Archives for December 2010

Deb Aoki rounds up the best manga of 2010 lists from many bloggers in one handy post at About.com. Animemiz lists her picks for the best manga of the year at Anime Diet.

Sean Gaffney looks at the new manga coming at us in the first week of the new year.

Lori Henderson posts her list of this week’s new all-ages comics and manga at Good Comics for Kids.

Jason Thompson takes a look at Video Girl Ai in his latest House of 1000 Manga column at ANN.

Alethea and Athena Nibley look back at the year in manga from a translator’s point of view, including the title they translated for CMX that was never even released.

David Welsh reaches the letter V in his seinen alphabet and picks the manga he’s most looking forward to next year. And his latest license request: Something from LaLaDX, please!

Lissa Pattillo picks up on some new offerings at Digital’s eManga site.

Johanna Draper Carlson notes some concerns about Square Enix’s new online manga store.

Kate Dacey notes that Viz is adding more manga to their iPad app.

Melinda Beasi and Michelle Smith discuss some new manga and ongoing series in their latest Off the Shelf column at Manga Bookshelf. Melinda also shares her new year’s resolution to read three series in 2011.

News from Japan: Dan Kanemitsu has a comprehensive editorial up at ANN giving the history of Tokyo’s “nonexistent youth” bill as well as an account of the underlying politics and the implications for the future. Saiyuki manga-ka Kazuya Minekura recently had surgery to remove a non-cancerous growth from her jaw; doctors removed part of her face and will replace it with prosthetics. The manga remains on hiatus. Meanwhile, ANN has the latest Japanese comics rankings.

Reviews

Kristin on vol. 12 of 20th Century Boys (Comic Attack)
J. Caleb Mozzocco on vol. 1 of Aion and vol. 1 of The Secret Notes of Lady Kanoko (Blog@Newsarama)
Anne Ishii on vol. 4 of Billy Bat (The Comics Journal)
Connie on vol. 33 of Bleach (Slightly Biased Manga)
Connie on vols. 9 and 10 of B.O.D.Y. (Slightly Biased Manga)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 5 of Butterflies, Flowers (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Connie on vol. 4 of Children of the Sea (Slightly Biased Manga)
Todd Douglass on vol. 1 of Death Note (Black Edition) (Anime Maki)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 3 of Dengeki Daisy (The Comic Book Bin)
Connie on vol. 4 of Dogs (Slightly Biased Manga)
Connie on vol. 4 of Evil’s Return (Slightly Biased Manga)
Lori Henderson on vol. 1 of Grand Guignol Orchestra and vol. 1 of March Story (Manga Xanadu)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 1 of I Am Here (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Connie on vol. 9 of I Hate You More Than Anyone (Slightly Biased Manga)
Brent Newhall on vols. 1-3 of Imadoki! (Otaku, No Video)
Kristin on vol. 1 of Itsuwaribito (Comic Attack)
Brenda Gregson on vol. 6 of Kimi Ni Todoke: From Me To You (Animanga Nation)
Katherine Farmar on vol. 1 of Kizuna (Comics Village)
Connie on vol. 22 of Knights of the Zodiac (Slightly Biased Manga)
Ed Sizemore on vols. 2 and 3 of Peepo Choo (Comics Worth Reading)
James Fleenor on vol. 1 of The Qwaser of Stigmata (Anime Sentinel)
Connie on vol. 28 of Tsubasa (Slightly Biased Manga)
Connie on vol. 6 of Very! Very! Sweet (Slightly Biased Manga)
Snow Wildsmith on Wild @ Heart (Good Comics for Kids)

Ed Sizemore and Johanna Draper Carlson discuss the manga year in review at the Manga Out Loud podcast.

David Welsh, Brad Rice, and Johanna Draper Carlson take a look at this week’s new releases, and Johanna also posts her list of the best manga of 2010.

Meanwhile, Lori Henderson names her best manga of the year at Manga Xanadu and Kristin makes her selections at Comic Attack.

Kelakagandy takes a look at some one-shot manga worth checking out in 2011.

Melinda Beasi takes a look at the latest manhwa news in her Manhwa Monday post at Manga Bookshelf. And she reveals her pick of the week as well.

At Robot 6, I take a look at someone who is putting bootleg manga on the Kindle—which of course is egregiously wrong—and what they are doing right.

News from Japan: Minami Ozaki is preparing a two-part side story to Bronze: Zetsuai Since 1989.

Reviews: Ash Brown looks at a week’s worth of manga reading at Experiments in Manga.

