Anime Spotlight: Rin ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~
Released by FUNimation
Taking Halo Legends off the table for a moment... Unless Summer Wars (or hope beyond hope, Mind Game) get scheduled for North American release, if you buy one anime title this year, buy Rin ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~. Not because it's the absolute best work that's going to be released over the course of the year (I hope). Because, if you're buying one anime release in a calendar year, Rin ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~ is probably the kind of title that'll interest you.
Long time blood and spectacle anime fans, this is it. Are you old enough to remember when anime was synonymous with violent porn and not moe body pillows? Konya wa Hurricane? "Gemma! Burn in your golden hell!"? When it was about seeing what freaky flick was sitting next to Super Deformed Double Feature on the Blockbuster shelf, regardless of whether you were also finagling VHS tapes from Japan?
Anime hasn't really been in the business of fulfilling that niche in awhile. There was Strait Jacket kindof, though I wouldn't really recommend it. Karas, kindof, and I've grown to like that more in hindsight, though it’s not terribly transgressive. It wasn't conceived for that set of interests, but I consider Shigurui: Death Frenzy a suitable fit. Afro Samurai probably counts, but the anime was crossover material from the ground up.
Now, we're getting Rin ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~, the best of this breed to be seen in North America in a while, with no clear rivals on the horizon. I wouldn't say that it is absolutely outstanding. Contrary to what I think the writer thought he was developing, it's wading pool deep. There's a lot more watching and seeing what will happen than there is active involvement. Yet, the notion of a light touch is alien to the production, and that turns out to be to its benefit. The gratuitous shower scene makes a triumphant return courtesy of a lead with an affinity for washing and putting on slinky gowns. The plot navigates towards sex scenes like a bee to a flower. It's got sex, and violence, and tons of sexualized violence such that its signature scene involves the lead being bound to a chair and tortured via piercing by a woman in a loligoth ensemble. From that bit of flagrant nastiness, it's on the table. This is going to be an anime that licks its lips at the thought of sadomasochistic violence.
Fortunately, unlike a lot of anime in recent years, these objects of these gag and skewer spectacles are, for the most part, adult.
As wrongheaded as bits of the premise of something like Wicked City might be, I've never been bothered by gratuitously trashy anime of the Yoshiaki Kawajiri variety. There is a threshold of blatancy after which I find it all fun rather than irksome. As such, even the anti-Semitism of Ichiro Itano's Angel Cop (scrubbed out of the localized version) was only worth a raised eyebrow. What bothers me is when anime tries to both moralize about and indulge in salaciousness. It spoils the fun when a work of anime starts wringing its hands or wrapping the audience's knuckles for enjoying the slick violence that it went through great pains to deliver. Anime does have great dark, tragic stories, but its tragedy porn has a tendency to be more odious that its torture porn. The latter is often too wrapped up in the presentation layer to get into too much trouble. Happily, Mnemosyne is unabashedly pulp. Episode titles like "Cat's Don't Laugh," "Angels Don't Cry" and "Flowers Don't Shed Tears" are sure to correct any remaining confusion as to whether or not this is dime novel business. Its creators have no problem doing what they're doing. The gratuitous and nasty bits don't quit have the natural flow of Kazuo Koike or mania of Go Nagai, but it works.
Mnemosyne has an unconventional origin and format. It's six, 45 minute episodes. Normally, this would suggest that the anime was distributed direct to video - an Original Video Animation (OVA). Actually, Mnemosyne was broadcast as a tenth anniversary special on Anime Theater X (AT-X). This station runs a lot of Comic Gun works, like the girl fight adaptation of classic novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms - Ikkitousen; and it runs them uncut (for example, Charge Girl Juuden-chan was unedited on AT-X, but available in its sanitized version in North America via streaming site Crunchyroll). Airing there, Mnemosyne had the freedom to go a bit nuts with nudity, blood and wounds.
I don't want to oversell Mnemosyne's brutality. I can think of plenty of manga with scenes that are more explicit and off-putting... Blade of the Immortal, MPD Psycho, Goth, Berserk, Gantz, Parasyte... some of these aren't even for a particularly old audience. Last Friday, I watched some Pride MMA fights, including Kevin Randleman taking a nasty kneebar from Mauricio "Shogun" Rua and the first two episodes of Archer. The next day, I finished watching Mnemosyne. Despite some chilling bits, I didn't find Mnemosyne to be that much further down fucked-up road than what I was watching on Friday. What makes the difference for Mnemosyne, and makes it worth watching even if it isn't going to trump every other bit of jarring violence is that it's all pop aestheticized. It's polished to a glow.
Rin ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~ opens with an apparent victim running away from a battle-geared up red-head, pursuing with a shot gun in hand. The quarry has a shirt thrown over her otherwise naked body. She's bleeding. She's breathing heavily. There seems to be significant damage to one of her arms. And, also of note, she has think-nothing-of-it green hair. She exerts herself trying doors, and then manages to pick a lock. On a roof top, she doesn't quite manage the action hero test of jumping to an adjacent building. The assailant takes aim, and takes out the arm with which the green haired woman was clutching the building. Cut...
Green hair wakes up in bed after a rough night. She dresses in moves into an office that looks Spartan, except for an oddly out of place, fluffy white dog.
A title card reads Shinjuku, 1990 - of note, Mnemosyne has a lot of fun with its setting... capturing and toying with the character of the place and of the time. Shots are obviously paying attention to recreating the look of the particular locale. Beepers and payphones are heavily employed. Character A: "he forgot how to delete [the file]?" Character B: "this [PC] has a 16-bit 40 MHz CPU, 128 MB of memory, and a 300mb hard drive! Do you think someone who uses this would really forget to delete stuff?" - Character A: "why are you wearing a French maid outfit?" Character B: "I think they'll be popular some day."
Back to the scene, our subject calls out "Mimi. Water please."
A periwinkle haired girl whose youth is as jarring as the dog’s presence comes in around the corner with a liquor bottle and two poured shots.
"Here you go"
Greeny sputters and Mimi retorts '"vodka" means "water" in Russian, you know!" Then, the young girl downs her own drink.
The not so secret of Rin ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~ is that it follows the exploits of immortal women. Rin Asogi specifically. Getting shot and falling down a few stories did not make for a good night for our green haired heroine, but it was one the consequences of which was mostly the need to replace her lost glasses. As she notes to the eyewear shop attendant, her eyes are as bad as they're ever going to get. Worsening vision is not something she needs to worry about.
To pass her extensive amount of time on the planet, Rin is a consulting detective out of Japan's Shinjuku district. Her cases seem to fall into the lost pet, missing person, object retrieval spectrum, but manage to land her in more serious business.
Honestly, 2010 is going to have to be a poor year for anime for Mnemosyne to be my favorite release. That said, I imagine that there's a good chance that Rin Asogi will be my new favorite character for a while. Here's someone who's a real personality. She's Philip Marlowe meets the Bride meets John McClane. She's the mistress of Shinjuku, with an otaku catalog of knowledge, and in many cases dirt, on everyone from the cops and gangsters to the drag queens to the homeless men in the park. Scenes of her beating the pavement really capture the sense of a creature in its element. She knows how to solve problems in that environment.
Rin might be immortal, but she does not possess an action hero body. She repeatedly says that she hates running. She can't naturally take a punch; can't win a contest of strength or of speed. However, her compensation is that she's a canny trickster... the kind of person who would wrap a bit of foil around her finger to briefly throw an acquaintance off guard by making him think she's been engaged.
She might not like running and might not be the kind of person likely to come out well going toe-to-toe, but she can and is interested in scrapping. Whenever possible, a strike first, strike last approach is taken. Fake stumble, and then clock the guy. Dive into the crowd of assailants and Capoeira hand stand/spin kick. Tie-them up with a blade on a line. Kick them or arm bar them when they're down. Rin is viciously committed to winning her fights, and her success in that owes more to her head than her skills, body or gear.
Rin is a complex, interesting character who commands attention. In the context of the anime, those around Rin are fascinated by her. She's not a cult of personality figure and she doesn't attract followers the way a shonen lead does. Instead, she registers as unforgettable - a problem when the people not forgetting are the pathological types populating this anime.
Mnemosyne doesn't just state this or sell it through the reactions of other characters. It broadcasts that magnetism and the anime's visual elements rise to the character's needs. Though more effective than artistic, Mnemosyne showcases excellent character animation. It's smart about how it uses close ups to capture rapidly changing expressions. The grimace as Mimi steps on Rin's toes to shut her up or the transition during the vodka drinking scene, from migraine to sputter to surprise to comfort. The obviousness of the moods registered isn't taking any chances, but each is set on the face for the right amount of time to be credible.
In Mnemosyne, immortal women see the otherwise invisible, ethereal tree of Yggdrasil as it releases time fruits into the air. As disturbing as the anime's live vivisection might be, it might be at its most disconcerting as it captures Rin's unease as she watches a gust of time fruits blow into a Shinjuku crowd. This is anime that knows how to sell discomfort, pain and abject fear by broadcasting the reaction on the faces of its leads.
The physical presence of the characters is as well animated as their expressions. Attention is paid to details like the gate of their step and those refinements establish a sense of their physical being. The fight animation is no let down either. With smartly off set framing to the shots and quick twists, the action really moves. It's great for dynamic energy, and terrible for screen shots.
Beyond its sensationalism and charismatic lead, what needs to be understood about Mnemosyne is that it is written by Hiroshi Ohnogi. Any anime is going to be shaped by its director. However, it's difficult to get a sense of what Shigeru Ueda brings to anime. As an episode director, animation director, story board artist and assistant in various other capacities in production across various genres and various levels of quality, there's no apparent unifying characteristic of his work. Conversely, Hiroshi Ohnogi does have a track record. Saying an anime is from Ohnogi is like saying a movie is from Darren Aronofsky. It's not that their perspectives match, but that they bring a consistent set of attitudes and interests to their work. If Aronofsky is going to make a movie about a wrestler, there is little chance of it being a light action sports entertainment piece. If Ohnogi is doing the schmaltzy blood and breasts business, then in some respects, it is going to be on Ohnogi's terms.
