The Manga Curmudgeon

Spending too much on comics, then talking too much about them

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Meanwhile, up at Javits

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I’ll get into Vertical’s announcements from the New York Anime Festival at a later date (Monday, to be precise), but I did want to highlight some of the other on-deck properties that caught my eye. (Deb Aoki has the full list at About.Com.)

genteI’m finding myself increasingly taken with Natsume Ono’s House of Five Leaves with each new chapter that Viz posts, so Ono’s Gente will definitely be on my radar. I don’t really think older Italian men in aprons, at least of the kind who might appear in manga for grown-ups, need any help looking sexy, but that might just be me. It’s a follow-up to Ono’s Ristorante Paradiso, which Viz has scheduled for release in March 2010. Gente is due in July 2010.

My desire to read about ass-kicking fictional librarians has often left me disappointed, but I remain optimist enough to give Hiro Arikawa and Kiiro Yumi’s Library Wars: Love and War a try. It’s due in June 2010.

On the Del Rey front, I liked Kitchen Princess a lot, but I liked it mostly for Miyuki Kobayashi’s surprisingly moody writing rather than Natsumi Ando’s cute but generic art. That said, I’ll certainly give Arisa a try, even though it’s about identical twins who meet later in life, and I’m still gun-shy on that subject after the clinically insane second volume of Papillon.

Bonus points to Del Rey for publishing the rest of Hiro Mashima’s Rave Master after Kodansha pulled the license from Tokyopop three volumes before the end.

Tokyopop has certainly published an awful lot of Natsuki Takaya’s manga, and that will continue with Songs and Laughter. In spite of (or maybe because of) my love for Fruits Basket, I’ve been hesitant to pick up other translated work by the creator, fearing disappointment. Can anyone recommend a title in this category?

Despair is in the details

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Would I use a three-day weekend as an excuse to slack off on a new Flipped column? Well, of course I would, but I didn’t in this instance. In fact, it’s even a day early. If Joyce Aurino can do all of that homework translating and adapting Koji Kumeta’s Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei (Del Rey), then the least I can do is say nice things about her work.

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Previews review Sept. 2009

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There’s a fair amount of interesting new stuff in the September 2009 edition of Diamond’s Previews catalog, along with a positively crippling number of new volumes of ongoing series that I simply must have. Let’s go in page order, shall we?

chobitsDark Horse continues its CLAMP collection project with the Chobits Omnibus Edition, a 720-page trade paperback priced at $24.95 (page 44).

It’s always unnerving when I read a quote from myself in something like this or on a book cover, because I sound even dorkier excerpted than I do in context, but I’m always happy to sing the praises of The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, written by Eiji Otsuka and illustrated by Jousui Yamazaki (page 50). The tenth volume solicitation seems to hint at the participation of zombies, but you should all buy it anyway. It’s not like it’s vampires.

CMX should have put some kind of sad-face emoticon after “Final Volume!” in their solicitation for the tenth volume of Kaoru Mori’s Emma. It’s back to focusing on the leads for the big finish (page 123).

I really liked the first volume of Nina Matsumoto’s Yokaiden (Del Rey), so I’m glad to see the listing for the second installment (page 248).

Digital Manga Publishing busts out the old-school shôjo with the first volume of Kaoru Tada’s Itazura Na Kiss (page 251). As the heroine seems to be something of an academic underachiever, I’d put good money on there being a scene where she’s late for school and runs out the door with a piece of toast hanging out of her mouth. That is not a criticism.

yellowI’ve been meaning to read Makoto Tateno’s Yellow for ages, as it sometimes shows up on those lists of yaoi titles gay guys might like. DMP offers the first volume of an omnibus version of the series, just in time for the arrival of the first volume of Yellow 2 (page 253).

If I didn’t already own all of the single issues, I would probably buy The More Than Complete Action Philosophers trade paperback from Evil Twin, written by Fred Van Lente and illustrated by Ryan Dunlavey. Actually, I’ll probably buy it anyway, because those comics are great, and I’d love to have them all bundled up (page 257).

yourandmysecret5Oh, glorious day! Tokyopop finally releases the fifth volume of Ai Morinaga’s pointed and hilarious Your and My Secret. The body-switching, pansexual love quadrangle continues (page 292).

Vertical gets in on the act with the eighth volume of Osamu Tezuka’s addictive Black Jack (page 300). I want a “Pinoko’s Most Unnerving Moments” edition. Though honestly, that would be all of them.

childrenofthesea2Viz has been inching me towards financial ruin for ages now, but they really give it their best effort this time around. There are the second volumes of Fumi Yoshinaga’s Ôoku: The Inner Chambers and Daisuke Igarashi’s Children of the Sea, the third volume of Kiminori Wakasugi’s Detroit Metal City, and the sixth volume of Naoki Urasawa’s 20th Century Boys, all on page 305.

