(CR) Hataraku Saibou (Cells at Work!)

[blakstealth]

props to the show for almost making me feel sympathetic for cancer. nice try, but NK will always win! ;_;

[mangamuscle]

I think I found two mistakes in the episode (from my limited pool of knowledge):

1) Cancer cells need no oxygen (only nutrients).
2) Cancer cells are not born cancerous, but degenerate over time.

I could be wrong of course. Dunno if the part about the cancer cell wishing he had a normal life was inspired in research that point towards cancer cells reverting to normal. So the white blood cell saying "We (the human body) can't do anything but kill you" might be meant to mean ".... until science manages to revert cancer cells to normal":

Cancer cells revert to normal when signal goes below threshold, study finds

[SeijiSensei]

I thought his anger was mostly because his mutation happened by random chance and ostracized him for reasons beyond his control. He child self said more or less the same thing as I recall.

[Master_Yoma]

That poor cancer cells he just wanted to live its not his fault that he mutated but have to say Macrophage got on good arm

Finely get to see the platelets again

[Dark Wing]

No matter how sympathetic they try to make it cancer is a monster and needs to be put down for good of the body.

[Wandering Soul]

I applaud the attempt to make cancer sympathetic, but in the end it is still something that can ruin someone's life and needs to eliminated.

[Liddo-kun]

Watched episode 7:

Sad that some cells turn to cancer. Well. they have to be killed or the body would die. And we once again have a short encounter with the adorable platelets. hnnng kawaii ^^

[Ultragunner]

Originally Posted by mangamuscle

I think I found two mistakes in the episode (from my limited pool of knowledge):

1) Cancer cells need no oxygen (only nutrients).
2) Cancer cells are not born cancerous, but degenerate over time.

I could be wrong of course. Dunno if the part about the cancer cell wishing he had a normal life was inspired in research that point towards cancer cells reverting to normal. So the white blood cell saying "We (the human body) can't do anything but kill you" might be meant to mean ".... until science manages to revert cancer cells to normal":

Cancer cells revert to normal when signal goes below threshold, study finds

about the two:

1) It's not like cancer cells need no oxygen, they can live with oxygen AND without.

2) Cells are "born" mostly via division/proliferation when "errors" are mostly like to occur, so yes some cells are "born" with defects that have the potential to cause cancer. On the other hand, cells can "degenerate" over time due to some trigger e.g. radiation, viral infection (HPV). BUT ultimately the cells need to be able to pass down the "errors" to be considered "cancer cells"

TL;DR: individual cells does not necessarily cause cancer by degrading themselves, in most cases they "errors" have to be accumulated over the generations of cells

TL;DR: cancer is incredibly complex, and the exact mechanism is still being heavily researched. IMO, we just need to know that cancer is "abnormal cell growth with the ability to invade other parts of the body" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer)

[Dengar]

I don't see any problem with showing sympathy for a cancer cell.

I think people may mistake what it means to show sympathy. It doesn't mean condoning their actions. It simply means that you understand their circumstances and what leads them to do what they do. And in the end, cancer cells really just do what they're programmed to do. That leaves them at odds with the rest of the body, sure, and obviously they need to be eradicated for the body to survive, but that doesn't mean it's impossible to show some sympathy.

[Ultragunner]

yes, even in reality cancer cells are just the unfortunate results/byproduct of the body function

cancer is a terrible illness, but what and how it came about is most tragic a.k.a the body’s own cells mutate, put everything in harm’s way, and mist be put down

[zeross87]

that totally felt like an end-of-season episode.

[James Rye]

Originally Posted by zeross87

that totally felt like an end-of-season episode.

Well, he did say he would return so you can guess the final will be against Cancer-Cell-kun again, but this time probably even more serious than in this episode.

[Vallen Chaos Valiant]

Originally Posted by Ultragunner

yes, even in reality cancer cells are just the unfortunate results/byproduct of the body function

cancer is a terrible illness, but what and how it came about is most tragic a.k.a the body’s own cells mutate, put everything in harm’s way, and mist be put down

I am more amazed at the number of people who wanted to portray cancer as evil incarnate.

In the end, cancer is just cells reverting to their ancient unicellular roots. The origin of life, that of single cells taking whatever it can, divide as fast as it can, and die once it can't handle the mess anymore. This was how life began, and thus it is inevitable during random mutations that cells sometimes go primitive. It isn't good or bad, it is just not compatible with multicellular organisms.

The urge to portray cancer as evil is entirely groundless. Cancer doesn't know what it does would get itself killed one way or another, it just doesn't know when to stop.

[Tenzen12]

People just take whole thing personally, because said multicellular organism happen to be us at times. You can't expect your regular Joe to be objective about it

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Vallen Chaos Valiant

I am more amazed at the number of people who wanted to portray cancer as evil incarnate.

In the end, cancer is just cells reverting to their ancient unicellular roots. The origin of life, that of single cells taking whatever it can, divide as fast as it can, and die once it can't handle the mess anymore. This was how life began, and thus it is inevitable during random mutations that cells sometimes go primitive. It isn't good or bad, it is just not compatible with multicellular organisms.

The urge to portray cancer as evil is entirely groundless. Cancer doesn't know what it does would get itself killed one way or another, it just doesn't know when to stop.

That's rather like saying that personification of any cell is groundless. It's true, but it's denying the entire premise of the series.

(And the point isn't that cancer is evil incarnate. The point is that they're just cells, and detrimental to the organism. If the ep tugged at your heart-strings, it's fine, but it didn't tug at mine.)

[Vallen Chaos Valiant]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

That's rather like saying that personification of any cell is groundless. It's true, but it's denying the entire premise of the series.

(And the point isn't that cancer is evil incarnate. The point is that they're just cells, and detrimental to the organism. If the ep tugged at your heart-strings, it's fine, but it didn't tug at mine.)

Japanese Cancer researcher's twitter posts about this episode.

My point is that the show portray cancer accurately, even a Japanese cancer researcher applauded the show's portrayal. And to portray cancer as evil would make no sense.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Vallen Chaos Valiant

Japanese Cancer researcher's twitter posts about this episode.

My point is that the show portray cancer accurately, even a Japanese cancer researcher applauded the show's portrayal. And to portray cancer as evil would make no sense.

I'd call it an argument from authority, except I'm not sure what you're trying to argue. Is a cancer evil? No, but neither is S. aureus.

[~Yami~]

I think the only false thing from this episode is that they didn't show the right way to summon other immune cells
Red Blood Cells could not summon other white blood cells in cancer battle
it should be cytokines that produced by NK cells, killer T, or Neutrophile

anyway, cancer cells could not be eradicated completely like what this episode stated
so cancer cells would return one day

[Itlandm]

Most mutant cells actually commit suicide when told to, but I can totally see why that was not shown in a program for a younger audience, and where the cells are depicted as humans. I am sure many young people could sympathize with the juvenile misfit even in this episode, and depicting suicide as the better option would send a very disturbing message. Even so, this is how most pre-cancerous cells end their lives. Only a few - usually after several generations of copying errors - become what we think of as cancer.

[James Rye]

Found this picture which shows our favorite cells in their natural size in our body:

Spoiler for Maid-san is yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyhhhhhhhhhhhhhuuuuuuuugeeeeeee~: