Features & Reviews

My Week in Manga: May 16-May 22, 2016

May 23, 2016 by Ash Brown

My News and Reviews

I ended up posting it a little later than I really intended, but my random musings on TCAF 2016 are now available to read. Although I didn’t make it to as many panels this year, I still had a great time and really enjoyed myself. I haven’t had a chance to listen to the audio yet, but I was also happy to discover that some of the panels that I missed The Sparkling World of Shojo Manga. In licensing news, Yen Press has picked up both the light novels and the manga for Death March to the Parallel World Rhapsody and Konosuba. Princess Jellyfish has been doing well enough for Kodansha Comics that the publisher is considering releasing more josei and seinen. In the meantime, expect to see more additions to the Attack on Titan franchise in English from Kodansha as well as Shuzo Oshimi’s manga Happiness. Also, Vertical Comics will be releasing Chihiro Ishizuka’s manga series Flying Witch.

Quick Takes

Attack on Titan: Before the Fall, Volume 7 written by Ryo Suzukaze and illustrated by Satoshi Shiki. I missed reading a few volumes of the Before the Fall manga, but I have read the original novel that it was based on so I didn’t expect that I would have much trouble picking the series up again. However, I think that the manga might actually be expanding on some of the material of the original, because I don’t recall things playing out exactly in the same way as they are in the manga. Or it could just be that it’s been so long since I’ve read the novel that I’ve managed to forget major plot points. Either way, I do like the way that Before the Fall expands the worldbuilding of Attack on Titan and how the prequel emphasizes some of the scientific and technological advances that are needed to make the main series work. Basically, the main character, in addition to having the requisite tragic backstory, is a test pilot (if that’s the right word) for what will eventually become the Vertical Maneuvering Equipment. A significant portion of the seventh volume of the Before the Fall manga is actually devoted to a field test which, like most encounters with the Titans, ist fraught with danger, disaster, and potential death.

Dicebox, Volume 1: Wander by Jenn Manley Lee. I discovered Lee’s ongoing comic Dicebox a couple of years ago while reading Comics: A Global History, 1968 to the Present where it was briefly mentioned. It piqued my interest so I thought I would give Wander, the first book out of four planned volumes (the second book is currently being serialized online), a try. I suspected that Dicebox would probably be a comic I would enjoy, but I didn’t expect that I would become so invested in the characters by the end of the first volume. Wander is almost completely driven by the characters and their relationships—the dramatic story boiling under the surface doesn’t become obvious until the final few chapters. Dicebox follows the lives of Molly and Griffin, two itinerant blue-collar workers moving from one job to the next, from one planet to the next. Molly tends to be fairly well liked, but Griffin, well she tends to piss people off, sometimes intentionally and sometimes not. Eventually it’s revealed that one of the reasons that Molly puts up with Griffin is that they are married. Dicebox is incredibly well-realized near-future science fiction. It’s also undeniably queer, and quite possibly has the widest representation of the variance of human gender and sexuality that I’ve ever come across in a single work of fiction, comic or otherwise. I’m loving Dicebox and definitely plan on reading more of the series.

Ninja Slayer Kills!, Volume 2 by Koutarou Sekine. I can’t say that I was overly impressed by the first volume of Ninja Slayer Kills and I really wasn’t planning on following the series, but I ended up with a review copy of the second volume, so I figured I might as well give it a try. I am admittedly surprised, but I enjoyed the second volume much more than the first. Almost the entirety of the second volume is devoted to a flashback, which is easy to miss unless close attention is paid to the manga’s prefatory material. Some of my complaints about the manga remain the same—for a series that is so focused on fight scenes and mayhem, the action can be frustratingly difficult to follow—but other aspects have improved. For one, there is absolutely no mistaking at least one of the character designs. Agony visually looks something like a highly-sexualized version of Pinhead from Hellraiser, complete with an enormous crotch-bulge sprouting numerous needles. The design is more disturbing than sexy, but it is memorable. Ninja Slayer Kills is all about being as over-the-top as possible, often reading like an in-your-face parody. It’s deliberately absurd and ridiculously violent, intentionally making heavy use of cyberpunk ninja tropes taken to their extremes.

JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Battle Tendency, Vol. 3

May 22, 2016 by Sean Gaffney

By Hirohiko Araki. Released in Japan as “Jojo no Kimyou na Bouken” by Shueisha, serialized in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz Media.

In modern days, it has become a somewhat amusing joke to say that “no one dies in (insert Jump title here)”, be it Bleach, One Piece (until recently), or other such series. There are lots of apparent deaths, but it is a very popular cliche to have the supposedly dead person reappear to much rejoicing, and Jump in particular loves to do it. That said, this is a good 25 years earlier, and so JoJo’s is not afraid to brutally murder major cast members in order to advance the plot and provide much character development and tears of rage from our titular hero. Indeed, the villains are so arrogant that being killed by one of them personally is deemed to be a blessing given to a worthy opponent – attention has been paid.

Last arc it was Speedwagon who survived, with Jonathan being killed off right at the very end. Joseph is a different, less tragic sort of hero, and so it falls to Caesar to be the one who loses his life so that the others may pursue their goal of defeating the evil whositses – honestly, a lot of the plot details of JoJo still tend to whiz by me as people scream battle poses at each other. Not that this is a bad thing – that is why we read this series, as Araki is very good at keeping a reader’s interest with reaction shots and amazed exclamations. Take, for example, the return of Stroheim, who has returned as something of a cyborg, and manages for a while to go toe to toe with Kars (named after the band, or the Gary Numan song? Or both). This despite the fact that the entire “he’s a Nazi, but I don’t hate him as a person” plotline is deeply uncomfortable, and I won’t cry when we leave World War II behind.

As for Joseph himself, he is, as ever, more of a trickster than his grandfather was, which allows him more success in battle against enemies who are prone to being faked out. Of course, this comes with cocksure arrogance and sometimes a petulant anger as well. He’s at his best here dealing with Suzie Q, who he flirts with for about two pages before she’s possessed by another one of the bad guys. This is why seeing him and Lisa Lisa devastated at the climax of this volume is so heartbreaking. We don’t like seeing Joseph like this. I have no doubt that he will get an epic revenge in the fourth and final volume of this arc, but will he be able to bounce back and show us some cocksurity? Who knows.

By now anyone reading this series knows what they’re getting into. I wish there was less “Nazis may be evil but they sure are cool” here, to be frank, but other than that this is wall to wall excellent shonen at 100% volume.

Random Musings: Toronto Comic Arts Festival 2016

May 20, 2016 by Ash Brown

©Kazu Kibuishi

As of 2016, I have now attended the Toronto Comic Arts Festival (TCAF) for four years running. TCAF is still the only large comics event that I make a point to attended, although I guess technically I went to an anime/manga/cosplay convention earlier this year since I and the rest of the taiko group I’m a part of were featured guest performers. Anyway, I digress. TCAF is an amazing event and I’m able to enjoy a fair amount of it even though my anxiety (social and otherwise) sometimes prevents me from doing everything that I’d really like to. Each year I attend seems to be a little easier for me, though it’s still certainly not easy. But, I do think TCAF is totally worth trying to push through my issues when I can, which probably says a fair amount about the event itself.

Like last year, TCAF 2016 turned into a family trip, which made me happy. The four of us arrived in Toronto late Thursday afternoon, settled into where we were staying, stretched our legs in a nearby park (which was much needed after spending hours cooped up in the car), and eventually found something to eat for dinner before turning in for the night. Originally, I was hoping and planning to go to the opening of Shintaro Kago’s solo exhibition at Narwhal, but for a variety of reasons I ended up deciding to chill with the family all night instead. Which was also good, since for all intents and purposes TCAF ends up being a vacation of sorts for us all.