Last, but certainly not least, Yen Press delivers the second volume of Yuji Iwahara’s Cat Paradise (page 310). For those of you who skipped the first installment, it’s about a school that lets you bring your cat. Charming as that sounds, many of the cats and their owners pursue extracurricular activities that involve fighting big, horrible demons. Fun stuff.

Upcoming 8/26/2009

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Time for another quick look at this week’s ComicList:

There are some nice guilty pleasures on the Wednesday agenda. Dark Horse offers the sixth volume of Gantz, Hiroya Oku’s ultra-violent, oversexed action drama. CMX delivers the ninth volume of Yoshito Usui’s ode to kindergarten crudeness, Crayon Shinchan.

sayonara3It’s a hefty week for Del Rey. I’m most eagerly anticipating the fifth volume of Ryotaro Iwanaga’s underrated Pumpkin Scissors, an intriguing blend of wacky action and thoughtful political commentary. I was surprised by how much I liked the first volume of RAN’s Maid War Chronicle, given its fan-service friendly premise, but it’s got an unexpectedly quirky charm, even though I’d very much like the male lead to die horribly. Anyway, the second volume is due out Wednesday. For me, Koji Kumeta’s Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei is about 50% impenetrable, culture-specific humor, and 50% really, really funny stuff that requires no supplementary essays. That ratio is balanced enough to put the third volume of the series on my “to buy” list.

Someday I’ll set down and try to compose a reasoned piece on the things that bother me about the Color of… trilogy of books by Kim Dong Hwa (First Second). It doesn’t seem like a project that should be entered into lightly, as lots of people seem to really admire them. The concluding volume, The Color of Heaven, is as laden with gynobotanical metaphor as its predecessors, though it’s beautifully drawn.

Tokyopop unleashes a couple of the new series it announced at its recent webcast. Minari Endou’s Maria Holic generated a fair amount of interest in the previously linked poll, landing in the middle of the pack, while Kazusa Takashima’s Mad Love Chase ranked a bit lower.

Upcoming 8/19/2009

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astralproject4Before I delve into this week’s ComicList (which is impressive), I wanted to make sure to point you towards Christopher Butcher’s examination of San Francisco’s New People center and what it might mean for the evolution of otaku culture in North America.

Okay, moving on to the “bitter complaint” agenda item: as regular readers of this blog surely know by now, I’ve been obsessively stalking the progress towards English-language publication of Fumi Yoshinaga’s award-winning Ôoku: The Inner Chambers for a really long time. It’s included on Diamond’s shipping list, but @Toukochan informs me that the quasi-monopolistic distributor evinces a winsome disregard for residents of “the Northwesteast Corridor” and often makes us wait for a week or more for new Viz titles. So when I said to myself, “Gosh, I really want to support manga for grown-ups in the direct market, and I also want to make sure I get a copy of this in a timely fashion, so I should pre-order it,” I should have replaced “in a timely fashion” with “at some point.” Screw you, Diamond. (Update: Apparently, the problem is not with Diamond but with garden variety slapdash-ery at the local level. There will always be reasons to say “Screw you, Diamond,” but this is not among them. Apologies.)

On the bright side, Diamond will manage to deliver the fourth and final volume of Astral Project (CMX) in a timely fashion. I’m not sure how marginal and Syuji Takeya are going to wrap up the many concurrent threads of the story, but I’m sure it will be fascinating. I’m also sure that I will wish there were more volumes. (And I really need to track down a copy of Mai Nishikata’s Venus Capriccio, which has gotten a lot of review love. The second volume arrives Wednesday.)

delreyxmenDel Rey continues with the manga-fication of Marvel’s mutant franchise with X-Men: Misfits, written by Raina (Smile, The Baby-Sitters Club) Telgemeier and Dave (Agnes Quill) Roman and illustrated by Anzu. It’s all about Kitty Pryde’s admission to Professor Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters, which sounds like a promising take on the property.

Random House releases Josh Neufeld’s A.D. New Orleans After the Deluge, a journalistic look at various citizens’ experiences during and after Hurricane Katrina. I’m planning on posting a full review later this week, but Neufeld has done a fine job with the subject matter. It’s excellent graphic-novel reportage. Tom Spurgeon recently ran a meaty interview with Neufeld about the genesis and evolution of the project.

I already picked up a copy of the fourth volume of Naoki Urasawa’s excellent 20th Century Boys (Viz) over the weekend at a bookstore, which is what I probably should have done with Ôoku, not that I’m bitter or anything. Urasawa continues to fold complications into his thriller while introducing and expanding on his complex cast of characters. It’s well worth your money, though Northeast Corridor residents may have to wait. Also promising is the first volume of Shiro Miwa’s Dogs: Bullets and Carnage. I really enjoyed the prelude volume.

