Discussion, Resources, Roundtables, & Reviews
Before Halloween week is officially over, it seems prudent to take advantage of this last opportunity to get our creep on. To that end, this week’s Saturday Spotlight archive post comes from Soliloquy in Blue’s Let’s Get Visual column, in which Michelle and I talk about what gives us “the jibblies,” featuring pages and panels from After School Nightmare, Tokyo Babylon, Pandora Hearts, and Junji Ito’s short manga story “The Enigma of Amigara Fault.”
Come take a look at what scares us!
MJ: Good morning, Michelle! I’ve just returned from a long walk with the dog, and the brisk weather has made my hands stiff. It’s hard to type! I hope a hot cup of coffee will warm them up quickly.
MICHELLE: I’ve not been outside yet, but it’s looking more foggy than brisk. But so long as it doesn’t rain, I am content. Is it your turn to go first? What have you been reading this week?
MJ: Ah, ha! It is not my turn! And so I turn the microphone back to you. What have you been reading?
MICHELLE: Curses, foiled again! I suppose I have no choice but to talk about… Puzzles on an Isolated Island! This series debuted recently on JManga with relatively little fanfare, but once I noticed it was both shoujo and a mystery, I decided to check it out. Alas, it turned out to have the same problems other mysteries in manga form also struggle with.
First, the premise. Alice Arisugawa (male) is a second-year university student who belongs to his school’s mystery novel club, along with level-headed senior Jiro Egami and enthusiastic fellow second-year Maria Arima. When Maria shows the group a treasure map inherited from her puzzle-loving grandfather, with a wealth of diamonds as the prize, the trio ends up journing to Kashiki Island, where the Arima family has a villa, to attempt to solve the puzzle. Instead of being motivated by the diamonds, however, Maria mainly wants to finish the task that her cousin died attempting three years previously.
When they get to the “isolated” island, they find about a dozen different Arima family members and friends. In the grand tradition of mystery manga like Case Closed, each of these characters is introduced with a box stating their name and occupation. None of them has any depth whatsoever, though we do get a few clues about which pair used to be lovers, or which guy doesn’t get along with his father-in-law. Soon enough, a typhoon rolls in and a murderer uses the cover of a back door slamming in the wind to kill a pair of guests with a rifle. The deaths are utterly unaffecting, not just to readers but to the characters as well, who rather emotionlessly begin trying to solve the case. The one spark of warmth comes from Alice himself, who is beginning to realize that he may have feelings for Maria.
Puzzles on an Isolated Island is a short series, complete in three volumes, and for that reason I’ll probably read the other two volumes just to see how it ends. I’m always excited by mystery manga, but in the end I simply must conclude that prose really does have the advantage where mysteries are concerned.
MJ: That’s so interesting, because other than the evidence at hand, it doesn’t seem like it should be difficult to write a good mystery in graphic novel form, does it? Am I missing an obvious shortcoming of the medium?
MICHELLE: Maybe because of the way manga is consumed, creators are trying to move the story along more swiftly. And so, in order to do that, things like character get sacrificed in favor of clues and theorizing. Maybe one day we’ll get a deliciously long-form mystery manga—heck, maybe something like that exists already that I just don’t know about—which will prove me wrong (and happily so).
Anyway, now I can ask you what you’ve been reading this week!
MJ: You can indeed, and I’ll even tell you! One of my debut reads this week was the first volume of Yen Press’ The Infernal Devices: Clockwork Angel, adapted from Cassandra Clare’s novel, with art by Hyekyung Baek.
Set as a prequel to Clare’s series, The Mortal Instruments, The Infernal Devices takes place over 100 years earlier, in Victorian England. Its first novel, Clockwork Angel, tells the story of Tessa Gray, a young woman who leaves New York to join her brother Nate in London, after the death of their aunt, with whom Tessa has lived since she and Nate lost their parents. When she arrives, she is informed that her brother has sent two women to meet her in his place, followed by a couple of fairly rude awakenings—the cold weather and her imminent kidnapping. The women lock her up and subject her to a series of experiments intended to force Tessa into using a special talent she was not even aware she possessed—the ability to change her shape into that of another person, living or dead, by holding an object that belongs to them.
Fortunately, Tessa’s captivity ends relatively quickly, as she’s rescued by a brash seventeen-year-old named Will Herondale, part of a group of “Shadowhunters,” who fight demons in the mortal world. Will takes Tessa back to the Shadowhunters’ “Institute,” where Tessa learns more about her abilities and suffers further shock when she eventually discovers her brother’s true motivations.
As a fan of supernatural shoujo manga, a story like The Infernal Devices contains nearly everything I’m most accustomed to as a reader. It’s got a slew of attractive characters with various supernatural abilities, a lovely period setting, and two rival love interests—one dark and dangerous, one comfortable and kind. Both love interests have poignant histories, of course, and both are extremely pretty. The trappings are so perfect, in fact, they come very close to feeling contrived. Fortunately, Clare just manages to save her story with some genuinely interesting characterization. And though Tessa begins as a bit of a cipher, she gains some real agency as the story goes on, and even pulls out the trick that saves the day at the end of the first volume.