Rob McMonigal on All My Darling Daughters (Panel Patter)
Michelle Smith on vol. 4 of Chi’s Sweet Home (Soliloquy in Blue)
Connie on vol. 3 of Evil’s Return (Slightly Biased Manga)
Leroy Douresseaux on Family Complex (I Reads You)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 2 of Gente (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Connie on vol. 6 of Hayate x Blade (Slightly Biased Manga)
Katherine Dacey on vol. 1 of Highschool of the Dead (The Manga Critic)
Julie Opipari on vol. 17 of Inubaka: Crazy for Dogs (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Michelle Smith on vol. 1 of Kamisama Kiss (Soliloquy in Blue)
Rob McMonigal on vol. 1 of Kobato (Panel Patter)
Alex Hoffman on vol. 5 of Nabari No Ou (Manga Widget)
Shannon Fay on No Touching At All (Kuriousity)
Connie on vol. 12 of Slam Dunk (Slightly Biased Manga)
Connie on vol. 26 of Tsubasa (Slightly Biased Manga)
Erica Friedman on vol. 8 of Tsubomi (Okazu)
Connie on vol. 4 of Very! Very! Sweet (Slightly Biased Manga)
AstroNerdBoy on vol. 9 of Yotsuba&! (AstroNerdBoy’s Anime and Manga Blog)

Kate Dacey reads bad manga so you don’t have to, and she posts the worst of the year in her 2010 Manga Hall of Shame post at the Manga Critic. Erica Friedman takes a walk on the sunny side of the street with her list of the top ten yuri items (manga, anime, people) of 2010 at Okazu. Dave Ferraro rounds out the year with his list of the ten best manga of 2010 at Comics-and-More.

Kelakagandy takes a look at omnibus volumes we can look forward to in 2011.

Erica Friedman rounds up the latest yuri happenings in this week’s edition of Yuri Network News.

Lori Henderson has the past week’s new all-ages manga and comics, along with her picks, at Good Comics for Kids.

The sci-fi magazine SF Signal asked a number of people to recommend their favorite genre-related books, movies, or shows, and if you scroll down this page, you’ll find Ed Sizemore’s five manga picks.

Digital Manga going with an online-only release (for now, at least) of the classic shoujo manga Mizuki, by Wedding Peach creator Nao Yazawa.

David Welsh’s latest license request is Cooking Papa, a long-running manga that sounds like it might be about cannibals but is actually about a family in which the father does all the cooking.

At The Hooded Utilitarian, Ng Suat Tong looks at the late manga-ka Hinako Sugiura, whose work is unlikely to be published in English anytime soon.

ASCII Media Works launched an online comic magazine, Dengeki Comic Japan, last week, and they say an English-language version is on the way.

News from Japan: A group of creators are putting together a doujinshi mocking the latest amendment to the Tokyo Youth Healthy Development Ordinance. A new chapter of Cyborg 009, the first in 18 years, has been posted on Club Sunday, the Japanese website for Shonen Sunday; the script is by anime writer Ryota Yamaguchi. And Ooikiku Furikabutte (Big Windup) is going on hiatus for a year.

Reviews: Ash Brown posts some short takes on recent library reads at Experiments in Manga.

Charles Webb on vol. 2 of 7 Billion Needles (Manga Life)
Ben Huber on Ayako (Japanator)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 7 of Bamboo Blade (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Connie on vol. 32 of Bleach (Slightly Biased Manga)
Lexie on Can’t Lose You (Poisoned Rationality)
Rob McMonigal on vol. 1 of Cat Paradise (Panel Patter)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 4 of Children of the Sea (The Comic Book Bin)
Kyla Hunt on vol. 1 of Chi’s Sweet Home (Graphic Novel Reporter)
A Library Girl on vol. 1 of The Dark Hunters (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 2 of I’ll Give It My All… Tomorrow (The Comic Book Bin)
Rob McMonigal on Red: A Haida Manga (Panel Patter)
Anna on vols. 6 and 7 of Silver Diamond (Manga Report)
Michelle Smith on vol. 1 of The Stellar Six of Gingacho (Soliloquy in Blue)
Ed Sizemore on vols. 6-8 of Sundome (Comics Worth Reading)
Connie on vol. 25 of Tsubasa (Slightly Biased Manga)
James Fleenor on vols. 1 and 2 of Vermonia (Anime Sentinel)
Nicola on vols. 1-3 of Vermonia (Back to Books)
Carlo Santos on vol. 9 of Yotsuba&! (ANN)

Merry Christmas! I’m sorry for my absence this week—as some of you know, December is the most demanding time of year at my day job, as I’m simultaneously raising money for our charitable fund and distributing aid from the fund—and people always seem to have more problems at Christmas. As I said on Twitter, by the end of this week I felt like a character in a Lifetime movie (several, actually). So I’m off now—yes, now—to do my Christmas shopping and baking. In the meantime, here’s the latest news:

Lissa Pattillo takes Square Enix’s online manga site out for a test drive, and she is not too impressed with what she sees. She sums up the online manga picture neatly in this paragraph:

Online manga should be aiming to offer readers what scanlations are always touted as providing in their purest intentions – manga the reader can’t get in their language or in print at all. Until sites start offering this, and at prices comparable to the value manga readers are used to paying for a fully-owned, physical copy, I don’t think digital manga will be fully embraced just yet.

I noted some recent insights into digital piracy at Robot 6.

Deb Aoki looks ahead to the new year with her list of the 25 most-anticiapated manga of 2011. Sean Gaffney has a shorter time frame: He’s looking at next week’s new manga.

The Comics Village team looks gives their take on last week’s new manga, and David Welsh looks at this week’s new releases at The Manga Curmudgeon.

Alex Hoffman posts some reflections on food manga and his top ten manga of 2010 at Manga Widget.

Melinda Beasi’s Christmas list includes three out-of-print shoujo series she’d like to complete. Lori Henderson celebrates the season with a look at manga that feature angels as characters. And Tim Maughan recommends Chi’s Sweet Home as that perfect last-minute Christmas gift for just about everyone.

Marc Bernabe’s latest video at Masters of Manga is an interview with Legend of Koizumi creator Hideki Ohwada about gambling manga.

Scholar Kate Dacey has put together a bibliography of resources in English about Osamu Tezuka.

Jason Thompson devotes the latest House of 1000 Manga column to a classic: Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure.

David Welsh reaches the letter U in his seinen alphabet at The Manga Curmudgeon, and he also takes a look at manga featuring all-girl musical groups.

Tony Yao wraps up his look back at 2010 at Manga Therapy.

Itochu has launched an iPhone app, Get Your Comic. I played around with it a bit on my iPad. It’s really an iPhone/iPod Touch app, so the page size is small, but you can blow it up on the iPad. The app works pretty smoothly, and if you like Harlequin Romance manga, this is the app for you—they have a good selection and it is shown in full pages, which look great on the iPad. (Most of these seem to be available on Digital’s eManga site as well.) Unfortunately, they chopped up Cyborg009 and Bushido: The Soul of Japan into single panels. The app is free and so is the first chapter of each book, so it’s worth checking out if you have an iThing. (Via ANN.)

Ash Brown is giving away a Strawberry Panic starter pack at Experiments in Manga—just post a comment about your favorite yuri/girls love manga (or admit you have never read any). And you’ll get a bonus chance for Tweeting about it!

News from Japan: ANN reports that Kodansha will publish the short manga stories of the late anime director Satoshi Kon, and they also have the latest Japanese comics rankings. And Weekly Bunshun magazine did the math to figure out how much money One Piece creator Eiichiro Oda has made from his long-running series: 2 billion yen.

Reviews: Michelle Smith and Melinda Beasi check out four Boys Love series in their latest BL Bookrack column at Manga Bookshelf. Melanie posts some short takes on recent titles at About Heroes. Caddy C. has some quick takes as well at A Feminist Otaku.

Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 12 of 20th Century Boys (The Comic Book Bin)
Lori Henderson on vols. 1-4 of Angel Sanctuary (Manga Xanadu)
Julie Opipari on vol. 1 of Eensy Weensy Monster (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 8 of Gatcha Gacha (Okazu)
Michelle Smith on vol. 1 of Genkaku Picasso (Soliloquy in Blue)
Lissa Pattillo on vol. 11 of Ghost Hunt (ANN)
Shannon Fay on vol. 6 of Honey Hunt (Kuriousity)
Kristin on vol. 2 of I’ll Give It My All… Tomorrow (Comic Attack)
Johanna Draper Carlson on vol. 9 of The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service (Comics Worth Reading)
Kristin on vol. 3 of Library Warsr (Comic Attack)
Zack Davisson on Manga Kamishibai: The Art of Japanese Paper Theater (Japan Reviewed)
Erica Friedman on Maria-Sama Ga Miteru: Cherry Blossom (Okazu)
Adam Stephanides on Money Moon (Completely Futile)
Connie on Not Love But Delicious Foods Make Me So Happy! (Slightly Biased Manga)
Anna on vol. 5 of Ooku (Manga Report)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 15 of Ouran High School Host Club (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Carlo Santos on vol. 2 of Panic x Panic (ANN)
Connie on vol. 7 of Rasetsu (Slightly Biased Manga)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 8 of Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei (The Comic Book Bin)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 22 of Skip Beat! (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Lori Henderson on vol. 4 of Time and Again (Comics Village)
Erica Friedman on vol. 7 of Tsubomi (Okazu)
Emily on Tsuugaku Densha (Emily’s Random Shoujo Manga Page)
Anna on vol. 2 of Twin Spica (Manga Report)

Dark Horse will be launching a digital comics app in January, and while they have quite a roster of Western comics, they have just announced the first manga on the app: Lone Wolf and Cub. And Viz is expanding its offerings on the iPad.

