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Upcoming 4/23/2008

April 22, 2008 by

Some highlights from the ComicList for Wednesday, April 23, 2008:

It’s Go! Comi for the win this week, with new volumes of three of my favorite series arriving simultaneously.

I’ve almost run out of good things to say about Setona Mizushiro’s After School Nightmare, which is probably one of the best Japanese comics currently in release, and certainly one of the best examples of the shôjo category. The cover of the seventh volume, due tomorrow, is particularly creepy for regular readers of the series.

While the second volume of Yuu Asami’s A.I. Revolution didn’t have quite the same feeling of discovery I found in the first, it was still a lovely reading experience. It’s got a sweetly old-fashioned feel as it explores the relationship between humans and robots. The robots are hunky, the humans are quirky, the stories are comforting and varied, and the art is gorgeous.

Train + Train, by Hideyuki Kurata and Tomomasa Takuma, got off to something of a weak start, but it’s become one of my favorites over its six-volume run. Likeable kids Arena and Reiichi get more education than they bargained for as they travel across a teaching planet on the “Special Train,” learning lessons in the form of dangerous missions. I’m not sure Takuma ever fully realizes the visual possibilities of this set-up, but the development of characters and themes is strong.

Filed under: ComicList, Go! Comi 4 Comments

Dogs and monsters

April 16, 2008 by

Some picks from the ComicList for Wednesday, April 16, 2008:

Viz does all the heavy lifting this week, which is a rather lean one.

I’ve already read the fourteenth volume of Naoiki Urasawa’s Monster, and it’s pretty much superb. This series has really built into a terrific suspense story as the characters have developed.

I’m a bit behind on Kazuo Umezu’s The Drifting Classroom, which concludes with its 11th volume. I’ll have to schedule a profoundly disturbing read-a-thon at my earliest convenience.

Then I can calm my nerves with some catch-up reading of Yukia Sakuragi’s Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs, which has reached its eighth volume.

Filed under: ComicList, Viz 1 Comment

Upcoming 4/9/2008

April 8, 2008 by

I’m so confused by this week’s shipping list. Things seem to have reappeared in spite of having shipped a while ago, or at least they were listed as arrivals on previous weeks. Ah well.

Surely the pick of the week will be the second volume of Joann Sfar’s The Rabbi’s Cat (Pantheon). The first collection of this series was my introduction to Sfar’s work, and it was love at first sight. I can’t wait to catch up with the philosophical feline.

Has the third volume of Yuki Urushibara’s splendid Mushishi (Del Rey) been in bookstores for a while and is just now arriving in comic shops? Possibly. I reviewed it a couple of weeks ago, and I recommend it to anyone who likes smart, heartfelt science fiction and fantasy.

While I don’t feel any urgency to run out and pick up the new volume of Kanako Inuki’s Presents (CMX) the day they come out, I always pick it up eventually. Aside from its old-school horror charms, this series is an excellent palate cleanser. The short stories of gifts gone wrong and horrible things happening to terrible people are very pleasant diversions to enjoy between chunkier series.

Speaking of pleasant diversions, Shin Mashiba’s Nightmare Inspector: Yumekui Kenbun (Viz) certainly counts. It’s certainly not the best paranormal-investigator manga you could select, but given how many entries there are in that category, that’s hardly a damning criticism. People plagued with bad dreams turn to Hiruko for help, though they shouldn’t expect any sympathy, and Mashiba turns out some amusing, generally effective episodes as a result. Mashiba’s beautiful, detailed artwork is the strongest selling point for this series.

Filed under: CMX, ComicList, Del Rey, Pantheon, Viz 1 Comment

Upcoming 4/2/2008

April 1, 2008 by

I’m having a weird week, so today’s look at Wednesday’s arrivals is going to be a little perfunctory. Still, there were a few titles I wanted to mention.

First up is the tenth and final volume of Minetaro Mochizuki’s Dragon Head (Tokyopop). I have no idea how this series is going to end. Will the survivors finally be rewarded with safety and rescue, or will they succumb to the dangers around them? Will Mochizuki explain precisely what happened to Japan and place it in context of the rest of the world? I don’t know, and I’m enough of an admirer of Mochizuki’s work that I’m perfectly willing to trust in his execution of whatever conclusion he derives. This book has received critical acclaim but not much in the way of sales. Maybe now that the whole shebang is available, more readers will take an interest.

I’m very intrigued by the premise of Lars Martinson’s Tonoharu (Top Shelf), which focuses on an American teaching English in a rural Japanese village. Martinson won a Xeric Award for the work, which is generally a good sign, and I like the look of the preview pages.