Hiroshi Ohnogi attended Keio University with Haruhiko Mikimoto, classic 80's character designer on works like Gunbuster, Orguss and Macross and Shoji Kawamori, mecha designer and co-creator on Macross. Kawamori was once the guy who did really cool transforming jets in brilliant space battles. Somewhere in the 90's it became apparent that this was not the extent of Kawamori's interests. You can call this point The Vision of Escaflowne - an anime series that helped popularize the medium in North America as something that could interest both male in female audiences. In this case, it was a girl transported to mystical land story, with involving webs of relationships that weren't cut and dried, set against a well realized landscape of feudal nations fighting with mech-armored armies. Yet, late in the series, those broadly attractive characteristics became eclipsed by Kawamori's interests in the nature of fate as it applied to both mystical and quantum physics principles. In doing that, Kawamori lost a lot of his audience.
Ohnogi was not with Kawamori on Escaflowne. He did work with Kawamori on Earth Girl Ajruna - an environment provocation piece, staged as a sort of Hindu magical girl action series that provoked vehemently negative reactions with its alarmism and with its spiritual views on the subject. And, he worked with Kawamori on Macross Zero - a prequel to the anime that was sculpted into the popular first third of Robotech, that managed to alienate Macross fans with its inclusion of an incongruous race of bird people and a haphazard narrative. And, the pair worked together on Aquarion, a new age remix of the original combining mecha anime, Getter Robo, in with the pilots of the three planes that combine into a robot orgasm as their machines link up. Aquarion is of particular relevance to Mnemosyne. The sexual infusion of the genre match in the series. This is not just dropping in sex scenes. It's having some familiar convention trigger sexual reaction, and making a metaphor or subtext more explicit. Mnemosyne and Aquarion also both evoke angelic imagery and both have world tree factoring into attempt to usher in a new age.
Vertical's Ed Chavez recently wrote on Twitter that he looks for characters in manga and narrative in anime. My response to him was that if that was the case, it was time for him to ditch anime because anime had largely ditched narrative. Look how many seasons of anime are now 13 episodes. Look at the drop off in complaints about how anime series end. Haruhi Suzumiya... Holo of Spice and Wolf... Konata of Lucky Star... anime hangs its appeal on lead characters that win the affection of their audience.
Daughters of Mnemosyne is about Rin... her charisma and the promise of a visceral reaction to her adventures, whether it’s grimacing as she's put into a compromising position or exhilaration as she turns the table. Scant attention is paid to developing a coherent mystery or episode to episode cascade. Some marvel or titillating tableau is sure to be coming up. If you're not watching Rin be Rin, you're watching to that next high spot.
In its disjointed way, Mnemosyne is circling towards something. In its efforts to excite the viewer, Mnemosyne does plenty for the audience. However, what it's working towards looks an awful lot more like what gets Hiroshi Ohnogi going than what the audience is probably interested in. Alone, Mnemosyne's trajectory is liable to evoke a lot of "what?" and "why?" reactions. Stacking it next to Arjuna, Aquarion and the like, Mnemosyne is apparently developing Ohnogi's pet themes. Familiarity helps one appreciate what he's doing. Even then, I suspect you really need to be on the same page as Ohnogi embrace Mnemosyne's plot. Beyond that, it’s likely that most will find Mnemosyne's narrative eminently dismissible.
Manga Spotlight: Blade of the Immortal
Volume 22: Footsteps
by Hiraoki Samura
Released by Dark Horse Manga
Various manga creators enjoy changing the situation and attitude of their work from time to time. Hirohiko Araki's Jojo's Bizarre Adventure has featured seven of the titular Jojo's: Victorian gentleman Jonathan Joestar; Jonathan's American, Jazz age martial artist/Indiana Jones grandson Joseph Joestar; Joseph's half Japanese teenage delinquent/super powered/horror puzzle solver grandson Jotaro Kujo; Joseph's local mystery solving teenage illegitimate son Josuke Higashikata; Italian gangster son of the Joestar family's enemy, Giorno Giovana; Jotaro's American, jailed daughter Jolyne Kujo; most recently, a horseback riding, alternate history version of Jonathan, Johnny Joestar.
Though not uniformly the case, these phases get longer and longer as a popular manga persists. For example, the "El Baile de la muerte" phase of Black Lagoon was 75% the length of all the manga's chapters that preceded it.
I've defended the "Prison Arc" stretch of Blade of the Immortal, in which the manga's prime swordsman was taken off the battlefield, chained in a hole in the ground and subjected to medical experiments. Depending on where you pin the start point, this chapter has been about a third of the length of the complete manga series from its inception to the end of the particular story line. Even with some admiration for the "Prison Arc," the idea of moving on is greeted with an exhalation. Now, Hiraoki Samura has moved Blade of the Immortal into its final phase, dubbed "Winter War." How long this will last is open to speculation, especially given that Hiraoki Samura has expressed interest in ending Blade of the Immortal for the majority of the last decade.
"Footsteps" sets the chessboard and the time table for what does have the makings of a final conflict. Primary players renew their acquaintance with each other.
Spoilers... maybe...
Sori, the ninja master more interested in the world of art, including the banned Western variety, is back. Taito Magatsu, the anti-government punk swordsman puts in an appearance. Makie, the geisha who is probably the most gifted fighter in the series has something of a key role in the volume.
Without violating the progress that the manga has made in developing its characters, many return to their pure, as-introduced presentation.
Manji, the immortal of the title for example.... The character killed the corrupt lord who he had served. Then, he killed the many men sent to bring him to justice, earning him the moniker the "Killer of a Hundred." The last of these was his brother-in-law, an act of violence that shattered his sister's mind. Cursed with immortality, he swore to kill a thousand evil men to make amends for the hundred good ones. The thousand evil men for a hundred good ones equitation is a bit of reductive morality, and Blade of the Immortal has not so much ignored it as not respected it. The sister and the "Hundred Killer" haven't been evoked in a while, but both concepts make a return in Footsteps.
Though Blade of the Immortal has returned to framing its protagonist with the parameters of his original concept, the tide of the manga has still turned Manji's mission into one of a number of cross currents. Undoubtedly, he still has a battle to face, but that's going to be a skirmish in the Winter War between the anti-establishment, Darwinian Itto-ryu sword school and the surrogates of Edo government power, specifically those under the command of banshu samurai Habaki Kagimura.
There's an operating principle that seems to have shaped Blade of the Immortal for a while. Though he's been writing a popular genre work since 1994, Hiraoki Samura is not a genre devotee. As such, Samura needs to do what he can to stay interested in Blade of the Immortal. In the section in which Manji was imprisoned, this effort included experimenting with the subject of atrocities; specifically human experimentation and the actions taken to perpetuate a government in power. Samura continues to exercise that line of thought with the man who supervised those horrors, Kagimura. He's proving to be an involving character. His role in Blade of the Immortal is that of the villain that you really want to see taken down... hard. He's personally responsible for the deaths of hundreds. He's defeated, tortured, and frustrated the manga's heroes. Yet, he's neither an obvious black hat nor the kindof hard, ideal bound man who wins a sort of macho affection. Footsteps humanizes him. He has relationships. He has complex opinions about the actions he's undertook. This isn't the simple shonen fight tournament trick of adding history and dimensions to a foe at the eleventh hour, as they're being shown the door. If he's not buried from the records, Kagimura is the kind of guy that history either reviles or romanticizes. Samura works with ideas of what such a dangerous person would really be like as he develops the character's agenda going forward.
This fleshing out of perspective is applied to other camps of the conflict during the volume's course, specifically the once antagonist, now large part of the series' focus, Itto-ryu. The manga has already worked a lot with these folks, but Footsteps more deeply develops how the Itto-ryu banner has been one that has both attracted and embraced revolutionary idealists like Magatsu, plainly evil men like misogynous serial killer Sabato Kuroi (Black Sabbath), criminals, madmen and the pathologically bellicose.
Before becoming a target of higher powers, the Itto-ryu operated by challenging and obliterating the weaker sword schools that sprung up in the peace time of the Tokugawa shogunate. This volume offers the story of an Itto-ryu delegate named Boa Hoshi - a crude, drunken, pathologically angry monk who fit well into the Itto-ryu's retinue of outcasts. Though the Itto-ryu are being hunted down by the government, and the dojos smashed by likes of Boa have had the opportunity to spring back to their original form, a number of the formally trained former students of smahed dojos have tracked own the Ittu-ryu leadership to aid them in the conflict. It's an act akin to joining the suicidal Fight Club who kicked your ass as the FBI are breaking down their door. It says something about the Itto-ryu and the violent men it attracts.
Beyond cementing ideologies and characters, Samura does what he's done regularly, but which might be a little odd for a manga supposedly entering its final phase. He introduces a host of new characters. There's the very political new face of the government, Hayabusa Ugen... a Janus with a weird mismatch of feminine and masculine features. There's the sure to impress new Itto-ryu field operative Baro Sukezane... a gift to the fans of the manga's sword fights. Two or three new ninja groups show up, offering something that this manga hasn't previously seen by way of hannya mask wearing cannon fodder. And, the true opportunity for Samura to stretch is skill at creating bands of exotic weapon carrying kenshi super groups... the "Six Demons" of Rokki Dan.
There are great fight scenes to anticipate from these folks, especially as broadcast by a group shot of the Rokki Dan framed by a couple dozen masked ninjas. There's the grinning guy with the pencil moustache, the staff clutching moleman, the guy with the shaved head, nunchahu and tightly corded muscles, the one eyed man, with long hair, a skull cap and a weird miniaturized polearm, and the hulking dude with a scar splitting the middle of his cranium and, oddly enough, dreadlocks coming off the sides of his bald top. What sets the group apart from previous teams who are likewise schedule to meet on this upcoming battlefield, or have met with Manji or some other misfortune, is age. These aren't young turks. It's like what they say about kung fu movies... watch out for the old guy. He's presumably survived a lot and is capable of dealing out some hurting. Most of the Rokki Dan don't look AARP aged, but it does seem like these folks are veterans of some grave business.
