Discussion, Resources, Roundtables, & Reviews
SEAN: So yeah, remember me bragging I got Yen releases a week early? Not this month.
What does that mean?
It means Vagabond 34, that’s what it means. And that’s it. Luckily, Vagabond is pretty damn awesome. So for Vagabond fans, new volume!
ANNA: Vagabond is pretty great.
SEAN: For everyone else, catching up on the stacks of manga to read next to you, like me?
MICHELLE: And how! Seriously, there are literally stacks.
MJ: What she said!
Welcome back. You can find Part 1 here, and here is the opening song again (yes, I do like the song).
Background on the Actors
For an idol drama, this drama has remarkably few idols. It rose to popularity mainly on the strength of the story. The only actor who really qualifies as an idol is Jimmy Lin, who plays Zhong Tianqi. This role was pretty made for him, for in addition to being an actor, he is a real-life professional car racer. However, his most famous role as a actor was not in an idol drama, but in wuxia (specifically, he played Duan Yu in the 2003 version of Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils).
Jimmy Lin as Duan Yu, Prince of Dali.
Arguably, Leon Jay Williams (who plays Zhong Tianjun) is also a quasi-idol, since he is a professional model, and quite easy on the eyes, even compared to most idol drama stars.
Interestingly, they cast a Korean actress, Yoo Ha-na, to play Xia Zhixing, which occasionally happens in Taiwanese television. It seems that her lines were dubbed, and I’m not sure who the dub artist (which I think is a pity, since the dub artist deserves as much credit as Yoo Ha-na). While I think their acting is okay, I think there are a number of Taiwanese actresses who could have played the role even better (I would have cast Barbie Hsu). There is a scene where Zhong Tianqi overhears some very soap-opera-ish dialogue, and Xia Zhixing claims “Oh, it’s just a K-drama.” I found that line doubly funny because the very character claiming that it was just a K-drama was being played by a Korean actress.
Location Location Location!
This drama features Ruifang, Wulai, and Pingxi, three of the top tourist attractions in the Taipei region.
However, rather than setting the story in Ruifang/Wulai/Pingxi, the story combines all three of them into the fictional village of “Mingde,” which is Xia Zhixing’s hometown. As someone who is familiar with Ruifang, Wulai, and Pingxi, this is a bit confusing, since sometimes the characters are in Ruifang one moment, and then they are in Pingxi the next moment.
However, I don’t think the drama shows the *really* beautiful parts of Pingxi, such as this spot, which just happens to be one of my favorite spots in all of Taiwan
Actually, Ruifang, Wulai, and Pingxi are more than just tourist attractions: they are important symbols of Taiwanese culture. Pingxi is often held up as being an idyllic Taiwanese rural town, which is why is it often featured in commercials, movies, etc (part of You Are the Apple of My Eye is set in Jingtong, which is in the Pingxi district). Wulai is the location of northern Taiwan’s highest waterfall.
The town of Wulai (I am resisting the urge to share even more photos of Wulai).
However, Ruifang in particular has an important place in Taiwanese culture. The towns of Jiufen, Jinguashi, and Shuinandong are all in the Ruifang district. Jiufen was once so prominent as a cultural center that it was called “little Shanghai.” As I’ve mentioned before, Jiufen and Jinguashi are the location of Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s A City of Sadness, which not only a famous Taiwanese film, it’s often ranked as one of the best Chinese-language movies ever made. Furthermore, Jiufen inspired Hayao Miyazaki to make Spirited Away, which is why the town is almost always full of Japanese tourists.
My own photo of the Thirteen Levels
The “Thirteen Levels,” one of Taiwan’s most recognizable landmarks, is in Shuinandong, and it appears in this drama (it also appears in Fated to Love You). One of my favorite works of art in the Tapei Fine Arts Museum permanent collection depicts the Thirteen Levels, and it’s featured in many films, both professional and amateur. I have never been inside the Thirteen Levels since it’s technically forbidden to enter, but I know someone who has been inside, and he said that he saw other people inside too, so apparently a lot of people ignore the restrictions.
In other words, watching this drama is a bit like taking a tour of the most popular destinations in rural Taipei.
Okay, I can’t help it, here’s a picture I took in Shuinandong looking up at Chahushan, which is in Jinguashi (if you’re confused, just know that this is all in the Ruifang district).
Fashion
I mostly find the costuming choices in Taiwanese idol dramas uninteresting, but this drama is definitely the exception, which is what you would expect from a drama which deals a lot with jewelry. And the guys’ clothes are just as interesting as the girls’ clothes.
See Zhong Tianqi and Xia Zhixing together. They’re clothes are not boring. I think Zhong Tianqi’s checkered collar is a particularly nice touch.
See Xia Zhixing and Han Zhiyin together. Again, their clothes are not boring.
Xia Zhixing and Han Zhiyin together, again. You can’t tell from this picture, but this outfit makes Xia Zhixing look a little pregnant. I actually like that, since it emphasizes her motherly qualities.
The Silliness and the Sadness
Whereas Fated to Love You has tongue-in-cheek humor, this drama is straight-up silly. In fact, part of the appeal for me is seeing just how far the drama will go. Just as protagonists are fearlessly themselves, this drama is fearless in is silliness.
Zhong Tianqi and Xia Zhixing get into awkward positions.
(Tangent: in a world free of rape culture, I would think it is totally funny that certain things the characters happen to be doing seem to be sexual assault, even though that is not the character’s intent at all, just I would think it’s funny if the characters seemed to be murdering somebody when actually it’s just an innocent mistake. But victims of sexual assault are so often disbelieved and told that the assault was “just a misunderstanding,” in fact, I can tell you from personal experience that victims sometimes tell themselves that it’s just a misunderstanding so that they don’t have to face that they are victims of harassment/assault, that I’m not completely comfortable with laughing when it’s revealed what certain characters *reasonably* suspect is sexual assault really turns out to be a misunderstanding).
Some of it gets pretty corny, but that, weirdly, is part of the charm.
It’s also full of melodrama (this fan music video, featuring the theme song, offers a good taste of the melodrama). Many of the plot twists are awfully cliché, but, well, it’s boldly cliché. And considering that a five-year-old girl gets Xia Zhixing to spend 8 hours publicly handcuffed to the hot and handsome Han Zhiyin, I am willing to overlook a couple cliches.
And I think this drama just might have the saddest moment of any idol drama I’ve watched. Specifically, the scene where Ou Yaruo listens to the MP3 player.
Why is listening to the contents of an MP3 player sad? Part of me wants to explain the context, but I do hope that this drama will eventually get licensed in English, so I don’t want to spoil it.
Someone on Youtube claims that (spoiler warning, especially if you understand Mandarin) this is the most moving scene in My Lucky Star, but I found it too cliché. Okay, I’ll be honest, I got totally emotionally invested in that scene too, but at least I’m embarrassed that such cliché melodrama got to me.
However, the moment which really got my tears flowing was when Xia Zhixing falls down on the road between Jinguashi and Shuinandong (even though I know this is supposed to the fictional village Mingde, I still can’t help but think of these places as being Ruifang/Pingxi/Wulai). There is nothing original at all about this scene, but the story is so bold, and so sincere, in its melodrama, that I really could not help myself. Even if I forget everything else in this drama, I don’t think I’ll ever forget this particular moment.
Availability in English
Currently, there is no legal way to watch this drama in English. It would be really nice if someone changed this state of affairs.
Conclusion
When I first started watching idol dramas, I stuck with idol dramas adapted from Japanese manga, since the stories were familiar to me, and I didn’t have enough confidence in my Mandarin comprehension skills to delve into completely new territory (and how is it that I have yet to discuss a single idol drama adapted from manga?)
This is the first idol drama I watched which a) was not adapted from a manga and b) had a plot that was totally unknown to me. I was not just concerned about my language skills, I was also concerned about whether or not it would be a good story (if I had read the manga, at least I could reasonably predict whether or not I would like the drama). Not only was I totally capable of understanding this drama, I fell in love with it.
It definitely has its flaws, and overall, I have to say that Fated to Love You is a higher-quality production. Nonetheless, this is one of my top favorite idol dramas, and when I say that somebody should license this in English, I’m serious.
Next time: The Nine Provinces (novel)
An earthquake is happening right now as Sara K. is writing this. Many Taiwanese people expect Sara K. to be freaked out at every single earthquake. Sara K. then points out that she grew up in San Francisco. She does feel a lot less earthquakes in Taoyuan than in other parts of Taiwan (such as Taipei and Hualien), most likely because Taoyuan has more stable ground than Taipei, and the faults around Hualien are more active.
SEAN: I have to admit I am impressed with the anonymous teams behind these series that are all coming out at a rapid rate, even if I don’t know who they are because they aren’t credited. The translation quality, while still not perfect, has risen considerably since the start back in August 2011, and the series are cranking out so that, presumably, we can focus on fresh new series in the future.
All of which is a nice way of saying I still don’t have much to say. The big manga for me this week and next is Joshi Kousei (aka High School Girls), which wraps up with the release of Vols. 8 & 9, and finally resolves the unanswered question about the Takarazuka pair. No, not whether they’re actually lesbians, that’s still unanswered. (Though obvious.)