Less fortunately, the series’ Victorian setting inevitably invites comparison with Yen’s other recent supernatural novel adaptation, Gail Carriger’s Soulless, which is far stronger—or at least makes a stronger impression with its debut volume. Like The Infernal Devices, Soulless introduces a supernatural society within its historical setting, complete with a sexy love interest (just one in Carriger’s case) and the usual romantic elements, but Soulless‘ awesomely capable heroine, Alexia, blows poor Tessa away. Hopefully The Infernal Devices‘ next volume will help narrow that gap a bit.
MICHELLE: I confess that I couldn’t get beyond the summary on this one, mostly because I am so beyond weary of supernatural organizations with names like “the Shadowhunters.” I got to that point and went, “Ugh, no.” I’m glad to hear that it’s better than I’d expected, though!
MJ: I can definitely relate to your weariness, and it was rather grudgingly that I accepted my own enjoyment of this volume. I think you’d enjoy it, too!
So, once again we have a mutual read on the docket for this week. Michelle, would you like to do the introductory honors?
MICHELLE: I will give it a whirl!
So, this week we both checked out the new 2-in-1 omnibus reissue of Yun Kouga’s Loveless, formerly licensed by TOKYOPOP and recently rescued by VIZ. In addition to continuing the series from where it left off with their release of volume nine, VIZ is also going back and publishing the first eight volumes, as well. I had a few volumes of this hanging around from the TOKYOPOP days, but had never read them, so this was a great opportunity to finally check things out. Going into this, I knew three things about Loveless: 1. There is a boy with cat ears, and these ears will vanish along with his virginity. 2. This boy’s elder brother has died. 3. This boy gets into suggestive situations with an adult guy who was a friend of his brother. And, really, that about sums it up, though there are nuances to embellish upon.
Ritsuka Aoyagi is twelve and has just transferred into a new school. He’s blunt and standoffish and has more than his share of problems. His mother is crazy and abusive and has refused to believe for the past couple of years that Ritsuka is really her son. Seimei, Ritsuka’s older brother, used to act as a buffer, but now he is gone, murdered by an organization called Septimal Moon. It’s this loneliness that leads Ritsuka to come to depend so much on Soubi, his brother’s former partner in the battle against said organization. Soubi’s a college student, and he and Ritsuka get very close very quickly. Though Ritsuka is upset to learn that Seimei commanded Soubi to love Ritsuka, he can’t help wanting to see him. Aside from a couple of brief kisses, their relationship is chaste, and Soubi claims not to have sexual interest in someone Ritsuka’s age, but it is kind of disturbing all the same.
Balancing this out is Ritsuka’s growing friendship with Yuiko, a cheerful girl who was determined to befriend him no matter how many times he rebuffed her. She’s the bright spot in the manga, though I get the feeling some Tohru Honda-esque tragedy in her backstory is just around the corner.
MJ: Well done! I have a feeling I’m enjoying this series more than you are, but given some of the relationship stuff, this doesn’t really surprise me. And on that note, I’ll jump right into the sort-of-disturbing relationship between Ritsuka and Soubi. While I certainly had the initial reaction of, “Whoa… this is kind of creepy,” I ultimately found it… well, really not very creepy at all, which led me to analyzing why that might be—and I think I figured it out!
More than anything, the Soubi/Ritsuka dynamic reminds me of a slightly more explicit (and by “explicit” I really just mean that they’ve kissed) version of the relationship between Shugo Chara!‘s eleven-year-old heroine, Amu, and high school senior Ikuto, who is set up from the beginning as a viable love interest (and eventually really becomes one later on). The main reason that Amu and Ikuto’s relationship never felt creepy to me is that it feels like the kid‘s fantasy, not the adult’s. Young girls will always fantasize about older boys/men, and in both Shugo Chara! and Loveless, one of the ways in which it seems to be clearly the younger character’s fantasy, is that it’s the older character (and only the older character) who is sexualized. Both Amu and Ritsuka are drawn as regular kids—there are no (in Amu’s case) panty shots or skimpy outfits or strategically “sexy” camera angles. They look like kids and they act like kids, and there’s nothing sexualized about it. The older characters, on the other hand, are the ones who receive the shoujo fanservice treatment. They are pretty and lithe and attractively fashionable. They glide around in a catlike manner, looking pretty as girls in the manner of nearly every teen idol in history. We’re asked to find them sexy and intriguing, but they ultimately feel safe in some way. It’s a young girl’s fantasy, through and through. The only real difference here is the addition of a BL element, which just kinda reveals Kouga’s personal proclivities more than anything else.
And speaking of Kouga’s proclivities… wow there is a lot going on here. There’s so much going on, in fact, that it comes close to being a train wreck, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned over the past few years, it’s that there is no train wreck I love more than a Yun Kouga train wreck. And this, I think, really comes down to characterization. Like a couple of my other Kouga favorites, Crown of Love and (the very different) Gestalt, the strength of the story is that everyone is really interesting. Even when she’s adhering to standard tropes (in this case, BL and shoujo tropes), Kouga doesn’t write standard characters. Everyone in Loveless is kind of a weirdo, in the same way as most actual people are weirdos. They have layers of sometimes-contradictory issues, little idiosyncrasies, both attractive and unattractive flaws—and these are all a real part of the story.