Friday, too, was more of a family day, although I did meet up with Jocelyne Allen (who translates Japanese novels and manga, and who is one of the interpreters for TCAF) for coffee in the morning. We chatted about taiko, translation, TCAF, Toronto, Tokyo and all sorts of other things, which was highly enjoyable. It was nice being able to find some time to talk with her in person since we primarily only know each other online and she’s understandably very busy during TCAF. Most of the rest of the day was spent exploring Toronto with the family, including the Royal Ontario Museum which had a really interesting exhibit—A Third Gender: Beautiful Youths in Japanese Prints—about gender and sexuality in Edo-era Japan. Finally, that evening I made my way to the tail end of Sparkler Monthly‘s annual TCAF mixer. It was a fairly small group when I got there, but a good time was had by all, myself included.

Saturday marks the beginning of TCAF proper, although there are plenty of related events that occur both before and after TCAF weekend. As was the case for the previous couple of years, I started off the 2016 festival in the in the exhibitors’ area before most of the main programming began. I ended up spending my entire comics budget for the weekend before the first day was over, but I was pretty happy with my haul which included some pre-orders, a couple of Kickstarter pickups, a few things I knew beforehand that I wanted to buy, as well as several unplanned, spur-of-the-moment purchases.

©Kate Beaton

This year I actually spent even more time on the exhibit floors buying comics, collecting sketches and signatures, and talking to creators than I have in the past. (A few highlights: I was particularly excited to meet Saicoink, whose comic Open Spaces and Closed Places I love, made a point to tell Kori Michele Handwerker how much Portals meant to me, and discovered some wonderful new-to-me creator’s like GQutie‘s Ronnie Ritchie.) That, combined with prioritizing the family more and considering the need for flexible schedules when dealing with a not-quite-two-year old, meant that I didn’t make it to as many panels this year. In some ways, TCAF 2016 for me felt more like TCAF-lite, but I still greatly enjoyed the festival and was thoroughly satisfied by all of the events, panels, and interviews that I was able to attend.

On Saturday, I ended up making it to four panels. The first was the Spotlight on Shintaro Kago, one of TCAF’s featured guests for 2016, who was interviewed by Youth in Decline’s Ryan Sands. Kago is particularly well-known for his horrific, erotic, and grotesque manga and illustrations. Many of Kago’s works are released ero-manga magazines. As he pointed out, his manga isn’t the type of work that would be published in Jump; there is a limited number of magazines (generally erotic or alternative) that would even consider releasing his work. But by submitting to ero-magazines, Kago is allowed a tremendous amount of editorial freedom. As long as the minimum erotic requirements are met, he is able to do almost anything that he wants to with his manga, including highly experimental techniques. An example of this is a work known in English as “Abstraction” which gained a fair amount of international attention when it was translated by a fan and posted online. When asked about his feelings regarding fan translations, Kago responded that in his case he was satisfied with his work becoming more readily available to a worldwide audience since the benefits he received from the original release (page rates, etc.) didn’t amount to much anyway. Another of Kago’s short manga, “Punctures,” was officially translated in English in the anthology Secret Comics Japan. Anecdotally, it was one of the few works by Kago that the editors felt would be safe enough to include and sell. At the beginning of his creative career, Kago actually wanted to be involved in making films. However, he realized that movies are very difficult to make alone, and since he didn’t have any friends to make movies with, he turned to manga as a way to express himself so that he wouldn’t need to rely on others.

After spending a bit more time wandering the exhibitor areas, I then made my way to the panel “Depictions of Sex in Comics” which was moderated by Rebecca Sullivan, a scholar specializing in sex and media as well as gender and cultural studies. The panel featured a variety of comics publishers and creators: Zan Christensen, Chip Zdarsky, Erika Moen, Cory Silverberg, C. Spike Trotman, and Shintaro Kago. Each of the panelists has their own approach to sex in regards to how it is related to and portrayed in their work, whether their focus is on sex education, erotica, some combination of the two, or something else entirely. One cultural difference that emerged during the conversation was that while erotic comics are currently seeing a resurgence in North America (Oni Press recently announced a new imprint devoted to sex positive comics, and there have been numerous, highly-successful crowd-funded projects for feminist and queer erotic comics in the last few years), the market for erotic manga in Japan has always been very strong. A very specific set of constraints exist in Japan in regards to the depiction of sex in media, what can and cannot be shown and so on, but the country probably has the most well-established and easily navigable erotic comics scene in the world. Many Japanese creators (including Kago himself) got their start working in erotic media before moving on to other and more mainstream projects. Interestingly, Kago also mentioned that BL isn’t necessarily always recognized as being “erotic” (possibly because its target demographic is women) and so in some ways the genre can actually get away with more than hentai aimed at heterosexual men which, in his experience, seems to come under public scrutiny and fire more quickly and more often.

Manko-chan… in 3D!

The third panel I attended on Saturday was Rokudenashiko’s Spotlight which was absolutely delightful. After a brief introduction by Rebecca Sullivan, Rokudenashiko began by telling her story of how she came to be a vagina artist and activist and how she was subsequently arrested multiple times. Accompanying Rokudenashiko’s talk was a slide show of some of her artwork, and she brought along some of her small sculptures to show as well, including a remote-controlled “Gundaman.” Much of what she talked about I was already familiar with having read her manga What Is Obscenity? (which I highly recommend), but it was wonderful to see and hear her in person. Just like her work, Rokudenashiko is incredibly charming, cheerful, and funny. The humor and cuteness that Rokudenashiko brings to her manga, illustrations, and sculptures is very deliberate on her part. She noted that many feminist creators dealing with similar subject matter frequently use their art to express their anger and sadness which makes for very heavy work. So instead, Rokudenashiko wanted to do something that was more lighthearted and amusing. It was only after she realized that some people couldn’t laugh and have fun with it that she became more aggressive in her activism efforts, but without ever losing her sense of humor and positivity in her artwork. However, some critics and academics don’t appreciate this, feeling that she’s making too light of a serious subject. Rokudenashiko was very pleased with her reception in North America, saying that the long lines of people waiting to meet her would never happen in Japan where most people are generally too embarrassed to engage so publicly even if they recognize her and are interested in and support what she is doing.

Last year at TCAF I attended a panel on manga translation which was fascinating, so when I saw the “Translation” panel listed as part of the programming for 2016 I was immediately interested. This year the panel was moderated by Deb Aoki and featured three panelists: Jocelyne Allen, who translates from Japanese to English, Samuel Leblanc, a Canadian creator primarily working in French whose debut comic Perfume of Lilacs was released in English, and the French creator Boulet who (after a disastrous attempt to work with fans) currently translates his own comics into English. Leblanc was able to work directly with his translator and was able to provide feedback on the translation being done whereas Allen very rarely had the opportunity to be in contact with the creators of the works that she was translating. Although each of the panelists brought their own perspective to the conversation, they all agreed that capturing the appropriate tone and style is one of the most difficult things about translation. That and the fact that it’s nearly impossible to make everyone happy with a translation since so many people are invested in it each for their own reasons, whether it be the original creators, the translators, the publishers, or the readers. Lately however, the trend in comics translation seems to err on the side of the artists’ original choices and intent rather than focusing on localization. There are also different types of translation work which require different sets of skills—translating comics isn’t the same as translating prose literature which isn’t the same as translating technical manuals and so on. One thing that can be particularly challenging for comics translation is that the amount of space allowed for text is often limited. The visual element of the comics can have a great impact on the interpretation of a scene and the resulting word choices as well.

It’s not everything, but it is most of this year’s TCAF haul

On Sunday I was only able to make it to two panels before heading back home. One of the reasons that I enjoy TCAF so much is that it is an incredibly queer-friendly and queer-positive event, both in the exhibitor areas and in its programming. I was especially looking forward to “Queer Science Fiction and Fantasy,” a panel moderated by Melanie Gillman and featuring Megan Rose Gedris, Jeremy Sorese, Dylan Edwards, Andrew Wheeler, Taneka Stotts, and Gisele Jobateh, all of whom are queer creators of queer comics. Historically, queerness in speculative fiction has been relegated to subtext, but more and more that queerness is becoming increasingly obvious and in some cases is even the focus of a work. Speculative fiction allows for the creation and exploration of worlds that reflect upon current societal issues while showing what other possibilities could exist. Several of the panelists mentioned that when they were growing up speculative fiction provided some of the only representation of queerness that they saw in media, such as alternative relationship and social structures or a wider variety of genders and sexualities. Frequently, it was the non-human characters that they were most easily able to identify with and the inherent queerness of speculative fiction helped them to understand and discover their own identities. (All of this rings very true for me, too.) Webcomics and self-publishing efforts have been huge in changing the landscape of the comics market to the point where more mainstream publishers, which are slow to evolve and risk-averse, are now reaching a tipping point where queer content isn’t being automatically rejected. Deliberately, intentionally, and unquestionably queer speculative fiction is an evolving genre. Whether they mean to or not, independent creators are currently defining the expectations, tone, language, and tropes that are being set for queer representation in comics and what queer speculative fiction looks like.