MJ: I admit I don’t have much to say, either, which isn’t to say that I’m necessarily disappointed with what’s happening at JManga. Sure, I miss some of the weeks when they introduced scads of new series, and it’s been a while since some of my personal favorites have been updated. But I appreciate the fact that they’re carrying on, updating what they can, when they can.
MICHELLE: My sentiments exactly. I’m sure at some point, there’ll be something for us to squee over again.
SEAN: There’s also Vol. 5 of Biscuit Hammer, which puts us at the halfway point, and Vol. 6 of Crime and Punishment: A Falsified Romance, which is also 10 volumes, but otherwise quite different from Hoshi no Samidare.
And Vol. 12 of Tactics, which has blown past the old Tokyopop releases (which ended with 8, I believe) and is blazing its own trail. The series is still ongoing from Mag Garden, I believe, and I still can’t remember what it’s about aside from “fantasy”.
MJ: Though I lost interest in Tactics midway through the Tokyopop run, I’ll admit that seeing so many available volumes pop up has re-awakened my curiosity. Should I give the series another shot? I’m thinking I just might.
SEAN: Speaking of fantasy (indeed, they’re by the same author), there is also Vol. 5 of The Mythical Detective LOKI. Please note that this version is not played by Tom Hiddleston, despite what Tumblr may tell you.
Lastly, Tsumanuda Fight Town still has maids who fight. I should really actually read this rather than mocking it, as it does run in Young King OURS, home of many of my beloved titles.
Anything catch your eye here?
Welcome to the March installment of BL Bookrack! This month, Michelle takes a look at Where a Person Is Most Vulnerable at JManga, while MJchecks out the latest volumes of Awkward Silence and His Favorite from SuBLime. In Brief: Punch Up!, Vol. 3 (SuBLime).
Awkward Silence, Vols. 2-3 | By Hinako Takanaga | Published by SuBLime | Rated Mature – As a somewhat finicky BL fan, I have a complicated relationship with Hinako Takanaga. Though I have several favorites among her works (You Will Fall in Love springs immediately to mind), I often find her romances too rushed to be satisfying (Little Butterfly). Furthermore, even some of my favorites of her work (The Tyrant Falls in Love) include elements I dislike so thoroughly that they send me hurtling from hatred to love and back again. Though Awkward Silence is far too mild-mannered a title to incite anything like hatred, its first volume fell easily into the “too rushed” section of Takanaga’s catalogue, thus robbing itself of the emotional resonance required to elicit anything close to love.
Volume two opens with blank-faced Satoru (who carefully reminds us every chapter that his face is incapable of expressing emotion) sulking over his boyfriend Keigo’s upcoming sleep-away baseball camp. Having been unable to properly express his feelings to Keigo before he departed, Satoru is tormented over the fact that Keigo may have left believing that Satoru was angry with him for going in the first place. Naturally, the only option is for Satoru to sneak into the camp in the middle of the night in order to explain himself. He does, and the two have sex.
Okay, a little bit more than that happens. Satoru’s antics lead Keigo’s baseball team to believe that the west wing of the school is haunted and minimal wackiness ensues, but the series’ chapters are so carefully formulaic, it’s obvious that the point of it all is to create an opportunity for the obligatory sex scene. And this is really the crux of the issue. While I certainly have no objection to sex scenes in a BL manga—and such scenes can contribute significantly to both plot and characterization—as is all too common in contemporary romance, Takanaga’s scenes are largely just… in the way. With so few pages available per chapter in which to develop her characters’ relationship, every panel is precious, and panels spent on perfunctory sex scenes are, frankly, nothing more than a waste.
Volume three plays a bit stronger, as it shifts its focus from Satoru and Keigo to a couple of amusingly mismatched upperclassmen (whose relationship vibe is not unlike Morinaga and Souichi’s in Tyrant), and Satoru’s charming (also blank-faced) mom is an unexpected highlight. But this relationship, too, suffers from a whirlwind approach that doesn’t feel quite earned. Takanaga’s expressive artwork particularly shines in this volume, making its shortage of emotional substance even sadder, in my view. Not recommended.
– Review by MJ
His Favorite, Vols. 2-3 | By Suzuki Tanaka | Published by SuBLime | Rated Mature – If I’m a sucker for any particular romance trope, it’s “friends-turned-lovers”—a predilection largely responsible for my obsession with writers like Keiko Kinoshita and Yeri Na, among others. In volume one of His Favorite, author Suzuki Tanaka proved that she’s got my number as well, with her story of childhood friends, Sato and Yoshida, whose developing “hot guy”/”spazzy guy” pairing is the best thing since Doumeki and Watanuki (with fewer ghosts and bento lunches).
In volume one, class stud Sato revealed to unpopular goofball Yoshida that he was the (once overweight, bullied) boy whom (once popular, badass) Yoshida fiercely protected all through grade school. Having nurtured a crush on Yoshida for years, Sato’s new “hot guy” status gives him the confidence to finally pursue Yoshida romantically, though the entire thing is baffling to both Yoshida and the rest of their high school class.
Volume two opens with Yoshida beginning to acknowledge that he has reciprocal feelings for Sato, though he’s desperate to hide it—not only from Sato, but from his group of misfit friends who expect him to share their unrequited longing for female companionship. This escalates in volume three when Yoshida is coerced into attending a disastrous group date. Meanwhile, Sato’s dealing with his frustration by bullying their classmates, whom Yoshida (in true form) angrily defends, leaving Yoshida feeling even more conflicted over his growing attraction for Sato. Nothing comes easy for the two of them, but despite the fact that what I’ve described so far sounds rather like a serious teenage drama, it’s absolutely romantic comedy in every way. And, really, that contradiction is what makes the series work so well.
Though nearly everything in His Favorite is deliberately overblown and played for laughs, the entire thing is firmly anchored by real emotional truth, which renders the series not only genuinely funny, but also genuinely affecting on a number of levels. Amidst the laughs, we really feel Yoshida’s inner turmoil over his unpopularity and small size, his fierce sense of fairness, and his developing feelings for a guy who pushes all his buttons in not-always-positive ways. And like Yoshida, we both love and revile Sato’s messy mix of loyal devotion and outright sadism. Tanaka’s characterization is deceptively effortless—clearly established with just a few deft strokes—allowing her to tell a emotionally complex story with the light touch of a screwball comedy. Even the story’s secondary (firmly comedic) romance, about a steadfast guy who only falls for sleaze-balls, manages to operate on multiple levels. And Tanaka’s clean, energetic artwork is just icing on the cake.
Obviously I’ve become a fan, but the best news of all is that there’s more of this series to come! His Favorite stands at five volumes and counting in Japan, so now’s the time to jump on board! Heartily recommended.
– Review by MJ
Where a Person Is Most Vulnerable | By Fumiko Shusai | Libre Publishing/JManga | Rated Mature – “I put all my short pieces I forgot about in one book,” writes Fumiko Shusai in the Afterword to Where a Person Is Most Vulnerable, and man does it show.
The anthology starts off promisingly enough. The title story is about neurotic Yamashita, who hates ants, and his bug-loving neighbor, Shimabara, who helps him overcome his fears a bit. “Strays Will Leave, Over and Over Again” is also pretty good, featuring a gigolo who keeps returning to his friend’s place every time he gets dumped. Less successful is “The End Is in a Dream, Silent,” about a guy who’s repaying a debt to a clotheshorse by cleaning his messy “room.” It’s okay, but extremely rushed.
In the titular story, the “place” in question refers to the delicate nether-regions where ants dared to crawl when Yamashita was a boy—as well as to his heart—but after the third story I began to think that apartments were somehow a theme, too. That while we might feel safe in our own homes, this complacency would also cause us to let down our guard. And it may even be true that Shusai meant to make some point along those lines, but the rest of the stories in this collection are so thoroughly disappointing that I soon began to doubt that such an intent ever existed.
Brief and insubstantial “Sculptures of Us” is about friends who get into fisticuffs over whether they had a drunken hookup the night before. “Love That Reaches the Other Side of Earth!,” about a seemingly hopeless boy and the childhood friend who takes care of him, had the potential to be something good, but is rushed beyond redemption. The real villain of the piece, however, is the horrible “Daddy, My Love” strip, all about the way in which a guy accidentally mistreats/mishandles his ex-girlfriend’s abandoned toddler, culminating with a panel suggesting they’ll become lovers in the future. EW! Gallon of brain bleach, stat!
So, are the first two stories worth 499 JManga “points”? I must regretfully conclude that they are not.
– Review by Michelle Smith
In Brief:
Punch Up!, Vol. 3 | By Shiuko Kano | Published by SuBLime | Rated Mature – For its first two volumes, I wasn’t quite sure what to make of Punch Up!. On the one hand were the well-defined protagonists, Kouta and Maki, who had plausible conflicts and insecurities, but on the other were the frequent and explicit sex scenes that left nothing whatsoever to the imagination. Was this a compelling drama or a smutty romp? Volume three caters to my personal preferences by establishing itself clearly as a drama (or melodrama, at least) when a workplace accident leaves Kouta with no memory of the last four years and effectively returns him to his mindset as a fifteen-year-old. This development could’ve easily taken the story in a cheesy direction, but it actually doesn’t, instead providing even more opportunity for conflicts and insecurities to flare. I had debated whether to continue with this series, but now I am truly glad I did! – Michelle Smith
Review copies provided by the publishers.