I’ll just pick a couple of my favorite characters here, beginning with Yuiko, whom you also like. I rather adore Yuiko, who at first appears to be a sort of standard “dumb girl” character, set up to help us root for the BL relationship, but really, she’s seriously awesome. She has her own quirks and her own complicated personal life, but she’s a true friend to Ritsuka and obviously someone who can be counted on. I fell for her immediately. Also, I’m very fond of Ritsuka himself, whose plight is really pretty awful. Not only has he taken over his brother’s role as a “sacrifice” in this supernatural battle of words he’s suddenly a part of, but his “true” name, “Loveless,” stands in painful contrast to his brother’s, “Beloved.” And this is the life he’s lived for the past few years, too. Having completely lost the memory of whomever “Ritsuka” was before, he lives with his mother’s grief over that loss every day, to the point that he’s started to believe that he somehow deserves her abuse, while also feeling a combination of terror and relief over the prospect that he, the current version of Ritsuka, might just disappear at any moment. His obsession with taking photos of everyone in his life and “making memories” with them is so desperate and poignant, I could die.
Obviously I’m liking this series a lot, heh. Which is odd, perhaps, but not unexpected, given its source.
MICHELLE: Though I was a bit snarky in my introduction, the truth is that I actually really am enjoying this, too. You’re absolutely right about all of the characters being interesting, and I too find the way Ritsuka perks up at the prospect of making memories (even with people he doesn’t really like) to be completely endearing. I like, too, that instead of being angry at his mom for her treatment of him, as my logical adult mind would dictate, he’s still extremely concerned for her and worries about what will happen to her if even this version of Ritsuka should disappear. He endures her abuse—sidebar: grr, I hate his useless father, who refuses to intervene—and yet comes away from that with the absolute conviction that he is never going to raise his hand against anyone.
Y’know, it occurs to me this is somewhat the opposite of Puzzles on an Isolated Island. Where that series is low on character, high on clues, Loveless is strong on character, and not forthcoming at all with clues. After two volumes, we still know practically nothing about Septimal Moon, or what the “plot” really is, but who cares? It’s still absorbing because of the characters. It’s not unlike Pandora Hearts in that way.
MJ: Yes! The father! Ugh. I’m so with you on that. And you make an excellent comparison there between Loveless and Puzzles on an Isolated Island, and also Pandora Hearts. I guess it’s obvious by now that out of those scenarios, I can get by on a skimpy (or confusing) plot more easily than I can on skimpy characterization, which makes me easy prey for a writer like Yun Kouga. I admit I kinda can’t wait for more.
MICHELLE: Even though I might be a little more restless for info—and a little more creeped out by… you know, I’m not sure it’s even Ritsuka and Soubi’s relationship so much as certain panels depicting them—I am generally quite content with the blend of elements in Loveless. Pleasantly surprised, really. I guess this is a case of us not knowing what we were missing ’til it wasn’t missing anymore!
MJ: Well said, Michelle!
By Shimura Takako. Released in Japan by Enterbrain, serialization ongoing in the magazine Comic Beam. Released in North America by Fantagraphics.
One of the things that impresses me most about this manga is how much everything seems to be in flux. Nitori and Takatsuki’s gender identity disorder is the most obvious, but nothing else seems to be clear-cut at all, just as kids feel right around middle school. In this volume we see their secret get revealed to the class, and though a majority of the fallout focuses on Nitori and Takatsuki’s feelings, we also get to see how it affects people like Sasa, who’s just concerned that her friends are all pulling apart, or Seya, who’s falling for Nitori without really knowing the truth, but whose feelings continue to be an issue even after he finds out.
We also meet a new character, Makoto, who takes a surprisingly large role in this volume. He’s surprisingly mature, being a bit more confident in his desires, more ‘intellectual’ in his speech and manners (watch his cutting remarks to Maho when she’s about to insult him), and no doubt also far more emotionally fragile than he lets on. He reminds me a bit of Saori, but she still wears her heart on her sleeve. He’s also shown to be quite attracted to Nitori, which is something we haven’t really gotten into given the age of the protagonists, but no doubt will as the manga advances. What will happen when sexuality starts to come up?
I was pleased to see us moving beyond the school in this volume, with Maho dragging her brother along to her modeling audition. I continue to enjoy reading about Maho, a very ‘bratty big sister’ character whose head you can nevertheless easily get inside. Loneliness and lack of self-confidence lead to some of the more impressively awful scenes in the book, as she sets up Seya on a ‘not date’ with her brother dressed as a girl. That said, after Makoto dresses her down, I think she’s starting to think more about what she’s doing. The final scene, showing her and Nitori defending each other against the overly pushy modeling crowd, is quite heartwarming.
Then there’s the scene with Takatsuki and Yuki. This is a manga that takes place in a slightly lighter, fluffier world than reality, so things don’t turn too dark, and there’s a sense of ‘easily forgiven’ to the whole thing. At the same time, though, Takatsuki’s panic and fear is palpable on the page, and reminds you once again that these are just *kids*. Yuki’s behavior also ties in with Maho’s earlier, and the modeling girls at the end, in that they’re treating Nitori and Takatsuki as objects, even if it’s unconsciously. Takatsuki, who’s already upset that they both got found out but that Nitori is taking the brunt of the class’ reaction, is especially upset by this. Neither she or Nitori are dolls that people can play with as they please, or substitutes that they can live vicariously through.
It took a while for me to get around to reading this volume, but as always I was immensely impressed when I finished it. As I said, this isn’t quite ‘reality’, but it still handles everything realistically, and shows the emotions that everyone goes through. The middle school years are a giant state of flux, and therefore a great place to examine the gender issues that Wandering Son does. Roll on, Volume Four.
SEAN: We’re back with another edition of JManga the Week of! And there are some great new digital titles hitting the site next week.
TAVERNA, Dark Cooking Club of St.George’s Girls’ School is such an awkward mouthful that it can only be a 4-koma series from our friends at Takeshobo. And indeed it is, running in the magazine Manga Life Win. Vol. 2 is out next week. It seems to be a cooking manga, only moe! … Do those two audiences even cross?
MJ: 4-koma tends to lean towards the “miss” side of hit-or-miss with me, but I’m usually willing to give it a try. Usually. We’ll see. The “cooking” bit does give it an edge—which is odd, actually, since I hate cooking.
MICHELLE: Yeah, I’m pretty wary, but the cooking part is at least kind of different.
SEAN: A Kiss on Tearful Cheeks is the 2nd title from Futabasha’s Comic Mahou no Island in 2 weeks, but this one seems to be slightly less off-putting than My Sadistic Boyfriend. Despite apparently starring a girl who can’t stop crying. Vol. 4 is out next week.
MJ: Oooooh, I just don’t know if I can take all the crying. I just don’t know.
MICHELLE: Ugh. I am totally making gross assumptions here, but I predict that the boyfriend makes her cry (or that she invents reasons for herself to cry) and then ends up repeatedly comforting her. It just sounds so dreary and, like, spirit-sapping. No thanks.
SEAN: The big debut title for me next week is Sekine’s Love, a josei-ish title that runs in Ohta Shuppan’s sui generis manga magazine Manga Erotics F. It’s a title about a stoic and unemotional man who starts trying to find someone who can make him feel. The audience, meanwhile, is attracted to him because his indifference is hilarious. I’ve heard great things about this, can’t wait to give it a read. (And no, it’s not – to my knowledge – BL.)
MJ: What readers don’t know, is that Sean sent out a pre-column email of squee over this title earlier today. And reading this, I’m inclined to agree with him. I’ll definitely be checking this out!
MICHELLE: I had never heard of this one prior to this afternoon, but it does sound intriguing. I guess JManga is trying to cover their bases—moe fans, check! Black Bird-type relationship fans, check! People who are weary of those other things and want something unique, check!
SEAN: Also, when finding the cover art for this post, I noted the cover says “A gentleman good at knitting is not good at knitting the love!” Is this the anti-Ninja Papa?
I know very little indeed about pupa, except that its title is in lower case and it’s from Earth Star Entertainment, whom JManga have done several series with recently. Judging from the cover, I’m guessing fantasy?
MJ: Looks kind of interesting, actually. Is that a teddy bear in there?
MICHELLE: I am just distracted by the title on this one.
SEAN: And Tokyo Girls Destruction is by Court Bettan, author of the cancelled Tokyopop series Harukaze Bitter Bop. It’s from Mag Garden, running in their seinen magazine Beat\’s (no, not a typo, that’s how it looks). It would appear to be another in a long line of Battle Royale clones, featuring cute girls all beating the crap out of each other.
MJ: Zzzzzzzzzzzz…
MICHELLE: For, like, half a second I though this was some kind of 51 Ways to Save Her series. Alas, ’twas not to be.
Though Twitter tends to be the social media platform of choice for manga bloggers and other industry folks, manga fans can be found all over, sharing their love of the medium in a multitude of ways. While text-heavy communities like LiveJournal (and its many clones) provide the best tools for sharing things like fanfiction and thinky meta essays, manga’s visual nature lends itself especially well to image-friendly platforms like Tumblr and Pinterest.
Sharing scanned images of manga online is a controversial pastime for sure, as huge “scanlation” aggregators invite intense scrutiny from the industry—both here and in Japan—and there is no doubt that the climate on this issue is tense. Manga Bookshelf bloggers have occasionally weighed in on the subject (and I, for one, have little interest in pursuing the argument further). But what discussion of scans generally does not include, is the sharing of isolated images—something we indulge in here at Manga Bookshelf as well. After all, who can deny the power of a single, glorious image, and the pure, fannish joy to be gleaned from same?
For those with an interest in sharing fannish manga joy on a regular basis, here are some suggestions to start!
Matsumoto Reiji from Fey Yes Vintage Manga on Tumblr
Browsing through the manga tag on Tumblr will provide enough images for a lifetime, but my own tastes lead me to a few particular favorites.
For fans of classic manga (and especially classic shoujo and josei) Tumblr is the place to be, with blogs like Feh Yes Vintage Manga and Classic Shoujo offering up scrumptious goodness daily.
Fans of the five-woman creative powerhouse CLAMP can get their fill at House of CLAMP and Hell Yeah CLAMP. Or for a bit more variety in medium, Unknownusername.
And back to classic manga, Osamu Tezuka’s panels is not to be missed!
On Pinterest:
Pinterest user Mariko Kato has some gorgeous images to share from artists like Akino Kondoh and Junji Ito.
Fans of horror manga will find fantastic imagery on offer from users Paper Wasp and Alexandra Zobenko.
For a very different, shoujo-friendly feel, try September Craft, who apparently shares my love for Nana Osaki.
For some eye candy that moves beyond just manga artwork, publisher Vertical, Inc. is active on Pinterest! Boards include Vertical Cooks, Vertical Fan Art, and Aranzi Aranzo.
Please feel free to share your favorite manga-sharing folks here in comments. Follow and enjoy!
Codename: Sailor V, Vol. 2 | By Naoko Takeuchi | Published by Kodansha Comics USA | Rated: T, Ages 13+
Oh, ho. What a difference a few months make. I had planned to review the second volume of Codename: Sailor V right after I reviewed the first. Then, Sailor Moon became more important to read and review, so Minako’s final solo mission was put to one side. Now that I’m officially taking a breather from Sailor Moon (it’ll be back later this month) and making time for other stuff, I want to get Sailor V out of the way first. Not that it’s a chore to read it—in many ways it is like its sister series in terms of execution—but the tone is different between the two leads.
In our last volume with Sailor Venus, a twofold structure is in place. One constitutes the bulk of the volume and is completely deceptive as to the volume’s true intentions. The other is examined near the end of the book and sets up the story to be continued on a grander scale. To explain, we get Mina fighting crime and villains for the most part—and yes, whether it’s DeVleene with her evil fattening chocolates (shame on thee!) or the Atavistic family of Nyan-Nyan, Wan-Wan and Chu-Chu (some mothers do have them), she dishes out the smite most excellently. She takes all of this in stride, all the while whining and complaining to Artemis, her familiar, about everything. At the end of the DeVleene chapter, we get a glimpse of a character who will trigger the other plot restructuring, Phantom Ace. As the final chapters started, I had no idea that Takeuchi would pull the rug from under me and ramp up some drama and heartstrings being pulled. She hadn’t done it for the whole of the other volume, so I wasn’t paying attention. When she showed Phantom Ace looking like Tuxedo Mask, I should have known what she was up to.
In many ways, I wish that Sailor V had been like this from the beginning, with some kind of gravitas to anchor the story. But then I remember that before Venus (spoilers) joins the rest of the Sailor Senshi in Sailor Moon, the girls treat Sailor V as a hero and a very serious character. So without having the Sailor V series be goofy by default, it would have been weird for Takeuchi NOT to portray Venus as a goofball to begin with and then, as she matures, the serious girl that she is. Plus when the aforementioned serious arc starts in Sailor V, all of Mina’s notions about what exactly she is destined for change for the better, but not without a bittersweet cruelty to proceedings. Mina HAS to have these challenges or what does she want to fight for? Certainly not for boys or fame, both of which she chased and lost and laughed off—but only at the end of her journey does she see how far she’s come.
This made me ask the question, to myself at least, what is the heroine/hero in a story of destiny? Is she the instrument of destiny or the catalyst of destiny? Where does her free will stop and the path of the “chosen one” come into play? If Mina had not found Artemis that day, would Artemis have sought her out anyway? If the Boss (whom we never meet at all, strange that) had not pushed Artemis to accept Mina despite her spacey moments and her reckless attitude, would Mina have succeeded? I suspect that that Mina would have become a Sailor Senshi anyway, but her journey would have been longer. She has all the talents to be one; all she needed was to accept her destiny. In the end, though, she has to make the decision to accept it. This brings me to the destiny that is revealed to her at the end. It’s not as bad a destiny as some shoujo heroines get saddled with. Certainly it sets her up for the awesome nature of being a Sailor Guardian. But still, the mantle of responsibility has a downside.
Artwork-wise, I find that Takeuchi has clean lines and excellent design work especially when she has Mina transform into whatever disguise she needs to use and with the costumes the villains wear. Things get a little busy in the crowds scenes and yes, I still have difficulty following some of the action, but it’s more manageable than in Sailor Moon. The translations by William Flanagan are excellent and he gives us a healthy dose of reference notes at the end of the book. I’m really spoiled by the level of the work.
In the end, I would say that in order to get a complete picture of the whole Sailor Moon manga experience, Codename: Sailor V is required reading. It sets up parts of the story that the reader will recognize from the main series. It also provides a fully detailed origin story for a team member other than Usagi. Not that Usagi’s origin is more or less important than Mina’s. But this is Mina’s story, full stop. You don’t need to read it to enjoy Sailor Moon—the other saga being self contained. But this is a nice arc for a character who starts out as slightly ditzy and a klutz but who takes on the whole ball of wax in regards to knowing what her path looks like and what it will take to walk it. It’s definitely not what it appeared to be in its first volume and it is a rare thing indeed for me to find a manga where I kinda liked the main character but totally got them after only two volumes. Still, however serious the last parts become, the title remains fun until the end. Mina makes me laugh as she commits crimes against basic logic and sense. As I sit reading while my family and friends talk or move around me, Mina’s silliness lets me forget my troubles for awhile. I laugh at Mina, reply to a question someone in the room asked me, and then go back eagerly to see what Mina’s going to do next. My advice: buy the two volumes, have fun and go from there.
SEAN: Hello, and welcome to Manga The Week Of: Expanded Version! We liked chattering about JManga so much that we decided to let it carry over into my regular feature. So pull up a chair, sit back, it’s the first week of the month, so Midtown’s list is… tiny.
