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18 February 2013 Leave a Comment

My Week in Manga: February 11-February 17, 2013

My News and Reviews

I posted two reviews last week. The first was for Dana Sachs’ novel The Secret of the Nightingale Palace. I didn’t like the main characters which made it difficult for me to enjoy the book, but there were still some parts that I appreciated. I also reviewed Hiroaki Samura’s Blade of the Immortal, Volume 18: The Sparrow Net. This volume is an important one for both plot and character development. Plus, we get to see Isaku and Dōa fight as a team.

Licensing news! Sean Gaffney has a nice writeup on the New Licenses from Viz and Seven Seas at A Case Suitable for Treatment. Vertical also announced some great titles at Katsucon which will be released this fall: Satoshi Kon’s Tropic of the Sea and Hikari Asada’s Sickness Unto Death. I’m particularly excited for Tropic of the Sea. I hadn’t heard about Sickness Unto Death before, but it looks like it will be an intriguing psychological manga (and it’s only two volumes).

Finally, the Naoki Urasawa Manga Moveable Feast has begun! This month’s Feast is being hosted by Justin at Organization Anti-Social Geniuses. Urasawa is one of my favorite mangaka, so I’m very excited for this particular Feast. Later this week I’ll be taking a look at Pineapple Army, his first work to be published in English.

Quick Takes

Knights of Sidonia, Volume 1 by Tsutomu Nihei. I’ve heard Knights of Sidonia called Nihei’s most accessible work to date, which I think is probably true. His artwork is certainly cleaner and more simplified, but I personally prefer Nihei’s darker, grungier illustrations in Biomega and Blame! So far the story in Knights of Sidonia is fairly straightforward, too. After living alone for years in the depths of the spaceship Sidonia, Nagate is discovered must learn to adapt to a human society that has evolved to survive in space. I find Nihei’s exploration of the course of human evolution one of the more interesting aspects of Knights of Sidonia; I’m particularly curious to learn more about Nagate’s friend Izana, who is neither female or male.

Rurouni Kenshin, Omnibus 7 (equivalent to Volumes 19-21) by Nobuhiro Watsuki. After the completion of lengthy Kyoto arc in the last omnibus,  Rurouni Kenshin is now well into its next story arc. Particularly important in this omnibus is the revealing of Kenshin’s background and past life as an assassin, for which he is still trying to atone. A new group of antagonists have appeared looking for revenge and they’re not afraid to strike out at those who are close to Kenshin. There are a few nice fight scenes, but this section of the story is much slower compared to the flurry of duels that ended the previous arc. I do like that these fighters are slightly more realistic. It’s not so much that they are super-powered but that they have access to technology and weapons that give them an advantage.

Sumo by Thien Pham. I really enjoyed Sumo, Pham’s first solo graphic novel. Scott is a football player whose dreams of playing professionally have crumbled. When he is offered a chance train in Japan to become a sumo wrestler, he takes it. Sumo is a surprisingly quiet and introspective work. Scott is trying to find his place in the world and struggling to reclaim the confidence he once had. Pham weaves three different time periods in Scott’s life together to create a single coherent story. The artwork is simple and stylized but very effective. It is not absolutely necessary to enjoy the work, but it does help to have some basic understanding of the hierarchy system inherent to sumo training halls.

Your Story I’ve Known by Tsuta Suzuki. In addition to a few volumes of A Strange and Mystifying Story, You’re Story I’ve Known is the only other manga by Suzuki currently available in English. I’m rather fond of Suzuki’s artwork. Her characters look like grown, adult men and she is capable of drawing some of the most endearing grins that I have ever seen. Your Story I’ve Known collects four boys’ love stories of varying lengths. There isn’t really a theme to the collection other than the fact that the characters have some actual depth to them. Unfortunately, the translation is problematic in a few places, and at least one scene is nearly incomprehensible. Granted, that may have been just as much Suzuki’s fault as the translator’s. But in the end, I still enjoyed the manga.

Blue Spring directed by Toshiaki Toyoda. Ever since I read Taiyo Matsumoto’s manga Blue Spring, I’ve had a hard time getting it out of my head. When I discovered that there was a live-action adaptation of it, I knew that I had to see it. Toyoda’s film is missing some of the more surreal elements of the original manga, but it still captures a lot of its heart. The film combines bits and pieces of many but not all of the stories included in the Blue Spring manga into a single narrative. It actually works quite well. It’s a violent tale about the disaffected students at an all-boys high school and the ways they find to take control of their realities. As a bonus, the film has a great soundtrack, too.

