Human Specimens’ ending was centered around the revelation of the identity of the person who had actually come up with the idea behind the titular project, who executed it, and who was going to bear the consequences of it. The narrative was set into motion by Shiro surrendering to the police after killing six boys—one of whom was his own son, Itaru—and turning them into a macabre butterfly-themed art installation in the middle of a forest near a remote village. Shiro said that he and his son were invited by his old friend, Rumi, to his ancestral house, which she had purchased and renovated, so that Itaru could partake in a competition of sorts to be her successor in the world of art. Before the proceedings began, Shiro became familiar with Ao, Sho, Hikaru, Toru, and Dai, and that apparently motivated him to blend his urge to see the world through the eyes of butterflies and his father’s plan of using “human specimens” for art. But then we got Itaru’s account of the days leading up to the murderous art installation, and it seemed like he was the one who put the project together, because he wanted to punish the aforementioned boys for being hypocritical. After that, Shiro found out what Itaru had done, punished him by including him in that art installation, and then took the blame for the murders. However, Anna, Rumi’s daughter, claimed that she was the one who had conceptualized the project to impress Rumi and become her successor, and Itaru had merely assisted her, whilst also taking the blame for the murders, which actually prompted Shiro to kill Itaru. Shiro wasn’t convinced by this narrative, because his instinct said that Anna wasn’t capable of something like that. Then who was the mastermind, and what was their ultimate goal? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
Rumi Was The Mastermind Of The Art Installation
From what I understood after making it all the way to the end of Human Specimens was that Shiro, Itaru, and Rumi’s stories of what had happened at the villa with Ao, Sho, Hikaru, Toru, and Dai were a weird concoction of half-truths and lies. Itaru wasn’t alive to tell his side of the story. Rumi had flown back from Japan to the USA and was on her deathbed. Anna was with Rumi. Hence, it was Shiro who ended up going to jail, because he thought that by surrendering to the police, at the very least, he’d be protecting Itaru’s reputation. But when Anna came to meet Shiro, we finally got the truth. FYI, I still don’t know if it’s the actual truth, but what we heard from Anna was the closest thing to it. So, here’s the chronological description of the events that led to the creation of the titular art project. Shiro’s father used Rumi’s mother as the “human specimen” for a painting, which basically meant that he painted a hyperrealistic painting of her. Rumi’s mother and father were happy with it, but since Rumi had tetrachromatic vision, she didn’t like it. To prevent Rumi from ruining the reveal of the painting, Shiro took her to the butterfly garden, and all the different colors there scratched the itch in Rumi’s head. Rumi’s parents died some time after the meeting with Shiro’s family, and Rumi moved to the USA to pursue art, got married, and had Anna.
Rumi’s husband died, and sometime after that, the mystery illness that had killed Rumi’s mother started showing up in her body, thereby affecting her tetrachromatic vision. Since Rumi had achieved critical acclaim because of her unique ability to perceive the world, she knew that without that, she’d lose her popularity. Anna hadn’t inherited her tetrachromatic vision, which meant that Rumi would leave no legacy. Therefore, Rumi decided to push herself to the extreme with the Human Specimens project, whilst also leaving behind an homage to her biggest source of inspiration: Shiro. I suppose the initial plan was that Rumi would kill the boys, make that art installation all by herself (probably with some assistance from Anna and Itaru), and then die peacefully after making Anna her successor and seeing the elation on Shiro’s face that she had visualized his dream of seeing the world through the eyes of butterflies (which involved seeing humans as butterflies).
Rumi Tasked Anna With Completing Her Project
Rumi fell ill and went back to the USA, assigning Anna to complete the task, show the finished product to Shiro, return to the USA, and give her Shiro’s feedback. Now, things got a little confusing after this point. We’re supposed to assume that, in the time it took for Anna to return to Japan and invite Ao, Sho, Hikaru, Toru, and Dai to the villa, Itaru had done some research of his own on the boys, came to the conclusion that none of them deserved to be Rumi’s successor, and decided to turn them into those macabre art installations. When he reached the villa, Anna was already there, and hence he helped her execute a plan that he had in mind as well. However, the background studies were actually done by Rumi, right? She was the one who had handpicked them based on her analysis that their pursuit for achieving beauty through art was kind of futile and they would never reach the peak of their skills in this lifetime, at least. Hence, it was better for them to become immortalized as a part of her tetrachromatic take on the world, which would be an achievement higher than anything they could ever attain. Which leaves us with Anna and Itaru’s execution of Rumi’s demented ideas based on the butterflies that Shiro had given to her when they were kids. So, a couple of things happened here. While hacking up the kids, Anna’s tetrachromatic vision was activated, thereby allowing her to see the world just like her mother did, and during the process of assembling the art project, Itaru’s imagination, which was so far limited to photography, was switched on.
Anna getting the tetrachromatic vision meant that she could carry on her mother’s legacy. Until now, the identity of her artwork was centered around mimicking Rumi’s style. She never got to discover who she was as an artist or a person. The sick joke here was that, instead of simply taking her bizarre idea to the grave and allowing Anna to script her own future, Rumi pushed her daughter to such an extreme, which transformed Anna into a version of herself. As admitted by Anna, one of the backdrops for Rumi’s art installation was incomplete because, while making it, her sickness had kicked into high gear and she had lost her tetrachromatic vision. Committing murder allowed Anna to complete that backdrop, because that sickening act triggered her dormant gene and brought her closer to her mother, both on a spiritual and artistic level. At the same time, it constrained her, because with her tetrachromatic vision, she could only be a replica of her mother. Sure, in the future, she might try to use that “superpower” to make something original, but she’ll always be confused about its uniqueness. Before passing away, Rumi essentially cursed Anna by labeling her as a failure because she hadn’t shown the art installation to Shiro, and refused to make Anna her successor. That will leave a hole in Anna’s soul that she’ll spend her whole life trying to fill. The more she tries to do that, the longer she’ll be trapped in this cycle of escaping Rumi’s shadow to become an authentic artist.