And the final member of the Rokki Dan who brings their number to six... well, she's a young swordswoman, and the daughter of someone. For a hint, her family crest, adorning the back of her battle gear also adorns the kimono of another character and the spine of Footsteps.
Footsteps does feature some action, but it is a very crowded, very talky volume. Recently, I wrote about Shaman Warrior and how it didn't seem like Park Joong-Ki was bringing his best to that manhwa's ending. Samura has set the table, and if things proceed as laid out in Footsteps, fans of Blade of the Immortal, especially fans of its clash of exotic, intricately rendered fighters, should be very pleased.
But, beyond putting together a clash of swords crowd pleaser, Blade of the Immortal's drive to persistence and popularity has been mediated by Hiraoki Samura's interests. And, whether it’s the literally torture porn Love of the Brute or the Burroughsian vision of Halcyon Lunch, the evidence from Samura's extra-BOI work is that his interests are strange and disturbing. Winter War might not be as unconventional as the prison piece, but Samura has by no means shed his interest in deviating from the genre norm.
Oh yeah, Footsteps also includes the return of bonus features in the collected edition. It features one of the guides to Samura's outlandishly designed weapons. And, it features a large section of Blade of the Immortal's newly expanded female cast recast and redesigned as the population of a gal game (aka dating sim). This is extensively footnoted, and you could say "if you have to explain the joke...," but seeing the uncompromising women of Blade of the Immortal as school girls in a relationship story is amusing enough to almost be worth the price of admission in and of itself.
Manga Spotlight: Bokurano: Ours
By Mohiro Kitoh
Released by VIZ Media
Deb Aoki of about.com:manga recently collected hints for manga reviewers. Most were general suggestions for writing cogent reviews. Mine was more subject targeted. "You don't need to talk to it, but know the manga's context; specifically the anthology in which it was published." Manga may look like one thing, but be written for an entirely different audience. Kazuhiro Okamoto's Translucent for example. It's about a shy girl suffering from an affliction that causes her to turn invisible. It looks like a for girls shoujo story. It's been marketed as one. And yet, the manga was serialized in Comic Flapper, a seinen anthology for teenage males, and at times, it struggled with defining the female subject through the male point of view character.
A work of manga might fit the readership you think would be interested in it, but the writing of that manga is going to be informed by the profile of its anthology's readership in Japan. And, if you go in thinking it’s for an audience other than that anthology's, sometimes the manga will violate your expectations.
I'm not quite sure how it's possible, but publishers seem to have been caught up in this assumption trap. A prime example is Mohiro Kith’s Shadow Star aka Mauro Nauru Hoshi Tama Taro Kop ( The dead star and the jewel of a girl), abbreviated as Caruaru. It looks like a kid’s adventure story. Energetic/upbeat ("genii" character type) twelve year old Shine Tami finds a sort of merchandise-bait space star fish; a goofy, puppy dog eyed creature that can take the shape of a backpack or flatten out into a board onto which she can surf into the sky. Looks innocent. Looks fun. It hit America a bit after Pokémon and looked like a bit a mature more variant. It got slightly violent, then, it got very violent.
Mohiro Kitoh has an instantly recognizable, distinctive way of stylizing his characters. There's a simplified abstraction. The bodies shapes are fairly realistic, but with the exception of emphasized contrasts, the forms have childlike litheness... as if no preteen/teens overeat or miss out on their exercise. This can convey youthful innocence, but it also conveys vulnerability. These are forms that are plainly susceptible to what cruelty might be thrown at them.
People in Kith’s view of our world are quite capable of doing terrible things to each other. There's an idealized notion of people being happy and healthy. Circumstance can shatter that. So can maliciousness. Running in Afternoon, home of Blade of the Immortal, Blame!, Gunsmith Cats and Eden: It's an Endless World, Kitoh had the license to make such violations in Shadow Star truly gut wrenching. If you went into Shadow Star expecting a Poke'-adventure, the characters weren't the only ones due to be violated.
Bokurano: Ours ran in alternative publication Ikki. More on this seinen periodical later, but for the time being, the important thing to know about Ikki is that it generally features manga with little visual resemblance to what most North American's think of as a manga look. Few entries have much name recognition here outside manga devotees. The best known is probably Sexy Voice and Robo, about a 14 year old girl with vocal talents who decides to turn them toward crime solving. Other company that Bokurano: Ours keeps includes A Serow's Deadly Fall - about grade schoolers and a goat/antelope; Taiyo Matsumoto's design crushing story of an assassin killing off other super powered world leaders - No. 5; story of forty something single father who decides and fails to become a hip manga creator - I'll Give It My All...Tomorrow; man with lizard head versus sorcerers - Dorohedoro.
If you weren't familiar with Mohiro Kith’s history, if you were unaware of the character of its anthology, Kitoh still offers
little opportunity to confuse Bokurano: Ours with a typical adventure.
It opens with the statement "The year we started junior high we considered ourselves all grown up. We thought we could do anything. But in reality, we were just kids, sheltered by our parents and by society."
On one hand, Bokurano: Ours puts lie to the notion that its subjects were entirely sheltered. On the other, Kitoh is getting at some of the themes of Mamoru Oshii's Sky Crawlers, from the opposite direction. In a statement about the movie Oshii said "in our peaceful country, there is no more starvation, revolution, or war. We have a society where we can live out our allotted spans of lives without ever having to feel deprived of food, clothing, or shelter...Isn't this comfortable life that we have achieved, a monotonous purgatory that doesn't end until we die?"
Oshii accentuated that freedom from dire want in Sky Crawlers' consequence free game/war. Bokurano: Ours does the opposite by expositing children to exaggerated mortal peril.
15 children, eight seventh grade boys, six seventh grade girls, and one fourth grade girl visit a decaying sea side village as part of a school program. They think it's childish. They complain about the smell of the ocean and the "gross" shore creatures. There's a cave in the distance and the group decides to check it out for some diversion. There, they find an incongruous collection of computer equipment, framed by tarps and lights. A man in hiking gear turns up and explains that he's been developing a game, and that he's just about ready to recruit some play testers to "pilot a giant robot to defeat enemies! The planet Earth will be attacked 15 times! But a giant robot will rise to Earth's defense! A black colossus! Layer upon layer of armor! Unparalled strength! An indomitable goliath!" The man, later given the moniker Kokopelli, doesn't exactly win over the crowd with this speech, but he does manage to get them to put their hands to a contract.
Later, the children are not sure if the experience with the man in the cave was reality or a shared dream; a question that is cleared up when they see fighter jet scrambled to intercept a tower dwarfing sort of black crustacean/man. A bizarre, sharp tooth teddy bear creature materializes in the air in front of the children, quickly clears up that he's "the almighty" and not some sidekick, then explains that their turn to pilot the giant robot is imminent.
In a general sense, what they're involved with is standard fight the alien invader in your giant robot procedure. The enemy has a weak spot. Find it. Crack it. This was seen in Neon Genesis Evangelion, as well as plenty of works before and since. Kitoh impresses with the immense sense of scale and unique design of his giant weapons. The fights scenes are cataclysmic, but that's neither his forte nor the chief appeal of Bokurano: Ours.
Some of the children embrace the opportunity to pilot a giant robot, seeing it as opportunity to become heroes or as a vehicle for fame. To others, it plays on their sense of obligation. Other still have no interest. Regardless of their enthusiasm or willingness, what becomes quickly apparent is that they've been roped into a sort of cosmic pyramid scheme. In that cruel trap, Kitoh is not so much deconstructing the giant robot story as using it as an industrial grade excavation devise to drill into human nature.
Mohiro Kitoh has been accused of being misanthropic or hating children, and a case could be made for either assertion. An alternative view is that he's unafraid to lay his subjects bare. There's a banally cruel way in which he starts that process in Bokurano: Ours. The children are taken into the cockpit of their giant robot, which has been outfitted by chairs from their bedrooms. In that moment, the self conscious teens lose the ability to hide details about their lives from each other. Their economic situation and home lives are opened up. On has an executive chair... another has a floor cushion... "pretty ghetto man!" "what kind of life do you live anyways?"
This is just the beginning. One by one, the children are forced into a temporary, godlike position. From that seat of life or death, earth shattering threat and responsibility each is forced to exhibit or develop a system for reconciling what happens. Whether they decide to be self sacrificing heroes or decide that the deaths of others are of no consequence to them, they relate the giant robot piloting experiences to their lives and crystallize a personal philosophy. Unlike the home chair outfitted in the cockpit for their peers to see, it's only the reader who becomes privy to these secrets. As the characters are developing reasons for it all, the next chapter, after the content of this volume underscores, or perhaps invalidates, this values exhibition with a dedicatedly nihilistic twist.
From a Kitoh interview on Viz's Sigikki site "my original idea was about a girl with magical powers. Whenever she used her magic, it would steal life from those who were important to her. That became a story about a robot who risks its own life in order to save others." What's poignant or disturbing in this process is that Kith’s stories become engines that consume characters to forward exploration.
Bokurano: Ours is a brutal manga, and Kitoh is able to channel the effect of that harshness. I've been critical of manga that I've considered tragedy porn, which use the edge of their painful consequences for little more than emotional scarification. Kitoh is giving every evidence of being more thoughtful than that. He's been developing each of his characters even in offhand moments. As a result, the tapestry of values being woven is taking shape into a provocative image.
That said, Kitoh manga is divisive, and Bokurano: Ours is certainly no exception. Hiroyuki Morita, director of the Ghibli movie The Cat Returns, developed an anime adaption of Bokurano: Ours, but had a problem with Kith’s treatment of the characters. As such, Morita won the go ahead to rework some of the story's operating principles. In turn, Kitoh blogged to decry the break in vision and urged fans of the manga not to watch the anime. Reactions to Kitoh works, either positive or negative are liable to be deep seated.