The final panel I attended on Sunday was “Discussing Diversity (More or Less)” which was moderated by David Brothers. The panelists included Karla Pacheco, Cathy G. Johnson, Gene Luen Yang, Anne Ishii (one of the marvelous people behind Massive Goods), Ant Sang, and Bill Campbell. Diversity is a huge buzzword right now and not just in comics and other media. (Even my workplace is trying to focus on issues surrounding diversity, so it’s something I’m thinking about a lot these days.) In many of the conversations taking place in North America, diversity is often broadly defined as being non-straight/white/male which, in reality, is actually most of the world. The panel’s incredibly refreshing approach to discussing diversity was simply to talk about it as if was normal, because it is, rather than treating it as an exception or something unusual. As the panelists spoke about their own personal experiences and work, several common themes emerged, probably the most important being that there absolutely is a market, and a need, for diverse media. Though it can be a deliberate initiative, diversity in comics is a natural and often unintentional extension of creators’ own lives, interests, identities, and perspectives. There is also a distinct difference between providing more diverse representation in mainstream media and allowing a more diverse pool of creators to participate and express themselves within that context. While it might be a starting place, non-straight/white/male characters being written by straight/white/male creators sets an extremely low bar in terms of diversity. New voices and perspectives are just as critical if not more so in order to ensure that the comics market remains healthy as it continues to grow and evolve.

Sadly, because the kidling was getting cranky, I had to leave the festival before the food in comics panel which I was really hoping to attend. I was sad to miss most of the “What Women Want” panel’s third year, too. But I have come to realize that even if I wasn’t leaving “early,” it is impossible to see and experience everything that TCAF has to offer and choices must be made. Actually, this is something that I’ve known since the very beginning. There are always going to be panels I miss or that conflict with one another, and after the fact I’m always going to end up discovering comics that I would have been interested in and creators that I wish I had known about. But even so, that doesn’t detract from my overall enjoyment of the event and I am tremendously happy with what I was able to attend this year. TCAF is such a truly wonderful festival. As always, I’m already looking forward to and planning for my trip to Toronto for the event next year.

The Manga Revue: Guardians of the Louvre

May 20, 2016 by Katherine Dacey

Whew–it’s been a while! Life got in the way of blogging for a few months, but the summer forecast looks good for manga reviewing. On the docket this week: Jiro Taniguchi’s Guardians of the Louvre, part of an ongoing graphic novel series published by NBM/Comics Lit that also includes Glacial Period, On the Odd Hours, and Rohan at the Louvre.

Guardians of the Louvre
By Jiro Taniguchi
No rating
NBM Graphic Novels, $24.99

One part Times of Botchan, one part Night at the Museum, Jiro Taniguchi’s Guardians of the Louvre is a stately, handsomely illustrated manga that never quite rises to the level of greatness.

The premise is simple: a Japanese artist lies ill in his Parisian hotel room, feverishly dreaming about the museum’s galleries. In each chapter, the hero is temporarily transported to a particular place and time in the Louvre’s history, rubbing shoulders with famous artists, witnessing famous events, and chatting with one of the museum’s most famous works–the Nike of Samothrace, who takes the form of a stone-faced tour guide. If the set-up sounds like The Times of Botchan, it is, though Guardians of the Louvre is less ambitious; Taniguchi’s primary objective is to celebrate the museum’s collection by highlighting a few of its most beloved works, rather than immersing the reader in a specific milieu.

The artist-as-time-traveler schtick is a little hackneyed, but provides Taniguchi with a nifty excuse to showcase the breadth of his artistry, offering the reader a visual feast of rural landscapes, gracious country manors, war-ravaged cities, and busy galleries. Using watercolor and ink, Taniguchi convincingly recreates iconic paintings by Van Gogh and Corot, effortlessly slipping into each artist’s style without slavishly reproducing every detail of the originals. Taniguchi’s characters are rendered with a similar degree of meticulousness, though their waxen facial expressions sometimes mar scenes calling for a meaningful display of emotion.

What prevents Guardians of the Louvre from taking flight is its relentlessly middlebrow sensibility. In one scene, for example, the Nike of Samothrace leads our unnamed hero through an empty Salle des États, home of the Mona Lisa. The artist examines the painting closely, musing about the tourist hordes that normally throng the gallery. “It’s not about art appreciation anymore. It’s wholly a popular tourist destination” he says wistfully. If his character was anything more than an audience surrogate, his comment might have registered as a thoughtful meditation on the commercialization of fine art, or the outsized fame of Da Vinci’s canvas. Absent any knowledge of who he is or what kind of art he creates, however, his remarks sounds more like a moment of bourgeois snobbery: don’t these peasants realize the Louvre is filled with other remarkable paintings?

A similarly pedestrian spirit animates the chapters documenting the 1939 evacuation of the Louvre. To be sure, the mechanics of packing and transporting the art are fascinating; Taniguchi’s expert draftsmanship conveys the complexity and physical demands of the task in vivid detail, inviting us to ride along with Delacroix’s monumental Raft of the Medusa on its perilous journey from Paris to Versailles. The dialogue that frames these passages, however, is rife with cliches. “They were ready to risk everything to evacuate the paintings,” the Nike solemnly informs our hero before implying that this operation was a little-known episode in French history–a strange claim, given the story’s romantic treatment in popular culture: surely the Nike has read All the Light We Cannot See or watched The Monuments Men?

The manga’s most effective passages, by contrast, are wordless. We see our hero wander through a forest where Corot silently paints the undulating boughs, and a medieval town where Van Gogh sets up his easel in a sun-drenched hay field. In these fleeting moments, Taniguchi’s sensual imagery allows us to step into the artist’s shoes and relive the creative process that yielded Recollection of Mortefontaine and Daubigny’s Garden for ourselves. If only the rest of the manga wasn’t so insistent on telling us how to appreciate these paintings.

Reviews: Sean Gaffney gives Rokudenashiko’s autobiographical manga What Is Obscenity? the thumbs-up. Over at The Fandom Post, Matthew Alexander jumps in the WABAC Machine for a look at Shaman Warrior, one of the first manhwa published by Dark Horse.

Julie on Abby and the Playboy Prince (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Helen on A Centaur’s Life (The OASG)
Megan R. on Earthian (The Manga Test Drive)
Frank Inglese on vol. 10 of Food Wars!! Shokugeki no Soma (Snap 30)
Richard Prenice on vol. 11 of Food Wars!! Shokugeki no Soma (Three if By Space)
Matt on vol. 2 of Forget Me Not (Ani-TAY)
Seth Hahne on A Girl on the Shore (Good OK Bad)
Michael Burns on vol. 2 of Handa-kun (Ani-TAY)
Matthew Alexander on vol. 1 of He Is My Master (The Fandom Post)
Infinitespeech on vol. 1 of I Am a Hero (The Fandom Post)
Kory Cerjak on vol. 3 of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Part 2: Battle Tendency (The Fandom Post)
Nick Creamer on vol. 4 of My Hero Academia (Anime News Network)
Nick Creamer on vol. 1 of Mysterious Girlfriend X (Anime News Network)
Chris Beveridge on vol. 2 of Nichijou (The Fandom Post)
Dustin Cabeal on vols. 13-15 of Nisekoi: False Love (Comic Bastards)
Dustin Cabeal on vol. 1 of Prison School (Comic Bastards)
Kristin on vol. 1 of Shuriken and Pleats (Comic Attack)
Frank Inglese on vol. 5 of Tokyo Ghoul (Snap 30)
Robert Prentice on vol. 6 of Tokyo Ghoul (Three If By Space)
Julie on Wife by Contract, Mistress on Demand (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Frank Inglese on vol. 9 of World Trigger (Snap 30)
ebookgirl on vol. 11 of Yotsuba&! (Geek Lit Etc.)