Last, and least, is the first volume of Nobuhiro Watsuki’s Gun Blaze West (Viz). It’s a perfectly competent example of “young man with a dream” manga, but it never quite transcends its familiar formula. Its Old West setting just about provides sufficient novelty, but I’ve never been a fan of gunslinger stories, so I’m left to amuse myself with nitpicking about the period and setting. (Why doesn’t his sister wear petticoats? What kind of schoolmarm is she, anyways? How come I never knew that Illinois had mesas, and where did they go?) I also found myself feeling like a grandpa as I thought that nine-year-olds probably shouldn’t be given a gun, no matter what their destiny may be. I kind of get the feeling that I’m missing the bus on this one, and that Watsuki’s reputation for Rurouni Kenshin will carry the book to healthy commercial heights.

Filed under: ComicList, Save Your Money, Tokyopop, Top Shelf, Viz 1 Comment

Upcoming 3/26/2008

March 25, 2008 by

Some picks from the ComicList for Wednesday, March 26, 2008:

Do you need anyone else to tell you that Hiro Mashima’s Fairy Tail (Del Rey) is a very entertaining fantasy adventure? Probably not, but I’ll chime in with my agreement anyways. Mashima isn’t aiming exceptionally high here, offering unapologetically mainstream entertainment about quirky wizards and their comic quests. It’s a very good example of an increasingly crowded field of comics that offer storytelling that’s as amiable as it is accomplished. The characters are lively, the art is eye-catching, and the stories are fast-paced and varied.

I think it’s smart of Del Rey to introduce the series by releasing two volumes at once. Endearing as it is, it’s also fairly lightweight, so doubling the quantity available should help to cement it in readers’ affections to a degree that a single volume couldn’t, at the same time drawing more critical interest than the series might have enjoyed otherwise. As I said, there’s a lot of competition in the field of amiable, accomplished, mainstream entertainment, especially on the manga shelves.

So yes, there’s nothing wrong with a comic that only wants to entertain. Allow me to contradict that assertion by wondering if Eiji Otsuka and Sho-u Tajima’s MPD-Psycho (Dark Horse) has enough on its mind. Part of the reason I’m so fond of Otsuka’s The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service is the writer’s ability to fold deeper issues into superficially engaging stories. Imaginative gore and varied psychoses aside, MPD-Psycho seems to be vamping along, and I’ve got the feeling that it’s really going to need some larger purpose to keep me from losing patience. Up to this point, it’s read like a collection of creepy grace notes (like barcodes on people’s eyeballs) in place of a driving, meaningful narrative.

Along with Charles Berberian, Philippe Dupuy has created the wonderfully entertaining Mr. Jean, star of Get a Life (Drawn & Quarterly), and Maybe Later, a nicely modulated look at their creative process. Drawn & Quarterly offers a solo work from Dupuy, Haunted, which sounds a lot less down-to-earth but very intriguing.

Villard offers a handsome paperback collection of David Petersen’s first Mouse Guard mini-series. In addition to the beautifully rendered, smartly told story of courageous rodents, there are plenty of extras that make the $17.95 price tag very reasonable.

Filed under: ComicList, Dark Horse, Del Rey, Drawn & Quarterly, Quick Comic Comments, Villard 4 Comments

Upcoming 3/19/2008

March 18, 2008 by

Before I get into this week’s releases, let me just note that there could not be a worse time for Anime News Network to experience server problems than on the day when there’s news to be read about a new series called “Detective Puppy,” as was noted at MangaBlog. Since this is manga, chances are only about 50-50 that the comic will actually feature an adorable canine solving crimes, but I must know more. (As an example of this kind of misleading cuteness bait-and-switch, Penguin Revolution = cute + funny – actual penguins.)

Okay, I’ll shift my focus to the nearer future, as in Wednesday.

My pick of the generally strong week is the second volume of Keiko Tobe’s With the Light: Raising an Autistic Child (Yen Press). In addition to having the really admirable intentions, the first volume combined documentary and dramatic elements quite well.

It’s a strong week for Del Rey, or perhaps more accurately for me as a reader of Del Rey titles. There are new volumes of Fuyumi Soryo’s sci-fi psychodrama, ES: Eternal Sabbath, Ai Morinaga’s screwball sports-manga parody, My Heavenly Hockey Club, and Tomoko Ninomiya’s funny and charming look at music students, Nodame Cantabile.