VIZ has experimented with supporting the localized releases of Ikki titles by serializing chapters online for free on Sigikki. For series like Daisuke Igarashi's Children of the Sea, Viz has rolled out the series ahead of its graphic novel release, removing material as it becomes available in the printed version. For the most part, this appears to be the case with Bokurano: Ours too. The trade paperback of volume one is scheduled to be released February 16, but chapters up to the first of volume two are still online. Preview chapters of published titles like Natsume Ono's Not Simple have also been made available on the site. The ends of posting some of the other works are less apparent. Eiji Miruno's Tokyo Flow Chart explains life by away of absurd process diagrams. It takes some work to develop an affinity for the manga, but only two chapters have been made available on Sigikki, in July and October '09. Tondabayashi's "What's the Answer" is an equally absurd work. There was one entry, posted in October, that responds to a kid on Christmas' question about "what was Santa doing yesterday." Based on the small sample size, it's difficult to work up an enthusiasm for the title.
Sigikki has been widely praised by North American comic/manga industry commentators. However, the question is "what are Viz's plans for Sigikki." It was adding about three chapters of manga a week. This stopped on December 24th. On January 16th, a blog entry clarified that it was on a Holiday break. With the hiatus indefinate, its future is open to speculation. Gonzalo Ferreyra, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Viz Media has commented on developing metrics for the effects of posting the manga online. The implication of this for the resumption of Sigikki, whether it involves tests like comparing sales of Children of the Sea while updating to Bokurano: Ours without, remains to be seen.
Upcoming in North America
Who knows how it reflect James Cameron's apparently dynamic agenda, but Yahoo Movies is saying that the Battle Angel Alita adaptation will be his next project.
Bandai
Bandai Visual Japan announced that Amazon.com will release the Mobile Suit Gundam UC(Unicorn) Vol.1 Blu-ray with a two-month exclusive window in North America under the “Honneamise” label.
Amazon.com will be taking pre-orders starting on January 10 with a street date of March 12, 2010 at a SRP of $49.98.
The story is set in Universal Century, three years after the events of the film Char’s
Counterattack. The series will be comprised of six 50-minute episodes directed by Kazuhiro Furuhashi.
The Blu-ray will feature Episode One with Japanese and English TrueHD 5.1 and Japanese and English Dolby Digital 2.0 audio with a 16:9 / 1080P High Definition transfer. Subtitle tracks will include Japanese, English, French, Spanish, and Chinese (in both Cantonese and Mandarin).
The English voice cast features the talents of Steve Cannon, Stephanie Sheh, Rachael Lillis, Tara Platt, and others.
Bandai Entertainment has scheduled Kannagi: Crazy Shrine Maidens Complete Collection ($59.98) and Lucky Star Complete Collection (Anime Legends, $49.98) for April 6th.
Eureka Seven: Good Night, Sleep Tight, Young Lovers, Hayate the Combat Butler Part 4 and Kurokami The Animation Part 1 have been delayed to March 2nd.
CMX
POLYPHONICA: CARDINAL CRIMSON VOL. 1
Advance-solicited; on sale May 12 • 5” x 7.375” • 162 pg, B&W, $9.99 US • TEEN +
Original story by Ichiro Sakaki and ocelot. Illustrated by Tomo Hirokawa
CMX/Flex Comix. In a place called Polyphonica, humans and spirits live side by side. Young musicians create magical sounds with their music, which bind the spirits to them. A struggling student named Phoron accidentally summons a spirit he met in childhood but later forgot about. Phoron could use all the help he can get, but this feisty spirit may prove to be more than he can handle!
STOLEN HEARTS VOL.2
Advance-solicited; on sale May 19 • 5” x 7.375” • 192 pg, B&W, $9.99 US • TEEN
Written and illustrated by Miku Sakamoto
MUSASHI #9 VOL.17
Advance-solicited; on sale May 5 • 5” x 7.375” • 200 pg, B&W $9.99 US • TEEN
Written and illustrated by Miyuki Takahashi
TERU TERU X SHONEN VOL.7
Advance-solicited; on sale May 19 • 5” x 7.375” • 192 pg, B&W, $9.99 US • TEEN +
Written and illustrated by Shigeru Takao
ORFINA VOL.8
Advance-solicited; on sale May 26 • 5.5” x 8” • 282 pg, B&W, $12.99 US • MATURE Written and illustrated by Kitsune Tennouji
VENUS CAPRICCIO VOL.4
Advance-solicited; on sale May 5 • 5” x 7.375” • 192 pg, B&W, $9.99 US • TEEN
Written and illustrated by Mai Nishikata
AH MY BUDDHA
Ikkou is your everyday teenage boy with everyday teenage desires. Too bad he's training to be a priest in a Buddhist temple full of incredibly gorgeous and obviously available priestesses. The temple is usually called on to perform exorcisms, and Ikkou's inner power is on hand for whenever things get out of control. A little flash of skin (usually a lot) from his female colleagues is enough to supercharge him, but the aftermath involves dealing with an extra turned-on priest whose loins were blazing to begin with. It's enough to make anyone cry out for Buddha to save them.
BEAST KING GO LION COMPLETE
From days of long ago... from uncharted regions of the universe... comes a legend... The legend of Golion, the original Japanese show that started it all in the world of Voltron. The five pilots may look the same, but their names and the events that occur are galaxies apart from the series you think you know. Were people evacuated safely? Do robots die? And what really happened to a certain main character?
Revisit the Voltron series as you've never experienced it before, and see what really happened in this newly restored and uncut version.
BLUDGEONING ANGEL DOKURO-CHAN
Imagine a world where the secret to immortality has been discovered, causing women to stop aging by the time they turn twelve. Sounds like it might be a perfect playground for a discoverer with less-than-wholesome interests, doesn't it? That's exactly why the Big Man Upstairs sends Dokuro-chan, one of his angelic assassins, into the past to "deal" with the sicko who messed with nature. But Dokuro-chan decides instead to move in with her target, Sakura Kusakabe, and keep him too occupied to find eternal life. Funnily enough, the path of nonviolence leads to a fountain of blood, as Dokuro-chan accidentally kills Sakura on an almost daily basis, only to resurrect him with a magical chant moments later.
DOJIN WORK COMPLETE
Dojin Work follows the life of a young girl named Najimi Osana and her exposure into the doujin world. She was first tempted into becoming a dojin artist after seeing how much one of her friends can make at a convention. Najimi loves to draw, though soon learns, contrary to what she expected, that this new world is anything but easy. As she attends more conventions and meets more people, Najimi eventually manages to find a group of very interesting friends. These friends already have some experience in the field and help her out along the way so that she can someday make a name for herself creating dojinshi.
GENSHIKEN 2
The Society for the Study of Modern Visual Culture, otherwise known as Genshiken, is now under the charge of a more confident Sasahara. Things have changed in between semesters (for all the details, check out the bonus Genshiken OVAs included on the Kujibiki Unbalance TV series), and the otaku club now has a new otaku-hating member named Ogiue. Sasahara's initial goal of starting a dojin circle and selling those fan-made magazines at the next Comic Festival becomes a reality, but reality is a cruel master. Who apparently Cosplays. Afterward, the club is abuzz with talk about Tanaka and Ohno's relationship, which takes a hesitant step forward.
KANOKON – THE GIRL WHO CRIED WOLF
Kouta, a country boy who lives with his grandfather, is now moving to the city to attend high school. Changes come with his new home and new school, but nothing could have prepared the gentle young man for girls, specifically a bombshell fox spirit named Chizuru. As if her aggressive advances weren't enough, he also catches the attention of a frosty wolf spirit named Nozomu. Kouta is dragged into supernatural events as a result of his contact with the two girls, and his school life only gets more chaotic by the day. But with a girl who gives "foxy" new meaning and another howling after him, things are looking up for his love life.
SUKISHO
Sora fell from the roof of his high school and was knocked unconscious. When he finally awoke, he found a kind-hearted boy named Sunao waiting over him. Sunao claims to be his best friend, but the fall erased some of Sora's memory. He doesn't remember Sunao at all, the wide-eyed young man acts like much more than just a friend. From that day on, Sora begins to experience flashbacks in which he is not himself, but a mysterious alternate personality with hidden powers. He begins to search for the secret of his lost memory and the flashbacks, but will Sunao be his companion, or his enemy?
TEKKAMAN BLADE COLLECTION
It is the near future, United Space Calendar Year 192. The evil alien Radam has besieged the Earth, gaining control of the enormous Orbital Ring that surrounds the planet, and raining down mysterious spores that fill Earth with alien plants. Aki and Noal, two pilots from the Outer Space Development Group, find one of the alien lieutenants who crash-landed on Earth. The stranger claims to have no memory, and is determined to fight to protect humanity! His name is D-Boy, and he appears to be a normal human, until he transforms into the bio-mechanical warrior, Tekkaman Blade!
Manga
4/14/2010
AKIHABARA@DEEP - Volume 6 of 6
Live Action
4/13/2010
Hansel And Gretel
4/27
KID WITH THE GOLDEN ARM
DEADLY DUO (Blu-ray)
Section23
April slate of DVD releases, include the first set of Japan’s long-running anime series Gintama.
Sentai will also issue three other anime series sets in April, including Hidamari Sketch x 365, Living for the Day After Tomorrow, and Le Portrait de Petite Cossette.
Switchblade Pictures has two live-action DVD releases from Japan, including Space Ranger Complete Collection and Venus Ranger.
Product details follow, in order of release
HIDAMARI SKETCH X 365 COMPLETE COLLECTION
Published by: Sentai Filmworks
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Run Time: 400 min.
Street Date: 4/6/2010
Format: DVD
SRP: $39.98
SYNOPSIS: You didn't think Yuno's story was over, did you? Of course it isn't, but if you've seen the first series of Hidamari Sketch, you should know not to expect the "A happens after B after C" pattern of the rest of the world. In fact, instead of just taking place after Yuno's first year at Yamabuki High, X365 continues the saga on both sides, around and in-between, filling in the details in an ever-expanding collage that's both avant-garde and slice of life! And if the format's not completely unexpected, we guarantee that some of the things that you never knew about before WILL be!
LE PORTRAIT DE PETITE COSSETTE
Published by: Sentai Filmworks
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Run Time: 120 min.