GAR GAR Stegosarus brings an anime fan’s perspective to the Kodansha-Del Rey deal and finds it good.

News from Japan: There’s going to be a new Battle Royale manga: Battle Royale: Tenshi-tachi no Kokkyō (Battle Royale: Angels’ Border), a spinoff from the original novel, will start running in Akita Shoten’s Young Champion magazine next month.

Reviews: Carlo Santos takes a quick jog around the latest releases in this week’s Right Turn Only!! column at ANN. Ash Brown looks back at a week’s worth of manga reading at Experiments in Manga.

Anna on vols. 1-3 of Black Gate (omnibus edition)
Erica Friedman on vol. 1 of Blue Friend (Okazu)
Katherine Farmar on Double Cast (Comics Village)
Carlo Santos on How to Draw Shojo Manga (ANN)
Penny Kenny on vol. 1 of Hyde and Closer (Manga Life)
Michael Buntag on vol. 1 of Love is in the Bag (NonSensical Words)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 5 of Ooku: The Inner Chambers (The Comic Book Bin)
Anna on To Marry a Stranger and To Woo a Wife (Manga Report)

Lori Henderson rounds up the week’s manga news and critiques some digital manga initiatives at Manga Xanadu.

Erica Friedman presents the latest Yuri Network News and counts down the top ten yuri manga of 2010 at Okazu.

Sean Gaffney takes a look at the new manga being released this week. Sean also has a license request, Soap Girl, although given the nature of the story as he describes it, it seems like a long shot.

David Welsh, meanwhile, rounds up some Osamu Tezuka manga he’d like to see published over here. And Brent Newhall provides a handy list of Tezuka manga that are available in English at Otaku, No Video.

At The Manga Critic, Kate Dacey takes a look at a classic early shoujo manga, Tezuka’s Princess Knight.

Sean Michael Robinson writes about the importance of Misturu Adachi, the creator of Cross Game, and the problem of sports comics as a genre at The Hooded Utilitarian.

Twin Spica is the topic of the latest Manga Out Loud podcast; hosts Ed Sizemore and Johanna Draper Carlson are joined by Sam Kusek, Daniella Orihuela-Gruber, and Tim Maughan for the discussion.

Melinda Beasi discusses three of her favorite female manga creators and cheers on Erica Friedman at Manga Bookshelf, and she teams up with Michelle Smith to look at artwork that fails at Soliloquy in Blue.

Linda Thai presents parts 12 and 13 of her interview with Stu Levy at Something Deeper.

Tony Yao takes a look at Vertical’s summer catalog at Manga Therapy.

Daniella Orihuela-Gruber has some tips on traveling with manga at All About Manga.

Susie of Studio QT explains why Gantz is so hard to retouch—and what she does about it.

Job board: Viz is looking for a publishing sales assistant. (Hat tip: Japanator.)

Reviews

Connie on Ayako (Slightly Biased Manga)
Kate Dacey on Ayako (The Manga Critic)
David Welsh on Ayako (The Manga Curmudgeon)
Lissa Pattillo on vol. 5 of Butterflies, Flowers (ANN)
Connie on vol. 2 of Deka Kyoshi (Slightly Biased Manga)
Connie on vol. 7 of Detroit Metal City (Slightly Biased Manga)
Snow Wildsmith on vol. 1 of Dragon Girl and vol. 1 of Sasameke (Good Comics for Kids)
James Fleenor on vol. 2 of Dusk (Anime Sentinel)
Rob McMonigal on vol. 8 of Emma (Panel Patter)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 3 of GA: Geijutsuka Art Design Class (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 2 of House of Five Leaves (The Comic Book Bin)
Rob McMonigal on vol. 2 of Jormungand (Panel Patter)
Michelle Smith on vol. 1 of Kizuna (Deluxe Edition) (Soliloquy in Blue)
Johanna Draper Carlson on vol. 7 of The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service (Comics Worth Reading)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 1 of Kurozakuro (I Reads You)
Erica Friedman on Mikazuki no Mitsu/Crescent Sweet Honey (Okazu)
Connie on vol. 15 of Ouran High School Host Club (Slightly Biased Manga)
AstroNerdBoy on vol. 28 of Negima! (AstroNerdBoy’s Anime and Manga Blog)
Andre Paploo on vol. 4 of Raiders (Kuriousity)
Ash Brown on Stay Close to Me (Experiments in Manga)
Ai Kano on vol. 3 of Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee (Animanga Nation)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 3 of Toriko (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
Brent Newhall on vols. 1 and 2 of Ultra Maniac (Otaku, No Video)
Rob McMonigal on vol. 5 of Yotsuba&! (Panel Patter)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 9 of Yotsuba&! (A Case Suitable for Treatment)