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31 December 2012 Leave a Comment

My Week in Manga: December 24-December 30, 2012

My New and Reviews

Last week was the last full week of the year! I’m looking forward to what 2013 might bring. Today ends the Hikaru no Go/Game Manga Manga Moveable Feast. I had two contributions for the Feast this time around. Yumi Hotta and Takeshi Obata’s Hikaru no Go is a fantastic series; I was excited to see it selected for the Feast. For my first contribution, I reviewed the first volume of Hikaru no Go. Keeping with the Feast’s game theme, I also posted some random musings on mahjong manga. I love mahjong, and it’s very unlikely any mahjong manga will be licensed in English, but references to the game can be found all over the place in manga. Not related to the Manga Moveable Feast but also posted last week was the final manga giveaway for the year. There’s still time to enter for a chance to win the first volume of Saki Hiwatari’s shoujo science fiction epic Please Save My Earth!

I was also saddened to learn last week that Keiji Nakazawa, survivor of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and creator of Barefoot Gen, passed away from lung cancer at the age of 73. In the past, I reviewed both the first volume of Barefoot Gen and Nakazawa’s autobiography Hiroshima: The Autobiography of Barefoot Gen. Jonathan Clements also recently reprinted his interview with Nakazawa from a few years ago. Nakazawa and his work will be missed.

Quick Takes

Blood Lad, Omnibus 1 (equivalent to Volumes 1-2) by Yuuki Kodama. I wasn’t planning on reading Blood Lad, but I recently heard some good things about the series. For the most part, Blood Lad was a lot of fun. But it’s a pity that the plot hinges on what is probably the weakest element in the entire manga—Yanagi Fuyumi, a human girl who’s fallen into the demon world. Unfortunately, she’s all boobs and no personality. But I do like the rest of the characters, particularly Staz, a vampire who’s obsessed with human, and specifically Japanese, pop culture. I was a little surprised that Blood Lad is a seinen series; it feels more like shounen to me. I’m not in a rush to pick up the next omnibus, but I certainly wouldn’t turn it away, either.

Blue Spring by Taiyo Matsumoto. I sought out Blue Spring specifically for the story “Mahjong Summer,” but I also happen to be a fan of Matsumoto’s work in general. I really liked this collection of loosely related stories about the delinquent, disillusioned, and apathetic students of Kitano High School. The teachers don’t care about what’s going on at the school and the students care even less. They are bored with school and life and seek out ways to occupy themselves before entering adulthood: playing dangerous games, getting involved with gangs and yakuza, showing off and talking shit, and so on. The school itself is rundown and covered with graffiti both inside and out. There’s a touch of the surreal to Blue Spring which is one of the things that makes the manga work so well.

Paradise Kiss, Parts 1-2 by Ai Yazawa. I don’t have a particular interest in fashion which is one of the reasons I haven’t picked up Paradise Kiss until now. It really is a shame I took so long because the series is fantastic. Yazawa excels at writing characters. They all have their histories and faults. They’re not always likeable, but they always come across as real people. I’m particularly fascinated by George in Paradise Kiss. He’s a hard person to read, and there’s a reason for that. He’s manipulative and a bit twisted, but he’s been damaged and hurt in the past, too. After reading part of Nana and now first two-thirds of Paradise Kiss, I am extremely impressed by Yazawa’s work; she is a phenomenal creator.

The Prime Minister’s Secret Diplomacy by Youka Nitta. Embracing Love is one of my favorite boys’ love series, and so I was looking forward to trying another work by Nitta. Unfortunately, I can’t say that I was particularly impressed by The Prime Minister’s Secret Diplomacy. Although I liked the story’s setup—two diplomats navigating their affair and liaisons, taking both personal and political risks in order to do so—I ended up fairly bored with the manga as a whole. And, except for a few brief moments, I wasn’t really feeling any chemistry between the two men, either. Apparently, The Prime Minister’s Secret Diplomacy is the beginning of a series; there’s at least one more volume, but it doesn’t appear to have been licensed in English.

Hikaru no Go, Episodes 1-15 directed by Shin Nishizawa. I love the Hikaru no Go manga, but up until now haven’t seen any of the anime adaptation. I’m enjoying the anime, but the manga is definitely the superior of the two. The art and pacing of the story are better in the manga and the anime isn’t as forgiving if you don’t already understand go. Granted, the anime does teach a little more about the game than the manga does. It even includes short go lessons with professional player Yukari Umezawa (who was also the supervisor for the manga) at the end of each episode. Sai seems to have lost much of his cute side, which made me a little sad; his serious nature is more prominent in the anime.

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