The crew at Manga Recon put their heads together to discuss various manga that should be rescued from licensing limbo, that cold, airless place where a publisher has the rights to a given title, but their efforts aren’t rewarded with audience demand. Sometimes they come back. This year saw the return of Ai Morinaga’s Your and My Secret (rescued from ADV by Tokyopop), Slam Dunk (rescued from Gutsoon by Viz), Black Jack (rescued from Viz by Vertical), and the continuation of books like Parasyte (rescued from Tokyopop by Del Rey). And Aurora’s Deux imprint just saved Cigarette Kisses from Broccoli’s Boysenberry imprint, which has to count as one of the shortest sentences to licensing limbo in history.
I thought I would focus on one at-risk title in particular, Mari Okazaki’s Suppli (Tokyopop), because I really think it’s something special. Suppli is one of those all-too-rare books about grown-ups… people with demanding jobs and complicated personal lives, kind of like Fumi Yoshinaga’s Antique Bakery. There’s plenty of smart, detailed character development and absolutely gorgeous art in Suppli, but don’t just take my word for it: