Anyone hoping for a definitive statement of Tokyopop’s 2015-16 plans was probably disappointed by the company’s SDCC panel. The company reiterated its intention to do “original manga,” announced it was launching a phone game called Sushi Cross, and hinted that it was negotiating an agreement with Disney. Tokyopop also revealed it will publish a new boxed edition of M. Alice LeGrow’s Bizenghast, one of the company’s best-selling OEL manga titles.
UDON announced that it would be reissuing Moyocco Anno’s tween-friendly fantasy Sugar Sugar Rune (originally published by Del Rey Manga in the 2000s). Also on UDON’s calendar: the oddly punctuated Steins’; Gate, which debuts next month.
If you didn’t make it to SDCC 2015, never fear: Deb Aoki has posted a detailed recap of the Best and Worst Manga Panel of 2015. Although the group focused on new releases from 2015, all five panelists also discussed manga they’d liked to see licensed, from Ai Yazawa’s Neighborhood Story (Gokinjo Monogatori) to Gengoroh Tagame’s My Brother’s Husband (Otouto no Otto).
I’m just going to try and pretend that Tokyopoop isn’t coming back and is just going to stay dead. I mean, Rose of Versailles and Legend of the Galactic Heroes licenses were announced, nothing Stu Levy can try to do can lessen the awesomeness of that.
I don’t doubt Stu Levy has a few great ideas up his sleeve; what remains to be seen is if he can actually execute them. When Tokyopop was still the second-largest American manga publisher, he launched dozens of forward-thinking initiatives: the Rising Stars of Manga, MyTokyopop, BLU Manga. Stu’s follow-through, however, was never as good as his brainstorming, which meant some of the company’s best ideas died on the vine. Maybe he’ll make a go of it with a leaner, more focused operation. It will be interesting to see what, if anything, develops over the next 12 months.