James Nicoll Reviews

2021’s Touring After the Apocalypse, Volume One is the first tankōbon in Sakae Saito’s post-apocalyptic Iyashikei manga. Touring has been serialized in in ASCII Media Works’ seinen manga magazine Dengeki Maoh since September 2020. Amanda Haley’s English translation was published in 2022.

Exuberant Youko and stoic Airi set out on an electric motor bike to tour Japan’s many wonders. Their guide? Digital photographs from Youko’s sister, who took her own trip long ago.

Too bad about the end of the world.

Some great cataclysm transformed Japan and presumably the rest of the world as well. Sea levels are much higher, buildings and other structures have fallen into ruin, and nature has reclaimed Japan. While Youko and Airi were safe in their underground shelter, others were not so fortunate. Corpses abound. The girls appear to be the only survivors.

This presents challenges. Old road maps do not indicate which roads are now submerged or collapsed. There are many stores and restaurants along their route… all looted during the cataclysm. Some of the wildlife is predatory, some mutated to enormous size in the wake of the unpleasantness.

Still, the only giant predator is an orca, no danger if the pair stay out of the ocean¹. Looters missed some caches, and the two women can always try their hand at eating the abundant wildlife. It’s a plus that Japan’s ruins are magnificent, well worth the time to track down.

While no living human survivors present themselves to the two travelers, Japan had by the time of its demise developed sophisticated AIs. Some, like the amiable robot whose upper half is briefly revived by the pair, were imbued with the consciousness of mortally injured humans. Others, like the almost-fully-functional, heavily armed tank who confronts Youko and Airi, are simply machines relentlessly following obsolete directives, ​“kill all looters, even the adorable teens” being just one.

~oOo~

A minor spoiler: it’s clear that Airi is a significantly enhanced cyborg, perhaps even a robot. She is too heavy to swim and one arm can transform into a plasma cannon². Generally speaking, Japanese schoolgirls float, and any plasma cannons they possess are strictly external gear³.

Readers will have many questions. What was the nature of the cataclysm? Are there any baseline human survivors aside from Youko or were only cyborgs and robots sufficiently robust to survive? The author no doubt knows the answers but is clearly in no hurry to provide them.

Instead, the reader is provided with lavishly detailed illustrations of post-apocalyptic vistas, overgrown ruins, and thriving wildlife. It’s very pretty, as long as one does not think about the implications. Or the occasional corpses, some of whom have clearly killed themselves to escape as yet unclear alternatives. Or that poor robot’s human family, who were at ground zero for the calamity that bisected the robot.

Genki girl Youko doesn’t seem to have any trouble focusing on the enjoyable aspects of life after doomsday. It’s an example readers might heed… although I suppose the trick will be surviving the apocalypse long enough to benefit from the aftermath.

Touring After the Apocalypse, Volume One is available here (Yen Press), here (Barnes & Noble), here (Bookshop US), here (Bookshop UK), here (Chapters-Indigo), and here (Words Worth Books).

1: Which would be a good idea even if there were no giant orca, as the regular sized sharks would happily eat Youko.

2: A prodigiously overpowered plasma cannon that almost certainly does not have a stun setting.

3: It’s been almost fifteen years since I reviewed the Haikasoru books. Maybe I should revisit Loups Garou, one of whose schoolgirl protagonists kit-bashes her own plasma cannon. As one does.