紫色のクオリア

MURASAKIIRO NO QUALIA

MANGA

STATUS
COMPLETE
VOLUMES
3
RELEASE
August 27, 2013
CHAPTERS
21

DESCRIPTION

Through the uncanny purple eyes of Yukari, all people appear to her as robots. Her talent is both a blessing and a curse. She is able to assist the police in sizing up threats, since her “skill” allows her to evaluate humans’ quirks and physical capabilities like cataloging the parts of a machine–yet her strange sight has cost her the friendship of her peers. She does have one friend in her corner: Hatou “Gaku” Manabu, a girl at school who cares deeply for Yukari. When Yukari is recruited into a secret organization, the real trouble begins. Gaku is thrust into a realm of mystery, quantum experimentation, and alternate universes, with only her wits–and her love for Yukari–to guide her along the way.

(Source: Seven Seas Entertainment)

CAST

Manabu Hatou
Yukari Marii
Alice Foyle
Nanami Tenjou

CHAPTERS

RELATED TO MURASAKIIRO NO QUALIA

NOVEL FantasyMurasakiiro no Qualia

REVIEWS

TheGruesomeGoblin
25/100
Nightmarish rubbish pushing the very boundaries of absurdity to their absolute maximum.
It is past midnight, and we have acquired the prime research subject as they were attempting to enter the local Canadian donut and coffee shop. We will now begin our testing.

“Uh… hello? Where am I? I’m supposed to start working in a half hour…”

I will now begin speaking to the subject.

So sorry to interrupt your night, but you will not be making your precious donuts tonight. We need you to study and analyze a foreign creation that has baffled and tormented our top scientists, philosophers, and physicists for over a year now.

“Excuse me? I just make donuts.”

We have seen your work. I cannot go into specifics, but our group, the Theoretical Generalizing Goblins wish to put your skills to a true test in analyzing this work we have discovered.

“Theoretical… Generalizing… Goblins? What? Look, the anime reviews are all fun and games, they’re nothing for some stupidly named secret society to abduct me over.”

We do not wish for you to review an anime. It is a manga we wish for you to review.

“What? I only infrequently do manga reviews! There’s no manga that you can throw at me that I’d really need to be abducted over…”

That’s where you’re wrong. It’s this manga we wish for you to review.

“Wha… oh no. I erased this from my mind! I... I won't do this again!”

You will be forced to experience it again to properly be able to analyze it. We will see to that.

“No, NO, NO!”

Restrain the subject before it becomes violent. Begin Experiment R-28.

R-28: Introduction

The object in question is identified as "Qualia the Purple" and is a manga adaptation (done by Shirou Tsunashima) of the novel by Hisamitsu Ueo. We do not know who is originally responsible for deciding they wanted to see the original work in manga form, but it is far too late to dissuade any such person from bringing this into the world.

We have provided a survey of questions to other subjects that we have exposed to Qualia. Although, Subject T-33 will be the one who will be penning the review, we will disperse the questions and the answers of the other subjects periodically throughout this review.

But for right now, let’s take a peek and see how Subject T-33 is faring with Qualia the second time through.

“Please. Please stop it. Please stop forcing these images and words into my brain. You can't just... you can't do any of this. The science... I can't even pretend to be qualified to point out all that's wrong with it, but there's no way any of this is correct. Schrodinger's Cat... SCHRODINGER'S CAT! WHERE DID THAT DARN CAT GET TO?? IS IT IN THE BOX?? OR IS IT NOT IN THE BOX?? OR IS IT DEAD?? IS IT ALIVE?? WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH PARALLEL UNIVERSES? HELLO? HELP?"

Ah yes, those sure are some results we’re getting from T-333. I believe we made the correct choice in choo--

“Remember when this was about a girl who sees everybody else as robots? Remember that? Whatever happened to that? Why is... why is alternate universes? Why is anything?”

Ahem, yes. Qualia the Purple is… even we’re not too sure how to classify it. Slice of life… sci-fi… fantasy… action… mystery…?

Or perhaps, or perhaps, it is simply outright nonsense disguised to be otherwise? For if one were to simply go off of the description alone, one would imagine it would be a pretty generic if somewhat strange premise for a series. Why, it even starts off that way.

But then perhaps the original creator took a massive amount of drugs and lost track of their mental facilities the rest of the time they were writing it and that’s how Qualia became the way it is.