Street Date: 4/20/2010
Format: DVD
SRP: $19.98
SYNOPSIS: What happens when the face you see in a reflection isn’t your own? That’s the shock that awaits Eiri Kurahashi when he sees the living image of Cossette d'Auvergne in a glass in his uncle’s antique shop. Infatuated, he becomes possessed and mysteriously makes contact with the beautiful young aristocrat, only to learn that she was murdered 250 years earlier. Now, her soul trapped inside the goblet, she can only be set free if someone is willing to pay for the sins of her murderer, the artist Marcelo… who may very well have been reincarnated as Eiri! As shadowy forces surround Eiri, his love for Cossette drives him down a tortuous path of self-destruction, while those who love him in the real world can only watch in horror!
GINTAMA COLLECTION 1
Published by: Sentai Filmworks
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Run Time: 325 min.
Street Date: 4/27/2010
Format: DVD
SRP: $39.98
SYNOPSIS: Life isn’t easy in feudal Japan… especially since the aliens landed and conquered everything! Oh sure, the new health care is great, but the public ban on the use of swords has left a lot of defeated samurai with a difficult career choice! This is especially true if they’re not particularly inclined towards holding a day job, which is why Gintoki Sakata’s opted for the freelance route, taking any job that’s offered to him as long as the money’s right. Unfortunately, in a brave new world filled with stray bug-eyed montsters, upwardly mobile Yakuza and overly ambitious E.T. entrepreneurs, those jobs usually don’t pay as well as they should for the pain, suffering and indignities endured!
LIVING FOR THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW COMPLETE COLLECTION
Published by: Sentai Filmworks
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Run Time: 300 min.
Street Date: 4/13/2010
Format: DVD
SRP: $39.98
SYNOPSIS: There are far worse things than having to deal with your ex-boyfriend’s little sister or your older brother’s ex-girlfriend. But that’s something Karada Iokawa and Shoko Nogami have to learn the hard way when a magic wishing stone inexplicably grants Karada’s wish to be older. And does it by stealing the years from Shoko! Now Shoko, who’s already graduated and studied overseas, is Karada’s age, just about to enter junior high school. Meanwhile Karada must suddenly face the real facts about what being grown up entails. And just to make a bizarre situation even more awkward, there’s the issue of how to handle their existing romantic interests!
SPACE RANGER COMPLETE COLLECTION
Published by: Switchblade Pictures
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Run Time: 120 min.
Street Date: 4/13/2010
Format: DVD
SRP: $19.98
SYNOPSIS: With the power of the Treasure Sword at his command, the King of Valhalla has maintained peace and prosperity across the universe. But when the sword goes missing it's up to three magnificent female warriors - Sting Blue, Orna Black and Caliban Red - to set forth on a mission and recover it before the forces of darkness can steal it for their own! Unfortunately, while the warriors are magnificent, they really don't get along well and foolishly divide their forces, even as the nefarious Dron Brothers of the Dark Planet close in on the sword itself! Now, in a horribly backwards part of the galaxy, on an insignificant world known as Earth, the fate of all creation will be determined in a knock down, hand to hand battle to the finish!
VENUS RANGER
Published by: Switchblade Pictures
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Run Time: 95 min.
Street Date: 3/30/2010
Format: DVD
SRP: $19.98
SYNOPSIS: When four beautiful girls sneak into the hideout of a shadowing organization, they suddenly find themselves being drafted as holy warriors in the ancient war of good versus evil! On the side of darkness is the Golden Venus, on the side of light, the Mysterious Silver! Scheming beastly goddesses, massive girl on girl battles and an epic spin on the entire powered ranger genre propel the V-Forces through an epic tribute to classic Japanese live action entertainment! No punches are pulled! All breasts are mostly real!
Recent Section23 releases include Hidamari Sketch and Glass Mask
HIDAMARI SKETCH SEASON 1 COLLECTION
Running Time: 350 min.
Age Rating: TV PG
Language: Japanese with English Subtitles
Published by: Sentai Filmworks
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Format: DVD
SRP: $39.98
SYNOPSIS: For years, Yunos dreamed of attending Yamabuki Arts High School; but now that she’s been accepted, it means the scary prospect of moving away from her home and family for the first time! Fortunately, Yuno quickly learns that if her new neighbors at the eclectic Hidamari (Sunshine) Apartments aren’t technically family, at least the majority share the bond of being fellow art students. From second year students like Hiro and Sae, who try to behave like helpful older sisters (mostly successfully) to her hyperactive new neighbor, classmate and best friend Miyako (who has the scariest apartment ever,) Yuno begins to build the support network she’ll need for dealing with strange characters like her oddly masculine Landlady, her cosplay obsessed home room teacher, her tooth-chattering Principal and all of the other odd denizens who inhabit her chosen world of art. It won’t be easy, and it won’t always be pretty, but with her friends at her back, Yuno’s going to reach for the stars in HIDAMARI SKETCH!
GLASS MASK COLLECTION 1
Running Time: 650 min.
Age Rating: TV PG
Language: Japanese with English Subtitles
Published by: Sentai Filmworks
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Format: DVD
SRP: $49.98
SYNOPSIS: Two Girls. One Dream. And the Entire World for a Stage. At 13 years old, Maya Kitajima seems destined to spend the rest of her life toiling in a crowded restaurant alongside her bitter and unstable mother; but when her incredible acting talent is discovered by the legendary diva Chigusa Tsukikage, Maya finds a new future filled with both golden opportunities and terrifying risks. For Ayumi Himekawa, success has always been assured, yet she longs to be recognized for her own talents and skills, not the family connections of her famous parents. For both, the ultimate prize is the role of The Crimson Goddess in the play of the same name, a part created by Chigusa and now portrayed by Ayumi’s mother. To achieve this goal, each must seek out and conquer every acting challenge, pushing the limits of their talent and endurance to the utmost, until they are worthy of the part…. But for one to win, the other must fail! The dramatic rivalry of a lifetime begins in the acclaimed first collection of GLASS MASK!
SPECIAL A COLLECTION 2
Running Time: 300 min.
Age Rating: TV PG
Language: Japanese with English Subtitles
Published by: Sentai Filmworks
Distributed by: Section23 Films
Format: DVD
SRP: $19.98
Special A Collection 2 assembles the last 12 episodes of the hit TV series, also known as “S.A.,” in a single two-DVD set. The series was first broadcast in Japan in April 2008 and has been widely anticipated by North American fans ever since.
SYNOPSIS: The members of the S.A. may be exceptional, but that doesn’t keep some of them from being exceptionally dense! While Kei’s thoughts about Hikari may be leaning in one direction, Hikari still sees him as the obstacle that has to be removed. Meanwhile, Akira’s attempts to protect her friend Yui from Yahiro are having unanticipated effects, Jun is forced to reveal a secret he’s been keeping from the others, and every other person in the group seems to be in love with someone else, but never the right ones. Finally, to cap it all off, an outside force threatens to intervene in a way that will destroy the S.A. forever! Will Hikari finally figure it all out before it’s too late? If you thought the tangled web of relationships in the first half of Special A was complex, be forewarned that everything’s going to get even crazier before the spectacular climax of SPECIAL A – COLLECTION 2!
Vertical
Kuriousity notes that Amazon is listing an October 19th release for Osamu Tezuka's 1972 work Ayako. Serialized in seinen anthology Big Comic, the story comments on the effect of American's occupation of Japan.
Publishers Weekly adds will also rerelease Tezuka’s MW, this time in a paperback edition, alongside Ode to Kirihito which Vertical is splitting into two volumes.
VIZ Media
BIOMEGA • by Tsutomu Nihei • Available February 2nd •
Rated ‘M’ for Mature Audiences • VIZ Signature Imprint
Zoichi Kanoe plunges into the depths of 9JO, a sprawling island city in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, in search of Eon Green, a girl with the power to transmute the N5S virus. The deadly contagion is spreading across the world and turns humans into disfigured zombie-like "drones.” But he's not the only one looking for her. Agents of the Public Health Service's Compulsory Execution Unit are also in hot pursuit with sinister designs of their own. Zoichi and his trans-human allies have no time to waste; the countdown to the apocalypse has begun!
BOKURANO: OURS• by Mohiro Kitoh • Available February 16th •
Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • VIZ Signature Imprint
One summer, fifteen kids innocently wander into a nearby seaside cave. There they meet a strange man who invites them to play an exciting new video game. This game, he explains, pits a lone giant robot against a horde of alien invaders. To play the game all they have to do is sign a simple contract. The game stops being fun when the kids find out the true purpose of their pact.
ULTIMO • by Hiroyuki Takei and Stan Lee • Available February 2nd •
Rated ‘T’ for Teens • SHONEN JUMP Imprint
ULTIMO represents a historic collaboration between comics legend Stan Lee, creator of many iconic series including Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four, and X-Men, and Hiroyuki Takei, the creator of the popular SHAMAN KING manga series. High above Farmless City, citizens are stunned by the sudden appearance of two floating figures. Are they human boys, monolithic robots, or something even more bizarre? As a battle ensues, destruction and devastation falls on the hapless city. One figure is Vice, and seems to be as evil as his name implies. The other is Ultimo, intent on trying to stop Vice from wreaking more havoc. But who are Vice and Ultimo really? Where did they come from? A new mystery begins with the fate of the world hanging in the balance!
March
CACTUS’S SECRET • by Nana Haruta • Available March 2nd •
Rated ‘T’ for Teens • SHOJO BEAT Imprint
Miku Yamada has a longtime crush on classmate Kyohei Fujioka. But no matter how many times she tries to show him how she feels, clueless Kyohei just doesn't get it. Frustrated, Miku gives up on him, only to have him start calling her "Cactus" for being so prickly when he's around. In the opening volume, Miku decides to try telling Kyohei her feelings by giving him chocolates for Valentine's Day. But Kyohei, unaware that he's the object of her affection, offers himself up as a practice partner for her love confession. Will Kyohei ever figure out Cactus's secret?
ARATA: THE LEGEND • by Yuu Watase • Available March 9th •
Rated ‘T’ for Teens • SHONEN SUNDAY Imprint
In a mythical world where humans and gods coexist, a ceremony marking the new governing princess is about to occur for the first time in 60 years. Only a girl from the Hime Clan may take this position, but the lack of females born to this family means that a boy called Arata must pose for the role. Meanwhile in modern-day Japan, a boy named Arata Hinohara is starting his new life in high school. He wants to put memories of his difficult past behind him, but things aren't going to be simple when he discovers a mysterious connection to the first Arata...
