SEAN: Still June-ing, still dreaming.
J-Novel Club has digital manga and light novels. On the manga end, we get Animeta! 4 and Demon Lord, Retry! 2.
MICHELLE: I enjoy Animeta!, though I can’t really claim that it’s great.
ASH: I’ve been liking it, too.
SEAN: For light novels, there is the 6th The Combat Baker and Automaton Waitress, Outbreak Company 14, the 2nd in the Tales of Marielle Clarac series, The Beloved of Marielle Clarac, and The World’s Least Interesting Master Swordsman 3.
We’ll divide Kodansha into digital with print coming later, and just digital. For the former, we see the debut of Chobits: the 20th Anniversary Edition. One of CLAMP’s more problematic series… and that’s a pretty high bar… it’s still worth a read.
MICHELLE: I haven’t read Chobits in 17 years (I’m so old), so I think I might give it another look.
ASH: Chobits was the first CLAMP work that I read, so it holds a special place for me, problems and all.
MJ: Definitely not my favorite of CLAMP’s work, but I’m interested in what a 20th Anniversary Edition has to offer.
SEAN: There’s also Eden’s Zero 8 and Wotakoi: Love Is Hard for Otaku 4. Definitely looking forward to more Wotakoi.
MICHELLE: Me, too!
ASH: Yes! It seems like forever since the last omnibus. I’ve been enjoying the series a great deal.
ANNA: I’m OK with skipping it!
SEAN: The digital-only debut is Hop Step Sing!. A VR Idol story that lists ‘Kodansha’ as the creator of the original concept, its artist is best known for yuri works from Galette magazine. This runs in Comic Days, though, and is about a girl who becomes a VR Idol, unsurprisingly.
For ongoing digital-only, we see All-Out!! 14, Ex-Enthusiasts: Motokare Mania 4, Fairy Tail: Happy’s Heroic Adventure 4, The Hero Life of a (Self-Proclaimed) “Mediocre” Demon! 3, My Roomie Is a Dino 3, and Orient 3.
MICHELLE: Ex-Enthusiasts is enjoyable josei, so I’m looking forward to more of that.
SEAN: Seven Seas has a digital-first debut, The Legend of Dororo and Hyakkimaru. A retelling of the classic Tezuka story, the artist is known in the West for Attack on Titan: Before the Fall. A young man whose body is split into 48 pieces joins up with a thief to recover them. This runs in Akita Shoten’s Champion Red, but I will try not to hold that against it.
ASH: The original Dororo is a favorite of mine, so I’m very curious to see this version.
MJ: I’m also a big fan of Dororo, so this is interesting to me.
SEAN: Also debuting digitally first is Sarazanmai, the light novel based on the anime series that also spawned a manga prequel, which we’ve already talked about. It is, and I quote, an “action-filled LGBT comedy”.
ASH: Adding it to list of Sarazanmai media I need to catch up on!
MJ: I read very few light novels, but the description sounds great.
SEAN: Digitally first but not debuts are Blank Canvas 5 (the final volume) and Reincarnated As a Sword novel 6.
MICHELLE: Oh, I totally forgot about Blank Canvas! I need to read this.
ASH: It’s such a great series.
SEAN: SuBLime has a debut with Therapy Game. It’s a sequel to Secret XXX, and also runs in Shinshokan’s Dear+. It seems to involve casual sex, heartbreak, and revenge?
Also out from SuBLime is Caste Heaven 2.
Vertical has, digitally, the 4th Bakemonogatari manga, which starts the Suruga Monkey arc.
Viz’s debut is How Do We Relationship? (Tsukiatte Agete Mo Ii Ka Na), a yuri manga from Shogakukan’s Ura Sunday. Based on a doujinshi series, it apparently really gets into the messiness of dating between two young women. I have been looking forward to this one.
MICHELLE: Same.
ASH: Likewise!
MJ: This sounds great!
SEAN: There’s also Komi Can’t Communicate 7, the 2nd Pokemon Adventures Collector’s Edition, Requiem of the Rose King 12, and Sleepy Princess in the Demon Castle 12. Komi and Sleepy Princess have had a crossover between each other. I would not expect Richard from Rose King to appear in either of those series, however.
MICHELLE: *snerk*
ASH: Ha! Likely not. Though it has been known to have dream sequences…
MJ: Always here for the Rose King!
ANNA: Me too!
SEAN: Lastly, some Yen Press hangovers. The 2nd Collector’s Edition of Nightschool, and the third Toilet-Bound Hakano-kun in print.
ASH: I’m really liking Toilet-Bound Hakano-kun, so far!
SEAN: What manga are you burning the midnight lamp over?
Jocilyn Wagner says
June 4, 2020 at 11:36 pmI thought for a second she was wearing hakama. Now THAT would have put a whole new spin on “Ura Sunday”. Anyone else remember Marimite “Mekuru”?
Wait… 20 years?! Well, I guess it was prophetic. I did spend the last ten years saying “chi” over and over and over. ;)