Fans of Andi Watson’s Glister (Image) should definitely give Princess at Midnight (also Image) a look. It was originally published in the first Mammoth Book of Best New Manga, and Image is releasing it as a stand-alone with some additional material.

Oni offers the second trade paperback collection of Maintenance, a funny look at custodians at a mad-scientist think tank, written by Jim Massey and drawn by Robbi Rodriguez.

Tokyopop ensures high placement on the month’s sales chart with the release of the 19th volume of Natsuki Takaya’s extremely moving, often emotionally raw fantasy-romance, Fruits Basket. The story itself is still going strong, even if Takaya has been forced to resort to members of the student council for her cover subjects.

Fruits Basket might get edged out of the top sales spot by the 16th volume of Hiromu Arakawwa’s Fullmetal Alchemist. I’ve almost gotten used to bestsellers also being really entertaining comics. At least in this context.

Filed under: ComicList, Del Rey, Image, Oni, Tokyopop, Viz, Yen Press 1 Comment

Upcoming 3/12/2008

March 12, 2008 by

First, I must reveal how pitifully easy it is to manipulate me. Echo has a new home! Echo has a new home! Well played, Pedigree. You make Grant Morrison look like Mark Millar.

Okay, now we will move on to this week’s comics, before I become dehydrated from the tears a dog-food company has wrung out of me.

Fortunately, my pick of the week is a wonderful piece of satire that will surely cleanse the palate. It’s the third volume of Adam Warren’s racy, funny Empowered (Dark Horse). For those of you just tuning in, a young super-heroine gets by with a little help from her friends, in spite of a singularly unreliable costume and the sexist contempt of just about everyone else in her line of work. Here’s my review of the first volume.

Kaoru Mori’s Emma (CMX) concludes with the seventh volume. After the absorbingly languid pace of the previous six books, this one felt almost hyperactive by comparison. It’s still lovely and extremely moving, though.

I really loved the classic feel of the first volume of Yuu Asami’s A.I. Revolution (Go! Comi), so I’m really looking forward to reading the second. A young girl helps prototype robots learn about human behavior in smart, sensitively conceived stories.

Maintenance (Oni) is one of the few series I still buy in pamphlet form, and the ninth issue arrives today. Custodians at a mad-scientist think tank encounter a wide range of mangled genre ambassadors, making for observant, odd workplace comedy. The first trade paperback is available, and the second is on its way. Here’s my review of the first issue.

Suppli (Tokyopop) is a great change of pace, following a twenty-something advertising exec as she tries to cobble together a new personal life after the end of a lengthy relationship. The art is lovely, and the observations are sharp and specific, and I’m looking forward to the second digest. Here’s my review of the first.

I already have the first volume of Ai Morinaga’s Your and My Secret, from way back in the days when ADV published it. Now Tokyopop has rescued the series from licensing limbo, and I might just love Morinaga enough to buy it all over again just to add one more to the sales column (and to spare myself a hunt through my shelving “system”). Kate Dacey summarizes all the reasons you should give it a try over at Manga Recon.

Filed under: CMX, ComicList, Dark Horse, Go! Comi, Oni, Tokyopop 2 Comments

Upcoming 2/27/2008

February 26, 2008 by

Man, the storm is following the calm this week. Tons of stuff is arriving in comic shops this week (that’s probably already in bookstores) that’s worth a look.

(Dear Borders: Please open a concept store in my area. The area is virtually free of pesky zoning regulations, and big box chains are welcomed with unnerving fervor and gratitude that’s almost pathetic. Just look at the parking lot of the Olive Garden if you don’t believe me. Failing that, please offer a “buy blank for the price of blank minus one,” as I will be in the vicinity of one of your non-concept outlets later in the week and would appreciate a bargain.)

It almost never happens that I come to a manga via the anime, but I’ve seen some episodes of Crayon Shinchan on Cartoon Network and found them hilarious. CMX has picked up the manga, once published by ComicsOne, and will be releasing it in all of its vulgar, adorable glory.

I’ve already gone on about the fifth volume of Kitchen Princess (Del Rey). It shows up in comic shops Wednesday.

Aside from the cheerful bad taste of the acronym you can form from part of its title, I’ve actually heard good things about Kei Azumaya’s All Nippon Airline: Paradise 3000 Feet (Juné).

The tenor has obviously been different, but I’ve also heard really good things about Ulf K.’s Hieronymus B. (Top Shelf). It looks like it should make for a nice change of pace.

