicide attempts were staged, which click immediately because really, what are the chances Eri just happened to be on the hospital roof when Yuto was about to jump off? It's like something out of a fictional story, because it actually is. And of course Yuto straight up tells us his romantic relationship with Eri was fabricated, though he clearly had feelings for her since he asked her out. Since we know we can no longer trust the narrative, us readers have to figure out their relationship through inference. For example, I think it's clear that Yuto cared about Eri more than his mom because even though he showed clips of his mom's hidden, darker side, he doesn't actually present similar clips of Eri, even if he tells us about her true self. This shows how strongly Yuto wanted to preserve the ideal image of Eri, even moreso than his mom.

And the ending was so brilliant. First, it was a really clever way to subvert our expectation that the terminally ill, romantic interest dies. I mean, I believe Eri still actually died; I think the explosion at the ending made that clear. But within the meta narrative of Yuto's story, she lived beyond her death. Speaking of the last panel explosion, it's brilliant in that Fujimoto somehow turned what should be terrible ending into a great one. Normally, using an explosion should signify an inability to think of a proper ending, but within the overarching narrative, Yuto's final use of the explosion perfectly parallels the beginning of the tale, bringing the type of symmetry to the plot that I love. 

Some general aspects I want to talk about:

• The ambiguity throughout the one shot is so well executed. I've already talked about it to an extent, but there are so many aspects you that can be interpreted in multiple ways. With the ending, you could interpret Eri as actually being a vampire, though I think this is the least satisfying interpretation. Also, while older Yuto claims the rest of his family died, this probably isn't the case since we don't see any of his purported family members and Eri's reincarnation establishes the fictious nature of the ending. But is older Yuto actually recording himself in the ending? Older Yuto's character design looks enough like his father that we can't be sure whether his dad is acting as him or if Yuto actually aged before filming the ending using himself. It's possible Yuto had aged, and edited himself into pre-existing clips of Eri to create the narrative he wanted, or he could have planned out the whole exchange with Eri and had his dad act as an older version of him. This is just one example of how ambiguous the tale is as a whole. 
• Eri being a vampire in the narrative is actually really clever. Yuto's reasons make sense; he said he wanted "to add a sprinkle of fantasy" and that Eri seemed like a vampire seeing as she brought him to a decrepit, abandoned house. But within Fujimoto's narrative, being a vampire symbolizes both the darker side of her personality as well as her parasitic reliance on Yuto to portray her in a positive light.
• Thematically, the story was very powerful. The exploration of the nature of storytelling was nuanced and expansive, and it provided a through-line in the manga to create cohesion. If I came away with any message, it's that there's no such thing as a true story, not even we are told are nonfiction. To tell a story is to lie; the writer can't help it, by choosing what details to include and which ones to omit, they portray things not as they are, but how they see them. Also, it was heart-wrenching to see someone's journey to process their grief, sorrow, and pain through creating a movie.

It was a fantastic story. That's all I can say at the end of the day, despite my ranting. And I think more people deserve to experience Goodbye Eri, which is why I'm making this post. If you're reading this, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.