Nursery Rhyme Comics | Edited By Chris Duffy | Published by First Second
Most people gain some familiarity with nursery rhymes as children, reciting “Humpty Dumpty” in school or picking out favorites from a big collection. This introduction usually comes through a Mother Goose story book, but that fictional old lady (or goose in a bonnet, depending on what book you have) isn’t with whom these rhymes originated.
While a lot of rhymes can be traced back to a certain time and place, many came to be the same way as folklore and fairy tales—passed down over the centuries with no precise origin or even meaning. Because of that, not only has some of the wording of the rhymes changed over time, but any version can be treated with varying interpretations and imagery. Despite their age, these sing-songy, fun, sometimes weird rhymes continue to resonate with children, so it makes perfect sense for publisher First Second to reinterpret the stories through one of the more popular mediums today—comic books—in their collection Nursery Rhyme Comics.
Altogether there are 50 rhymes presented in this book, each one drawn by a different artist. In my experience, such a wide variety of creators almost inevitably leads to just as much variety in quality. Somehow, this is not the case. Instead, First Second has gathered 50 amazingly talented artists who, despite their differences in design and technique, make each page a treat.
Thanks to the brevity of the rhymes, the comics take up no more than three pages each, so very little time is spent with any single artist. These sudden shifts do create a little bit of abruptness as you move from short rhyme to short rhyme. Fortunately, editor Chris Duffy managed to arrange the comics in a sort of arc, beginning with “The Donkey” playing a saxophone “to wake the world this sleepy morn,” moving into more active comics, and then slowing down towards the conclusion of “Wee Willie Winkie” as the story’s children fall asleep with their own copy of Nursery Rhyme Comics.
With so many great artists on board, it would have been a shame to have them all adhere to a certain theme or mood, and it seems that First Second wisely allowed their artists to interpret the rhymes in any way they wanted. Style and mood range from things like the calm watercolors of Patrick McDonnell’s “The Donkey” to Reina Telgemeier’s bright cartoons. But the artists also give us their own takes on the rhymes themselves. Telgemeier’s “Georgie Porgie,” for instance, is a kid at his birthday party getting pie all over the girls he kisses. And in Andrew Arnold’s version of “Hot Cross Buns,” a pigeon steals cakes from a pair of bratty kids.
Artists interpreting some of the more nonsensical rhymes, like the weird non sequitor at the end of “I Had a Little Nut Tree,” have fun with stories that just don’t make much sense anymore. Then there’s “Hush Little Baby”—a song with pretty general action—transformed by its artist into an active conversation between a father and his daughter, making excellent use of word bubbles and creative panels.
Some of the artists did choose to take more traditional or literal views of the rhymes, like in Richard Sala’s version of “Three Blind Mice”, and while these are still well done, they aren’t quite as memorable as some of the other selections. But even some of the more literal takes do an excellent job evoking emotion, like the blow-by-blow account of the very short rhyme “The North Wind Doth Blow,” in which we see a robin tumble through the air before finally coming to a rest, or the pure romance of Edward Lear and Craig Thompson’s “The Owl and the Pussy-cat.”
One thing Nursery Rhyme Comics proves by the end is how effectively nursery rhymes can converted into comics. These sing-songy stories have no narration that the artist must carve out, and no descriptive prose that they must decide whether to write or visualize. Instead, these are stories so simple that the artists may come at them with all their creative talent.
This collection serves as a pretty great introduction to nursery rhymes for kids, covering all the bases, from weird and funny to calm and peaceful rhymes. This book can also be used as a sly way to introduce comics into the life of a kid you know—offering up so many styles and tones that any kid is sure to find a graphic novel niche to enjoy. Dialogue and narration are spaced out nicely, preventing the pages from becoming overly cluttered with words, which makes this an easy book to read out loud with a child, but also fun for an older kid (or an adult) to read by him/herself.
Thanks to the artists First Second gathered together, this was a thoroughly enjoyable book. And whether or not you’re already acquainted with the rhymes included, it’s so much fun to see how the artists chose to adapt them.
SEAN: I have a sneaky suspicion I know what the Pick of the Week is going to be next week… regardless of that, let’s see what publishers have to offer.
Blade of the Immortal may have come to a close recently in Japan, but Dark Horse still has a few more to go. The back cover to Vol. 26 hints that Tonight Someone Dies, so it is no doubt very important that everyone grab this.
MICHELLE: Someday I will continue with this series.
SEAN: And then there’s the first Tokyo Babylon omnibus. Which is filled with Hokuto, who is awesome and the only real reason to read this early CLAMP title! Oh yeah, there’s her brother as well. And some guy. I suppose a few people might read it for them instead.
MJ: TOKYO BABYLON TOKYO BABYLON TOKYO BABYLON. Okay, yes, I’m a fangirl on a massive level, here, but there are so many reasons why this is my favorite CLAMP series (and one of my favorite manga series of all time). I’ll save my loudest raving for Pick of the Week (and Off the Shelf), but out of all the CLAMP re-releases Dark Horse has undertaken over the past few years, this is the one I’ve anticipated most eagerly. I’m so looking forward to re-reading the series.
MICHELLE: I agree, but cannot possibly match MJfor sheer enthusiasm!
ANNA: Maybe I should give this series another try? I read the first few volume and found it so much less gripping than X\1999 that I don’t think I ever finished it. That being said I do have feelings of pleasant nostalgia whenever I think of early CLAMP series in general.
SEAN: SubLime has the third volume of His Favorite, whose cover makes it look like this is a manga about Luffy the uke and Robin the seme. I’m sure it’s not about that at all. Not that that would not be a highly entertaining title in its own right.
MJ: This is one of my favorite recent series from SuBLime, though your comment adds an element of hilarity I hadn’t considered!
MICHELLE: Wow, I had never noticed the similarity in scars before.
SEAN: Vertical has the 3rd and final re-release of Paradise Kiss, which most everyone else got this week. It’s a terrific series, and I particularly love the ending. If you didn’t get it yet, get it.
MJ: I’m a bit sad that the debut of Dark Horse’s Tokyo Babylon omnibus will probably overshadow the end of Paradise Kiss, so I’ll do my best to rave about both. I had some quibbles early on regarding Vertical’s adaptation of some beginning chapters, but these have long since been made up for by subsequent volumes. And if I had to choose the loveliest of Vertical’s work on this series, I’d have to go with volume three, which is stunning in every way. This is absolutely a must-buy this week. It’s on my personal top ten as well!
MICHELLE: There are things about the ending to Paradise Kiss that give me geekbumps to even *recall*, even though it’s been years since I last read it.
ANNA: I’ve been enjoying the Vertical editions of this series and plan on buying this!
SEAN: The rest is all Viz. 07-Ghost hits Vol. 3 and shows us that the best answer for ‘who is ready to lead the Church’ is ‘how much TRAINING have they had’? I bet the Papal Conclave doesn’t concentrate on that at all.
MJ: I never got any further than volume one of this series, but I’ll catch up eventually! And I’m looking forward to it, too.
MICHELLE: Ditto.
ANNA: I have been hoarding the 2nd and 3rd volumes and plan to read them together very soon. I enjoyed the world building and action in the first volume very much.
SEAN: Arata the Legend hits lucky Vol. 13, whose luck is to come out a week after a Fushigi Yuugi release and thus likely be ignored. Shame.
MICHELLE: Aw. Arata is quite good, too, though it’s true I don’t love it as well as Genbu Kaiden.
ANNA: I don’t think Genbu Kaiden can help it though because it is so intrinsically loveable.
SEAN: Fullmetal Alchemist has a 3-in-1 out, covering Vols. 10-12. This is, in my opinion, the only shonen manga to give One Piece a run for its money at perfection. It’s that good.
MJ: Since this series also made my all-time top ten list, I certainly agree with you. Wow, it’s a banner week for my favorites, isn’t it?
MICHELLE: It is. And it’s high time you read some One Piece, missy, so that could be your favorite, too!
ANNA: I agree that Fullmetal Alchemist is a magnificent series and it is unfortunately one that I stopped reading due to it having so many volumes. I intend to reread the whole thing and finally finish it one day though.
SEAN: Neon Genesis Evangelion also says it’s a 3-in-1, but the first volume was deluxe, more like their VizBIG line. Re-reading the start of the series re-kindled my interest in it again, so I’ll definitely be taking a look at it.
Lastly, RIN-NE Vol. 11 continues to have cute little one-shots, occasional dramatic mini-plots, and no forward progression. (sniffle) It makes me so nostalgic for Ranma and UY’s lack of any progress… it’s like Takahashi has come home!
MICHELLE: I really enjoy RIN-NE for what it is, and without any expectations for it to be anything else. I’ve described Takahashi’s comforting, homey works before as “manga meatloaf,” and I think RIN-NE epitomizes that ethos.
SEAN: What are you folks reading this week?
On Magazine no Mori we’ve discussed the issue of the demographic categories of manga several times. Today’s review is a perfect example of when those categories fail to be useful.
GFantasy, published by Square Enix, (along with what often seems like an endless number of magazines that have the word Gangan in the title) is listed by the publisher as a shounen magazine. And it is, quite likely, read by some number of young males. There is a lot of action in this magazine. But. The series best known from this magazine, has another audience entirely.
