Something is going to happen to Mouse in 100 days.
It’s been four years since manga The Crocodile Who Dies in 100 Days fulfilled the promise in its title by ending with the death of its main character. It was a conclusion at once both completely predictable and utterly shocking, with the laid-back, often heartwarming tone of the slice of life story having readers hoping against hope that the crocodile would be spared, only for him to abruptly die right on schedule on what was otherwise shaping up to be a fun, relaxing spring day in the park with friends.
▼ The final scene of The Crocodile Who Dies in 100 Days, with Crocodile’s friends wondering why he’s late to their cherry blossom party, the protagonist crouching down near a bird in a flurry of sakura petals, and his phone lying on the ground.
But just as suddenly as the story ended, another has now begun, with creator Yuuki Kikuchi announcing the start of a sequel series, The Mouse Who Dies (X) in 100 Days.
In his announcement, made on August 20, Kikuchi says that he hadn’t initially intended to write a sequel, but that his feelings gradually changed after hearing from so many people that say they still enjoy reading/rereading The Crocodile Who Dies in 100 Days. As the new manga’s title indicates, the focus is now on Mouse, one of Crocodile’s friends.
Kikuchi even posted a sort of interlude between the end of The Crocodile Who Dies in 100 Days and The Mouse Who Dies (X) in 100 Days, in which we finally see how Crocodile died. After spotting a small bird that had tumbled into the street, he scooped it up to get it out of harm’s way, but was instead himself struck by a car.
▼ Kindhearted to the last, Crocodile passed away while trying to ask the bird “Are you all right?”
There’s a bit more mystery this time around as to where exactly the story is going. Kikuchi explicitly states that The Mouse Who Dies (X) in 100 Days is a “continuation” of The Crocodile Who Dies in 100 Days, which would indicate that it takes place after Crocodile’s death. In the next segment posted after the interlude, we see Mouse taking a moment to remember a fun time with Crocodile…
…and the first official chapter of The Mouse Who Dies (X) in 100 Days, in which Crocodile shows up in every panel, is even titled “We had fun, didn’t we?”
▼ “I’m a gunfighter” declares Mouse, only for Crocodile to pop right back up with “I’m the strongest immortal monster in the world, so your bullets don’t work on me!”
So it looks like flashbacks are definitely going to be a part of The Mouse Who Dies (X) in 100 Days, but it’s also not a strict prequel. In the new series’ announcement, Kikuchi goes on to say:
“I think everyone who’s alive right now, all of us, have experienced both happy and painful things in our lives. Mouse and Crocodile’s lives are just like ours, with happy experiences and painful ones too. After ‘that’ happened, how does Mouse go on living his daily life? What happened to Crocodile? I’d be happy if you could read this new series while thinking of those things.”
There’s also that “X” in The Mouse Who Dies (X) in 100 Days’ title. In the new series illustrated title, the characters for “Dies” (死ぬ) are crossed out, and where each chapter of The Crocodile Who Dies in 100 Days ended with an ominous reminder of how much time was left until Crocodile was destined to die, the new series first chapter finishes with the message “99 days until death,” again with the character for “death” (死) crossed out.
You could make an argument that the overarching theme of The Crocodile Who Dies in 100 Days is that in the real world, not everyone’s death is the end point of a dramatic sequence of narrative events. Sometimes you don’t get a heads-up that your days are numbered, just like Crocodile wasn’t privy to the countdown the manga’s readers were presented with. And yet, you can’t live your life with a constant sense of urgency either, since the stress of trying to pack significance into every waking moment leaves no space for the mundane requirements, or the simple joys, of ordinary daily life.
So is Mouse going to die in 100 days, or is there some other major turning point in his life going to happen then? We’ll have to read on to find out, and the series’ chapters are posted via Kikuchi’s Twitter account here.
Source: Twitter/@yuukikikuchi via Otakomu
Top image: Twitter/@yuukikikuchi
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