DOROHEDORO • by Q Hayashida • Available March 16th •
Rated ‘M’ for Mature Audiences • VIZ SIGNATURE Imprint
In a city so dismal it's known only as "the Hole," a clan of sorcerers have been plucking people off the streets to use as guinea pigs for atrocious "experiments" in the black arts. In a dark alley, Nikaido found Caiman, a man with a reptile head and a bad case of amnesia. To undo the spell, they're hunting and killing the sorcerers in the Hole, hoping that eventually they'll kill the right one. But when En, the head sorcerer, gets word of a lizard-man slaughtering his people, he sends a crew of "cleaners" into the Hole, igniting a war between two worlds.
RISTORANTE PARADISO• by Natsume Ono • Available March 16th •
Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • VIZ Signature Imprint
In exchange for Nicoletta's playing "the daughter of an old friend," Olga offers Nicoletta a place to live and an apprenticeship at the restaurant. Nicoletta fits in well among the unique personalities at Casetta dell'Orso. She gets along particularly well with the kindly headwaiter, Claudio, a divorced man who, after years, has still never taken off his wedding ring. As Nicoletta's feelings for Claudio become complicated, she finds a sympathetic ear in Olga, leading the estranged pair to form a friendship neither expected. But as they grow closer, the pressure exerted by the secret they share becomes too much to bear.
STEPPING ON ROSES • by Rinko Ueda • Available April 6th •
Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • SHOJO BEAT Imprint
Poor Sumi Kitamura… Her irresponsible older brother Eisuke keeps bringing home orphans for her to take care of even though they can barely afford their own basic needs! Just when Sumi's financial problems become dire, wealthy Soichiro Ashida enters her life with a bizarre proposition: he'll provide her with the money she so desperately needs if she agrees to marry him. But can Sumi fool high society into thinking she's a proper lady? Moreover, is it worth giving up everything for this sham of a marriage?
ROSARIO + VAMPIRE SEASON II • by Akihisa Ikeda • Available April 6th •
Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • SHONEN JUMP ADVANCED Imprint
Average human teenager Tsukune accidentally enrolls at a boarding school for monsters--no, not jocks and popular kids, but bona fide werewolves, witches and unnameables out of his wildest nightmares! On the plus side, all the girls have a monster crush on him. On the negative side, all the boys are so jealous they want to kill him! And so do the girls he spurns, because he only has eyes for one of them – the far-from-average vampire Moka.
HOUSE OF FIVE LEAVES • by Natsume Ono • Available April 20th •
Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • VIZ Signature Imprint
Masterless samurai Akitsu Masanosuke is a skilled and loyal swordsman, but his naïve, diffident nature has time and again caused him to be let go by the lords who have employed him. Hungry and desperate, he becomes a bodyguard for Yaichi, the charismatic leader of a gang called "Five Leaves." Although disturbed by the gang's sinister activities, Masa begins to suspect that Yaichi's motivations are not what they seem. And despite his misgivings, the deeper he's drawn into the world of the Five Leaves, the more he finds himself fascinated by these devious, mysterious outlaws.
FLOWER IN A STORM • by Shigeyoshi Takagi • Available May 4th •
Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • SHOJO BEAT Imprint
Riko Kunimi is trying to lead a normal high school life when Ran Tachibana bursts into her classroom carrying a gun and tells her that her life is now his. Ran, the richest, most powerful 17-year-old in Japan, wants her as his wife and he's not taking no for an answer!
MAOH: JUVENILE REMIX • Original Story by Kotaro Isaka / Story & Art by Megumi Osuga • Available May 11th • Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • SHONEN SUNDAY Imprint
“As crazy as your ideas might be, as long as you believe in yourself and tackle the issue head-on, you can even change the world.”
Ando is a high school student who has the power to make others say out loud what he's thinking. Inukai is the mysterious leader of a vigilante group called Grasshopper, which is at odds with the city's redevelopment plan. In this chaotic city, these two will come together to weave a story of courage, determination and confrontation.
SATURN APARTMENTS • by Hisae Iwaoka • Available May 18th
Rated ‘T’ for Teens • VIZ SIGNATURE Imprint
Far in the future, humankind has evacuated the earth in order to preserve it. Humans now reside in a gigantic structure that forms a ring around the Earth, thirty-five kilometers up in the sky. The society of the Ring is highly stratified: the higher the floor, the greater the status. Mitsu, the lowly son of a window washer, has just graduated junior high. When his father disappears and is assumed dead, Mitsu must take on his father's occupation. As he struggles with the transition to working life, Mitsu's job treats him to an outsider's view into the living-room dioramas of the Saturn Apartments.
AFTERSCHOOL CHARISMA • by Kumiko Suekane • Available June 15th •
Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • VIZ Signature Imprint
St. Kleio Academy is a very exclusive school: all of the students are clones of famous historical figures such as Beethoven, Queen Elizabeth I, Napoleon, Mozart, and Freud. All of them, that is, except for Shiro Kamiya. As Shiro struggles to adapt to this unusual campus, St. Kleio's first graduate, the clone of John F. Kennedy, is killed. Are the clones doomed to repeat the fate of their genetic progenitors, or can they create their own destinies? And how does a normal boy like Shiro fit in?
LIBRARY WARS: LOVE & WAR • by Kiiro Yumi • Original Concept by Hiro Arikawa • Available June 1st • Rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens • SHOJO BEAT Imprint
Iku Kasahara has dreamed of joining the Library Defense Force ever since one of its soldiers stepped in to protect her favorite book from being confiscated in a bookstore when she was younger. But now that she's finally a recruit, she's finding her dream job to be a bit of a nightmare. Especially since her hard-hearted drill instructor seems to have it in for her!
VIZ Media, in conjunction with Stan Lee’s POW! Entertainment announced release of the new manga ULTIMO on February 2nd. ULTIMO is the result of a historic collaboration between comics legend Stan Lee (Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, and the X-Men), and Hiroyuki Takei (Shaman King). ULTIMO, rated ‘T’ for teens will carry a MSRP of $9.99 US/$12.99 CAN.
With girl and money troubles, life is hard enough for high school student Yamato, but then he stumbles upon Ultimo, a peculiar-looking puppet. Things only get stranger when Ultimo awakens and his archenemy, Vice shows up. Ultimo and Vice are Karakuri Dôji, the mechanical embodiment of pure good and pure evil, devoid of human emotions that can cloud one’s judgment. Their purpose: to battle to the death to prove once and for all whether good or evil is the most powerful force in the universe.
VIZ Media will also debut Yun Kouga’s shojo manga CROWN OF LOVE on February 2nd. CROWN OF LOVE is rated ‘T+’ for Older Teens, will be published by the Shojo Beat imprint, and will carry an MSRP of $9.99 U.S. / $12.99 CAN.
Sixteen-year-old Hisayoshi "Kumi" Tajima wasn't looking for love. But after he accidentally bumps into teen idol Rima Fujio, he can't stop thinking about her. Living worlds apart, he'll never have a chance to meet her again. Until Rima's former agent Ikeshiba gives him the perfect opportunity – by turning Hisayoshi into an idol himself! Too bad Rima only sees him as competition for Ikeshiba's attention.
Well Go USA
Well Go USA will be releasing the live action adaptation of Welcome to the NHK author Tatsuhiko Takimoto’s Negative Happy Chainsaw Edge on March 30th
Anime
Nausicaa.net has a translation of the current status of Ghibli's adaptation of the Borrowers.
Key animation: 547 cuts (32,000 pieces) completed - 55%
Animation: 375 cuts (24,000pieces) - 37%
Painting: 250 cuts - 25%
Background painting: 350 cuts - 35%
Completed cuts: 212 cuts - 21% (~19 minutes)
Total running time will be a ~100 minutes.
Production began last May and the blogger comments, "To speak honestly, I think these number show a slight delay of production." Staff members were also announced:
Chief animator: Akihiko Yamashita, Ai Kagawa
Animation check: Kaori Fujii
Art director: Yoji Tanishige, Noboru Yoshida
Cinematography: Atsushi Okui
Color designer: Naomi Mori (She debuts with this film)
Sound effect and Music: Kouji Kasamatsu
The Zhu Zhu Pets robot hamsters will be hitting Japan in Spring 2011 via Sega Toys. Anime and manga are being develop to be release in conjunction with the toys.
Writer Tow Ubukata and character designer Hisashi Hirai are confirmed to be return for a new Xebec produced incarnation of mecha anime Sokyuu no Fafner, entitled "Heaven and Earth."
Not exactly "upcoming in Japan," but the Korean adaptation of mini-dinosaur manga Gon has been pushed back to late 2011. Financing for the 3D CG animatied work was finalized last month.
Volume 12 of Yoko Matsushita's Descendants of Darkness was released in January 19th, after an eight year gap from the previous volume. The book will collect a retouched revision of six chapters that had been serialized in Hana to Yume during 2000 and 2001.
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via News Paradise
Kentaro Miura will resume Berserk in Young Animal # 03 (to hit stands January 22)
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An announcement about Daisuke Sato and Shoji Sato's on hiatus Highschool Of The Dead will be made in Dragon Age #03 (February 9)
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Kei Tome (Kurogane) will begin a new series Mahoromi-Jiku Kensetsu Genshitan in Big Comic Spirits # 09 (On sale February 1)
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Asaki Masashi (Psychometric Eiji & Shibatora) will work with novelist Takamichi Yamada on new series Zasso Onna, starting in the Afternoon # 03 (On sale February 25).
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Yasuda Suzuhito (Yozakura Quartet) has a one shot scheduled to be printed in Ultra Jump # 03 (On sale February 19).
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Naoe Kikuchi (Saikano) will serialize a two part manga in Sunday GX # 03 (On sale February 19) and Sunday GX # 04 (On sale March 19).
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Hiroyuki Takei ( Shaman King) will resume Juki Ningen Jumbor (published in Shonen Jump in 2003) in Ultra Jump.