For GFantasy is the home of Black Butler by Yana Toboso. It is true that Jun Mochizuki’s Pandora Hearts and Ryhogo Narita’s Durarara! have as much to appeal to men as women, however there is an extraordinary amount of “pretty boys in ridiculous clothes” and a fair dollop of slashable male pairs for a typical “shounen” magazine. A series like Cuticle Detective Inaba makes more sense, really, when you assume that the audience is female. Pretty boys with animal ears, shotacon, a cross-dressing boy…these are not typical tropes meant for a male audience. GFantasy is really better understood as “shounen for women” with a fair bit of cross-over audience, as indicated by Peach Pit’s Zombie-Loan, and the Higurashi series.
As you can see from the many titles that have been translated, Yen Press has a pretty well-developed relationship with Square Enix and the Gangan imprint manga. (The anime for many of these series have been picked up by Funimation and Sentai Filmworks.)
GFantasy began life back in 1993 as Fantastic Comic, had a few special releases and in 1994 was renamed GFantasy. There are no circulation numbers for GFantasy on the JPMA website. At 580 yen ($6.43 at time of writing) for 650 pages, it’s a good bet you’ll get your money’s worth, as long as you like fantasy adventure, perhaps spiced with a little romance.
The GFantasy website is quite good, with excited focus on the enclosed giveaway that month, news of series that have been transformed to anime and other media and a sample comic in 2 parts. More sample chapters can be found listed under “G Stories” and they have a running prize for submissions to the magazine. (I really like manga magazines that do that. Recruitment for the next generation is an every-day job.) Unusually, the magazine has a blog on their website, as well as the usual news and fan mail form. In my experience, this indicates a slightly higher than usual understanding of fan community by the editors and, probably, a slightly higher than usual engagement by the audience.
GFantasy Magazine, from Square Enix: http://www.square-enix.co.jp/magazine/gfantasy/
Jewel thieves! Car racing! Beautiful scenery! Melodrama! Silly sexual humor! This drama has a lot going for it. Let’s set the mood with a song:
Now, a scene from the first episode.
Example Scene
Ou Yaruo is getting married today. Or at least that’s what she thinks.
When the door opens, she assumes that it’s her fiance.
Actually, it’s her ex-boyfriend.
Clearly, this is not good news.
Ou Yaruo tells him to get out.
He does not get out.
In fact, he gets closer to her. She apparently broke his heart when she dumped him.
He’s very interested in her necklace.
The sneak tabloid photographer has arrived on the scene…
… and he’s just in time to take a picture of them kissing.
After the kiss, he leaves, leaving her wondering what the meaning of this encounter was. Does she still love him? Did he come to take back the jewel of her heart?
Then she realizes, no, he did not come to steal the jewel of her heart. He just wanted to steal the big jewel in her necklace, which he has slipped off her neck while kissing her.
The Heroine
From all of the Taiwanese idol dramas I’ve seen, I think Xia Zhixing is my favorite female protagonist. She’s one of the most honest and compassionate characters in the entire drama – which is ironic, considering she’s a con artist dating another con artist.
Well, Zhong Tianqi catches her in the act, and she gets sent to prison for two years. Not only does she spend two years in prison, but when she gets out, she discovers that she’s lost her con artist boyfriend.
But wait! She catches Zhong Tianqi stealing a jewel too! He got her sent to prison while he’s a thief himself. No fair!
So why did Xia Zhixing become a con artist in the first place? It’s revealed that she’s an orphan, and she grew up in poverty. Being a con artist was the only way she was able to find out of her poverty, and after leaving prison, she finds herself back in financial distress. The fact that she now has a criminal record makes it hard for her to make an honest living which, ironically, is the only thing pushing her back into a career of crime.
Because of her own difficult experiences, Xia Zhixing has a lot of empathy for other people in unfortunate circumstances, especially people who ended up in them through no fault of their own. At one point, she makes a HUGE sacrifice for the sake of an innocent child she barely knows.
When she’s not trying to pull off a con, she is not afraid to be herself, even when this might make people uncomfortable. For example, she does not try to hide her criminal past to anybody that she cares about.
Many of her cons revolved around selling fake jewels. During this “job,” she learned a lot about jewelry, and developed an interest in jewelry design. Is this the path to an honest living, or will her past hold her back? Or will she put others’ needs before her own?
The Guys
Much as I love Xia Zhixing, this drama is make even better by a good set of male protagonists.
Guy #1: Zhong Tianqi
He is the black sheep of his rich family. He’s handsome, he speaks French, and he races cars. Most of all, he’s fearless, whether that means defying his father, standing up for what he feels is right, or car racing while blindfolded.
I am not kidding about the blindfolded car race.
He also takes things very, very deeply to heart. That means that, when somebody is important to him, he will dedicate himself to that person 100%. On the other hand, when he feels betrayed, he gets very, VERY nasty (see the above scene where he ruins his ex-girlfriend’s wedding).
It’s a common trope in Taiwanese idol dramas for Guy #1 to turn into a jerk at some point, and in my opinion Zhong Tianqi does this better than any other Guy #1. First of all, it’s clear that he becomes a jerk because of intense personal suffering, but most of all, I like that he’s a colorful jerk. He is the standard to which I hold up all other Guy #1 jerks. If the male protagonist must turn into a jerk, he at least should be as much fun as Zhong Tianqi.
Oh, and he’s also a prince.
Guy #2: Zhong Tianjun
Zhong Tianjun is Zhong Tianqi’s older brother. He is one of the sweetest male characters I have encountered in a Taiwanese drama, He’s patient, forgiving, understanding. He protects people from sexual harassment. And he tries very very hard to be romantic. Oh, and he’s handsome and wealthy.
He’s the perfect romantic hero. In fact, he’s too perfect. That is why there is Guy 2.5.
Guy #2.5: Han Zhiyin
Han Zhiyin is hot celebrity from Thailand who is, ah, flirtatious and promiscuous. However, he finds himself having deeper feelings for her than he’s felt for anyone else. And while he’s a hotshot model, he grew up in the slums of Bangkok, so he can relate to Xia Zhixing’s background in a way that Zhong Tianqi and Zhong Tianjun cannot.
He also does things with as much, if not more, flair than Zhong Tianqi. Then again, as a celebrity, it’s his job to do things with flair.
The Bechdel test highlights the lack of deep female-female relationships in fiction, but in Taiwanese idol dramas, there is also a dearth of male-male relationships too. However, the relationship with the Zhong brothers is quite touching and interesting in its own right, and the relationship between Zhong Tianqi and Han Zhiyin is also quite fun.
Not that female-female relationships are completely neglected. Though Xia Zhixing and Ou Yaruo most certainly are not friends, I actually think their relationship is one of the most intriguing in the entire story.
Ou Yaruo
Ou Yaruo is a jewelry designer who works for the company owned by the Zhong family. She loves her job, she’s a rising designer, and she is Zhong Tianqi’s first love. Seems like she has exactly the kind of life Xia Zhixing wants, doesn’t it?
Well, on the surface that’s the case. But Ou Yaruo has a terrible secret.
Her past is possibly even sadder than Xia Zhixing. Xia Zhixing is an orphan who grew up in poverty, but at least she was cared for by a loving uncle. Instead, Ou Yaruo wishes that she had been an orphan, and least then she would not have been traumatized by her abusive father, who currently is in prison.
She is terrified by the thought that somebody will find out the truth about her family, and that if the truth comes out, she’ll lose career and that the people who love her will hate her. In fact, she is literally willing to kill to protect this secret.
The people close to Xia Zhixing, on the other hand, know that she was a con artist, and that she has a prison record, so she has no dark secret which may cost her livelihood and the love of the people around here.
Ou Yaruo has the career Xia Zhixing wants, and possibly the heart of the man Xia Zhixing is in love with. But Xia Zhixing has the integrity, bravery, and emotional security that Ou Yaruo wishes she had.
But Wait, There’s More…
You have probably figured out by now that this is one of my favorite idol dramas, which meant this post was getting a bit too long. I hope this post has piqued your interest enough to bring you back next week, when I will talk about this drama some more.
Sara K. saw swarms of purple butterflies in Maolin last week. Some of those butterflies flew all the way from Japan. Maolin itself is a gorgeous place. On a different note, she also has a guest post up at Yago.
Let’s just pretend I posted something in January. I certainly meant to! (I had a moment of panic just now thinking I wouldn’t even be able to get one in for February, since the site was down for me for a bit and tomorrow I won’t be home from work before the month’s over in MJ’s timezone, but I made it!)
This month’s request is actually a license rescue. I’m not sure if that makes it more or less likely than something that’s never been licensed before, but it does seem that quite a few things are being picked up for a second go-round, so I refuse to give up hope!
Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo, aka The Case Files of Young Kindaichi, aka The Kindaichi Case Files, is one of my very favorite manga of all time, possibly even my number one favorite. Last year saw its twentieth anniversary, and though I haven’t been reading it since the very beginning, it has been a very long time since I first fell in love with the series. (It’s weird to think that if Kindaichi actually aged, he would now be in his mid-thirties like me, rather than an eternal teenager!)