Such a strange creation with downright bizarre and insane elements requires a more… scientific and methodical approach to dissecting it. That is where we, Theoretical Generalizing Goblins come into the picture. However, we had a bit of trouble finding suitable willing subjects... hence, we had to get a little bit rough with Subject T-33 who repeatedly refused to voluntarily review Qualia.

Subject T-33 shall now begin his review. Subject T-33 has claimed that it will be impossible to review this manga without going into full spoilers. Therefore, those reading this later should take this into note prior continuing past this point. The Theoretical Generalizing Goblins group recommends if you intend on studying this work no matter what, you go into it completely blind first. But if you think you will not endure the journey, then witness the sufferings of Subject T-33 below first.

It should be explicitly noted that the above is actually from the manga itself and not a creation of our making which we included in R-28. But the message works here as well as in the manga itself.

R-28: Schrodinger's Plot

They have me in a padded room and they forced my eyes open as they projected each chapter of Qualia on the wall, and they have told me I cannot leave until I finish this review. After being forced to reread this manga, it makes me realize that there are things much more preposterous than some secret society with Goblins in the name going around abducting people to force them to review manga.

The original premise of this manga starts out simple enough. The two main characters of this manga are ordinary high school girls, except... the one that has PURPLE eyes apparently sees literally everyone else and every other living creature...

...as robots. See a cat? Guess what, that's not a cat. It's a cat shaped robot. See your best friend you've known for years? Guess what, they're a robot. EVERYBODY AND EVERYTHING IS A ROBOT EXCEPT FOR YOU. YOU ARE THE ONLY LIVING ORGANIC HUMAN BEING IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE, EVERYTHING ELSE IS JUST ROBOTS. THE PROOF THAT YOU ARE A HUMAN IS IN FACT YOUR PURPLE EYES BECAUSE THE TITLE OF MANGA HAS THE WORD PURPLE IN IT.

But you see, this is weird in itself. Extremely so, but if the entire manga was solely about JUST that, then I wouldn't... I wouldn't be sitting here in a padded room because of this manga. No, the plot has many twists and turns, ups and downs... Schrodinger's Cat makes a cameo appearance.

My favorite chapter of this manga was the one where they just go on and on about Schrodinger's Cat. I have always been so interested in Schrodinger and his Cat. Why I never once thought when I started reading this manga, that it would just slather me in information about Schrodinger's Cat. I was so pleasantly surprised as they took their time and went into this interesting subject matter and my brain was going "wow this manga sure is interesting and GOOD if you have at least a basic understanding of quantum physics and metaphysics and SCIENCE THINGS."

But then I had another thought... fucking what? Where did the plot go? What was this chapter? Why are you going on about Schrodinger's Cat? What is the point of this manga? Why are you doing this to me? Why are you performing this assault on my mental FACULTIES?

R-28: YUKARI IS A FUCKING SIDE CHARACTER

Hey, guess what? HEY, GUESS WHAT?

QUALIA THE PURPLE? THE CHARACTER WITH THE PURPLE EYES WHO SEES EVERYONE AS ROBOTS? You might be thinking, that character has to be pretty important to the entire manga. Right? You would think that, right? I thought that. I truly did think that. Everybody is just treating Yukari like she's perfectly normal other than the main character. No, actually, not only do people not think she's fucking crazy, BUT THAT HER "ABILITY" IS LEGIT OR HAS AN ACTUAL VALUE IN SOCIETY.

Like the police come and visit her and go "oh yeah you see there's this fucking serial killer on the loose and we know how you can see everybody's robot bodies that are hidden to the normal NON PURPLE eye so yeah if you could help us with our case we would appreciate it" and like there's this super special school that's actually run by this manipulative evil worldwide group that goes "oh we need the girl who claims that everybody is robots."

Beyond the first part of the manga when you're still thinking the manga is about her, she basically almost entirely and completely fucking disappears. GONE. Like she's still in the manga and she is literally the entire motivation behind everything the main character does but...

Why not... why not just calm down, and do a manga about this girl who sees everybody as robots?

Why does... why does the manga just completely shift, and all that shit about the robots and serial killer it just... it just completely falls to the wayside? Like it becomes about the main character's descent into... I can't describe the actual main plot of this manga as anything other than actual literal complete insanity.

By the point where Yukari did return to importance I was just...