Oh dear, they’re doing it again. (Note: as of 5pm Wednesday. If they update their list again later, this is all irrelevant). Sometimes Viz shows up late to Midtown. No idea if it’s due to Hurricane Sandy, Diamond, or mere happenstance. As it happens, I checked with my own comic store, and they seem to be getting in Viz’s 11/6 releases on 11/6. So I will proceed to break them down here as well, assuming most comic shops not affected by possible Sandy distribution delays will get them.
But first, our fine folks at Kodansha have some stuff coming out! Actually, it came out everywhere else today. But when you’re Diamond Comics Distributors, you can … well, do whatever you want. So they ship Kodansha a week late.
In any case, Air Gear 26 is out, continuing the great Air Gear tradition.
Mardock Scramble continues our 6 theme by having Vol. 6 out.
MJ: I am several volumes behind on Mardock Scramble, but I really liked it early on. Should I try to catch up? Anyone have an opinion?
MICHELLE: I find the concept interesting, but never started it and thusly haven’t bought beyond the first couple of volumes. Also, “the great Air Gear tradition” made me snicker.
SEAN: And, carrying the 6 theme to a third release (hey, 666. Happy Halloween!), Negima! is up to Volume 36, meaning it’s close to completion. I see Asuna is on the cover. Is she back in action?
MJ: I do sort of consider Ken Akamatsu to be the devil, so that works. (Please don’t hit me.)
MICHELLE: I really have tried to approach his stuff with an open mind, but I just can’t like it.
SEAN: Finally, ruining the 6 theme by being a Vol. 8, Sailor Moon ends its S arc and starts Super S. Let me tell you folks who only know this arc from the anime: you are in for a treat.
MJ: I can’t wait!
MICHELLE: The outers are in it, the outers are in it! On the sad side, however, Fish-Eye and Tiger’s-Eye appear so briefly in the manga version as compared to the anime that it’s kind of a blink-and-you-miss-them situation.
SEAN: Yen Press was supposed to have Vol. 2 of Soul Eater NOT! out two weeks ago, but for some reason it got delayed to this week for comic shops. This fusion of the Soul Eater Universe with the moe aesthetic is taking a while for me to warm up to, but I’ve heard it’s not all light and fluff. Will there be creepy art to give nightmares in the best Soul Eater tradition? Let’s hope so!
Now, on to Viz, which may or may not get to all stores, and may or may not have all these titles, but oh well.
First, Bakuman enters its final quarter with Vol. 16, and continues to have a love/hate/mostly hate relationship with its female characters, but is a lot of fun nevertheless.
MJ: I have to admit I’ve been addicted to Bakuman since the beginning, even when it’s really pissed me off. So I’ll be picking this up for sure.
KATE: I freely place myself in the Feminists Who Loathe Bakuman Camp. The authors’ treatment of the female characters — especially the smart, competent ones — is a deal-breaker for me, even though the manga shop talk is fun.
MICHELLE: Like MJ, I get annoyed, but then I keep reading. Some of the kooky supporting cast is a lot of fun, which helps.
SEAN: Bleach has Vol. 50 and 51, which I’m pretty sure don’t star Aizen. What is this strange Aizen-less manga I see before me?
MICHELLE: I am soooo looking forward to the end of this Hueco Mundo arc. I don’t know any Bleach spoilers, so I have no clue what’s coming next, or whether it is better, but ye gods, this has been dragging on.
SEAN: A new Blue Exorcist! At least for those of you who didn’t read it digitally ages ago. One of the best current Jump titles, and always a treat.
Claymore hits Vol. 21, and the cover simply glares at you balefully, daring you to pass it by. Do you really want to take that risk?
MJ: I can’t pass it by!
SEAN: We’re not quite caught up to Japan with Kamisama Kiss, so the volumes are still coming out fast and furious. Here’s #11, which features a New Year’s theme just in time for November! Well, surely it’s New Year’s somewhere…
Kimi ni Todoke hits Vol. 15 here (it is caught up, so we’re seeing it less now), and Chizuru and Ryu are standing pensively back-to-back, not looking each other in the eye. We all know what that means. SMOOCHIES! …well, OK, probably not. But I hope they get a nice juicy plot arc.
MJ: This series just never stops being charming, does it?
MICHELLE: No, it doesn’t.
SEAN: Naruto is up to Vol. 59! Holy crap! I admit I haven’t read it since Vol. 6, so the cover makes about negative zero sense to me, but hey, it sells amazingly well, so therefore is doing many things right.
In case you missed the Nausicaa Manga when Viz released it a few years ago, they’re now putting it out again in a handsome box set. It’s a gorgeous manga, as well as environmentally conscious. Pick it up today.
MJ: I am thrilled about this, I have to say. I did miss this when Viz originally released it, so I’m incredibly pleased to have another shot at it.
KATE: I’ve also been looking forward to the new edition of Nausicaa. The old edition — though nice to look at — was printed on crummy paper that didn’t age well, and I’ve been eager to replace mine with a cleaner, newer version.
SEAN: Wasn’t it released on environmentally correct paper? That may be why…
MICHELLE: Somehow I missed this news! I have an awesome local library with a genuinely huge manga selection, so I was lucky enough to read Nausicaa (the four-volume Perfect Collection edition) that way, but I might need a handsome box set of my very own!