I can see why it would be a daunting project to tackle. The first series, consisting of twenty-seven volumes (with a total of nineteen cases awkwardly divided between the volumes), ran from 1992 to 1997 and was followed immediately by the second series, which consisted of ten volumes (seven cases, all either single or double-volume stories, which eliminated the problem of getting to the end of the book and finding yourself left hanging in the middle of a mystery) and ran until 2001. That was supposed to be the end of it, but (thankfully!) it ended up restarting in 2004 with what has been referred to as simply “the new series.” This series was also released with one case per volume (or divided into two volumes for some of the longer ones) and resulted in nine cases spread over fourteen volumes. Then in 2012 the formerly “new series” was rebranded as the 20th Anniversary Series, with three volumes having been released in that line so far with a fourth due in March (and annoyingly, they’ve gone back to the same format as the original series, rather than the more superior “one case per volume” format of the second and third series).
So that’s a total of fifty-four volumes (or thirty-seven cases) just in the main series, and it’s still on-going! Not to mention there are also six volumes of short stories and two volumes featuring Police Superintendent Akechi. And if you really want to be thorough, there are nine novels as well. (It’s also spawned four different drama series (the most recent of which just started airing a few weeks ago), as well as an anime.) That’s a lot of material to work with.
One thing I really like about Kindaichi (aside from the fact that they’re just good mysteries) is that people never kill for money or jealousy or petty stuff like that. It’s always revenge. Inevitably when Kindaichi reveals the killer, the killer will launch into a sob story about how the people they murdered wronged them (often those who were murdered turn out to be murderers themselves), and I’m not going to lie, I eat that sort of thing up with a spoon. Hearing the killer tell their story is probably my favorite part of the cases, though the reveal as to how they pulled it off comes a close second.
The first eighteen volumes were released by TokyoPop, but the series was dropped long before they went out of business. If it was dropped due to low sales, maybe another company would be hesitant to pick it up, but in that case a digital-only release might be the way to go. The translation and editing still requires some investment, but it’s not as risky as traditional publishing.
You might be wondering why we need another mystery series when there’s already Detective Conan, but apart from the fact that there can never be enough mysteries, Conan and Kindaichi are different types of series. Although both are murder mysteries, Kindaichi is much more realistic (well, as realistic as you can get when you’re talking about a high school boy who stumbles across murders wherever he goes) and serious compared to the Inspector Gadget-y hijinks of Conan.
Both for people who love Conan and are looking for more mystery manga, and those who want something different, Kindaichi is a good choice, and I hope that eventually it becomes available to more people.
SEAN: Ah, the first week of the month, the only week I never have to worry about things to talk about. And sure enough, there is a LOT coming out. Let’s discuss:
Dark Horse has two titles that aren’t Gantz or Evangelion, an achievement in itself. Including the debut of a new series, Blood-C. Which is yet another CLAMP franchise designed to promote an anime, made in conjunction with Production I.G. It’s a girl by day, monster slayer by night sort of story, and I believe gets quite dark. The artist did the Bandai manga version of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time.
ANNA: I feel like as a long-time CLAMP fan I should be more interested in this, but this is just reminding me that I need to get that 4th Cardcaptor Sakura omnibus.
MJ: I find I’m never really interested in these anime-related projects of theirs. But the new omnibus of Tokyo Babylon comes out soon, so I’ll be able to rave then.
SEAN: And for those who liked the Evangelion doujinshi anthology, there’s one coming out for Trigun called Multiple Bullets. Given Trigun has an actual creator,. this is a little more serious than the other types we’ve seen, and includes a 2-chapter story by Nightow he wrote for the movie premiere.
Kodansha has the 6th Negima omnibus. The translation had been fixed by this point, and it has no extra content, so it’s really just for anyone who didn’t get it the first time and is annoyed that it’s not available digitally yet.
Seven Seas may not be listed on Midtown, but my shop is getting in at least one of their titles (and, I conclude from incomplete data, the other one as well). Cheshire Cat Waltz has been sort of a middling Alice in the Country of ______ title, being neither as annoying as the Twins one nor as intriguing as the main narrative or the Joker series. But it’s decent enough, and Boris is one of the less insane people in it.
ANNA: I read the first volume of Cheshire Cat Waltz and wasn’t compelled to try other volumes, but I’m finding Joker much more interesting.
MICHELLE: I didn’t hate Cheshire, but Joker is definitely superior. I’d like to forget that I ever read the Twins one.
SEAN: There’s also Volume 2 of Mayo Chiki, for those who want it.
Vertical has the 3rd volume of Heroman, which is Stan Lee! How can you not like a Stan Lee! manga? (Best not answer that, la la la…)
MJ: I wish I could like this, for Vertical’s sake. But. Yeah.
SEAN: And, of course, there is a giant pile of Viz. Bakuman is still rumbling along towards its finish, and Vol. 18 will no doubt have lots of Jump drama, long stretches of dialogue, and annoying casual sexism.
MJ: I can’t help it, I’m hooked!
MICHELLE: I’m really behind, but I’ll catch up one of these days!
SEAN: Barrage is the first of Viz’s Shonen Jump Alpha premieres, where the Western World learns just what happens to 3/4 of all Jump manga every year – they go 2-3 volumes and then stop. And no, the popularity here has nothing to do with it. But given Viz is mostly avoiding longer Jump series right now, Barrage is a good short investment. It has the good old fashioned “posing as the prince” storyline, and is already half over!
ANNA: I’m reading this in preparation for a full review and am enjoying it a bunch. Actually I wish more shorter shonen series were released here, so I could get quick hits of shonen manga as opposed to committing to a very long series.
MJ: I’m really looking forward to this! Michelle and I will be covering it soon for Off the Shelf, and I’m feeling kinda eager.
MICHELLE: I wasn’t especially eager ’til I read Anna’s comment, but now I am! :)
SEAN: Ai Ore is over, but don’t worry, Mayu Shinjo’s series live on. I find my enjoyment of Shinjo depends on how much she humiliates her hero, so greatly enjoyed Vol. 1 of Demon Love Spell. Not sure how long that will last with Vol. 2…
ANNA: Demon Love Spell is fab! I also enjoyed the first volume very much!
MJ: I did too! Shockingly so!
MICHELLE: I liked it okay. Didn’t I read somewhere that Ai Ore! is not considered officially over, though? If it really is, I might have to do a cartwheel.
SEAN: Yeah, sorry, “End of Part One.”
I honestly keep forgetting that Fushigi Yuugi: Genbu Kaiden is still running, given that its author is famous enough that her publishing schedule for it is “whenever”. But hey, here’s a new volume.
ANNA: For me, new volumes of Genbu Kaiden are always an excuse for a celebration. I love this series.
MJ: I completely agree, Anna. This series is such a treat anytime it turns up.
MICHELLE: Forsooth. Genbu Kaiden is great, but I feel bad that every time I read it or talk about it I always want to add “I hope she writes Byakko Kaiden next!”
SEAN: One Piece is almost at the 2/3 mark in its quest for 100 volumes! And best of all, Vol. 66 finally wraps up Fishman Island and starts a new arc! Halle-freaking-llujah! Of course, even the poor One Piece arcs are miles better than most shonen.
MICHELLE: I fell behind on One Piece, too, but am determined to get caught up and do a brief of volume 66 in the near future.
SEAN: Oresama Teacher remains one of my favorite comedies that Viz is putting out, and Vol. 13 features everyone’s favorite superhero, SUPER BUN, on the cover. What more could one ask for?
ANNA: Indeed. I only hope there are some pigeon note-passing antics in this volume as well.
MICHELLE: Pigeon note-passing antics?! Did this occur recently? I haven’t read volume twelve yet… did I miss cute pigeon-y goodness?
SEAN: There is Pokemon Adventures Vol. 15, apparently a 2nd edition of same. I don’t follow Pokemon at all, but know that it brings in piles of cash. In my headcanon, this and Yu-Gi-Oh are paying for the end of Excel Saga.
Psyren starts its second half with Vol. 9, which features more battles, more teamwork, more psionic powers… in other words, a lot more Jump. Not sure anyone’s head will explode, though. “Nooooooo!” BOOOOOM! (See, Even A Monkey Can Draw Manga’s influence is still felt today…)
MICHELLE: Here’s another shounen series I like that I’ve fallen behind on. (That makes three this column!) There just aren’t enough hours in the day to read everything I’d like to read.
SEAN: Rosario + Vampire Season II hits Vol. 11, which must be very confusing if you mix up the Arabic and roman numerals…
Skip Beat’s 3-in-1s return by popular demand! Vol. 4 has the original 10-12, which if I recall is right in the middle of the Dark Moon shoot.
MICHELLE: Yay, Skip Beat!
SEAN: Strobe Edge has a 3rd volume. Having introduced the rival girl, and then done a side story that really showed she’s not a villain at all, I’m interested to see where the series takes this.
ANNA: This seems like a nice conventional shojo series. Nothing wrong with that at all.
MJ: I’m a lot more interested in this series than I thought I would be when I started it, so this is a happy thing.
MICHELLE: I like it quite a lot. It might be taking a conventional route, but it’s not being lazy about it, which I appreciate.