A pretty girl…

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… is just not to be found in Hitoshi Iwaaki’s almost entirely awesome Parasyte (Del Rey).

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Don’t get me wrong. I love the series, I really do, and I’d put it in my all-time favorites category. But part of loving something is being able to recognize its imperfections and accept them, right? And in the case of Parasyte, one of those flaws is that Iwaaki draws young, female characters in ways that make them look haggard, dowdy, and… well… just plain weird, even when they aren’t supposed to inspire any of those adjectives.

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Seriously, she’s supposed to be happy in that panel. On the other hand, it’s a tribute to Iwaaki’s gifts as a storyteller that he’s managed to have a successful, award-winning career in manga in spite of his seeming inability to draw cute girls.

Happy text

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I’m sensing one of those seasonal disturbances in the force where people start to get knowingly pessimistic about The State of Manga and Its Future, so I thought I’d just highlight some of the great books coming out during the remainder of 2009 in the hopes of nipping this round of gloom in the bud. Nouvelle manga, award winners, classic shôjo, an alternative anthology… things are looking pretty terrific from where I’m sitting. Expensive, but terrific.

adistantneighborhood1A Distant Neighborhood vol. 1, Jiro Taniguchi, Fanfare/Ponent Mon, $23.00, sometime soon: “Who hasn’t thought about reliving their past, correcting perceived mistakes or changing crucial decisions? Would this better your life or the lives of those closest to you? Or would your altered actions prove even more harmful? One man gets the chance to find out… Middle-aged Hiroshi Nakahara is on his way home from a business trip when he finds himself on the wrong train heading for his childhood hometown. His footsteps take him to his mother’s grave and it’s there that he is catapulted back into his life as an 8th grader – but with all his adult memories and knowledge intact. As he struggles to make sense of his predicament his adult memories of his childhood return but are somehow subtly changed. The questions start to form … would his father still disappear without explanation? would he still marry his wife?”

ookuÔoku: The Inner Chamber, Fumi Yoshinaga, Viz – Signature, $12.99, Aug. 18: “In Edo period Japan, a strange new disease called the Red Pox has begun to prey on the country’s men. Within eighty years of the first outbreak, the male population has fallen by seventy-five percent. Women have taken on all the roles traditionally granted to men, even that of the Shogun. The men, precious providers of life, are carefully protected. And the most beautiful of the men are sent to serve in the Shogun’s Inner Chamber…”

moyasimon1Moyasimon vol. 1, Mayasuki Ishikawa, Del Rey, $10.99, Sept. 29: “BACTERIA TO SCHOOL: Tadayasu is a new, fresh-faced university student hiding a bizarre secret: He can see germs with the naked eye. Between the machinations of an eccentric professor determined to unlock the power of the microbial world and the doomed agricultural experiments of his fellow students, will Tadayasu ever find the cool college atmosphere he so desires?”

itazura1logooutlineItazura na Kiss vol. 1, Kaoru Tada, Digital Manga, $16.95, Nov. 4: “High school senior Kotoko Aihara has had a crush on Naoki Irie since freshman year. Unfortunately, there a few things are discouraging her from to him: he’s a member of ‘Class A,’ the top ranking class in school, whereas she’s in ‘Class F’; he gets the top score on every exam; and he’s so smart, popular and handsome that he’s been class president every year. When Kotoki finally musters up the courage to present him with a love letter, though, Naoki outright refuses it, telling her point blank—with a look of disgust and boredom—that he doesn’t like ‘stupid girls.’ Poor Kotoko’s worst nightmare! Her heart is broken, but then a change in circumstance forces Naoki and Kotoko to be together every day…!?”

ax1Ax (vol. 1): A Collection of Alternative Manga, $29.95, Dec. 29: “Ax is the premier Japanese magazine for alternative comics. Published bi-monthly for over ten years now, the pages of Ax contain the most creative and cutting-edge works of independent comics in the world’s largest comics industry. Now Top Shelf presents a 400-page collection of stories from ten years of Ax history, translated into English for the first time! This groundbreaking book includes work by 33 artists, including Yoshihiro Tatsumi, Akino Kondoh, Kazuichi Hanawa, Shinichi Abe, and many many more!”

Pinoko says…

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Um… sure you are, Pinoko, but remember what we talked about? How you were going to mention Kate Dacey’s Black Jack Contest over at The Manga Critic? It ends at 11:59 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 5, and it’s open to United States residents 18 years of age or older.

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Well, then you could enter to win the first six volumes of Osamu Tezuka’s Black Jack from Vertical. It’s about a gifted but unlicensed doctor treating all kinds of maladies for ridiculous fees, and you’re in it, too!