Manga the Week of 5/25

May 19, 2016 by Sean Gaffney, Ash Brown, MJ, Michelle Smith and Anna N 2 Comments

SEAN: Does it say something that having only 25 titles out the week of a Yen Press release dump is rather mild now? I keep thinking “it could be worse!”. I think it’s the new normal.

There are other publishers, of course. Kodansha Comics gives us a 2nd volume of Real Account, a title with good buzz despite being a survival game series.

ASH: I was surprised; it has the potential to become really interesting.

SEAN: There’s also an 8th Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle omnibus, and I believe this is about the time when I started to actively mock the series.

MJ: Poor Tsubasa. So much abuse.

SEAN: Vertical has a new series debuting again, this one called Devils’ Line. It is also a dark fantasy series, just like last week’s To the Abandoned Sacred Beasts, and features vampires. It runs in Kodansha’s Morning Two.

ASH: Not particularly interested in vampires, but I do tend to like dark fantasy.

SEAN: OK, that’s it for other publishers. On to Yen Press, starting with its novel line. Another was a under-the-radar horror novel that was released a while back digitally, and did well enough to get a hardcover release later on. Now it’s done well enough to get a sequel licensed, Another Episode S/0.

ASH: I’m looking forward to reading this! The volume includes the manga as well as the novel, too.

SEAN: Baccano! is easily one of my most awaited novel releases in the history of ever, and it’s finally here. From the creator of Durarara!!, this actually came first, and shows us the story of a group of Mafia (cough) sorry, Camorra gangs in 1930s New York City and their run in with a mysterious elixir. Read this. It’s in hardcover and digital.

The other big novel (also in hardcover and digital) this month is Overlord, whose description sounds like it’s another SAO/Log Horizon knockoff, but I’ve been assured that that’s not actually true, and that this is a fantasy series that goes to a lot of interesting places as it examines what it’s like to be a monstrous creation in an RPG. Looking forward to seeing what the fuss is here.

MJ: Well, hm.

SEAN: Lastly, there’s a 3rd Strike the Blood, a title that has underperformed for me previously, but maybe the third time is the charm.

Yen Digital seems to be the week after this, so let’s dig right into Yen proper, starting with a third volume of Aldnoah Zero Season One, which is still not Gundam.

Anne Happy: Unhappy Go Lucky! is a new debut that falls somewhere between shonen and seinen, as it runs in Manga Time Kirara Forward, also home of Aldnoah Zero and School-Live!. It’s about a high school class made up of those with natural bad luck, and their struggles to overcome it.

Black Butler has a 22nd volume, and the butler is still buttling onward, while also, yes, being a hot and sexy demon.

Corpse Party: Blood Covered is the first in a series of omnibuses (2 volumes per book) based on a game that came out in 2008. A group of kids find themselves in an alternate dimension that is haunted by the ghosts of some murdered schoolchildren. If you liked Higurashi’s mystery and gore, you should like this.

There’s a second Dimension W.

And a third Dragons Rioting. I need a title I care about stat.

Ah, here we go! Inu x Boku SS wraps up with its 11th volume, and I hear it’s a good ending despite the unfortunate death of its creator right around when it was written. I have enjoyed this series far more than I expected, and am sad to see it go.

Is It Wrong to Try To Pick Up Girls In A Dungeon? has a 5th manga volume, and I suspect will start coming out slower, as we’ve caught up to Japan.

There’s a third Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun, hooray! The cover features Kashima and Hori, who may be the series’ most popular fan pairing.

ASH: This series is so great. I love it.

MICHELLE: Yay, I’m looking forward to this!

MJ: I obviously need to start reading this, looking at my colleagues’ comments.

ANNA: I’m also very much looking forward to this.

SEAN: Its novel may have gotten delayed to September, but the manga is still here, as we get the debut of My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong As I Expected (just call it OreGairu, everyone else does). The story may sound familiar – a pair of misfits end up in the school Service Club trying to help others despite horrible personalities. It does, however, have one very important quality – there are no fantasy elements to it.

Another Madoka spinoff bites the dust, with the final volume of Puella Magi Suzune Magica.

School-Live! gets a third volume of heartwarming friendship and terrifying zombies.

Strike the Blood gets a third manga volume. Don’t confuse it with the third Strike the Blood light novel, out the same day. Yes, we’re still doing that.

Trinity Seven has hit volume 5, and I believe will be getting that Blake’s Seven crossover any minute now.

We also get the 6th Ubel Blatt omnibus, Ubel Blatt Vol. 5. Yes, we’re still doing that as well.

Umineko: When They Cry begins a new arc, despite Beatrice being, y’know, dead. But that hardly stops anyone in this series. Dawn of the Golden Witch is here! We’ll meet more weird “furniture”, and see how murders happen when it’s Battler that’s writing it. Oh yes, and Erika is there too. The artist also did the Higurashi: Massacre Arc manga.

I believe the 12th Until Death Do Us Part omnibus catches us up with Japan, so it’s a perfect time to go read the 2500 or so pages you may have missed.

Lastly, yay! A lucky Volume 13 of Yotsuba&!, the first new volume since 2013! (It was on hiatus in Japan as well.) Are you ready to see Koiwai’s mother? Yotsuba sure is!

ASH: I am so far behind in reading Yotsuba&!, but it is an absolutely delightful manga.

MICHELLE: Yay!!!!

MJ: Finally! I feel like Yen has largely moved towards series that are just not going to be my cup of tea, but this is a reminder that it hasn’t always been so!

SEAN: Aside from Baccano!… yes, OK, and Yotsuba&!… what are you getting this week?

What Is Obscenity? The Story of a Good-For-Nothing Artist and Her Pussy

May 19, 2016 by Sean Gaffney

By Rokudenashiko. Released in Japan by Kinyobi, Inc., partially serialized in the magazine Shuukan Kinyobi. Released in North America by Koyama Press.

Like many people, I first heard about Rokudenashiko via news reports retweeted and reblogged around the internet. In fact, it may have been watching The Daily Show, which covered her arrest (she makes reference to it here). But when I saw that she had a panel at TCAF and was promoting a manga discussing what happened, I decided to seek it out. and I’m delighted that I did, as this manga is fascinating, managing to make the reader angry and outraged at her mistreatment while at the same time laughing hysterically. It actually comes in two parts. The first, written for the weekly magazine, is a light-hearted (but the events are serious) look at her arrest and imprisonment for distributing 3D copies of her vagina via crowdsourcing. The second half retells some of the same events, but as part of her life story, and it’s more serious and personal.

The amazing double-standards of Japanese culture, which has no issues with the word ‘chinko’ (which means dick), but can’t abide the word ‘manko’ (which means pussy) is on display throughout, from the initial sneering and TV-cop stereotype of her arrest to the hilarious points where the officers try to take her statement and she humiliates them by insisting on saying ‘manko’ as many times as possible. We get a lovely tour of Japanese women’s prison, which is as unpleasant as you’d imagine, and she has a variety of cellmates, ranging from the normal to the intensely strange. Interspersed through the manga are various textual articles discussing the nature of obscenity, Japanese law (yes, it really is far more like Phoenix Wright than you’d expect), and the campaign on the outside to petition for her freedom (which we barely see as we’re following her POV).

As I said earlier, the second part of the manga is a short biography of her life, and how she ended up becoming an artist who used her ‘manko’ as an inspiration for various art projects and showcases. The most amusing part for me was that her initial reasoning was seeing that you can have “vaginal surgery” and thinking “whoah, cool!”. She was later told by her editors to change it and make her more ashamed of her body in order to sell to readers better. I am reminded of many other editorially demanding manga series. That said, we also see that using ‘manko’ in her art also led to her divorce, to her friends abandoning her, and to suicidal thoughts. None of that was in the more commercial first part of the book, but it adds a sense of depth and realism that touches the heart.

