MANGA MANIA: PARASYTE Vol 7 by Hitoshi Iwaaki

Another volume, another blood bath. This time it does not involve a high school. Humans are onto the parasyte infiltration of municipal government, and they plan a raid to determine just who is infected. For some reason they think it is a good idea to bring in a necrophiliac serial killer with a talent for spotting aliens to help. But you just can't trust those necrophiliac serial killers. 

We also learn that not all parasytes are created equal. Some are tougher than others, especially those who look like a G.I. Joe. They can absorb bullets and spit them back at you. 

In the concluding portions of this volume, at last love comes to Shinichi. And Migi, the parasyte inhabiting his right hand, has been sleeping more than usual but wakes up to work out a spectacular escape for the climax.

MANGA MANIA: PARASYTE VOL 4 BY Hitoshi Iwaaki

Now the parasytes are working their way into public office. Their leader, a woman who was pregnant when she was taken over, has given birth. Her nanny is alarmed to see that she silences her child's cries by squeezing its head, and she carries it around in a bag like a loaf of bread. And there is one unexpected killing. A primary lesson of all Japanese horror manga seems to be: do not get too attached to any one character. Everyone's life is up for grabs.

MANGA MANIA: PARASYTE VOL 2 by Hitoshi Iwaaki

Parasyte, Volume 2 by Hitoshi Iwaaki
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Japanese really know how to set up primal situations for adolescent protagonists.

Sinichi and Migi, the alien parasite that inhabits his right hand, are getting along pretty well. But when Sinichi's parents leave for vacation, his mother has her head stolen by a parasite in need of a new one, and Sinichi is faced with the reality that he must kill his mother, or what used to be his mother, before she gets either himself or his father.

Along the way he meets up with a kinda pathetic possessed human, a loser contemplating suicide over his lost girlfriend about the time a parasite becomes lodged in his jaw. He also discovers that thanks to Migi's ability to subdivide himself, he is developing something close to superpowers. He quits taking shit and starts kicking ass.

Iwaaki's images in this second volume are more extravagant than the first. The transformation scenes and the scenes of two parasites swapping stories while their human hosts stand around with nothing to do have a loopy nuttiness about them that can make the parasites, whose only interest in self-preservation,  strangely appealing.

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