SEAN: And Vampire Knight has Vol. 16. The series was just announced as coming to a close, so I assume there’s only one or two volumes left to go. In any case, I plan to be riveted yet hopelessly confused, as always when I read Vampire Knight.
MICHELLE: Oh, I hadn’t heard that news! Perhaps I’ll just hold on for the final volumes to come out here and then read it all in a chunk; probably things will make a lot more sense that way. Maybe.
SEAN: That’s a lot of manga. What are you getting?
Today is “Peace Memorial Day,” a national holiday in Taiwan. Though every other national holiday I can think of in Taiwan is also celebrated in other parts of the Chinese-speaking world (even Double-Tens day is somewhat recognized in China), “Peace Memorial Day” is Taiwan’s and Taiwan’s alone. It is a memorial to the “2/28 Incident” (AKA “2/28 Massacre”) which happened in 1947.
In the Fires of 2/28 is a manhua by Du Fu-ann published last year which describes the events which led to the “2/28 Incident,” the “incident” itself, and the aftermath.
TRIGGER WARNING: This manhua describes violent conflict, including sexual assault, and I have decided to include some graphic imagery. Also, because of the graphic imagery, this post is NSFW.
So, What Happened?
Here is a summary of what happened, as told by the manhua.
After WWII, Japan had to cede control of all overseas territories, including Taiwan. Whereas many Asian countries (such as India, Korea, and the Philippines) got independence after WWII, The Allies decided to transfer Taiwan to the administration of the Republic of China. At first, the Taiwanese people were really happy about this, since China was their ancestral land and they considered this to be the equivalent of independence. It would be a little as if world leaders had decided make Quebec a part of France.
However, once the Republic of China actually took control of Taiwan, the people were bitterly disillusioned. The Chinese soldiers were poor, shabby, and greedy. The economy went down the tank, with rapidly rising unemployment, hyperinflation, and grain shortages. The Kuomintang (KMT), who controlled the Republic of China government, was far more corrupt and discriminatory than the Japanese administration, promoting Chinese people without qualifications to well-paid positions while forcing qualified Taiwanese people to do low-paid work, looting left and right, and sexually assaulting people with impunity. By 1947, the Taiwanese people were seething with fury, and all that was needed was a match.
The match was lit on February 27, 1947, when government agents hit a woman selling tobacco on the street on the head with a pistol. Other people in the street came to the woman’s support, and then one of the government agents fired a gun and killed somebody in the crowd. This sparked a huge spontaneous protest, which the government did not respond to.
The next day, Feburary 28, was the beginning of a violent uprising by people all over Taiwan. In some places, the Taiwanese stole weapons and formed their own armies to drive out the Chinese, and many Taiwanese people were organizing to form their own government, independent of the Republic of China.
The army of the Republic of China brutally repressed this uprising. After they took back control of Kaohsiung (Taiwan’s second largest city), they brutally punished the residents. The KMT also rounded up many intellectuals, even ones who were not part of the uprisings, and executed them, lest they form an independent government. Tens of thousands of people were murdered this way. The forces of the uprising were driven deeper and deeper into the mountains, until finally, they were defeated. After this, the KMT imposed martial law on Taiwan.
Meanwhile, the KMT was losing the Chinese Civil War, and eventually their army (as well as well as many Chinese citizens) had to retreat to the islands of Hainan, Kinmen, Matsu, Zhoushan, and Taiwan. Then the islands of Hainan and Zhoushan also fell to Chinese Communist control, leaving only Kinmen, Matsu, and Taiwan under the control of the Republic of China.
In the epilogue, the manhua mentions that martial law was finally lifted in 1987, and ends with an image of Lee Teng-hui, then president of the Republic of China and leader of the KMT, officially apologizing in 1995 for the 2/28 incident and offering compensation to the victims’ families.
So, how does this work as a comic book?
This manhua is only about 150 pages long, so it has to simplify things and leave some aspects of the “2/28 Incident” unexplored. I’m okay with that, since it’s intended to be an accessible introduction, not a thorough account.
In my first draft, I expressed my discomfort with the way the Chinese are depicted as two-dimensional villainous caricatures, not because I excuse their crimes (the looting, corruption, rape, and murder are inexcusable), but because it rings false—all of those heinous crimes were committed by people. However, upon reflection, I realize that from the victims’ point of view, they may very well have been caricature villains, and the manhua is primarily interested in the victims’ perspective.
However, I still think the lack of personalization of the Taiwanese people makes the story feel too dry and didactic. Since this is a story of many people, focusing on a few characters would also be artificial on its own way, but I think the manhua would have benefited from putting a little more emphasis on individual stories instead of mostly telling the story from the point of view of the masses. Comic books draw strength by appealing to feeling, and the best way to draw feeling is to tell stories of individual people.
There is a Taiwanese family which plays the role of Greek chorus but … something about them feels too didactic to me.
The closest the manhua comes to showing the Chinese point of view is the inclusion of a political cartoon from a Shanghai newspaper.
In this cartoon, the Republic of China/KMT are worms which have infested the big apple (China) for a long time, and have just started infesting the small apple (Taiwan). It shows that, as intense as the suffering of the Taiwanese people under the KMT was, the Chinese had been suffering worse for a longer period of time. I think this is a really important point. Even though the poor Chinese soldiers did commit a lot of crimes too, it was the KMT elite, not the non-elite Chinese, who were ultimately responsible. And, in some ways, the suffering that the KMT imposed on the poor Chinese soldiers was worse than what they imposed on the Taiwanese.
What makes the manhua work, however, is the artwork.
The Artwork
While I criticize the narrative for not being sufficiently personalized, the artwork does partially make up for this by making the events come alive through is lively movement, such as in this page where a soldier breaks in and shoots an older man:
However, I also think the artwork is the main reason I’m uncomfortable with the depiction o the Chinese. Looking carefully at it again, there’s not much in the text which dehumanizes the Chinese. It’s mainly the artwork which makes the Chinese look like caricatures.
Truman makes the KMT cry.
On the one hand, I recognize this may represent the victims’ point of view. However, I am especially bothered by the way the Chinese, particularly the KMT, are depicted as being humorous. I know that it’s artistically a good idea to balance tragedy wit humor, but even with my warped sense of humor I don’t think any part of this story is remotely funny, and making the criminals look funny just feels … wrong.
The Chinese are stealing everything they can, how funny … not.
The manhua also makes use of various metaphorical imagery. One image which is repeated again and again is this flower … I’ll be honest, I don’t know what the flower’s significance is, by it generally accompanies a block of text describing historical details.
The flower above KMT leaders acting like spoiled brats.
Some of the imagery works very well, such as this image of the Republic of China (represented by the hands) wringing Taiwan dry.
I do applaud the manhua from not shying away from gruesome imagery. It doesn’t dwell on the graphic stuff too much—the purpose is to tell a story, not to revel in violence—but I think drawing out some of the horrors is necessary for the reader to feel a tiny bit of how terrifying the “incident” was.
The Republic of China forces round up, shoot, and rape the people of Kaohsiung.
Students are rounded up, blindfolded, shot, and their bodies are thrown into the sea.
The Republic of China forces gouge students’ eyes, castrate them, and then behead them.
There are some drawings which are beautiful in a horrifying way, such as this scene:
Dead bodies lie across a blank page.
These gruesome images make a stark contrast to the almost expressionless “leaders” who seem oblivious to the horrors around them.
This, in my opinion, is a more powerful way to show how monsterous the KMT elite were than making them look like cartoon villains.
The Slant
This is one of the most politically charged sections of Taiwanese history, and as such, people have very passionate views on this story. Just as black people, southern whites, and non-southern whites tend to have different interpretations of the U.S. Civil War, so do different groups in Taiwan tend to have different interpretations of the 2/28 “incident,” and it tends to reveal one’s political bias.
The slant taken by this manhua is that General Chen Yi, who was put in charge of Taiwan immediately after Taiwan passed into Republic of China control, is the big bad guy. This is a relatively non-controversial position to take, since almost everybody agrees that he was horrible. Not much is said about Chiang Kai-shek, though the manhua does compare him to Koxinga (the Ming dynasty general who fled to and took over part of Taiwan after the Ming dynasty was driven out of China).
Of course, the very act of making a manhua about this at all is a political statement. For decades, anything referring to the “incident” was heavily censored, and one of the big fights of the Taiwanese democracy movement was making it possible to discuss the “incident” in public. This manhua is exercising the freedom won by the democracy activists.
Availability in English
As far as I know, this manhua is totally unavailable in English.
While it is primarily targeted at a young Taiwanese audience, I think people all over the world have something to learn from the “2/28 Incident,” and this is an accessible introduction. However, I have no idea who would translate this into English.
For those who want to know more about the “2/28 Incident,” Formosa Betrayed by George H. Kerr (who appears in the manhua) is available online for free.
I do wish the people who put the manhua together had consulted an English editor.
I think the real George Kerr spoke grammatically correct English.
Conclusion
This “incident” was so formative of Taiwanese politics and identity that I don’t think it’s possible to have a deep understanding of Taiwanese society without knowing what happened.