So rest assured, this is a highly entertaining and moving memoir. But it’s also a wonderful look at the standards that go into defining what is obscene, and the struggles that an artist has to go through in order to be able to express themselves properly. The behavior of the police and courts in this book is jaw-dropping, and if nothing else, I’m hoping that more awareness of the these issues might lead to international pressure for change. In the meantime, the story of Rokudenashiko and her artistic triumphs and struggles is a must-read for anyone who loves freedom of expression.

The Birth of Kitaro

May 17, 2016 by Sean Gaffney

By Shigeru Mizuki. Released in Japan as “Gegege no Kitaro” by (among others) Kodansha, serialized in various magazines. Released in North America by Drawn & Quarterly.

There was already a sampler of Kitaro a few years back, also by Drawn & Quarterly, but this new collection appears to be the equivalent of a multi-volume best-of, apparently signed off on by Mizuki himself, who gave the editor a test to see if he could choose the stories that Mizuki himself would have chosen (he got all but one). And so we see some earlier Kitaro manga from the late 60s, including a lengthy chapter from the magazine Garo that shows off how Kitaro came to be, and helps you understand that the otherwise generic zombie on the cover really is one of the main characters. It’s a grim little tale, more serious than the rest of the stories in this volume, possibly as it lacks the series’ main drawing point.

See, Kitaro is a nice kid, mostly (his ethics can be rather questionable from a human perspective), but he is essentially Mickey Mouse. He’s the title character and appears in every story, but what the readers really want is someone a bit more fallible and funny. And you can’t get much funnier or more fallible than Nezumi Otoko, which translates to Rat Man. He is the Donald Duck of this series, only Donald was never quite so evil. Nezumi Otoko will do absolutely anything for money, including tricking old rich men out of their life savings, luring respectable young manga editors to their yokai-influenced deaths, and take advantage of the dead – multiple times. Even when he’s not being an ass, he’s usually a coward, always the first to run away. This, of course, makes him a marvelous character, the best reason to read this series. He’s beloved in Japan (for a certain definition of beloved), and was used as narrator for Mizuki’s Showa history.

The other big reason to read the series is the yokai, who veer from the silly to the terrifying, but they’re all dangerous. Neko Musume shows up here, and those who recall her cute moe appearance in some of the more recent Kitaro animes will be startled by this bowl-cut girl who tries to literally eat Nezumi Otoko when she first sees him (to be fair, he deserved it – he always does). The Gyuki and Hideri Gami are more typical straight-up monsters, in the former case even managing to possess Kitaro, who gets to enjoy a rare turn attacking people. Kuckily, Kitaro is made of stern stuff, able to survive even being dropped in a volcano. Also luckily, this is very much not a serialized story. Tales need to end in a certain number of pages, so the yokai rarely get to do much before Kitaro has won and they’re off on their next adventure. (The anime was airing as these manga chapters were running, and you can see references to the insanely catchy theme song in these final ‘the adventure continues’ panels.)

Even if you aren’t a fan of manga history or yokai stories, this is still a must purchase. It’s also fairly child-friendly, despite a few scares. I am eagerly awaiting more.

Bookshelf Briefs 5/16/16

May 16, 2016 by Sean Gaffney and Michelle Smith Leave a Comment

Genshiken: Second Season, Vol. 8 | By Shimoku Kio | Kodansha Comics – The first half of this volume has a lot of amusing antics, but let’s face it, the second half is where the truly eye-popping stuff happens. Madarame is still having trouble getting his head around the fact that four different people are interested in him, and confesses to Kugayama (when did we last see HIM in this series?) that he thinks he’s just nervous as he’s still a virgin. So he gets talked into going to a host club, and naturally it’s the one Keiko works at. What follows shows off that Madarame has more issues than just his lack of experience to work through—if he can’t notice Keiko trying to get into his pants THAT blatantly, then there’s something terribly wrong. Will this subplot be ending anytime soon, however? Or is it the main plot? – Sean Gaffney

Kimi ni Todoke, Vols. 24 | By Karuho Shiina | Viz Media – Usually, I don’t mind the slow pace of this series, as it has a mood that would be somewhat ruined by Hakusensha-style fast-paced violence. I will admit, though, I did think this volume dragged a bit, as we wait endlessly for Sawako to realize what everyone else does first: she wants to go to the educational university, not the one Kazehaya is going to. As for our other couples (or ex-couples), Chizuru and Ryu are dating but she still struggles with the fact that cheering him on means separating. And Yano is discovering that getting into a top-flight university really is as hard as it seems. This is still an excellent series, of course, and I’m hoping the next volume will give us more forward progression. – Sean Gaffney

Love Stage!!, Vol. 5 | By Eiki Eiki and Taishi Zaou | SuBLime – After showing signs of improvement in the previous volume, Love Stage!! trots out some truly eyeroll-inspiring material in volume five. After arguing with Izumi about the time he’s spending with their lecherous producer and being intimidated by Izumi’s acting talent, Ryoma is rendered incapable of performing. Instead of dwelling on their professional rivalry, which might’ve been interesting, we instead get a plot in which the producer’s hypnosis causes Ryoma to forget Izumi entirely, leading to much angst and, ultimately, the two of them falling off a cliff. Yes, really. And then they have to huddle together for warmth because a freak thunderstorm has delayed the search party. Siiiiigh. And yet, I will probably read the next volume anyway. – Michelle Smith

Oresama Teacher, Vol. 20 | By Izumi Tsubaki | VIZ Media – With Hayasaka’s memory now restored, volume twenty first clears up his (needlessly) complicated family circumstances before moving on to reveal the nature of the arrangement Momochi and Hanabusa have made. I like that Hanabusa has been shown to be a good guy, and liked too that Aki was disgruntled that the gang kept Hayasaka’s recovery a secret from him in order to ensnare Momochi, but this is a series that doesn’t delve deep into its characters, so instead of more time with either of them, we get an interlude about Mafuyu and Okegawa unknowingly being penpals (bonus: there are panels from the overworked carrier pigeon’s POV!) and a fast-forward to a Christmas party, during which Hayasaka might’ve figured out Mafuyu is Super Bun! I hope he really did, but I expect comedic deflection in the next volume. We shall see! – Michelle Smith

Shomin Sample: I was Abducted by an Elite All-Girls School as a Sample Commoner, Vol. 1 | By Risumai and Takafumi Nanatsuki | Seven Seas – I almost didn’t get this simply because of the reprehensible cover, and I still cringed every time there was a blatant panty shot in this series. That said, there were one or two moments in the book that I was indeed amused, which shows off my low standards if nothing else. The story is pretty much given in the subtitle above, and most of the good humor relies on the sheltered young girls being naive about everything, The bad humor relies on things like panty shots, walking in on someone in the bath, and whenever our hero isn’t being a smartass (as that’s his best trait). If you read Seven Seas and Yen’s skeezier titles, this is right up your alley. For others, I’d pass, even though it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. – Sean Gaffney

The Wallflower, Vol. 36 | By Tomoko Hayakawa | Kodansha Comics – Spoilers: no, they don’t. But honestly, if that surprises you, you were reading the wrong series. Hayakawa has said for eons she’s good at comedy and bad at romance, and that shows in the final volume of The Wallflower, which at least makes an effort to hit the series’ core themes: Sunako likes dark, Halloween-ish stuff; Sunako can be quite the lady when she tries, but doesn’t care to; and Kyohei and Sunako are perfect for each other and both are ignoring that fact heavily. There’s more non-SD Sunako here than in many, many volumes, which is a nice treat for the readers. I’ve always enjoyed this series even past its sell-by date, but admit it’s time for it to end. And so it has. – Sean Gaffney

My Week in Manga: May 9-May 15, 2016

May 16, 2016 by Ash Brown

My News and Reviews

Despite being in Toronto for the majority of last week for the Toronto Comic Arts Festival (which I should hopefully have a write-up about soon), I still managed to post a few things here at Experiments in Manga. For those interested in what sorts of manga and other books make their way onto my shelves, April’s Bookshelf Overload is now available. The feature used to be posted fairly early on in the month, but at least for the time being it’s more likely to appear sometime in the second week as I’m following a more relaxed posting schedule. Last week I also reviewed Philip K. Dick’s award-winning novel The Man in the High Castle which explores an alternate history in which Germany and Japan won the Second World War and occupy most of what was the United States. It’s a fascinating, thought-provoking, chilling, and frankly terrifying work.

