It’s an interesting index of what people care about that the post that got the most commentary at Love Manga recently is the one on Go! Comi’s new licenses. Go check it out, and be sure to read the comments, because I learned something and it looks like David did too.
David Welsh gets a sugar rush in his latest Flipped column, where he looks at books that bring home the kawaii. If you go into insulin shock, the treatment is a bracing dose of Kawaii Not.
This LJ poster is disturbed by a shoujo manga called Boku ni natta watasi and concludes that all shoujo manga is freaky. I think she’s reading the wrong books, myself.
About Brigid Alverson
Brigid Alverson has been reading comics since she was 4. After earning an MFA in printmaking, she headed to New York to become a famous artist but ended up working with words instead of pictures, first as a book editor and later as a newspaper reporter. She started
MangaBlog to keep track of her daughters’ reading habits and now covers manga, comics and graphic novels as a freelancer for
School Library Journal,
Publishers Weekly Comics Week,
Comic Book Resources, the
Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog, and
Robot 6. She also edits the
Good Comics for Kids blog at School Library Journal. Now settled in the outskirts of Boston, Brigid is married to a physicist and has two daughters.
Based on the lj user’s post, it seems that this Boku ni natta watasi manga contains every cliche known to modern shoujo manga. I feel for (or pity?) the lj poster; if she didn’t like it, then throw it aside and pick up something else. But I also feel for (or pity?) what is currently happening (and selling) in the manga industry in Japan if more and more shoujo manga will be constructed based on cliches.
Well, her take is “what do girls see in this???” Of course, there are some girls that will enjoy the fanservice, but I agree, it looks like she was reading a crappy manga in scanlation (because, I’d wager, it’s not good enough for licensing). But it’s interesting to see her take on all those manga cliches. Some of the comments were worthwhile, too.