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Hideo Yamamoto (Ichi The Killer) will be bringing his latest manga series Homunculus to an end this year. The trepanation/psychosis title is the only manga series to have made me physically ill.
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Risque manga creator Amazume Ryuta will commence new manga series Papirabirz in Young King # 04 (On Sale January 25)
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Yoko Kamio's (Hana Yori Dango) new manga series will be called Torah Ôkami
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Kindaichi Renjûrô's (Hare+GU) new manga series OX? Million No will launch in Shonen Gangan # 03 ( February 12)
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Ai Morinaga (My Lovely Hockey Club) commence new manga no Hoshi Kirara in Betsufure # 03 (February 13).
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Tsutomu Takahashi (Sidooh, Jiraishin) will have a new Sky High one shot in Super Jump # 04 (On Sale January 27). Sky High is a Hell Girl-like supernatural revenge anthology, about the wronged dead given the opportunity to go to heaven, wander earth as a ghost or curse a member of the living and consequently descend to hell themselves.
San Fransico's VIZ Cinema will screen DAIDO MORIYAMA: STRAY DOG OF TOKYO, the latest documentary from its ongoing NEW PEOPLE ARTIST SERIES 7:30pm on Tuesday, January 26th – for one night only
The film will also be released on DVD the same day from VIZ Pictures. Tickets for the special screening are $25.00 and will include a copy of the DVD, postcard, and NEW PEOPLE pin buttons to all who attend. $10 tickets are also available for regular admission.
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White on Rice will screen at the LDS Film Festival at the Scera Center in Orem, Utah Saturday, Jan. 23 at 7:00pm. Dave Boyle's first film, Big Dreams Little Tokyo will screen on Friday, Jan. 22 at 7:30.
LA's Cinefamily will be presenting Jerry Beck's Animation Tuesdays: Toonstruck - Cartoons In Love on Tuesday, February 2nd at 8:00pm
In the cartoon world, marriage is not exclusively for one man and one woman. It can be between two mice, two wabbits, even a skunk and a pussy-cat! Animation historian Jerry Beck (Cartoon Brew.com) opens the film vault and presents a collection of love-obsessed cartoon classics starring all your favorites -- from the sex-starved Pepe LePew, to Tex Avery's luscious Red Riding Hood. As usual, the program features rare 35mm and 16mm Technicolor film prints -- cartoons suitable for cartoon lovers of all ages! Bring a date, and don't be late!
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InvaderCON, a event is themed around Invader ZIM, will take place March 26-27, 2011 at the Marriott Century Center in Atlanta, Georgia.
Pop Japan Travel announced a new anime-related tour with a trip to Japan for the 2010 Tokyo International Anime Fair. The tour will also include visits to hubs of otaku culture like Akihabara and Nakano Broadway, the Ghibli Museum, a chance to view the cherry blossoms in bloom, and a visit to an animation studio. The tour is being organized in cooperation with Kintetsu Travel
The tour is scheduled to take place from March 24 until April 1. The cost of the tour will be $1985 and includes all accommodations, round trip airfare to Japan from Los Angeles, dinner in a cosplay-themed restaurant, transportation, professional bilingual tour guides, entrance fees to all activities, and a customized guidebook created exclusively for the tour.
Founded in 1994 by 20-year comic veteran Wes Tillander, the Atlanta Comic Convention showcases comics, cards, prints, gaming artwork, videos, toys, manga, anime, statues, new artists, book signings and more.
Tillander will consult on Atlanta Comic Con to maintain the local traditions of the event. Wizard will expand the show from a one-day format to a three-day weekend format, while many aspects of pop culture will continue to be represented
Wizard World Comic Con Tour:
March 26-28, 2010,Toronto Comic Con, Direct Energy Centre
April 16-18, 2010, Anaheim Comic Con, Anaheim Convention Center
June 11-13, 2010, Philadelphia Comic Con, Philadelphia Convention Center
August 19-22, 2010, Chicago Comic Con, Donald E. Stephens (Rosemont) Convention Center
October 7-10, 2010, Big Apple Comic Con, Pier 94
November 12-14, 2010, Austin Comic Con, Austin Convention Center
Atlanta Comic Con, TBD
New England Comic Con, TBD
The event is a dazzling array of displays and activities, some of them record-breaking and most of them free: It features the largest fireworks outside of Japan, a half-hour long symphony of fire shapes and flowers with supplies shipped directly from Japan by boat. Prior to the fireworks, a 10-hour non-stop outdoor stage show is being performed. Visitors can watch and learn martial arts, Japanese arts and crafts, and touch and taste Japanese culture first-hand. Japan Day has been so popular with every age group that it has fostered its own sub-event: the largest gathering anywhere in Europe of Manga fans. Thousands of them convene in what’s called the “popculture-zone”, many dressed up as characters from their favorite books of this Japanese comic book genre.
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Anime News Network reports that four out of Anime Expo's seven division heads have resigned in protest over the management of the major convention.
Resignations include Veronica Hernandez (exhibits division manager)
Jay Lee (exhibits assistant division manager)
Joe Woo (interactive events division manager)
Rob Wu (operations division manager)
Derf Tang (operations assistant division manager)
Miko Estacio (operations assistant division manager)
Jason Shuai (programming division manager)
Joseph Kitzman (programming assistant division manager)
The resigning staffers are asking for the removal of convention organizers Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation (SPJA)'s new CEO Michael Lattanzio and Interim Con Chair Joyce Lim.
When asked to comment on the resignations, Lattanzio told ANN, "It seems the drama continues. For years the Anime Expo Division of the SPJA has experienced turbulence from Concom management. […] Last summer the Board of Directors made a decision to transform the SPJA into a professional, results-driven company focused on serving its attendees and the industry." Lattanzio added, "We wish those who have resigned the best of luck in their future endeavors and encourage those who are still with us to become more actively involved."
SPJA Board Chairman Marc Perez also responded, "Certainly, the Board is concerned that some of its valued Concom staff have resigned, while also understanding that transitions such as this can be difficult. We invited those whom have had concerns to express them in a professional manner through proper channels, rather than through threats and resignations. […] The SPJA Board hopes very much that the SPJA members and staff will give Mr. Lattanzio the fair chance he deserves […] but understands and accepts the resignations of those who find that they cannot or will not do so."
Amoung the points of comentions was Lattanzio's decision to terminate the SPJA's contract with BAM! Marketing, Publicity, & Promotions.
To celebrate Gundam UC's Blu-ray release, Bandai Channel will begin streaming classic Gundam series starting February 1.
Six TV series of Gundam (Mobile Suit Gundam, Mobile Suit Z Gundam, Mobile Suit Gundam Wing, Mobile Suit Gundam SEED, Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny, and Mobile Suit Gundam 00) are planned for free streaming in North America and Europe for limited time only on AnimeNewsNetwork,Crunchyroll and YouTube
Content currently available include
Appleseed
Azumanga Daioh
Conduct Zero
E's Otherwise
Kiba
Lady Death
Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi
Mega Man
My Beautiful Girl, Mari
Nadesico The Movie
New Fist Of The North Star
The Place Promised In Our Early Days
RahXephon
Saiyuki
Saiyuki Requiem
Sin
New streaming content from FUNimation inclides FUNimation.com/Video
Baccano! ENG 3-4
Black Cat ENG 16-18
Casshern Sins JPN 19-20
Dragonaut: the Resonance ENG 9-10
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood JPN 39
Guyver: The Bioboosted Armor ENG 5-6
Heat Guy J ENG 19-20
Linebarrels of Iron JPN 19-20
My Bride is a Mermaid JPN 9-10
Oh! Edo Rocket JPN 3-4
Pani Poni Dash! ENG 1-4
Pumpkin Scissors ENG 11-13
Red Garden ENG 8-10
Sgt. Frog ENG 16-17
Sgt. Frog JPN 49-51
Shakugan no Shana ENG 17-18
Shin chan ENG 5-13
Tower of Druaga: The Aegis of Uruk ENG 9-10
Welcome to the N-H-K ENG 11-13
X JPN 1-4
Xenosaga ENG 3-5
YouTube.com/FUNimation
Black Blood Brothers ENG 7-9
Burst Angel ENG 20-22
Casshern Sins JPN 11-12
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood JPN 38
Heat Guy J ENG 14-16
My Bride is a Mermaid JPN 1-2
Pani Poni Dash! ENG 1-4
Ragnarok JPN 23-24
Shakugan no Shana ENG 8-10
Shuffle! ENG 8-10
Slayers EVOLUTION-R JPN 11-13
Soul Eater JPN 47-48
When They Cry ENG 25-26
X JPN 3-4
Hulu
Big Windup! ENG 5-7
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood JPN 38
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VIZ Media has announced that the anime adaptation of demon-battling action and adventure KEKKAISHI is now available online on Hulu. The series debuts with 5 episodes with new installments launching each week.
KEKKAISHI is based on a hit manga series by Yellow Tanabe (also published in North America by VIZ Media). Mystical forces are powerful in the region called Karasumori. For over 400 years, it has been the duty of a clan of “kekkaishi”—barrier masters—to guard the land and exterminate the supernatural creatures that are drawn to the area night after night.
Yoshimori Sumimura is a junior high school student at Karasumori Academy. Following in the tradition that's been passed down through generations, he is the twenty-second “kekkaishi” of the Sumimura clan. But by day, Yoshimori's got other demons to battle: an addiction to sweets and a seriously crotchety grandfather! Yoshimori's pretty neighbor, childhood friend and rival, Tokine Yukimura, is also a “kekkaishi,” but their families are feuding over who is the true practitioner of the art. Protecting people from danger while growing stronger himself, Yoshimori will battle the forces of evil again tonight!
As you may have noticed, we've been taking a break on sigikki.com for the holiday season. We'll be back soon to our regular updating schedule, and we hope that you're looking forward to a new batch of manga goodness for 2010.
In the meantime, Happy New Year!
Anime on American TV
On the heels of confirmed that they've licensed three new anime series, after lettingt he licenses for Death Note and Blood+ lapse, Cartoon Network schedules indicate new anime will start on Adult Swim February 14th.