A few interesting things that I came across online last week while I wasn’t wandering around Toronto: The lead lawyer of Rokudenashiko’s legal team wrote a nice summary and explanation of the recent verdict in her obscenity trial, including the next steps that will be taken in the case. (I reviewed Rokudenashiko’s What Is Obscenity? a couple of weeks ago; the manga is excellent, and I was thrilled to have the chance to meet Rokudenashiko at TCAF.) Over at Publishers Weekly, Brigid Alverson writes about Hachette and Kadokawa’s recently announced partnership and what it means for Yen Press. Finally, Leah Zoller and Kathryn Hemmann have started to post a series of articles at The Lobster Dance based on their panel The Sparkling World of 1970s Shojo Manga, which should be fantastic.

Quick Takes

Noragami: Stray Stories, Volume 1 by Adachitoka. Even though I have fallen behind in reading the main series, I have been enjoying Adachitoka’s Noragami. I’m apparently not the only one as the manga has been doing quite well for Kodansha, enough so that the publisher also licensed Stray Stories, a multi-volume series of Noragami side stories. For the most part, the short manga of Stray Stories don’t appear to rely on the main Noragami storyline although it is assumed that readers are at least already vaguely familiar with the manga’s characters and basic premise. So far, Stray Stories reminds me a bit of Noragami‘s earlier, more episodic nature before the series’ overarching plot began to take precedence. The short manga collected in Stray Stories also tend to be more comedic than serious, which I greatly enjoyed. The first volume was a lot of fun, and I’m glad that there will be more side stories to come. Stray Stories allows Adachitoka to expand on the world and characters of Noragami in ways that wouldn’t make sense in the main series but that are still enjoyable in their own right.

Real Account, Volume 1 written by Okushou and illustrated by Shizumu Watanabe. I’ll admit, I actually wasn’t expecting all that much from Real Account, so I was a little surprised by how much liked the first volume of the series even if there were a few things that didn’t quite work and even if there was at least one minor plot hole. Quite a few manga seem to have come out over the last few years with a similar basic premise in which a group of people find themselves trapped in an online environment where they must survive. If they die onlie, they will die real world as well. In the case of Real Account, that online environment is greatly influenced by social media and the users’ survival depends on them having at least one follower. The titular “Real Account” is something closely akin to Twitter with a few additional elements, like games, mixed in. Some of the deadly games those who are being held hostage are forced to play are actually quite clever and highly psychological, relying on the unpredictable nature of human relationships when self-preservation is on the line. At this point in the series it’s still unclear who is behind it all and what their motivations are, but there is definite and not particularly subtle social commentary being made.

Sense & Sexuality by You Higashino. Originally released in English in print as part of Media Blaster’s Kitty Media line, Sense & Sexuality is now available digitally from Sublime Manga. I haven’t come across very many manga that take place during Japan’s Taishō Era, but it’s a really interesting time period in the country’s history and one of the reasons Higashino’s boys’ love one-shot Sense & Sexuality was first brought to my attention. The manga follows the sexual conquests of Hanamura and Takakura, two close friends from noble families whose lives are filled with decadence, leisure, and hedonism. They have turned their romances into a game, betting on who will be the first to bed the various attractive young men they have identified as their targets. Eventually though, their sights are set upon each other. For the most part, Sense & Sexuality is fairly episodic. There’s just enough story to hold it all together, but what little plot there is simply provides the excuses needed for the manga’s plentiful and explicit sex. High literature it is not, nor does it need to be. I really liked Sense and Sexuality‘s setting, the characters have a bit more depth to them than it initially seems, and the manga can be surprisingly humorous even though I wouldn’t necessarily describe it as a comedy.

The Man in the High Castle

May 13, 2016 by Ash Brown

Author: Philip K. Dick
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 9780544916081
Released: October 2016
Original release: 1962
Awards: Hugo Award

Philip K. Dick’s The Man in the High Castle is one of those classic science fiction novels that I’ve been meaning to read for ages but for one reason or another never quite got around to. Recently, though, the novel seems to be popping up wherever I turn: Viz Media’s speculative fiction imprint Haikasoru takes its name from the title; it was mentioned multiple times in the tenth volume of Mechademia which I read not too long ago; and in 2015 it was adapted as a live-action television series. Originally published in 1962, The Man in the High Castle can be counted as among the first major works of fiction written in English to examine an alternate history in which Germany and Japan emerged victorious from the Second World War, a historical turning point which has since become one of the most popular for the subgenre to explore. Winning the Hugo Award for best novel in 1963, The Man in the High Castle is also regarded as one of Dick’s most well-known and highly-acclaimed works. The novel has been re-published around the world numerous times with the most recent US edition scheduled to be released in 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

After being defeated, the United States of America was divided into three political entities at the end of World War II. The Pacific States of America is overseen by Japan and the Eastern United States is occupied by Germany while the central third of the country, the Rocky Mountain States, remains an independent buffer zone. Less than two decades have passed since the end of the war. Nazi Germany, having become a major power, continues to dominate and conquer the rest of the world and has even extended its reach to space. However, internal power struggles threaten to throw the precariously-balanced international political landscape into war and turmoil once again. In the meantime, Americans have had to either learn to adapt to their occupiers’ whims or to flee their homeland. The Japanese rule is fairly benign, especially when compared to that of the Germans, but it is still grating and demeaning for the Americans who are slowly losing their national identity along with the freedoms and respect that they once enjoyed in the past.

The alternate history that Dick envisions in The Man in the High Castle is honestly terrifying and horrifying. Under the global influence of a fascist, totalitarian regime, extreme racism and prejudice is rampant and genocide isn’t a thing of the past but of the present and future. People live in a world in which insidious fear, hatred, anger, and uncertainty have come to dominate. The Man in the High Castle follows several different and fairly ordinary characters from a variety of backgrounds who are all ultimately connected to one another, either directly or tangentially: an antiques dealer making his living selling Americana to Japanese clients, an American craftsman and jewelry maker who must hide his Jewish identity and heritage, a Japanese trade official stationed in what was once California, an American woman who teaches judo in the Rocky Mountain States, and a Nazi defector trying to prevent impending atrocities from becoming a reality. By the end of the novel, both together and separately, they have all taken a stand against the status quo and have made a difference, however small, in the world around them.

In addition to being a work of alternate history itself, there is a novel within The Man in the High Castle—The Grasshopper Lies Heavy—which explores yet another potential reality. That novel plays a pivotal role as does the Chinese classic the I Ching which many of the characters consult as an oracle or use to make major decisions and which Dick himself used to guide the story and plot of The Man in the High Castle. The writing style of The Man in the High Castle did take some time for me to get used to. Much of the novel consists of the characters’ internal monologues and thought processes, resulting in a work that frequently feels like fragmented stream-of-consciousness. Parts of the novel are also written in deliberately stilted English which, while clever and effective (and while I can understand and appreciate Dick’s intentions), doesn’t necessarily always make for the most pleasant reading experience. However, the underlying ideas and themes behind The Man in the High Castle are tremendous. Ultimately, The Man in the High Castle is a fascinating and chilling read, and a novel that is remarkably relevant and thought-provoking even today.

Manga the Week of 5/18

May 11, 2016 by Sean Gaffney, Ash Brown, Michelle Smith and MJ Leave a Comment

SEAN: Third weeks of the month tend to be grab bag weeks, and this is no exception, but as with most grab bags, there’s always something in there that’s of interest.

For those who were eagerly awaiting the new volume of Blood C, I got nothing. But we do have a spinoff from that series, titled Demonic Moonlight, coming from Dark Horse.

ASH: Huh, I think I missed this particular license being announced. Granted, I’ve not read Blood C, either.

SEAN: Cage of Eden has slowed down its release schedule, but it’s still going, and has reached its 20th volume from Kodansha.