"Oh. Oh yeah, she's the one with the purple eyes and sees everybody and everything else as robots? Wow, how fucking mundane is that compared to all of the other shit I just experienced."

R-28: GAKU BECOMES GOD BECAUSE SHE BELIEVES

The main character on the other hand... I hate her. I hate her with every fiber of my being.

The way she meets Ms. "You Are a Robot" is she kiss collides with her in the hallway as Ms. "You Are a Robot" chases her down to confirm her true gender. But that's not important. None of that is important.

What is important is that later on in the manga after she has her arm cut off and then rebuilt by Yukari and becomes capable of using her hand as a means to communicate with Yukari and alternate versions of herself in parallel and alternate universes, she BECOMES GOD. SHE BECOMES CAPABLE OF ALL SORTS OF SHIT BECAUSE FUCK IT. YOU REMEMBER THAT CHAPTER WHERE THEY EXPLAIN SCHRODINGER'S CAT? MAYBE THERE'S AN EXPLANATION SOMEWHERE IN THERE.

She's... she's a high school student! I know she had her arm cut off in a scrape she had with a serial killer and then rebuilt but with the added functunality of a cell phone capable of calling alternate universes, but WHEN DID SHE GAIN THE INTELLIGENCE OR THE ABILITY TO... JUMP UNIVERSES? OR BASICALLY JUST TIME TRAVEL? Like she just goes, "oh I messed up in this universe, better try another one" over and over and over again.

And eventually, and EVENTUALLY, SHE BECOMES GOD. SHE BECOMES ONE WITH EVERYTHING, IN HER PURSUIT TO SAVE HER FRIEND. "FUCK YOU FATE, I'LL BECOME GOD BECAUSE I BELIEVE IN SCIENCE AND METAPHYSICS AND ALTERNATE UNIVERSES AND SCHRODINGER'S DOG AND I WILL BECOME GOD TO SAVE MY BEST FRIEND WHO I MAY OR MAY NOT HAVE ROMANCE FEELINGS TOWARDS BECAUSE FUCK IT THIS MAY AS WELL AS BE IN THE YURI GENRE AS WELL."

But then, you look a bit closer, and yeah. This manga, is an adaptation, of a novel. So to be fair, maybe all of the metaphysics and the alternate universes are went further into in the novel. But even in a novel form, I could not picture the emotional and plot leaps this manga takes.

They're just ordinary high schoolers at the start. I would have never expected one of them would effectively become God, and then become not God again.

R-28: THE SERIAL KILLER WAS THE ONLY GOOD PART

Even then, it's still batshit weird.

Okay, what if I told you there was one moment in the manga when I thought this was amazing? That everything else could be forgiven because of how genius this one singular moment was? It was just so fucking weird and out of left field that it actually briefly managed to get me on the manga's side. There just happens to be a serial killer and they target one of the two main characters, and then robot girl comes to the rescue with...

With an army of toy robots that then proceeds to DISMANTLE the serial killer. Her head is detached along with every other limb and she's still alive and talking and freaking the fuck out because this girl literally just took her apart.

This part was just so weird but the correct type of weird that I was temporarily on board with the manga and thought it was going to lead into a great direction. Instead, it completely flips around and starts heading in a different path, and literally the only significance that the first section of the manga has is that Yukari rebuilds Gaku's missing arm into an interdimensional quantum cell phone.

The army of toy robots, the serial killer, fucking Yukari's ability to rebuild or dismantle human flesh robots... yeah, that's all done and over with. It's time to fucking get into alternate dimensions and Gaku talking to other versions of herself through her HAND.

R-28: Is there an alternate universe where this is good? And where Gaku has a clear and consistent character?

You might be thinking this review seems a bit scrambled or rushed. Or, that this is one huge fabrication and I'm just making all this shit up. I assure you, padded room aside, I'm not.

This is a real manga. This is a real series someone created. After the serial killer is wrapped up, a pompous new girl comes to Gaku and Yukari's school and is aware of Yukari's gift and wishes to recruit and bring her back to a weird special school where her gift can be put to better use.

Gaku is supportive of Yukari and advises her to go if she wants, and then the fucking story just trips the fuck out and it turns out the special school is in fact an evil society that wishes to run tests on Yukari for her gift and use her, but GOOD NEWS.