I think it’s also helpful for getting a better understanding of Taiwanese media. For example, in Fated to Love You, Xinyi (the lead female character) comes from a family which was on the victims’ side in the 2/28 “incident,” whereas Cunxi (the lead male character) comes from a family which was on the aggressors’ side. I don’t think the audience needs to know this to appreciate and enjoy the drama … but this is a fact which is very apparent to Taiwanese audiences.
Sara K.’s grandfather was actually in China when World War II officially ended. According to her father, when WWII was declared over, from her grandfather’s point of view, that was the end of the war. But for his companions, who were in the Republic of China army, the war was not over—they knew that the Chinese civil war was going to restart almost as soon as Japan was defeated. Sara K. does not know what happened to her grandfather’s companions, but most likely they switched sides to the Communists, fled to Taiwan, or were killed.
Legend of the Fox vs. New Tales of the Flying Fox
Legend of the Fox and New Tales of the Flying Fox are both Shaw Brothers’ movies adapted from the novel Other Tales of the Flying Fox. Other Tales of the Flying Fox is a prequel to the novel The Fox Volant of Snow Mountain, which I have already discussed. However, while the original novel also has some of the characters from The Book and the Sword, they don’t show up in the movies.
Quick Story Overview
Hu Fei is an unfortunate young orphan. Just after he was born, his father, Hu Yidao, was killed by his friend Miao Renfeng in a duel—but Hu Yidao only died because the malevolent Tian Guinong put poison on Miao Renfeng’s sword. Hu Fei’s mother committed suicide shortly after this.
Hu Fei is a young man who has learned martial arts from the manual left by his father. Meanwhile, Miao Renfeng’s wife Na Lan abandoned him and their daughter to go be with Tian Guinong. As Hu Fei contemplates getting revenge on Miao Renfeng, Miao Renfeng is tricked, poisoned, and blinded. Since Hu Fei feels it would be dishonorable to kill Miao Renfeng while he’s blind, he works to restore his eyesight, so that he can then kill him with honor (isn’t that so logical?) Hu Fei meets Cheng Lingsu, a young woman who is an expert on poison and antidotes, and he asks her to help him restore Miao Renfeng’s eyesight. He also gets involved Cheng Lingsu’s conflicts with her master’s other students.
Both movies cover this much of the story, but beyond this, the plot of the two movies diverge. For example, Yuan Ziyi, who is a key character in both the original novel and in New Tales of the Flying Fox, does not appear at all in Legend of the Fox.
Background on the Movies
Why did Shaw Brothers adapt the same novel twice only four years apart (1980 and 1984)? I don’t know.
Legend of the Fox was directed by Chang Cheh, who is considered one of the great marital arts movie directors.
New Tales of the Flying Fox stars Felix Wong as Hu Fei and Kara Hui as Yuan Ziyi. Felix Wong is famous for playing Jin Yong heroes, such as Xu Zhu, Guo Jing, Yuan Chengzhi, and Qiao Feng. Well, in this film, he plays Hu Fei. Kara Hui, meanwhile, is a noted and highly-respected kung-fu movie star.
Mesmerizing Disco Fashion
One of the things that really struck me about Legend of the Fox was the fashion. Many of the characters were dressed as if they were ready to go to a disco party.
This is 18th century China?
I was particularly mesmerized when there were whole slews of people dressed in oh-so-late-70s clothing.
Seeing all of those chests becomes hypnotic after a while.
New Tales of the Flying Fox also looks like an 80s film, but at least if feels like it’s set in imperial China, not a disco club.
My review of Legend of the Fox
First of all, this movie has *way too much dialogue*. I think at least 1/3 of the dialogue should have been cut out. I could have maybe forgiven the wordiness if it were being really faithful to the novel, but it makes a number of departures from the original novel (completely changing the ending, for example).
The acting … okay, the acting is not bad. At least, not bad enough to make me cringe. However, I don’t feel that the actors brought much to the table. Sure, the performances have a minimal competence, but I also feel that they didn’t bring any insight to the stories or the characters. Chin Siu-ho, in my opinion, was a shallow Hu Fei, which is a pity, because I think Hu Fei has a lot going on psychologically.
Now, it’s clear from the fight scenes that this came from the golden era of martial arts films. Everybody involved is clearly professional and skilled (I would expect no less of Chang Cheh). Some of the fights are a little long … but some of the fights are bloody impressive, such as the one where blind!Miao Renfeng fights a bunch of guys armed with chains.
Alas, while the fights do a fine job of supporting the movie, they can’t carry it—and as you may gather from the above comments, the script and the acting don’t carry the movie either.
Summary: though some of the fights are nice, I don’t like this movie.
The Value of Young Women
I could dedicate an entire post to the way Jin Yong’s female characters are treated, but here’s a short version: in Jin Yong stories, young women are valued for beauty/attractiveness and intelligence/knowledge. A young woman ideally is beautiful and smart, but if she’s not beautiful, she better be smart, and if she’s not smart, she better be beautiful. Young men, on the other hand, don’t have to be smart, or pretty, or anything else to be valued.
Cheng Ling-su, in the novel, is not pretty, so she has to justify her existence by being very smart and knowledgeable. This is who they cast to play her in Legend of the Fox
That’s right, they cast a pretty actress to play one of the few Jin Yong female protagonists who is not pretty.
Who do they cast in New Tales of the Flying Fox?
I think this is okay. By the standards of Hong Kong cinema, she is plain-looking.
My Review of New Tales of the Flying Fox
Even though this movie (90 minutes) is much shorter than Legend of the Fox (123 minutes), a lot more happens. This is partially because there is a lot less pointless dialogue.
Doesn’t that look exciting?
In fact, this movie moves so quickly that once I got into the story I didn’t realize how quickly time was going by. “Whoa, I’m already an hour into the movie!”
The fight scenes are shorter in this movie, but I think that makes them better. They pack more of a punch this way. But it’s not just that. They also have a delightful playfulness about them.
Playing with pots is fun.
The highlight of the movie for me, however, is the way that Felix Wong and Kara Hui come together so well in this film. Every scene featuring Hu Fei (Felix Wong) and Yuan Ziyi (Kara Hui) was a joy to watch. As actors, they reacted to each other like lightning, building on each other’s performance. It’s to bad there is no TV series starring the two of them together—I would watch it.
Felix Wong as Hu Fei and Kara Hui as Yuan Ziyi
1) Some parts of the plot should have been better explained. I was able to follow everything because I had read the novel … but without knowing what happened in the novel, some things would not have made sense.
2) I would have liked more development of the relationship between Hu Fei and Cheng Lingsu. Ideally, Cheng Lingsu/Hu Fei/Yuan Ziyi should be a tense love triangle, but Hu Fei/Yuan Ziyi pretty much steals the show in this movie. The problem is that Hu Fei and Chung Lingsu simply don’t have enough screen time together, and as a consequence, one of the most moving parts of the story falls a bit flat in this movie.
Hu Fei and Cheng Lingsu: these two do not look like they have romantic feelings for each other.
Summary: If the biggest complaint I can make about a movie is “it was too short,” then I probably really liked the movie.
Availability in English
Both Legend of the Fox and New Tales of the Flying Fox are available on region 3 DVD with English subtitles.
Conclusion
The original novel is a bit all over the place, so it makes sense that a movie adaptation would pick and choose bits, and try to mold them into a coherent movie. These two movies did not pick and choose the same things, so even though they are based on the same novel, they feel very different from each other. Legend of the Fox is more about scheming and demonstrating physical might, and New Tales of the Flying Fox focuses more on personal relationships, with violence added for fun.
Yuan Ziyi has her knife at Hu Fei’s throat – how romantic.
If you want to see a movie adaptation of Other Tales of the Fox, pick New Tales of the Flying Fox, not Legend of the Fox.
There will be a special post on Thursday, February 28.
Sara K. needs to watch more martial arts movies. She also needs to spend more time learning Chinese. She also needs to spend more time hiking. She also needs to cook more often. She also needs to learn some new skills. She also needs at least two hundred years of good health and economic security to do everything she wants to do. Sigh. That’s not going to happen.
SEAN: (I was away last week, so you get a two-fer this time around.)
I appreciate – I really do – JManga getting out all these Vol. 3s and 5s and 7s. For a while it seemed that we’d get Vol. 1 of selected series with nothing else, so it’s great to see that they’re moving on with many titles to further volumes.
That said, damn, it’s hard to come up with new ways to break everything down. But here we go…
Joshi Kousei (High School Girls) has Vol. 6 this week and Vol. 7 next week. For those who are truly HSG fanatics, the release of Vol. 6 here means we now have all the reissued covers, including the ones DrMaster never reprinted. Woot! Funny series, too. Everyone should read it.
MJ: I will. I promise. Soon.
SEAN: More Elemental Gelade.
More PoyoPoyo’s Observation Diary.
A new Ninja Papa, which hopefully will avoid the gentle downward slide it’s had since its ludicrous beginnings.
The Mythical Detective Loki gets a 4th volume, and I continue to be confused as to whether it’s the original or the Ragnarok that ADV put out.
And Sun-Ken Rock has a 3rd volume for me to catch up on, and is easily the MANLIEST thing in this entire list – yes, it even tops Ninja Papa.
MICHELLE: I am sad to say I have absolutely nothing to say about any of these.
MJ: It’s getting difficult, isn’t it?
Anything catch your eye?
