MangaBlog

Del Rey’s panel was relaxed, with a lot of back-and-forth between the panel and the audience. They announced some actual new titles, showed the trailer for “The Bugmaster,” the soon-to-be-retitled movie based on the Mushishi manga, and gave a backstage glimpse at the manga-making machinery at Del Rey.

New titles first. The Del Rey folks did something that other publishers should immediately imitate: Each title announcement included a suggestion for who would like this particular manga.

Shiki Tsukai, written by Toru Zeku, art by Yuna Takanagi, due out in September

This was serialized in Sirius magazine in Japan. The title means “Keeper of the Seasons,” and according to Dallas Middaugh, the main character is one of the defenders of the universe, magical warriors who control the seasons. This is suggested for fans of Negima and Tsubasa.

The Complete Guide to Manga, by Jason Thompson, due out July 10

This book will include detailed listings of over 900 manga series. Of course, it will be outdated within minutes of being published, but Del Rey plans to post updates on the website and possibly publish revised editions if it sells well.

Pumpkin Scissors, by Ryuoutaku Iwanaga, due out in November

Middaugh described this one as military sci fi with a sense of humor and compared it to Fullmetal Alchemist. The anime is in development from GDH.

Psycho Busters, by Yuya Aoka, art by Akinari Noa, due out in November

Aoka is the creator of GetBackers. This one was summed up as “government conspiracies and psychic teenagers.”

Aventura, by Shin Midorikawa, due out in December

From the Power Point slide: “Fantastic art and a story set in a school for magic that bears absolutely no resemblance to any other hypothetical schools for magic.” From Middaugh: “This is probably why I shouldn’t write these Power Points late at night.” Seriously, they showed a trailer for this and the art looked pretty nice.

Middaugh then ran through the already announced titles that are coming out in the next few months: Princess Resurrection, Train Man (the novel), Dragon Eye, My Heavenly Hockey Club, Le Chevalier d’Eon, Alive, and Mushishi.

That was a good enough segue into the trailer for “The Bugmaster,” which debuted at the Venice and Cannes film festivals. Marketing director Ali Kokmen explained that the rights for the U.S. release are still being negotiated, but he does expect the name to be changed. (Not a bad idea: Google “Bugmaster” and the first hit you get is an exterminator.)

Then the Del Rey staffers, including licensing and acquisitions director Mutsumi Miyazaki, translator Elina Ishikawa, editor Tricia Narwani, production manager Erich Schoeneweiss, and Kokmen, gave a detailed account of the steps they went through to produce the upcoming title Mamotte! Lollipop, from licensing through promotion. My favorite moment was Dallas’s description of a conversation with a translator about a particular sound effect. “It’s the sound of something appearing suddenly from the dark,” the translator said; Dallas settled for “Whoosh!”

Middaugh also admitted, in a backhanded way, the importance of scanlations when he explained why the company made a trailer for Aventura. “Aventura is a manga that is out in Japan, but it’s very recent, only 2 volumes,” he said. “As you know, clearly we think it is something special, but a lot of the way manga and anime get buzz in the U.S. is somebody picks it up, translates it, and puts it on the web. With recent series like Aventura, there isn’t time for that to get out, so we make a trailer, show it to you, and hope there will be buzz about it.”

I returned from NYCC last night into the arms of my waiting family (key quote: “What did you bring me?”) and although the Comfort Inn Murray Hill had its charms, including comfortable beds and free wireless internet, it did feel good to be home again.

I’ll be posting more NYCC reports later, and I even did a couple of video interviews (!) for Digital Strips, but in the meantime, check out this post at The Comics Reporter, where Tom Spurgeon is collecting all the con reports. I’ll sift through and list the manga ones later in the week, when everyone has turned theirs in.

Katherine Dacey-Tsuei stayed at the con longer than I did and caught one of the big scoops of the weekend: Vertical is starting a separate manga imprint. Check out her latest Manga Recon post for more on that, the Tokyopop creator panel, and the CMX panel.

The American Anime Awards were Saturday night, and Active Anime lists the winners. Fruits Basket took the prize for Best Manga.