GAKU CAN USE HER INTERDIMENSIONAL CELL PHONE WHICH IS ALSO HER HAND TO TALK TO ALTERNATE VERSIONS OF HERSELF FROM ALTERNATE UNIVERSES AND SHE DISCOVERS HOW TO BECOME THOSE VERSIONS OF HERSELF, SO SHE ENTERS A REPEATING CYCLE OF ATTEMPTING TO STOP THIS EVENT FROM HAPPENING TO SAVE YUKARI.

Even if she stops Yukari from going to the school, SHE ENDS UP DYING OR GETTING KILLED OR BEING TAKEN THERE ANYWAYS. Basically, Yukari, whom you would think is the poster character for this manga more or less just fucking disappears from the manga entirely as all this shit is going on. And Gaku, just fucking...

Okay, first of all, I don't care how much quantum physics and science jargon you spew at me, Schrodinger's Cat this, Schrodinger's Cat that, YOU CAN'T JUST... SHE'S TALKING THROUGH HER HAND TO ALTERNATE VERSIONS OF HERSELF IN ALTERNATE UNIVERSES. There's... THERE'S NO RATIONALIZING OR MAKING THIS SEEM SENSIBLE OR NOT CRAZY.

Gaku and Yukari, it's not like their lifelong best friends. Or... even if you view this as a yuri, like the sole reason the two met was because Yukari wasn't certain of Gaku's gender and they kiss collided in the hallway. In actual reality if after this happened, the person told you that they see everyone as robots, you would distance yourself from that person as much as possible because they are fucking insane and you literally JUST met them.

But no, Gaku just fucking snaps and her character sprouts wings and flies far beyond the boundaries of logical and sensible characters. She decides that no matter what, as a HIGH SCHOOL GIRL, SHE'S GOING TO DEFY FATE ITSELF TO ENSURE YUKARI'S SAFETY, EVEN IF SHE HAS TO BECOME ONE WITH THE UNIVERSE AND ASCEND TO GODHOOD ITSELF TO MAKE SURE IT HAPPENS.

Meanwhile, I'm just sitting here, internally screaming out of agony, as my brain tries to process anything that is happening and FAILS TO DO SO. Because I just didn't understand... why... and how. Up to this point I will argue that I don't think we saw anything to inspire any sort of belief that Gaku would have any reason to go THAT far.

Look, Yukari is insane and rebuilt Gaku's arm into a cell phone. She didn't have to rebuild it to also have the function as a interdimensional cell phone? Why did she do that? Your best friend genuinely believes that you're just a walking soulless automaton and you just go... oh... okay, I guess? Then immediately right after that, you tell them the following:

IF YOU ARE EVER IN ANY SORT OF MORTAL AND TERRIBLE DANGER, I WILL ENTER AN INFINITE TIME LOOP IN AN ATTEMPT TO REWRITE THE UNIVERSE SO YOU CAN IN FACT LIVE EVEN IF I MUST BECOME SOME WEIRD GODLIKE DEITY AFTER OVERCOMING THE SCIENTIFIC BOUNDARIES OF THIS UNIVERSE.

I'm sorry, I'm just not gonna extend that type of offer to the girl who thinks I'm a goddamned robot.

Also, can I just say eventually I so turned against Gaku as a character that I was reveling in and hoping that she would fail and Yukari would remain dead. Let me justify this real quick, Gaku straight up outright admits that she stops being herself and just fucking snaps in the manga itself but. Like, she fucking starts manipulating, killing, and emotionally torturing the other characters and this includes HERSELF, ALICE, AS WELL AS EVEN YUKARI. Like she becomes Yukari's mother and then like locks her up in their house so nobody ever finds out about her eyes and she's like this fucking withdrawn asocial feral child and...

Like the final "Gaku", the one that ends up being the "successful" one that ends up mattering, literally takes over the vague evil science society and becomes a weird manipulative messiah being. And she's just like... "oh, I won the NOBEL PRIZE, I traveled the globe doing GOD'S WORK because I am the MESSIAH."

I'm genuinely not sure I've ever hated a character more than I did Gaku.

"I CAN DO ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING AS LONG AS I'M OPEN TO THE IDEA THAT PARALLEL WORLDS EXIST. I AM CAPABLE OF SAVING THE ENTIRE WORLD AND UNDOING EVERYBODY ELSE'S DEATH BUT NOT MY BEST FRIEND, YUKARI. AND YUKARI IS THE ONLY ONE THAT MATTERS, THE ENTIRE WORLD CAN BURN FOR ALL I CARE."