SEAN: Neon Genesis Evangelion is (digitally) day/date with Japan! And out only a week later in print! This is truly amazing, and big kudos to Viz for pulling it off. Best of all, this is the version with the happy ending! … OK, I lie, it’s not. It’s still depressing. But hey, maybe Shinji is more proactive? The manga’s been good at that.
KATE: The NGE omnibus has been sitting in my review queue for a few weeks. I’ve never read or watched any NGE stories, so I’m hoping that VIZ’s new three-in-one edition will make it easy for me to familiarize myself with this enormous, seemingly inexhaustible supply of material.
SEAN: Did I say holy crap when Naruto hit Vol. 59? Well, One Piece is up to Vol. 65! And… well, is still in the Fishman Island arc, but can’t have everything. I believe this is a ‘battle-only volume, the kind Jump readers love! If only as it reads smoother in Volume than it does week-to-week.
MICHELLE: Yay, One Piece!
SEAN: Another manga I tend to push as much as possible, Oresama Teacher has hit its 11th volume. The subject is Christmas! … OK, what with that and New Year’s, Viz is playing mall music at us far too early. But I’m not complaining!
MICHELLE: I like Oresama Teacher, but I do sort of inwardly groan when shoujo manga feel obliged to hit all the holidays. Hopefully this’ll be one of those times where the series is genuinely funny.
SEAN: The giant huge box set thing that is Ouran High School Host Club Vol. 1-18! It’s a fun series, if you haven’t checked it out, and need a Christmas Present for your wish list, this is a great choice.
Rosario + Vampire Season II hits Vol. 10, and possible Chapter 5 and Verse 2. In any case, vampires!
KATE: I’ve long thought of Rosario + Vampire as Twilight for guys: it’s got impossibly beautiful female monsters who inexplicably love an unremarkable human. While none of the vamps in Rosario sparkle, they do show a lot of cleavage and leg — the next best thing, I guess, if you’re a fourteen-year-old boy. It’s not my cup of tea, but I can definitely understand its appeal.
SEAN: You don’t need vampires to have girls falling all over themselves for a nebbish guy. See: any harem manga ever.
SEAN: NEW SERIES ALERT! Strobe Edge, from Io Sakisaka, is a school romance about a girl who wants to find out what love is and the school heart-throb… um, haven’t I heard this premise before? Oh right, Japanese shoujo manga. Despite that, this is apparently a lot of fun. I heard that people are… NICE in it. Gasp! It ran for 10 volumes in Shueisha’s Betsuma.
MJ: I’ll admit that Kate’s review gave me some pause about picking this up, but it’s really hard for me to pass up new shoujo.
KATE: I freely admit that I’m turning into a big curmudgeon when it comes to shojo manga; I’ve read one too many stories about nice, unassuming (read: boring) girls who develop crushes on hot guys. Strobe Edge isn’t bad, just predictable as taxes. Give me Maria Kawai and her razor-sharp barbs any day.
MICHELLE: It doesn’t look like it’s going to be a manga that makes me explode into hearts, but I’m definitely planning to give it a chance.
SEAN: Speaking of series I hadn’t realized hit double volumes, there’s Tegami Bachi! Presumably the mail must still get through for these letter bees.
Vampire Knight, which I still can’t quite quit, hits Vol. 15. If only it weren’t so damned addictive. Also, vampires!
Lastly, there is We Were There, which has no vampires whatsoever. It’s almost over, but there’s still this volume and 16 to go. So there’s LOTS more ways the author can make her character’s lives miserable! (Admit it, that’s why we love it. This is *the* angst shoujo.)
MJ: I love this “angst” shoujo. I really, really do. It’s a longtime favorite, and I never miss a new volume.
MICHELLE: I love it, too. Volume 15 is on the top of my review pile!
At CBR I wrote a roundup of the manga scene at NYCC, which really includes a lot of more general trends, plus some cool announcements.
At Heart of Manga, Laura looks forward to the shoujo manga that will debut this month.
MJ picks her three favorite manga monsters at Manga Bookshelf. MJalso invites possible Manga Bookshelf contributors to send in their pitches for columns, and she wants to know what you think about the front page of the site.
Akira creator Katsuhiro Otomo appeared at CalArts recently, his first North American appearance in 15 years; the conversation was mostly about anime and film but did touch on his manga work as well.
Here’s a fascinating look at the Mumbai Anime Club, where things are different and yet the same as over here.
Ash Brown is giving away a pretty cool prize: The first seven issues of the first translation of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, which includes a poster by Moebius.
News from Japan: Volumes 31 and 32 of Hunter x Hunter, which runs in Shonen Jump but is on hiatus, will both be out in December.
