This timeline covers Naoki Urasawa's Monster, from the first volume to the last.
Each event is dated as precisely as possible : either with the exact day date, or with a general indication (the year or the month of the event). An event preceded by a (?) is an event that can't be dated precisely : its date is my best guess based on the date of the other events. I intentionally chose to use the volumes as the only reference : I didn't use any information from Another Monster (except one : Tenma's birth date) since it isn't available legally for most readers of the series and since a few events' dates are not coinciding with the manga's timeline (for example, the Lieberts murder logically takes places in September of 1986 in the manga but is dated differently in Another Monster).
Your
comments and feedbacks are welcome, whether they are about some chronogical mistake or question, or some language correction (I translated the timeline from French to English, which isn't my native language so it may contain numerous grammatical or structural mistakes...
Since I had to put a lot of work and time into this timeline (collecting every event by re-reading each volume in details, finding and editing the proper pictures to illustrate the events, putting the timeline into effect, and then translating it from French to English) the best appreciation you could show for my work would be to share it with other Urasawa addicts, and to join our boards to discuss Naoki Urasawa's works! We have opened an English-speaking section and we would love to discuss Urasawa's mangas with international readers!
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How to use the timeline?
You can scroll the timeline, whether by dragging the events to the left of your screen with the mouse or by pulling the grey square beneath it. :
To change the timeline's display, use the Settings button on the far right bottom : 
You now have 4 options: :
- a Search engine that allows you to find every hit of a particular word. I highly recommend that you use this Search engine to access all the events of certain categories : the timeline's system is not made for timelines with lots of categories so they do not all appear... For example, if you want to look at all the "Richard Braun" events, just type "Richard" in the Search engine.
- a Categories option that allows you to display the events depending on a certain criteria or, on the contrary, to mix multiples categories to see how they intertwine as time goes by. It's even more useful if you want to see how different characters' paths evolve in parallel. This option is sometimes inevitable to display ALL the events regarding a character. For example, Johan's path can only be seen entirely by displaying two Categories : "Johan Liebert", and "The twins".
- a View type option, which allows you to choose your type of displaypermet de choisir le mode d'affichage de son choix. The « Category bands » is particularly useful to put some events in perspective, as you can see below :
- a Zoom
There is a total of 16 categories, each having its specific color :
- Kenzô Tenma
- Johan Liebert
- Anna/Nina
- The twins : all the key events regarding both Johan and Anna/Nina, including every event involving their mother
- Inspector Lunge
- Eva Heinemann
- Wolfgang Grimmer
- Roberto
- Franz Bonaparta
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Peter Çapek
- Margot Langer/Halenka Novakova
- Karl/Hans Georg Schuwald
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Richard Braun
- Martin
- Historical Event : the real crucial historical events
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Diverse : all the events that don't fit into any of the previous categories
Chronogical mistakes
There are only few (two), especially regarding the story's complexity but one of the two is quite important :
- The first meeting between Peter Çapek and Franz Bonaparta is not dated precisely. Yet it necessarily takes place before 1969 since Çapek mentions Bonaparta to Milan that year. However, when Çapek meets Bonaparta for the first time, Bonaparta gives him his three picture books : The God of Peace, The boy with the big eyes and The boy with the big mouth, and A Nameless Monster... It's chronologically impossible since, if The God of Peace has indeen been published in 1966, the other two picture books were published in 1973 and 1977. They didn't even exist when Çapek and Bonaparta met!
- The biggest mistake concerns the twins' departure from the Three Frogs after the apartment's fire. Both these events happen in 1981 , they are clearly dated in the manga. The twins are then supposed to walk to the border separating Czechoslovakia and Germany, where they are rescued and taken by General Wolf. Yet, Wolf's first meeting with the twins is systematically dated of 1984. Which means three fulls years would have passed between the twins' escape from the Three Frogs and their meeting with Wolf... which isn't realistic at all, especially when you consider that they wear the same clothes after the Three Frogs fire and when Wolf takes them. The 1984 date is clearly a chronogical mistake from Urasawa.
To solve this mistake, we could guess that Wolf does indeed take the twins in 1981 and immediately puts them in Kinderheim 511. Yet, he does make a big change in the manga's story since it would mean that Johan would spend 4 years (instead of 1) in Kinderheim 511, before leading to its destruction.
See also : Billy Bat's complete timeline (in French only)
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Illustrations/pictures© Naoki Urasawa/Studio Nuts/Shôgakukan/Kôdansha | Timeline and text © Alexis Orsini
