Dream Eater Merry


Dream Eater Merry is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yoshitaka Ushiki. The series was serialized in Houbunsha's seinen manga magazine Manga Time Kirara Forward from 2008 to 2020. An anime television series by J.C.Staff which aired in 2011.

Plot

Yumeji Fujiwara is a young male student like any other who, after an event that occurred 10 years previously, gained the power to see the aura of other people's dreams, and the ability to predict what kind of dream they will have next. Since then, he has started to have strange dreams of cats following him for an unknown reason. The boss of the cat army, John Doe, tells him that his body is needed to access the real world. One day, a mysterious girl fell on top of him as he was returning home from his errands. This girl, named Merry Nightmare, is a dream demon, searching for a way to return to her world. Yumeji decides to help her, and a gate to the world of dreams opens again, this time in full daylight. She appears in the daydream world looking for an answer on how to get back to her world. Meanwhile, an evil dream demon named Pharos Hercules is leading other dream demons to make humans into their vessels to raise an army, killing those that oppose him which causes humans to lose sight of their goals and ambitions. Yumeji eventually becomes Merry's partner, using his ability to scout out dream demons so Merry can hunt them.
After Hercules' downfall, Merry's quest to return to the dream world continues. In the meantime, a mysterious boy named Kyou Shiragi transfers to Yumeji's class, where dream demons are suddenly manifesting; as a result of their losses, they cause humans to accomplish their goals instead of destroying them. With dream demons seen by previous vessels, Yumeji and Merry now must investigate this unusual phenomenon and restore balance. It is revealed that Yumeji and Merry met 10 years previously when an incident occurred in the dream world. During the school cultural festival, a powerful dream demon in the form of Kyou and his minions attempts to disturb the balance of both worlds. The pair and their companions fought together to send the adversaries back through the doorway, repairing it, and everything the dream demons have touched becomes undone. Knowing they will forget each other, Merry bids Yumeji farewell with a kiss. Sometime later, Yumeji and his friends still remember Merry and others by heart, and Yumeji started writing a book based on their recounted adventures.

Characters

Main characters

Antagonists

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Writing Club

All-girls' school

Other characters

Anime original

Media

Manga

The manga series by Yoshitaka Ushiki was serialized in Manga Time Kirara Forward magazine from March 24, 2008, to November 24, 2020, and was compiled into twenty four tankōbon volumes by Houbunsha, the first of which was released on October 27, 2008, and the last on December 11, 2020. One spin-off volume, Shadow Stomper Merry by Kenji Tsurubuchi, and three anthology volumes were released in 2011. The manga has been licensed in France and Germany with the title Merry Nightmare.

Anime

An anime television series based on the manga Yumekui Merry was announced in the September 2010 issue of Houbunsha's Manga Time Kirara Forward magazine. Produced by J.C.Staff, the anime series is directed and written by Hideki Shirane, and music composition by Keiichi Oku. The anime series aired in Japan on the Tokyo Broadcasting System between January 7, 2011, and April 8, 2011, later rebroadcast on the Mainichi Broadcasting System, Chubu-Nippon Broadcasting, RKK, and the satellite channel BS-TBS. The opening theme for the anime is "Daydream Syndrome" by Marina Fujiwara while the ending is by Ayane Sakura. Both artists belong to the Japanese musical ensemble and dōjin circle, IOSYS. The anime has been licensed in North America by Sentai Filmworks under the title Dream Eater Merry.

Episodes

Video game

Characters from the series appear alongside other Manga Time Kirara characters in the 2018 mobile RPG, Kirara Fantasia.

Reception

In their Winter 2011 Anime Preview Guide, the majority of Anime News Network's staff of reviewers gave modest ratings for the first episode. Theron Martin states the series is straddling the line between the typical and the really weird, but figuring out what's going on should be half the fun. Jacob Chapman comments that the first episode was unusual in that it was nicely paced and "goes down easy." Gia Manry compares Yumekui Merry to a poor man's Soul Eater with its definite sense of style over substance.