And Devil Survivor is more than halfway over with its 5th volume.

Kodansha also has a 2nd volume of haremnesia series Forget Me Not.

MICHELLE: *snerk*

SEAN: And a 14th Noragami, which I believe still has one or two fans.

ASH: It does and I’ve been enjoying it, too, though I’m terribly behind.

SEAN: One Peace has the 3rd volume of the manga adaptation of Rise of the Shield Hero.

Seven Seas has a trio of releases. Devils and Realist is up to Volume 9, and still features very handsome demons.

ASH: Yet another series I’ve fallen behind on, but the artwork and demons are very pretty.

SEAN: If you love Monster Musume, you’ll be delighted at the new spinoff, I Heart Monster Girls.

And there’s a 2nd volume of dark Pokehorror series Tomodachi x Monster.

A late entry that came out this week. Blame Amazon not actually classifying it as manga. Top Shelf has a collection of stories by Masahiko Matsumoto, famous gekiga and alternative manga artist. It’s called Cigarette Girl and looks absolutely fantastic. A must for fans of manga history.

MJ: Oh! Yes! Something I actually care about! Glad to see this on the list!

ASH: It’s literally been years since this manga was first announced; I’m thrilled it’s finally coming out!

Vertical debuts To The Abandoned Sacred Beasts, another in what is proving to be a lucrative line of ‘dark fantasy’ series.

ASH: Dark fantasy? I am intrigued.

SEAN: And Terra Formars from Viz has now hit a dozen volumes.

Lastly, we see a 4th Ultraman. A reminder that it’s a sequel to the beloved original TV show.

Are you grabbing something from this grab bag of manga?

Bookshelf Briefs 5/10/16

May 10, 2016 by Sean Gaffney and Michelle Smith Leave a Comment

Barakamon, Vol. 10 | By Satsuki Yoshino | Yen Press – This is without a doubt the best volume of Barakamon to date, coming full circle to show off what began the title: Handa’s troubled relationship with his father, and his inability to stop overthinking his calligraphy. He can’t avoid the topic this time, though, as his parents are in town to visit, and we begin to see that Handa’s father is not the heartless strict man that previous chapters may have made him out to be. It all culminates in a father/son battle at Naru’s school, showing off how good his father REALLY is, but also that when Handa isn’t trying, he can have moments of genius that make his father realize that he has a true rival on his hands. A brilliant volume, and I didn’t even get to Kirie, a trans character who’s very well-handled. – Sean Gaffney

Horimiya, Vol. 3 | By Hero and Daisuke Hagiwara | Yen Press – Being best friends can be very comforting, whereas being in love can be terrifying. So it’s no surprise that much of this third volume of Horimiya sees Hori and Miyamura desperately trying to avoid their relationship changing, even if it means simply sticking their fingers in their ears and going la la la. In the meantime, we meet a couple of new cast members, one of whom seems to have a thing for Ishikawa, in case you wondered if we weren’t going to have more love triangles. It’s all relaxed and heartwarming rather than angsty or wacky, though, and so it just feels good to read. I especially liked the simple presence that Miyamura gives Hori when she’s sick, possibly the sweetest moment in a sweet volume. – Sean Gaffney

Maid-sama!, Vols. 7-8 | By Hiro Fujiwara | Viz Media – This was better than the previous volume, I will grant you. Admittedly, I found both side-stories fairly tedious, even if it gave us a chance to see Misaki as a delinquent. Misaki still spends most of the volume flushing in embarrassment, but is beginning to admit her feelings, even if it’s like pulling teeth. Usui’s perfection may be put to the test soon, as we see his jealousy and longing observing the wacky-yet-loving antics of Misaki’s family. (We also meet her younger sister, one of my favorite characters.) And we get set up for what I suspect will be the next major plot arc, the student council elections. Will Misaki get re-elected, or will the guys manage to get their Dark Horse in? Also, we’re now caught up with Tokyopop. – Sean Gaffney

Maid-sama!, Vols. 7-8 | By Hiro Fujiawara | VIZ Media – As I’ve been rereading Maid-sama! in VIZ’s new editions, I’ve had cause to wonder why I’d been so eager for a license rescue of this series. Now, at last, I remember. After several volumes of harassment, bickering, and episodic filler, Misaki and Usui are finally honest with each other about their feelings. Although I could argue that the smooch they share to the accompaniment of fireworks is somewhat cliché, this welcome development still makes me interested to find out how much the series might improve going forward. I do hope, however, that we’re not expected to take dull-as-dishwater Hinata seriously as a romantic rival, though I do sadistically enjoy it when Usui torments him. Aoi can also feel free to fall off the face of the Earth. – Michelle Smith

Missions of Love, Vol. 12 | By Ema Toyama | Kodansha Comics – Well, there was no way that Hisame was going to be able to keep up being irredeemably evil for the rest of the series, particularly given that the rest of the cast aren’t exactly wonderful people. And so over the course of this volume it becomes apparently that he’s really just a petulant child who enjoys breaking his toys and hates it when they’re taken away from him. Mami is his old favorite, and the idea that she might actually be falling for Akira infuriates him. And his new toy, Yukina, is having trouble coping herself, especially with Shigure MIA for most of the book. Her novel is being affected by the fact that true love is not running at all smoothly. Still 100% trash, and 100% addictive. – Sean Gaffney

Nichijou, Vol. 2 | By Keiichi Arawi | Vertical Comics – The ensemble is an important part of Nichijou, and we get to see more of them here, including Nakanojou’s non-mohawk personality traits, the amusing (and possibly romantic) antics of the Go/Soccer Club, and Misato becoming such a tsundere that aliens literally suck her up into the sky out of embarrassment. At its heart, though, the series knows that it stars Yuuko, whose puns are too lame to react to, whose tsukkomi reactions are simply unstoppable (though at least in the end she manages to get Mai to show something other than her poker face), and whose daydreams involve time cubes destroying the world (possibly as they have more or less than four). Nichijou remains strange and wonderful. – Sean Gaffney

What Did You Eat Yesterday?, Vol. 10 | By Fumi Yoshinaga | Vertical, Inc. – I just want to sigh contentedly after finishing a volume of this much-beloved series. Not only does so much of the food look delicious—things that made me salivate this volume include croquettes and pancakes!—but I genuinely adore Shiro and Kenji, and find myself identifying with them a lot, especially in relation to their aging woes. Parents having surgery, middle-aged partners who lament the loss of their youthful physique… definitely some universal rites of passage. No, there’s no big drama here, unless you count a new hairstyle for one of the protagonists or future career prospects for Shiro, but it’s so all so comforting and lovely that I am not complaining one little bit. My love for What Did You Eat Yesterday? knows no bounds! – Michelle Smith

One Piece, Vol. 78

May 10, 2016 by Sean Gaffney

By Eiichiro Oda. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz.

My last review of One Piece was, for me, quite negative, as I was getting very weary of Dressrosa. That hasn’t changed one bit with this new volume, unfortunately, and we’re still here. I am going to make a concerted effort not to bring up Rebecca, despite my teeth grinding so much during the “you are a pretty princess who must not fight” scenes I may need to see the dentist. Instead, let’s be positive and focus on the fun things going on in this arc. And there are fun things, because even when Oda is getting more sexist by the volume and rehashing things we’ve seen before, he can still introduce crazy stuff that makes you grin, or even show us a kid wearing a Bartholomew Kuma T-shirt.

The cover, showing off the Straw Hats (+ Law), reminds us that the main cast may have gotten a bit too unwieldy, given that Oda now has to write out half the Straw Hats in order to not overburden an already overburdened arc. That said, it does allow those who are remaining to have moments to shine. Zoro has done “beyond the impossible” so many times that you’d think it would be old hat by now, but no, it’s always fun, mostly as every time you’re reminded what a complete lunatic he can be when he’s in battle mode. If the enemy needs to be stopped but is much too far away, just have yourself hurled at the enemy. If he shapeshifts too fast to kill his real body, just cut everything so fast he doesn’t have time to get away. And oh yes, use haki to make sure your swords won’t even get scratched. When Zoro isn’t sleeping or getting lost, he’s there to be super cool, and he achieves that here.

