Links, we got links

David Welsh dissects this month’s Previews in his Flipped column and concludes that October will be manga month, with something for every taste.

Panels and Pixels reviews some recent manga, including Life, Monster, and Golgo13.

And at Buzzscope, Erin post some thoughtful reviews of Scott Pilgrim, Robot, Ultra Cute, and Dokebi Bride—now there’s a miscellaneous bookbag!

She started out reading “The Rose of Versailles,” but by the time Chung In Kyung became the first person in Japan to get a PhD in manga, she had switched to political cartoons. Actually, Chung, who is South Korean, did her thesis on a Korean political cartoon, so maybe her PhD is in manwha. Either way, it’s a first. She has plenty to say about Japan, though:

Although Japan has led the world in comics, Chung says Japanese artists fail to cast a critical eye over their own society, and so their comics are seldom politically provocative.

Chung herself draws cartoons, and she says, “I want to become a cartoonist who is hated by Japanese politicians.” A noble ambition, and one she is likely to achieve.

Not much on manga in the latest PW Comics Week, but there is an article about how next year’s New York Comic-Con will be better than this year’s. Since PW’s sister company runs NYCC, the usual precautions apply, but it does seem like they’ve learned from this year’s, er, excess of success.

An exhibit in Milan examines the increasingly international face of comics.

Why not just call it Otaku Life? ComiPress brings news of a new Japanese magazine that combines mecha and bishoujo. As one commenter notes, “That sounds like quite possibly the worst mag ever.”

British chain Ottakers is sold. Earlier this year, they offered a manga collector’s card that had David Taylor mighty pleased.

A mural by eight manga-ka is rediscovered.

You know what I want? I want a copy of the summer edition of Kateigaho, the Japanese English-language magazine, which takes a break from its Zen theme for a story on “Manga and the NANA Phenomenon.” Hat tip to the always entertaining Mainichi Daily News, who sum it up thusly:

With all this talk of Zen, readers will either feel well on the way to enlightenment or ready for a slap across the back with a wooden stick. The summer issue features on glittering Ginza and the new phenomenon sweeping the Western world of “Shojo Manga” (comic books for girls) will have a similar effect to the latter!