Parasyte: Los grises

I came into this expecting a live action adaptation of the manga/anime, but they ended up using new characters and a new setting to tell a different story. At first I was just going to cut the show off, but I decided to give it a chance and honestly..

It's not bad. They stick to the rules that were developed inside of the book and show pretty well, the only thing that concerned me was the head swapping. There is 1 parasite that swaps bodies a lot but in the source material, swapping bodies was regarded as pretty dangerous. I also don't understand why they'd swap bodies when they had the ability to change the way their faces looked in the book/show.

I'm not a film critic and I am not going to pretend to be like other reviewers. The show is a decent watch for fans of the series. It's not as deep in terms of philosophy and character development as the book/show but it's a good time passer. If you've never seen the source material, the show might seem a little goofy.

I would not consider myself a huge fan boy of anime, but I have seen my fair share of popular ones in my life. I have seen many live action adaptation, but never was compelled to write a review.

Here I am, this show reminds me of how I felt in love with Death Note decades ago. Things happen, and you are not entirely sure where the show will take you next. I would not say, you are on the edge of your seat every moment, but you are somehow leaning towards more sinical consequences every time.

All in all, this is absolutely worthy of your time, especially if you had somewhat favorable memory of the anime this is an extension of.

Let me come back here and as just this in a few hours. Because I will binge the rest immediately. Parasyte The Maxim is one of my top three favorite animes of all time. I did not think for a second that telling a different story in that universe would be as impactful, and maybe it won't fully be when it is over. But this starts absolutely fantastic. From the music, the camera work, the acting, the effects, the twist in how the mutation work. I just hope this manages to touch on some of the big questions that the original anime did. So far it is very promising to where it leads. After seeing some of my favorite books having a solid iteration on Netflix in 3 Body Problem it certainly seems to me that Netflix is in a new creative peak. Bravo!

Filled with action and cliffhangers.

It's not often I watch these sort of gore fest action show. This show was engaging from start to finish, it's common for shows to have lows and highs but this is a stable high show that exceeded my expectations. The designs of the characters and their surroundings is unique and plays a role throughout the show. Everything in the show is intertwined and in the end the plot is naturally engaging without any over the top elements. However there's nothing to really analyse, there's no deeper meaning and overall it's more of a time crunch than a movie you learn something from.

As someone who saw the anime almost a decade ago, which was an adaptation of a manga by the same name, I was very curious how this story could possibly be adapted into live action without looking very silly (see the Japanese live adaptation films).

Without spoiling anything, The Grey is not another live-adaptation of the manga, nor is it a sequel to it. It's more like a spin-off. The events that happen in Parasyte, in the original material, we only saw what happened in Japan. The Grey looks at what happens when the parasytes affects a different country. In this sense, you don't have to read the manga or watch the anime, as the TV series cover the worldbuilding fairly well.

Now, the big question is, did it end up looking as silly as the films? No. I'd say the special effects in The Grey were awesome. Probably the best parts of the show. It will no doubt look a bit cartoonish still but I was very impressed. How much of it was practical effects? How much was it VFX? They have blended it very well.

However, the shaky cam definitely didn't do the show any favours. Maybe it was a necessary evil to make the VFX looks as real as it did, but I rather have the camera stationary so we can focus on the fights, because some of the fights were pretty insane. But again, it might be because the cuts and shaky cams hid a lot of glaring issues and is why it was used.

Still, Parasyte was and still is an interesting series just because it asks some interesting questions about humanity, survival, and morality. I don't think the philosophy was as in-depth as the manga or anime, given there were only 6 episodes, but there is enough to ponder here and definitely makes me want to watch the anime again (highly recommended but also has its fair share of flaws). For those who knew the source material, the last couple minutes in this show was super cool to see.

In summary, Parasyte has an interesting premise and the TV series did an excellent job adapting it as a live action. Slowly, I think Netflix is producing more and more quality live adaptations which had been known for a long time to be a joke (Cowboy Bebop and Death Note is still a joke but Alice in Wonderland and One Piece was very good).