MangaBlog

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)

The link post is running late today due to some Christmas-related duties, but here’s the big news of the day: Square Enix has launched their online manga store. Now the pirates-versus-iTunes theory will be tested for sure, as a major publisher allows you to buy your manga cleanly and legally on the web, as opposed to skulking around scanlation sites.

I haven’t kicked the tires yet, but the lineup looks good: The first volumes of Fullmetal Alchemist, Soul Eater, Record of a Fallen Vampire, and Yumekui Kenbun: Nightmare Inspector are all up there, with second volumes either already in the store or coming soon. And they are offering all manga for $5.99 for a limited time. I hope they aren’t planning on charging more than that, as $5.99 is at the high end of what I would be willing to pay, frankly. You have to register to buy manga, but they have wisely opted to allow non-members to read free previews. Also wise: Including a forum for fans, which can become an attraction in itself.

Full press release after the jump. Go check out the site and let me know what you think of it in comments.

SQUARE ENIX LAUNCHES ONLINE MANGA STORE

Market-leading titles including Fullmetal Alchemist and Soul Eater
Now Available Via Digital Distribution

Special Sale Price Now Available for a Limited Time

LOS ANGELES (Dec. 17, 2010) – Square Enix, Inc., the publisher of SQUARE ENIX® interactive entertainment products in North America, today announced the launch of its online manga store, where users and fans can view electronic editions of popular Square Enix manga series, such as Fullmetal Alchemist® and Soul Eater®. Users can access the store through the SQUARE ENIX MEMBERS website, a free-to-register membership site operated by local subsidiaries of Square Enix (http://publications.na.square-enix.com/na/us/top).

Through the new service, SQUARE ENIX aims to provide a global audience with easy access to localized versions of its popular manga titles through streaming. Also, through cooperation with regional localization/publishing companies, SQUARE ENIX will endeavor to promote both print and online versions of its manga titles globally. Furthermore, it is the company’s aim for the official online distribution service to serve as a deterrent against illegal downloading and piracy.

Anchored by established series in the United States, the online distribution service will continue to provide manga titles that will appeal to readers of the region (further details outlined below). Starting today, the initial lineup in the United States will be four titles, including Fullmetal Alchemist and Soul Eater, available at the special sale price of $5.99 for a limited time. The first update is scheduled for January 11, 2011. New titles will be added bi-monthly after January.

The community services offered through the SQUARE ENIX MEMBERS website will not only allow members to enjoy manga titles, but also supply a public forum where fans can provide commentary and exchange opinions about their favorite series. The site will also have special offers where members can download free wallpapers. Non-members can get a taste of the Japanese manga experience as well through free previews of the first chapters from each of the available titles.

Square Enix is dedicated to creating new entertainment experiences via online communities, shopping sites and other Internet-based business operations, and digital distribution of manga is one such endeavor toward that goal. The company plans to continue delivering a wide variety of content to an expanding global customer base through numerous outlets and multiple forms of media.

At The Comics Journal, Roland Kelts discusses the absurdities of the amendments that the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly just passed to the Youth Healthy Development Ordinance, including the fact that it specifically mentions “manga and anime” and leaves photography untouched—so real child pornography remains legal, while drawn images are banned.

Melinda Beasi reveals her Pick of the Week at Manga Bookshelf.

Kate Dacey has declared Osamu Tezuka Appreciation Week at The Manga Critic, and she starts off with an essay about what she finds so compelling about his work and review of vols. 1 and 2 of Black Jack.

Melinda Beasi, Danielle Leigh, and Michelle Smith resume their discussion of Nana with volumes 15 and 16 in the latest installment of The NANA Project. And Melinda and Miichelle discuss some manga for girls in their Off the Shelf column.

David Welsh has some suggestions for Eisner nominations, and he also reaches the letter T in his Seinen Alphabet.

Tony Yao has been taking a look back at Japanese pop culture in 2010 at Manga Therapy; part three of the series is up now. And he posts photos from Sunday’s Anime and Manga Day at Kinokuniya, at which Kodansha Comic announced their new lineup.

Linda Thai continues her interview with Tokyopop CEO Stu Levy with a discussion of piracy and the lag between publication in Japan and the U.S. at Something Deeper.

Translators Alethea and Athena Niblye are the new team on Negima, and as they explain at Manga Life, it wasn’t easy keeping mum about it.

Daniella Orihuela-Gruber wraps up her 2010 guide to manga gift guides at All About Manga.

Ash Brown discusses buying manga at Half.com at Experiments in Manga.

The makers of ComiPo!, a manga-drawing software that includes pre-designed characters that users can customize and pose, plan to be release an English-language version in the spring.

News from Japan: Erica Friedman sings the praises of Nakayoshi, the oldest continuously published shoujo manga magazine in Japan and the home of Sailor Moon. The first chapter of Raiden-18, by Fullmetal Alchemist manga-ka Hiromu Arakawa, is online at Shogakukan’s Club Sunday site, and the second will follow shortly. These two chapters ran in Sunday GX magazine in 2005 and haven’t been republished since; the third chapter will run in the January issue of Sunday GX. ANN has the latest comics rankings from Japan.

Reviews: Todd Douglass looks at a stack of recent manhwa, many the final volumes of their series, at Anime Maki.

Lori Henderson on vol. 2 of Bunny Drop (Manga Xanadu)
Lori Henderson on vol. 3 of Children of the Sea (Comics Village)
Leroy Douresseaux on vol. 1 of Itsuwaribito (The Comic Book Bin)
Anna on vol. 1 of Kurozakuro (Manga Report)
Sean Gaffney on vol. 3 of Library Wars: Love and War (A Case Suitable for Treatment)
A Library Girl on vol. 1 of Millennium Prime Minister (A Library Girl’s Familiar Diversions)
Carlo Santos on vol. 9 of Real (Anime News Network)
Kristin on vol. 22 of Skip Beat and vol. 11 of Vampire Knight (Comic Attack)
Connie on vol. 5 of Sugarholic (Slightly Biased Manga)

Wow! Linda Thai is up to part 10 of her interview with Stu Levy and still going strong!

The Comics Village team looks at the best manga of the past week.

Melinda Beasi links to an article about manhwa created for the rental market and some recent reviews in her latest Manhwa Monday post.

Masters of Manga is back in business, with a profile of Tokuo Yokota.

Alex Hoffman of Manga Widget and Kristin of Bento Bako Weekly present their 2010 manga gift guides.

News from Japan: I haven’t paid too much attention to Tokyo’s Healthy Youth Development Ordinance, which passed yesterday, but Erica Friedman takes a hard look at the potential effects on manga as well as the possible anti-gay motivation behind it at Okazu.

Reviews: Ash Brown looks at a week’s worth of manga reading at Experiments in Manga. Michelle Smith has short reviews of four Yen Press manga at Soliloquy in Blue.

Dave Ferraro on Ayako (Comics-and-More)
Shannon Fay on Azumanga Daioh (omnibus edition) (Kuriousity)
David Welsh on vol. 1 of Genkaku Picasso (The Manga Curmdgeon)
Julie Opipari on vol. 23 of Kekkaishi (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Anna on vols. 5/6 of Papillon (omnibus edition) (Manga Report)
Amy Grockl on vol. 1 of My Girlfriend Is a Geek (Comics Village)
Johanna Draper Carlson on the December Shonen Jump (Comics Worth Reading)
Lori Henderson on the November issue of Yen Plus (Manga Xanadu)