Pirates and pundits

Wow, the CMX shutdown really touched a nerve, much more so than the other manga publishers that we have lost over the years. Heidi Macdonald gathers up the wrath in a good roundup post at The Beat, and as always, be sure to read the comments. Christopher Butcher gives us a little history, pointing out that CMX got off to a rocky start with retailers as well as fans. Simon Jones has some further thoughts on CMX and DC. David Welsh lists his ten favorite CMX series and starts looking for new homes for the orphans. Connie lists her favorites at Slightly Biased Manga. Lissa Pattillo reflects on losing CMX after recently rediscovering it. At Heart of Manga, Laura mourns the series left unfinished. And Jason Yadao says farewell and notes

When I wrapped up the Rough Guide to Manga about a year ago this month (and hey, have I ever mentioned that it’s still on sale at finer book retailers online worldwide?), I listed 21 active mainstream manga publishers. Five of them — Aurora, DrMaster, Go! Comi, Infinity and now CMX — have since gone dormant or shut down, and Viz is 40 percent smaller in terms of workforce. Sure, one publisher also opened up during that time, but Kodansha’s release of all of two volumes of manga in six months — and re-releases of older material, at that — doesn’t exactly inspire much hope in me.

Jason Thompson has a fascnating article on the manga creator Ippongi Bang, in which he also chronicles the manga boom and bust of the 1990s and the heyday of Antarctic Press as a manga publisher: “Rumiko Takahashi may have been more famous, but Ippongi Bang would actually come to your convention and party with you.”

Who’s checking out the new manga this week? David Welsh and Sean Gaffney, that’s who! And Lori Henderson looks at this week’s all-ages comics and manga, a list that will soon be sparser now that CMX is shutting down.

Erica Friedman speaks out on scanlation at Okazu:

No mangaka is excited to be scanlated. You are not providing a service – you are complicit in copyright violation. You are not “building an audience,” you are devaluing something that many people have worked hard to create. And for every one person who *might* buy a work *if* it comes out and *if* it’s available at a local book store when they want it, you’re giving someone else’s work – something you have no right to in the first place – away to hundreds, maybe thousands of people who will take it and ask for more. The only audience you are building is one made up of people who have no intention of paying for the privilege – or worse, paying you to “support the group,” while the mangaka who did the actual work gets nothing from it.

JoonAng Daily looks at sagging sales in the manhwa industry; sometimes being made into a movie can give a series a boost, but other times that’s not enough. The article points to piracy as the culprit, and artists are fighting back by putting their work on the web themselves.

I had forgotten Del Rey put out so many good books! Thomas Zoth runs through 15 essential Del Rey series at Mania.com.

Same Hat reprints Enter the Id, an essay on manga by Frederick Schodt.

Tanbishugi spots two new Tokyopop listings on Amazon, for Kirameki Gingachou Shoutengai and Sorairo Kaigan (Skyblue Shore), both from Hakusensha.

Reviews

Michelle Smith on vols. 3 and 4 of Banana Fish (Soliloquy in Blue)
Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane on vol. 2 of Beast Master (Manga Life)
Charles Webb on vol. 1 of Bokurano: Ours (Manga Life)
Russell Phillips on vol. 2 of Cat Paradise (Manga Jouhou)
Julie Opipari on Cute Devil (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Billy Aguiar on vols. 1 and 2 of Happy Cafe (Prospero’s Manga)
Julie Opipari on How to Capture a Martini (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Ed Sizemore on vol. 1 of I’ll Give It My All… Tomorrow (Comics Worth Reading)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 2 of Itazura Na Kiss (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Snow Wildsmith on vol. 1 of Kobato (ICv2)
Erica Friedman on vol. 1 of K-On! (Okazu)
Nick Smith on vol. 1 of Maoh: Juvenile Remix (ICv2)
Tiamat’s Disciple on vol. 4 of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (Tiamat’s Manga Reviews)
Zack Davisson on vol. 2 of Mikansei No. 1 (Manga Life)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 3 of Millennium Prime Minister (The Comic Book Bin)
Lissa Pattillo on vol. 1 of My Girlfriend’s A Geek (ANN)
Johanna Draper Carlson on vol. 4 of The Name of the Flower (Comics Worth Reading)
Tiamat’s Disciple on vol. 3 of Nightschool (Tiamat’s Manga Reviews)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 3 of Rin-ne (The Comic Book Bin)
Clive Owen on vol. 10 of Rosario + Vampire (Animanga Nation)
Zoey on vol. 1 of Sarasah (Manga Jouhou)
Becky Fullan on Sighing Kiss (Manga Jouhou)
Emily on Stolen Hearts (Emily’s Random Shoujo Manga Page)
Tangognat on vols. 12 and 13 of Swan (Tangognat)
Tiamat’s Disciple on vol. 2 of Taimashin: The Red Spider Exorcist (Tiamat’s Manga Reviews)

Did you enjoy this article? Consider supporting us.

Comments

  1. DanielBT says

    I’m probably a little late to the mourning party, but I gathered up all the various comments I posted around the web about the passing of CMX. I added some more thoughts between the original comments & added some theories at the end.
    http://sundaycomicsdebt.blogspot.com/2010/05/cmx-commentary.html