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Lots of people do. According to this week’s ComicList, the sixth volume arrives in comic shops today.

Other promising arrivals include the eighth volume of Girl Genius: Agatha Heterodyne And The Chapel Of Bones (Airship Entertainment) by Phil and Kaja Foglio and Cheyenne Wright and the 16th volume of Nodame Cantabile (Del Rey) by Tomoko Ninomiya.

On the less promising front, at least by my taste, is the first volume of Kanoko Sakurakoji’s Black Bird (Viz), which seems to be anticipated with some eagerness. I agree entirely with Kate Dacey’s review. Those covers with the blood-flecked girl being manhandled by some dude are entirely accurate.

Previews review August 2009

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For some reason, as I looked through the current Previews catalogue, I kept thinking, “You know, it’s nice that comics publishers who don’t print a single thing I’d ever want to read can still do well.” I can’t explain it, but it kept happening.

Anyway, this edition sees the launch of two new imprints. First up is Del Rey Comics, an offshoot of the much-loved Del Rey Manga from Random House. Things kick off with a $1, 16-page zero issue introducing readers to The Talisman: Road of Trials by Stephen King, Peter Straub, Robin Furth, and Tony Shasteen (page 252). Now, I haven’t read a King novel since Needful Things, but comics based on his work seem to sell well, so this seems like a smart launch property for Del Rey’s pamphlet line. Random House ups the smart with a full page ad on page 253 showing some of the comics-shop-friendly properties that they’ve shepherded in the past.

Now, let’s flip ahead to page 286. For a long time, Del Rey Manga had a cooperative agreement with Kodansha, one of the biggest manga publishers in Japan. Then about a year ago Kodansha decided to open up its own shop in the United States. At long last, their first Previews solicitations show up offering new printings of the first volumes of Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira (softcover, 368 pages, $24.99) and Shirow Masamune’s Ghost in the Shell (softcover, 352 pages, $26.99). The price points are roughly comparable to Dark Horse’s for the same properties, but they still seem kind of steep to me. Still, they’re modern classics, and it’s not a bad idea to launch with them. That said, I think Del Rey wins on the crafty debut front.

Neither Del Rey Comics nor Kodansha Comics has a web site yet, so no links are available.

theboxmanOkay, let’s flip back to page 261 for comics that interest me more viscerally, that is to say, comics that I’d actually like to buy. Drawn & Quarterly offers Imiri Sakabashira’s The Box Man (softcover, 128 pages, $19.95), which “follows its zoomorphic protagonists along a scooter trip through the landscape that oscillates between a dense city, a countryside simplified to near abstraction, and hybrids of the two. Sakabashira weaves this absurdist tale in a seamless tapestry constructed of elements as seemingly disparate as Japanese folklore, pop culture, and surrealism.” I’m game.

Given my love for the Moomin comic strips, I will buy anything with Tove Jansson’s name on it, so I’m glad Drawn & Quarterly is offering The Book About Moomin, Mymble and Little My, an all-ages book featuring Jansson’s marvelous characters and quirky storytelling (hardcover, 24 pages, $16.95).

Viz adds another awesome-sounding title to its Signature line with Taiyo Matsumoto’s GoGo Monster (page 310, softcover, 464 pages, $27.99). Viz promises “a nuanced tale of a young boy and his overly active imagination.” Viz also notes that Matsumoto won the Eisner (2008’s Best U.S. Edition of International Material – Japan) for Tekkonkinkreet: Black and White, also from Viz Signature.

Oh, look… they're waving good-bye!

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There’s another very noteworthy title in this week’s ComicList, and I didn’t want to bury it under a review of another book, or vice versa. The book is neglected enough as it is, and I didn’t want to contribute to that.

parasyte8It’s the final volume of Hitoshi Iwaaki’s horror demi-classic Parasyte (Del Rey), and there are lots of reasons to be excited by its arrival. First of all, there’s the fact that it got here at all. Parayste is one of those sort-of rescues, originally published by Tokyopop. That out-of-print version is lovingly recalled by Shaenon K. Garrity in one of her much-missed installments of the Overlooked Manga Festival. Sincere appreciation should be extended to Del Rey for giving the series another opportunity to reach new readers.

I’m devoted, but lazy, so I’ll just point you to my Flipped column on the book:

“The thing that I like best about Parasyte is that it reminds me that spooky schlock and thoughtful storytelling aren’t mutually exclusive. A story can use shock tactics but not lose its hold on the reader or the authority of its underlying message. Humans and parasites may not be able to peacefully coexist on Iwaaki’s pages, but art and pulp are living in perfect harmony.”

I’m toying with various ideas about how to further promote Parasyte appreciation, so check back on, say, Thursday of next week. Because we know what happens to the inattentive and/or careless.

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