Then there’s Luffy, who gets to battle the real Doflamingo at long last, in what is hopefully the climax of this arc. The timeskip has helped to mature Luffy, even if (like the rest of the cast) he can backslide at any time for comedy reasons. True, his reasoning for going all out against Doflamingo is still somewhat simplistic – you made my friends cry, you made my friends mad. But honestly, that’s a good enough reason to begin with, and if anyone deserves to be punched into next week, it’s Doflamingo, who sets up one last deathtrap to kill everyone on the island for the lulz. Flashbacks show that if you tell a young boy filled with rage and fury that he is better than everyone else and give him whatever he wants, bad things will ensue. Luffy is the opposite of this, even though he is also filled with rage and fury here. Abuse of power is the main enemy in One Piece, be it pirates, marines, World Government, or what have you. If you do it, Luffy is here to kick your ass.

So there are many things to like here, but again, I will be very, very glad to see the back of this arc. I believe that in the next volume I finally achieve this.

My Week in Manga: May 2-May 8, 2016

May 9, 2016 by Ash Brown

My News and Reviews

Last week at Experiments in Manga I announced the winner of the superhero duo manga giveaway. As usual, the post also includes a list of manga, in this particular case a list of manga featuring superheros of one ilk or another. Last week I also posted my review of Rokudenashiko’s comic memoir What Is Obscenity?: The Story of a Good for Nothing Artist in Her Pussy which is a wonderfully engaging and important work. Rokudenashiko is one of the featured guests at the Toronto Comic Arts festival which is this upcoming weekend; I greatly admire her and her work, so I’m looking forward to having the opportunity to meet her in person.

Elsewhere online: Rokudenashiko was recently interviewed in preparation for her trip to Toronto. Massive Goods hints at an upcoming announcement regarding an English-language release of Gengoroh Tagame’s award-winning My Brother’s Husband, which I am super-excited about. And Ryan Holmberg wrote a about Katsumata Susumu’s Anti-Nuclear Manga for the Sainsbury Institute and, at the other end of the spectrum, about the Nuclear Literati: Nakashima Kiyoshi’s Furusato Goes to Hell for The Comics Journal.

Quick Takes

I Am a Hero, Omnibus 1 (equivalent to Volumes 1-2) by Kengo Hanazawa. By this point I’m fairly burned-out when it comes to zombies, but I had heard so many good things about the award-winning I Am a Hero that I had to give it a try. And, I must admit, the manga is one of the most interesting and best examples of the genre that I’ve come across in quite some time. For me what makes I Am a Hero stand out is the lead character, Hideo. After making his debut as a professional mangaka, he’s back to being an assistant when his career failed to take off. He has the tendency to talk to himself, hear voices, and hallucinate, so everything that he experiences has to be questioned. The zombie apocalypse doesn’t really come until the second half of the first I Am a Hero omnibus. Until that happens, most of the hints and clues of the impending disaster can be easily dismissed as part of Hideo’s delusions. When the apocalypse finally does happen the series suddenly becomes horrifyingly brutal and grotesque as the world descends into chaos. Hideo remains surprisingly calm in the face of it all, partially because he initially assumes that the end of the world is just another one of his hallucinations. By the end of the first omnibus there’s already an extraordinarily high body count (most the named characters are done for and even Hideo isn’t completely unscathed), so I am very curious to see where the series goes from here.

Maga-Tsuki, Volume 1 by Hoshino Taguchi. Apparently the initial inspiration behind Maga-Tsuki was originally going to be worked into a shōnen battle manga, but in the end it turned into a harem-ish romantic comedy. Personally, in this case I probably would have been more interested in the action-oriented series, but Maga-Tsuki does offer some variations on the usual tropes that are amusing. It is, however, very trope-heavy and contains the expected levels of fanservice for this type of story. When he accidentally breaks the sacred mirror protected by his family’s shrine, Yasuke finds himself cursed by the goddess sealed within it. In order to lift the curse he must make Orihime, a goddess of calamity and misfortune, happy, which proves to be something of a challenge. In the meantime, his soul has been separated from his body and he must maintain constant physical contact with Orihime or else he will die. A kiss from Orihime will conveniently revive him, though. This obviously results in all sorts of complications and misunderstandings, especially when it comes to trying to confess his feelings to the girl that he likes. I like that Maga-Tsuki makes use of Japanese mythology, otherwise I’m not sure that it would have managed to hold my attention. However, I do have a hard time seeing the sweetly cute and seemingly innocent Orihime as an ancient, all-knowing goddess even if her divine powers are suitably impressive.

The Nameless City, Volume 1 by Faith Erin Hicks with colors by Jordie Bellaire. In general I tend to be fond of Hicks’ work, but I’ve been especially anticipating the debut of The Nameless City trilogy having followed its development and progress online. The titular Nameless City is a city that has been conquered and re-conquered countless times. Situated in a geographically advantageous location which allows the ruling kingdom immense control over the area’s economics and trade it makes a sought-after target. The city is currently under the domain of the Dao and has been for a few decades, but it’s likely only a matter of time before there’s another invasion or the residents rise up in revolt. Inspired in part by Chinese history, The Nameless City is about an unlikely friendship that develops over the backdrop of warfare, clashing cultures, and political intrigue. Kaidu is one of the Dao, sent to the Nameless City to participate in military education and training (though he’d much rather be reading than fighting), while Rat is one of the city’s many orphans whose parents were killed by the Dao. As Kaidu gets to know Rat he gets to know the city, and he learns more about his own people in the process, too. As for Rat, she initially hates Kaidu simply because he is Dao, but that slowly changes as she realizes that not all Dao are the same. I’m really enjoying seeing their relationship develop and look forward to the next volume, The Stone Heart, a great deal.

Yowamushi Pedal, Vol. 2

May 8, 2016 by Sean Gaffney

By Wataru Watanabe. Released in Japan in two separate volumes by Akita Shoten, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Champion. Released in North America by Yen Press.

The last volume promised we’d see a race, but I don’t know if readers were prepared for the race to take up the entire omnibus, which is to say two volumes of the original Japanese release. Given that it’s meant to be an endurance test to weed out those who aren’t ready for the big time, it makes sense. And, of course, it ends up showing off the character development of our three leads – Onoda discovers the joy of competition, particularly when he gets a real bike; Naruko realizes that he is not in fact top dog here; and Imaizumi finds a desire to win that had been absent in him for some time. In other words, this still manages to embody all the archetypes of sports manga in one handy volume.

Onoda is still the star, and we see him coming to terms with the fact that he can’t make it on pure guts alone – though god knows he tries, particularly when he gets his racing bike. There’s a lovely bit where he sees the car of team captains behind him (they’re there to pick up those too far behind and say they’ve lost) and despairs, but no, they’re here to give him his racing bike, which got stuck in traffic before the event. The team captains (and Kanzaki, who continues to boggle at Onoda’s raw potential, though this being a sports title, and an Akita Shoten one at that, I expect boggling is all she will do) also get to play Greek chorus along the way, explaining why *this* is the exact point that Onoda will finally run out of steam, only to be proven wrong time and time again.

Of course, he eventually does collapse – your male sports lead does not end up winning against the veterans in the early volumes. The course is designed to kill anyone who doesn’t plan on being a “cycling uber alles” sort, which means most of it is a giant hill. Onoda wins the race to the top of the hill, but that’s all he has in him. As for Imaizumi, there’s some lovely characterization here as he unconsciously finds himself riding as he did when he was a child (something noticed by Kanzaki, who was a childhood friend of his), and also overexerting himself despite knowing it’s not the right thing to do in order to efficiently win the race. Stoic types in manga are always at their most interesting when they go up against something that threatens their facade. It doesn’t necessarily have to make them emotional, but it’s good to see.

So now that Onoda has made a name for himself, to the point where even Kanzaki’s non-cycling BFF says that he seems to have more presence than before, what’s next? My guess is more cycling, and probably an intense training regimen. Are we too early for an inter-high meet? What does the author plan to do with the eccentric yet clearly intelligent and wily coach we’re introduced to? I definitely plan on finding out next time.