Shiro Freed Anna
Itaru had a voice of his own, which he could express through his photography, but he felt that that wasn’t enough. He wanted to paint and impress Shiro by showing him how the world looked through the eyes of a butterfly, as it was something that Shiro had dreamt of since he was a child and had failed to do himself. It’s evident that Itaru was never a part of Rumi’s art installation. Itaru came up with that idea of integrating himself into the project once it was complete and Anna had gone to the USA to tend to Rumi’s final rites. The only major issue here was that there was no way for Itaru to become a “human specimen” without somebody’s help. Again, things did get a little confusing here. So, what you are about to read is my understanding of the ending of Human Specimens. Itaru left a breadcrumb trail for Shiro so that he’d arrive at the villa and see what he and Anna had achieved, while also witnessing Rumi’s final gift to him. I don’t think that detailed documentation of the art installation was Itaru’s way of taking the fall for Anna or taking the credit for a project that was birthed out of Rumi’s mind and executed by him and Anna. If that was the case, he would have published it himself. Leaving all that stuff on his computer and in the red room allowed Shiro to frame himself as the sole architect of the project and take the fall for Anna, Rumi, and Itaru.
Sure, Shiro wasn’t entirely innocent himself, because he had killed Itaru and made him a part of that art installation. But his hands weren’t as bloody as those of those other three. Yes, you can argue that killing one person is as bad as killing five people. However, the point is that Shiro bore the brunt of the actions of other people as well as his own. Rumi never faced the consequences of her actions and died a saint. Itaru died as well. Anna walked away from the whole situation somewhat unscathed; I say “somewhat” because the psychological scarring will be permanent. Only Shiro faced the music and was forced to live with the memory of killing his own son. That said, was the idea of killing Itaru something that he came up with, or was he entertaining Itaru’s dying request? There’s no way to say for sure. We saw that, after Itaru completed the painting, which’d serve as the backdrop of his own corpse, he left a message for Shiro, asking his father to turn him into a specimen. But then he painted over that message. That’d mean Shiro never saw that message and instinctively integrated Itaru into that art project, took the blame for all the murders, and went to jail, where he’d rot for the rest of his life while the actual murderer, Anna, got off scot-free.
The Point Of The ‘Human Specimens’ Project
Now, I must ask: what was the point of all this? Well, in my opinion, I think this whole saga showed how pointless, and eventually dangerous, it is to attain the impossible, especially if you are doing it for someone else’s sake. I think Shiro’s father was the only artist who was truly free, because his art was personal, and he was happy with presenting it to the public and letting it be appreciated on its own merits. The same could be said about Shiro, because he knew that that “butterfly vision” was virtually impossible to attain. He studied butterflies. He lamented about not being able to see the world through that species’ eyes. However, he never went overboard with it. Itaru also didn’t harbor any kind of macabre dreams, but he had this deep-seated dissatisfaction that he couldn’t paint like his father or his grandfather and was only good at photographing what already existed in real life. He was never criticized for it. Actually, he was always lauded for the way he captured our mortal realm on film. For some reason, that wasn’t enough for Itaru, and his feelings of never having lived up to the expectations that he had for himself were exacerbated through Rumi’s art camp and his friendship with Anna. Sure, that “unlocked” his ability to paint, and it was lauded by Shiro as well, but was that worth it? The whole art installation became a crime scene and was probably dismantled so that it could be properly analyzed for evidence and the bodies could be buried or cremated, thereby making Rumi’s endeavor completely futile.
Rumi was the mirror opposite of Shiro. She had experienced the same things that Shiro had, but her tetrachromatic vision ignited a sense of duty in her that she had to fulfill something that her best friend, Shiro, couldn’t. Maybe that “sense of duty” came from a place of arrogance as well, because she had the power to see the world in a way nobody else could. That hubris increased with all the praise she got over the years, and that ultimately had a negative effect on her daughter. Shiro lived a low-key life, and despite going through so much hardship, he was able to make his son a functional human being. Rumi had everything that Shiro dreamt of, but she turned her daughter into a murderer. If Shiro had known what Rumi had become, maybe he would have kept Itaru away from her and her daughter. And the weird tragedy of this whole situation is that a father and a son’s lives got turned upside down because they associated themselves with a messed-up mother-daughter duo. Shiro understood that if he cursed Anna for what she had done, he’d be dooming the child. Hence, he underscored the fact that Anna had done what she had done because of Rumi, and that she was free to pave her own path now that that nightmare was over. Butterflies are synonymous with metamorphosis. So, in a way, Shiro ensured that at least one of their journeys was an extension of that metaphor. Whether or not Anna will make the most of the gift that’s been given to her by Shiro is a big, fat question mark, though. We can only hope that she’ll try for Shiro’s sake, thereby making his sacrifice somewhat worthwhile. Anyway, those are just my thoughts on Human Specimens. If you have any opinions on the same, feel free to share them in the comments section below.