Reviews: Be sure to check out Bruce P’s review of the lesbian-free Lesbian III: Bloodsucking Women at Okazu. Other reviews of note:
Alexander Hoffman on vol. 1 of Attack on Titan (Manga Village)
Sarah Sammis on vol. 1 of Chi’s Sweet Home (Puss Reboots)
Lesley Aeschliman on vol. 1 of Gakuen Alice (Blogcritics)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 2 of Jiu Jiu (The Comic Book Bin)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 11 of Kamisama Kiss (The Comic Book Bin)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of Limit (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Matthew Alexander on vol. 7 of Ooku: The Inner Chambers (The Fandom Post)
Brigid Alverson on vol. 1 of Polterguys (MTV Geek)
Matthew Warner on vol. 6 of Psyren (The Fandom Post)
Kristin on vol. 24 of Slam Dunk (Comic Attack)
Lori Henderson on vol. 1 of Yokai Doctor (Manga Xanadu)
I’m not a huge fan of horror manga as a genre, nor am I particularly easy to scare. But I do find that when a manga can scare me, it sticks with me forever. While a good ghost story is generally the ticket for me (and indeed I picked out three ghost hunters for my last Halloween column), there are other types of monsters that can get to me as well—often in complicated ways. So, without further ado…
3 Favorite Manga Monsters
1. After School Nightmare | Setona Mizushiro | Go!Comi – As I realized in the midst of a Let’s Get Visual column last year, sometimes the scariest monsters are the ones we see in ourselves. In After School Nightmare, Setona Mizushiro explores the terror of a group of high school students who are forced to endure a series of shared nightmares in which they appear as the physical manifestations of their own worst fears… about themselves. As you can see from the scans included in that column, the results are twisted, eerie, sometimes grotesque, and may hit just a bit too close to home for many readers (including this one). *Shiver*
2. March Story | Hyung Min Kim & Kyung Il Yang | Viz Media – Monsters aren’t always evil—at least not unambiguously so—and it’s a monster like this who played a big part in winning me over to March Story, an exquisitely drawn comic by a pair of Korean creators working in Japan. Though the series’ first volume was wildly uneven, one of the characters who immediately caught my eye was Jake, the (literally) bigger-than-life mentor of the story’s heroine, March. Though Jake first appears smiling and offering March a ride, she is immediately, utterly creepy, and remains so throughout, despite her frequent role as comic relief.
3. Wild Adapter | By Kazua Minekura | TOKYOPOP – Sometimes, our monsters don’t look like monsters, and may even be people we love. Hello, Wild Adapter. While both of the series’ main characters are frequently referred to as “monsters” (and one of them even has a sort of animal paw for one hand), the one who has done many, many monstrous things is Kubota, a former up-and-coming yakuza whose apathy about nearly all other people has made him a fairly brutal killing machine. One of the images that sticks in my mind always is the one below (discussed in-depth in our Wild Adapter roundtable), in which Kubota has helped out a young woman by savagely beating her abusive ex-boyfriend. Though he’s done this to protect her, even he knows that his actions make him a monster. It’s a poignant and chilling moment, especially as we’ve already grown to love him as a character (and continue to love him even afterwards). Well done, Minekura, well done.
Readers, who are some of your favorite manga monsters? As you can see, my criteria is pretty broad, so feel free to push the envelope!
From the back cover:
On a hillside near the cozy Irish village of Glennkill, the members of the flock gather around their shepherd, George, whose body lies pinned to the ground with a spade. George has cared for the sheep, reading them a plethora of books every night. The daily exposure to literature has made them far savvier about the workings of the human mind than your average sheep. Led by Miss Maple, the smartest sheep in Glennkill (and possibly the world), they set out to find George’s killer.
The A-team of investigators includes Othello, the “bad boy” black ram; Mopple the Whale, a Merino who eats a lot and remembers everything; and Zora, a pensive black-faced ewe with a weakness for abysses. Joined by other members of the talented flock, they engage in nightlong discussions about the crime and embark on reconnaissance missions into the village, where they encounter some likely suspects. Along the way, the sheep confront their own struggles with guilt, misdeeds, and unrequited love.
Review:
I’m not sure where I first heard about Three Bags Full, but the promise of a mystery with a team of sheepy sleuths on the case guaranteed that I had to read it. Originally published in German as Glennkill, this English edition has been translated by Anthea Bell.
Despite its bucolic setting, things are not very peaceful in the Irish village of Glennkill. One morning, George the shepherd is found dead in his pasture and his sheep, particularly several whose intelligence has been greatly increased due to George’s habit of reading aloud to them, set out to find justice. What ensues are various scenes of the sheep surreptitiously observing humans—“It was the first time Othello had been to a funeral, but the ram behaved beautifully.”—and filtering the information they glean through a sheepy lens. Usually, they get things a bit wrong, but the logic of their reasoning is quite endearing. They still manage to behave like sheep and often, certain of the flock complain about all the thinking and learning and must be cajoled from backsliding into blissful ignorance. Metaphor, much?
This was Swann’s first novel—a sequel, Garou came out in 2010 but no English translation is yet available—so perhaps it’s not surprising that, while the sheep are charming, the mystery itself is not as well-developed. George had apparently discovered a dirty secret of some of the villagers years before, but nothing much actually comes of this. Then, we also learn George was a drug dealer—with a rather clever method of transporting his goods—but nothing much actually comes of this, either. That said, the way in which the sheep encourage the truth to come out—though they’re convinced that what needs to “come out” is some kind of tangible thing lurking in the shepherd’s caravan—is pretty cute to envision, so I can’t complain too much.
Lastly, a couple of compliments! I applaud the English translation by Anthea Bell, which is so well done—and retains so much wit—that one would never guess it wasn’t the original text. Also, I happened to “read” Three Bags Full in unabridged audio format and the narrator, Josephine Bailey, was simply superb. Each sheep had their own easily recognizable voice, and the lambs were nothing short of adorable.
Here’s hoping Garou eventually makes its way to our shores!