The schedule includes
12:00 a.m. New Anime
12:30 a.m. Bleach
01:00 a.m. Bleach
01:30 a.m. Bleach
02:00 a.m. Bleach
02:30 a.m. FLCL
03:00 a.m. Cowboy Bebop
03:30 a.m. Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
04:00 a.m. Fullmetal Alchemist
04:30 a.m. Big O
05:00 a.m. Inuyasha
05:30 a.m. Inuyasha
Anime x Games
In support of the victims in Haiti, Gaia Online is matching donations to the Red Cross relief and development efforts up to $10,000. To make a Gaia Online matched donation, visit the Red Cross Website, click on “Donate Now,” and select “Haiti Relief and Development.” When completing the donation form, type Gaia Online in the field titled "Company/Organization Name.” Supporters do not need to be a Gaia Online member to make a matched donation.
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Tatsunoko vs. Capcom producer Ryota Niitsuma told Jostiq there is a possibility of developing new Capcom-made games based on Tatsunoko properties (Gatchaman, Tekkaman, Karas. "The reception of the game by Tatsunoko was quite positive. [Tatsunoko] saw how we were able to incorporate the characters very successfully into a fighting game, so I think that, in the future, that could lead to us using Tatsunoko characters in other ways."
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a new Hokuto Muso - Fist of the North Star/Dynasty Warrior trailer
The official Pokémon.com has been relaunched. The new site brings together Pokémon animation, video games and the Pokémon Trading Card Game. It features online mini-games, episodes of the animated series, an interactive Pokédex, a "Pokémon Trainer Club", and news
"Koihime Musou" is separated into two sections, the traditional adventure part where you enjoy the story along with the female characters derived from the characters of the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", and the interactive simulation battle part where you are in control of their army.
"Koihime Musou" is slated to release in April 2010 from MangaGamer.com.
The Business
Former Gonzo subsidieary Gonzo Rosso will adapt new name Rosso Index. Atlus parent Index Holdings now owns a majority of the game developer.
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The Comic Journal on things the industry is doing right, including Vertical's manga releases, and the on hiatus Sigikki
American comic publisher Top Shelf, scheduled to release a collection of Ax alternative manga, announced that it has entered into a capital investment deal with new media entrepreneur John S. Johnson, and independent film producer Anthony Bregman.
Johnson, and Likely Story, Bregman’s film production company, have purchased a 33% interest in Top Shelf Productions, Inc. Johnson will join the board of Top Shelf, and Likely Story will get a first-look deal for all new Top Shelf publications for possible film and TV development.
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Stone Bridge Press (publisher of the Anime Encyclopedia, Satoshi Kon: The Illusionist, Anime Classics Zettai!, Anime Companion 2) has announced announced that Peter Goodman, who founded the book publisher in 1989, has reacquired 100% of the company’s shares from its Japanese owner, IBC Publishing of Tokyo. Goodman sold Stone Bridge to Yohan, Inc., a Japanese book distributor, in 2005. Ownership of Stone Bridge passed to IBC, formerly a Yohan subsidiary, just prior to Yohan’s declaration of bankruptcy in 2008. Goodman remained as an executive at Stone Bridge throughout and will continue to lead the company as publisher and editor-in-chief.
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Toei has signed a deal with Uniqlo to offer shirts based on g Dragon Ball, One Piece, Galaxy Express 999, Dr Slump and Saint Seiya - will be developed by Uniqlo for France, Russia, the UK, the US, Hong Kong, China, Singapore and Korea.
The launch is being planned for spring.
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Shuho Sato (Say Hello to Jack Jack) has claimed that a "major publisher" of 70 magazines including manga anthologies, lost several billion yen last year. In particular, Sato said that one "major magazine whose name everyone knows" loses 1 to 1.5 billion yen (about US$11-16 million) annually. Sato further reported that all of the publisher's 10 top-selling books are manga, and predicted that three of these top-selling manga series will be ending this year.
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Matt Alt translated comments by Ken Akamatsu about the state of the manga industry in Japan, specially how the famous titles sell, everything else doesn't.
"As source material for TV dramas, films, and anime, and as a standalone product, the tankobon is here to stay," remarks Akamatsu. "The tankobon that do sell, sell in incredible volumes. But this means that the ones that don't, slide into obscurity."
When I raised the possibility that moribund company policies and outsourced labor in the anime industry might be hollowing out the next generation of domestic talent, a high-ranking executive producer in Japan replied: "We're not really afraid of outsourcing, because no one can approximate original Japanese ideas, the true value of intellectual property. Low-wage labor is one thing, but it's not the same as true creativity."
That may be so--for now. But in an expanding age of rampant file-swapping, downloading, digital mashups and cross-platform network flow, "originality" may be an outdated analog virtue, losing ground to sheer speed and flexibility.
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Variety reports shipments of video software in Japan, including DVDs, fell 5% last year, the fifth year straight that a drop has been recorded. DVD shipments fell 11%. A doubling of Blu-ray shoppes to $217 million did not offset the DVD drop.
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ICV2 spoke to Gonzalo Ferreyra, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Viz Media part 1part 2 and part 3
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United States District Court for the Central District of California has ruled in favor of Konami Digital Entertainment in their legal dispute with Upper Deck in a pre-trial judgment regarding the alleged counterfeit Yu-Gi-Oh! cards
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Japanese retailer DVD Fantasium has announced that it will no longer carry imported products released by Funimation. DVD Fantasium notes that Funimation releases anime on DVD and Blu-ray Disc for the American market, and says that these releases cannot be sold at retail overseas due to licensing agreements.
Konohana author Kazumi Yoshiyuki (aka Matsumoto Drill Kenkyuujo has reported that his editors at the Champion RED Ichigo anthology has pushed back on the erotic cnent of his manga, rejecting the roughs.
Voice actor Daisuke Gouri (Dragon Ball's Mr Satan, Kinnikuman's Robin Mask, Gundam's Dozle Zabi and Bask Om, Tekken's Heihachi Mishima, Patlabor's Hiromi Yamazaki) died of an apparent suicide at age 57. Gouri was discovered, with blood dripping from his wrist, by a passerby on a street in Nakano ward.
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Science-fiction author, translator, magazine editor, and anime "science-fiction researcher" Takumi Shibano passed away due to pneumonia on Saturday, January 16. He was 83. He co-founded and edited Uchujin (literally, "Cosmic Dust") in 1957. Anime involvement included consulting for Tatsunoko Productions on Tekkaman, Gatchaman F, and Casshan
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Voice actor Isamu Tanonaka passed away of a heart attack at age 77. He's best known for the walking eyeball father of the title character in Ge Ge Ge no Kitaro.
And the Award (or Nomination) Goes To...
Nominees for the bookstore organized the third Manga Taisho award. Any manga title that was released in 2009 and has eight volumes or less was eligible.
I Am a Hero by Kengo Hanazawa - excellent horror manga from the creator of the dark geek tale Ressentiment
Aoi Honoo by Kazuhiko Shimamoto - artist of the Skullman manga released in North America by Tokyopop
Uchu Kyodai by Chuya Koyama
Otoko no Issho by Keiko Nishi
Kuragehime by Akiko Higashimura
Koko Kyuji Zawa-san by Eriko Mishima
Thermae romae by Mari Yamazaki
Bakuman. by Tsugumi Ohba, Takeshi Obata - manga about manga creation from the folks behind Death Note
Mushi to Uta: Ichikawa Haruko Sakuhin-Shu by Haruko Ichikawa
The Young Adult Library Service Association announced their Top Ten Great Graphic Novels for Teens. Amoung them, manga included
Igarashi, Daisuke. Children of the Sea, vol 1. VIZ Media. 2009.
Urasawa, Naoki and Takashi Nagasaki. Pluto. VIZ Media. 2009.
Yoshinaga, Fumi. Ooku: The Inner Chambers, vol 1. VIZ Media. 2009.
Forget moe. Forget light novels. Forget visual novels. They are all red herrings. They are just pop eating itself, and most of those who protest their existence would simply replace them with works equally niche and worthless.
If you want the actual future of anime, look to this show. The future is cheap flash animation done badly.
As young people gravitate more and more to digital media, worries are growing about the future of manga, at least in printed form. But at the same time, manga has rooted itself in society, and its branches have begun growing in other parts of the world. Fujiko Fujio (A), one half of the renowned Fujiko Fujio cartoonist duo that broke up in 1987 and author of the autobiographical masterpiece Mangamichi, has long been a prominent member of the manga world. Together with mangaka and manga critic Jun Ishikawa, he recently looked back over 50 years of manga history, which matches the history of two major shonen (boys) manga magazines, both launched in 1959.
Maybe more groups similar to CLAMP is the answer? They came from outside the industry and were never assistants to published creators. CLAMP members focus on their strengths, collaborate, and create together. Maybe that's the answer. I’m surprised that more young creators aren't trying that model, but I’m not at all surprised that it has taken independent female creators to give us a glimpse of what an alternative Japanese creative collective might look like.
When one reflects on the epic genre of literature they might think of Homer’s wine-dark sea, the ferocity of Grendel, or maybe Dante’s vision of Heaven and Hell. Epics are large works that force their way into their restricted genre, not just by their size and scope, but on the impact and influence they have on the society in which they are created. For something to be called an epic, it must be replete with cultural significance and deal with important themes on a grand scale. Moreover, it must be accepted as having this significance by the culture that spawned it.
Consequently, comic books do not often come to mind when one discusses the various great epics of literature. In America for instance, the medium has often been plagued with a biased dismissal by the academic world that has only in recent decades begun to change. Yet when one examines the criteria established by scholars of the subject, they see that the comic book medium is more closely related to the ancient genre then might at first be realized. Lone Wolf and Cub, the critically acclaimed and widely influential Manga by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima, is a clear example of a comic book that follows all the requirements to be considered a member of the epic genre of literature.
The Anime Today podcast has returned with guests Johnny Yong Bosch and Cristina Vee of AnimeTV
In this new interview, Bosch and Vee discuss their roles as hosts of AnimeTV, as well as what fans can expect to see as part of the show’s second season, which is available via the Revision3 online television network.