And Viz has decided against pacing themselves this week, churning out manga I really like in a great flood. The situation is so serious that I have to resort to the bulleted list.

  • Beauty Pop vol. 6, by Kiyoko Arai: ACK! Get that horrible child off of the cover!
  • Gin Tama vol. 5, by Hiroaki Sorachi: Really, really smart comedy about really, really dumb characters. Many try to pull this kind of thing off, but few succeed.
  • High School Debut vol. 2, by Kazune Kawahara: I thought the first volume had tons of potential, and I’m assured that Kawahara realizes that potential in really interesting ways.
  • Honey and Clover vol. 1, by Chica Umino: Sweet and hilarious stuff about a group of art students.
  • Nana vol. 9, by Ai Yazawa: I’m a selfish ass, so I’m just glad that this book is coming out more often. It looks as though things get even more uncomfortable in this volume, which is just as it should be in soap opera.
  • Naruto vol. 28, by Masashi Kishimoto: I’m pretty much a Naruto newbie, so when Viz sent this volume my way, I was curious to see how it functioned as a starting point for someone who was basically ignorant of everything that went before. It works well, and it’s a very entertaining comic in its own right. Also, Sakura splits the earth open with her fist and does a variety of other impressive things, and I am instantly smitten.

    • But seriously, was that level of quantity and quality strictly necessary?

    Filed under: CMX, ComicList, Del Rey, Juné, Top Shelf, Viz 10 Comments

    Upcoming 2/20/2008

    February 19, 2008 by

    Some picks from the ComicList for Wednesday, Feb. 20:

    Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá’s very entertaining mini-series, The Umbrella Academy: Apocalypse Suite (Dark Horse), concludes with its sixth issue. If you’re coming in late and are curious, the trade paperback is available for pre-order.

    A new volume of Eiji Otsuka and Housui Yamazaki’s The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service (Dark Horse) is always cause for celebration. The sixth tankoubon arrives tomorrow, promising new business rivals for the afterlife entrepreneurs.

    I really need to catch up on Tomomi Yamashita’s Apothecarius Argentum (CMX), which is already up to its fourth volume. It’s very attractive, features appealing leads, and offers fun bits of trivia about medicinal and/or lethal substances.

    After four volumes of dealing with the somewhat generic machinations of snotty classmates, the orphan heroine of Natsumi Ando and Miyuki Kobayashi’s Kitchen Princess (Del Rey) gets slapped right in the face with actual adult duplicity in the fifth installment, and holy crap, is it good.

    If you’re craving tales of weird, malevolent, otherworldly organisms turning humans into death machines but find Hitoshi Iwaaki’s Parasyte (Del Rey) a little too old-school, the publisher also offers a more modern take on the same subject matter with Tadashi Kawashima and Adachitoka’s Alive. I like both, but Alive is the one with a new volume arriving tomorrow.

    It’s Signature week from Viz, which is always exciting, but I find myself distracted by the latest issue of Shojo Beat, infused as it is with lots of Bryan Lee O’Malley.

    Still, it’s hard to get too distracted to note that Naoki Urasawa’s Monster, now in its thirteenth volume, has become a really spectacular thriller. Watching Urasawa keep his multiple narrative threads from becoming a hopeless tangle is quite breathtaking.

    Filed under: CMX, ComicList, Dark Horse, Del Rey, Viz 1 Comment

    Upcoming 2/13/2008

    February 12, 2008 by

    I need to just abandon introductory paragraphs on these things and come up with some lazy boilerplate, because they’re becoming increasingly feeble. Something like…

    Some picks from the ComicList for Wednesday, Feb. 13:

    Dark Horse offers the third volume of Kazuhiro Okamoto’s Translucent, a coming-of-age comedy about a girl you can see right through. I know, it sounds like it will pound your skull to jelly with the metaphor hammer even if you manage to find protective headgear, but it’s really sweet, often very funny and populated by charming, quirky characters.

    I was instantly smitten with the first volume of Yuki Nakaji’s Venus in Love (CMX), a slice-of-life college comedy about a girl and a guy in love… with the same guy. The second volume arrives Wednesday, and I’m really looking forward to it.

    I’m not entirely sold on Lewis Trondheim’s Little Nothings: The Curse of the Umbrella (NBM), but I’m willing to be convinced. The pages posted at the blog NBM has erected are absolutely gorgeous, though it’s hard to get a handle on the general subject matter and tone. I guess what I’m asking is if it’s good mundane or bad mundane?

    Filed under: CMX, ComicList, Dark Horse, NBM 4 Comments
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