The Gaku is immortal. Did you hear me? Did you hear the words I said??

THE GAKU IS IMMORTAL.

R-28: WHERE IS THE PLOT, SCHRODINGER

Is there a plot in the box or is it not in the box? Is the plot alive or is it fucking dead?

I've already mentioned this but I sort of want to underline it, there is an entire chapter where Gaku talks to the totally important and relevant other girl character who is completely normal and therefore actually distanced herself from Yukari after learning about her gift, and they just go on and on the entire chapter about Schrodinger's goddamned Cat.

What the ever living fuck was the purpose of that chapter? What the fuck was the purpose of this entire MANGA?

Because at the end, after Gaku becomes God, she gets talked down and decides not to be God anymore and reverts everything back to normal again, but then smashes her hand against a window and then has the interdimensional cellphone disabled or removed from her hand.

...And, she basically begins to forget all of the dimension hopping she did and all of the different lives she lived...? So basically Yukari is still possibly gonna die in the future and everything she did had absolutely no fucking purpose and we're not even shown one way or the other if Yukari's bullshit gift was legitimate in any way shape or form.

...Now that I think about it, who cares even if Yukari actually was the only human or if Gaku was a robot? GAKU COULD FUCKING HOP DIMENSIONS AND VERY EASILY ASCENDED TO GODHOOD. WHAT DID YUKARI DO/ACCOMPLISH, EXACTLY?

...Actually, now that I think about it, Gaku wouldn't have been able to ascend to godhood without the interdimensional hand cellphone she gave to Yukari in the first place... but... wait? Okay, hold ON. We need a chart. We need a chart for this to work out the progression of the plot of this manga.

Wow, that was fucked up. Creating that took actually more time than writing any of this review up to this point.

So okay yeah, none of it mattered. Literally none of it mattered. As a matter of fact, the manga itself throws the word "dream" out there fully on its own accord which...

You should never voluntarily go for a "dream" ending. It was all a dream...! None of it actually mattered at all in the end...!

That part where Gaku goes back and becomes her child self and then creates magic so she can become a magical girl happens and then the manga is just like well that happened also let's move on now and...

...Wait, did I even talk about the magical girl chapter yet???

"Try having your whole body repaired with jungle gym parts." This... this is a sentence in the chapter... where they try to explain Yukari's gift with science and... like why, why even try to explain it at all? That's the most baffling thing to me still. You can't, so just don't... at all... please.

Yeah, a nightmarish world where a serial killer chops your arm off and then a purple eyed girl proceeds to slay her with an army of toy robots, then gives you a cell phone hand which leads you into becoming essentially GOD. BUT NO, THIS ISN'T SCIENCE FICTION. THIS IS REAL. THIS IS SERIOUS.

R-28: Miscellaneous Points that Caused Me Agony

When Gaku becomes deity Gaku and Yukari is alive again and is talking to deity Gaku, there is a point where Yukari...

Is... is she saying she sees the goddamned text boxes of the manga with Gaku's dialogue in it? Her eyes directly looking towards the text box and her hand is directly positioned underneath of it so what else is... happening there?

Also, Gaku straight up kills herself. More than once throughout the manga. Just outright... like one version of herself slips back into sanity and starts talking sense, and then another version of her comes up and blows her brains out.

She even tells herself through her interdimensional quantum cell phone to kill herself after another version of herself admits to her that she's falling in love with the poor girl who was a pawn that she herself was now using as a pawn as a means to an end. Additionally, that she possibly felt romantic feelings towards her other friends in the past as well.

Then finally, finally, there was the point of the manga that caused my brain to just completely shut down. I read this manga in one day and I went through a VERY wide range of emotions. I could not BELIEVE that this would get even WEIRDER after the parallel world Schrodinger's FUCK was introduced.

All of this weird shit and it leads to, okay, let's undo it all, it basically was just nothing but a dream.

. . .

R-28: Conclusion

...There's no winning with this one. The original act of reading through this genuinely felt like an all out attack on my senses and my brain itself. But the manga itself provided me a warning and I discarded it and pushed on, because I am incredibly dumb. I give this like a 2.5 out of 10 or a 25 out of 100, but I can't actively not recommend this at all.

Because... if you're into really weird and insane shit, this series is definitely... it definitely fits the bill. I mean, I hated, HATE, this series, but I was never bored through it. Even when it was dumping MAD SCHRODINGERS on my head, I was just baffled and trying to comprehend anything.

Now, can somebody please let me out of this fucking padded room? The review is done. Theoretical Generalizing... Gnomes or whatever? I need to get back to Tim Horton's, I am VERY late.

Were you under the impression we were going to let you leave the compound when you were finished? Because we never once promised that.

...Oh.

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planetJane
80/100
So, how much do you know about quantum physics?
This review contains major spoilers for the majority of the reviewed material. Keep that in mind before continuing.

Qualia The Purple is an autobiography of a deity hiding inside a psychological thriller. It is a love story about a girl who steals the first kiss of a robot. It is about a brutal mahou shoujou who ruthlessly destroys evildoers long before they commit their crimes. It is about dying in a plane crash and waking up in your room earlier that day. It is a simple school life comedy about four friends, one of whom is a girl with very strange purple eyes.

Qualia The Purple is a lot of things. Over 18 chapters (plus some intermissions), it might just count as one of the single wildest rides in the entire medium. There really is not a lot else like this. But as with all stories, we should start at the beginning. For a while, Qualia presents Yukari Marii as its central mystery. She is a girl with deep purple eyes who perceives other human beings as robots--human-sized mecha, if you would. The first few chapters alone segue from a light school dramedy centering on Yukari and her friend Manabu “Gaku” Hatou to being about the more unusual implications of Yukari’s powers. We find out that the police enlist her to help with catching murder suspects. Eventually Yukari and Hatou get caught up in the case of a dismembering serial killer, who kidnaps the both of them. To make quit a long story very short, Yukari is able to subdue the killer and use her eyes to “fix” Hatou, relieved of one of her arms by the serial killer.

In a lesser manga, this’d be all Qualia has to offer. Greasy crimes and Hatou and Yukari solving them. In reality though, Qualia is such a bizarre, unwinding narrative that it’s difficult to actually know where to start. Hatou, let’s get this out of the way, is the real main character of Qualia. When Yukari “fixed” her, she did so using parts from a cellphone, giving her hand the ability to be used as a phone. Initially, she only uses this power to call Yukari (who is the only person who has her cell number), but as the narrative goes on, a mysterious transfer student named Alice enters the picture, pestering Yukari to join an organization for “geniuses” like them called JAUNT. Yukari, eventually, joins. Yukari is killed. Hatou discovers she can call versions of herself from parallel universes, and the manga well and truly flies off the rails, to which it never really returns. All for the better, as said, Qualia The Purple is one of the most shamelessly you’ll-never-guess-what-happens-next page-turners in all of manga.

What starts as Hatou trying to solve Yukari’s murder explodes out into her discovering that she can use her multiversal cellphone to change the past. And from there Qualia quickly shifts form into an exploration of how far someone can go to save someone they love. Throughout countless universes and across billions of years of history; Hatou steals, kills, betrays, and has the same done to her. Any version of herself that fails to save Yukari is expendable, and despite lifetimes of trying, every single one does indeed fail. It’s really quite hard to convey the sheer scope of the storytelling going on here. We see a good chunk of these realities--some in more detail, some in less. In each we’re made privy to Hatou’s thought process as she tries to work out if this is what will finally save her beloved Yukari. It makes it hit even harder each time that she fails.

There is a happy ending buried in all this. After all of her instances across many timelines effectively “merge”, leaving Hatou as a nameless godlike being, she travels back to beginning of the universe. Waiting the 13 billion-odd years out, she finds that in this world, Yukari survives. At this point, Hatou is little more than the narration boxes, which Yukari can promptly percieve and begins talking to. Convincing her that she can’t actually change reality in the way she’s trying to, Hatou returns to being a normal girl, and her memories of being a multiversal singularity begin to fade.

None of this short summary really does the series’ writing justice. It’s an endlessly interesting thing. Flawed, to be sure, but fascinating. Qualia is what you get if you adapt some high-concept sci-fi to the manga format, and really it’s a good case that there should be more of such a thing. There is a truly silly amount of half-correct babble about quantum mechanics that the series could probably have well done without. That aside though, the writing is strong even if the characters are rather broad. The art too deserves praise, often staying subdued when it needs to and then breaking out into more impressively cosmic displays when the narrative calls for it.

All in all, it comes highly recommended. There’s not too much out there like this.

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