SEAN: The main problem with my list of manga that’s coming out is it originated on my Livejournal page as a list to remind me what *I* might be getting at any given time, with the titles I wasn’t buying included because well, why not? As a result, I tend to keep these lists geared towards me. With that in mind, here’s a breakdown of the sources I use:
a) My comic shop in New Haven. This is mostly via Diamond Distributors. “But Sean,” (I hear you cry), “Diamond is showing Yen’s stuff coming out the week of 2/27, not 2/20!” Yes, but I got Yen stuff on Wednesday, including this Umineko volume that is as big as a small house. This is because Diamond sometimes splits its shipments over two weeks, shipping to some stores (such as the Northeast Corridor) before others. This happens to me a LOT with Yen, which I frequently get early.
By the way, rule of thumb for Diamond. Ships early: Dark Horse, Fantagraphics, Seven Seas. Ships late: Kodansha, Vertical. Ships on same date: Viz, Yen (except Northeast Corridor).
b) Midtown Comics list, which goes live sometime Wednesday Afternoons. They have their own distribution for many publishers (i.e., not Diamond), including Viz and Seven Seas. This is why they sometimes have Viz titles a week late, and frequently have Seven Seas titles very late. This is what allows Aaron to list the same Seven Seas titles in comments over multiple weeks. :)
c) Amazon, where I usually fill in the blanks from the other two lists.
With that said, almost everyone who isn’t me will get Yen Press titles the week of 2/27, so just port those over to this list.
So what ELSE is coming out next week? Kodansha, mostly. We have the 27th volume of Air Gear, which ships only a few months before they try to entice in new readers with the Air Gear omnibus. For me, though, the prospect of Tenjo Tenge-style fanservice plus rollerblading has always left me a bit cold.
MICHELLE: Yeah, I have never been able to muster the fortitude to try Air Gear.
MJ: Nor have I.
SEAN: Battle Angel Alita: Last Order hits Vol. 17. I got way, WAY behind in this series (as in, I still have to finish the original non-Last Order Alita), so I suspect I’ll just wait for the omnibus. Which has new content anyway, apparently.
MICHELLE: I have the first three volumes of the original series, but I still haven’t read them. One day!
SEAN: Cage of Eden is up to Vol. 9, and will be resolving its psychic arc while no doubt showing that there are a lot of large-breasted females and hideous carnivorous animals in it. As I said, the perfect comic for 12-year-old boys.
MICHELLE: My Air Gear comment can easily be applied here as well.
MJ: Mine, too. Wow, I have so little of interest to say this week!
SEAN: And Kitchen Princess hits its third omnibus. I don’t have much to say about this, except it’s great shoujo that for once you could actually give to a young girl to read – well, mostly. It can get a bit dark at times.
MICHELLE: I can’t believe I’ve owned this series for so long without reading it even though I’ve heard very good things about it! Bad me.
MJ: I missed this series the first time around, so I’m pretty happy to have a chance to catch up now!
SEAN: I have no idea if Bond of Dreams, Bond of Love is any good, but the covers are magnificent. The lead male, despite his gigantic chest of death, still appears to be the grumpiest man on the planet, and his companion is the perfect contrast, having a face that anyone would love to hit. Seriously, look at that “Oops!” face. Anyone would understand why the big guy is so mad. Well, besides “Why did they draw me so wide…?”
MICHELLE: I read the first two volumes of this and didn’t like it very much. The shrimpy guy is just as annoying as he looks and I have no idea what the grumpy dude could possibly find to like about him. I don’t intend to bother reading any more of it.
MJ: My biggest issue with this series (aside from finding it just kinda boring) is that the drawing style and the age difference—particularly in one scene early in the first volume—give it a shotacon vibe I just can’t stomach. It’s definitely Not For Me.
SEAN: Assuming anyone stuck around after the meandering opening, what’re you getting?
SEAN: Third week of the month, which is starting to traditionally mean that Diamond Comics ships Yen Press stuff a week early to me. So this Midtown list is augmented by the Yen stuff my shop will be getting.
Dark Horse has run out of Evangelion spinoffs, so is dipping into the well of doujinshi anthologies, a type of manga we’ve previously seen over here with the Code Geass: Knight and Queen manga. They’re put out by real publishers, so don’t expect anything over 18 rated, and are by various artists and writers. I’m going to guess the majority will be humorous, but who knows?
MJ: Possibly this will put me on many fan hate lists, but… I’ll admit I’m tired of Evangelion. I loved the anime series (like everyone) and I’ve read some of the manga adaptation, but if it’s come to publishing doujinshi, can we just admit that there’s nothing left here to milk but fanfic? Which is fine—I’m pro-fanfic, but I kind of expect that to remain in fan circles. Am I being a big fuddy-duddy here?
MICHELLE: Not at all. I’ve consumed even less of Evangelion than you have and I’m still weary of it!
SEAN: Kodansha Comics has Volume 30 (yes, 30) of The Wallflower, which is to shoujo harems what Hayate the Combat Butler is to shounen harems. It will never ever resolve, and no one will have their character developed. But – funny things will occur! Love those funny things.
MICHELLE: Yeah, this is just not my kind of shoujo series. I wish I could like the funny things, but the lack of evolution wears me out after a while. Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei is another example of that happening.
SEAN: Seven Seas (like Yen, shipping via Diamond but not to Midtown) has the 2nd Dance in the Vampire Bund omnibus. The first one is still sitting in my to-read stack, so I can’t really tell you much about it. Maybe someday…
MJ: This series’ fanbase has made me reluctant to try it out, but I should probably look past that, shouldn’t I?
SEAN: Another softcover re-release from Vertical, this one of Tezuka’s Ayako. It’s still a brick, but may weigh a bit less.
MJ: Ayako has its issues, but it’s well worth reading. If you missed the hardcover, this is a must-buy.
SEAN: And now it’s time for a giant pile of Yen to hit comic shops. The Betrayal Knows My Name has hit five volumes. I guess the betrayal’s knowledge isn’t enough to end the series all that fast, so there must me more to the protagonists than just the name. (You can always tell which of the series I discuss I don’t read, can’t you?)
MJ: I featured this volume in my latest My Week in Manga, so I can make up the difference. :D
MICHELLE: I haven’t read any of this either, but I will someday!
SEAN: We have a new action series that will likely appeal to the Battle Royale/High School of the Dead crowd, this one with the compelling title of BTOOOM! The covers may have been changed to avoid lawsuits, but the contents inside still scream survival game.
MJ: Michelle & I discussed this in Off the Shelf last week. I found it unoriginal but decidedly fun.
MICHELLE: It looks uncomplicated, which is actually a compliment.
SEAN: The Misfortune of Kyon and Koizumi is the second doujinshi anthology we’re talking about this week, oddly enough. This one’s based off of the Haruhi Suzumiya series, and features the two guys in the main cast. I’m not actually sure how BL-heavy it’ll be – Haruhi‘s fandom still skews very male. But we shall see.
MJ: I’m going to contradict myself and admit that I’m actually kinda interested in this one. So Evangelion fans can start throwing heavy objects at me now.
MICHELLE: Not me. I avoid all manga iterations of the Haruhi story.
SEAN: I’ve long since lost track of what’s going on in Nabari no Ou, but this is the penultimate volume, and would seem to be flashback-tastic. Recommended to ninja fans who can’t stand Naruto.
MJ: That’s me! :D Seriously, though, I love Nabari no Ou. I’m behind on the series as well, but I plan to catch up soon!
MICHELLE: I don’t love Nabari no Ou, but I’ve still managed to read nine volumes so far, and will probably finish it. I don’t hate it, but it just doesn’t seem to stick with me.
SEAN: Pandora Hearts, of course, is nowhere near finishing, even as it reaches 14 volumes. I don’t follow this one either, so I’ll just note that the serious guy on the cover looks very serious indeed. I’d do what he says if I were you.
MJ: This series totally owns me. It’s a perfect example of how deeply I can love something that’s flawed. I love Pandora Hearts with my whole heart.
MICHELLE: Again, I am stopping short of admitting that I love this series, but I am happy when I see new volumes of it.
SEAN: Triage X has managed to get out a 2nd volume. I’m not certain if its cover is as appalling as the first volume, but it certainly tries hard. Meanwhile, nurses, guns, motorcycles, and explosions.
MJ: Ugh.
MICHELLE: Double ugh.
SEAN: Umineko: When They Cry has hit the end of its first arc with this 2nd omnibus. I’m pretty much expecting everyone to die horribly, because that’s what this author does. But will they die horribly in a fascinating and endlessly debatable way? Oh, I hope so. A bit less uuu-uuu would be welcome, though.
MICHELLE: Gah, that “uuu!” crap was so annoying. I will probably read this, since I read the first half, but I am not anticipating loving it.
SEAN: Lastly, in the 3rd omnibus of Until Death Do Us Part, our hero and his charge go on the run from innumerable assassins and other killy things. Luckily, they’re the stars. That counts for a lot in a manga series.
MJ: I still haven’t tried out this series, but I’m thinking about it. Thoughts?
MICHELLE: I actually kind of like this series, but I find that I can’t really give a coherent explanation. I like the premise, I guess, and the supporting organization that helps the hero, etc.
SEAN: Omnibus? Doujin anthology? What’s your poison?