Yen Press didn’t have a panel, but they did announce their new titles, which include Svetlana Chmakova’s next book. MangaCast has the scoop. Also, Ed has some new titles from CMX, and I’m sure he’ll be posting more with his coverage of that panel. Also: A new title from Blu!

ANN reports that Newtype USA has picked up a CLAMP title, Kobato, to be serialized in the magazine.

New blog alert! Manganews has a blog, and they’re off to a running start with a debate over Netcomics’ plans to license manga.

David Welsh objects to Marc Siegel’s characterization of manga as pabulum for those not quite ready for real comics.

Shaenon Garrity’s Overlooked Manga Festival features a special event: A look at Manga Hell, the last issue of Viz’s manga magazine Pulp.

Floating Sakura looks at incest manga.

The big news at the CPM panel was not new title announcements but the fact that a number of previously announced titles are scheduled for release in the next couple of months.

CPM managing director John O’Donnell came into the panel brimming with energy and attitude and started right in with a discussion of his company’s troubles over the past year. “In January, our our largest customer, Musicland, which is 30 percent of our sales, filed for bankruptcy,” he said. “Most annoying!”

“Then Tower Records, 5 percent of our sales, filed for bankruptcy. Most annoying!”

As a result, CPM had issues with getting paid and had to deal with it by cutting back its production schedule. “We apologize for any inconvenience it caused,” O’Donnell said. “There’s nothing worse than getting into a series and having it disappear.”

By then, O’Donnell had clearly won over the sparse but enthusiastic crowd. He went on to show a series of trailers for new and existing titles. (You can see the trailers on the BeBeautiful website; just click on the title and there will be a link to the trailer). Like everyone else at NYCC, O’Donnell mixed new and existing series together in one long list; in fact, the only title covered thas isn’t already in stores is Midaresomenishi: A Legend of Samurai Love. Yes, a samurai yaoi manga. Vice president Masumi O’Donnell announced the release schedules, which included a couple of one-shots that aren’t listed in their current catalog, although I think they have already been announced: Casino Lily, by Youka Nitta, due out in May, and Virgin Soil in July. Because the Japanese publisher Biblos, which published Embracing Love, also went bankrupt last year, John O’Donnell said that series is up in the air after vol. 6. “Everything has to go back and be renegotiated with the author,” he said. “I wish I could give you a straight answer, but I can’t. We’ll be back there next month for the Tokyo anime fair.”

Then he had a question for the audience: How do you feel about manhwa?

Not too good, said various audience members, citing weaknesses in drawing style and storytelling—the plots jump around too much, one person said.

“You sound like the Japanese we talk to,” said O’Donnell. “They say pretty much the same thing,” but he compared that to carmakers in Detroit complaining that the Japanese made little cars that no one wanted to drive.

The CPM strategy has been to find the top-selling manhwa in Korea, and the number one-selling manhwa-ga, O’Donnell said, is Hyun Se Lee, whose works include Nambul, Mythology of the Heavens, and Hard Boiled Angel. (Fun fact: That last one was originally titled “Angel Dick”; CPM changed the title, O’Donnell said, because “it’s not yaoi.”)

Again, none of this was exactly news because the titles are already out in the U.S., but we were treated to a video of an interview with Lee, and it looks like Lee’s Armageddon and Sook Ji Hwang’s Angel Shop are scheduled for release soon. Again, old and new were mixed together so it was hard to tell.

The panel ended with a book called Doggy Poo, which, according to O’Donnell, started out as a children’s book about a doggy poo who was sad because he was, well, a doggy poo, but ultimately, after a series of adventures, learned that There Is A Place In The World For Everyone. Supposedly a Korean student who was about to commit suicide saw the book, decided not to off himself, and went on to become one of the richest men in Korea; he built an entire movie studio just to make a Claymation version of this book. Although the movie leaves everyone in tears, O’Donnell said, most American publishers won’t touch it because it’s about… doggy poo. Anyway, the trailer is on the CPM website, and I must say, it is an awfully cute little doggy poo.

Did I just say that? I have now officially been in New York for too long.

Manganews translates a Japanese article on the demise of Monthly Shonen Jump.

I spent a big chunk of today wandering around talking to people and doing some interviews for Digital Strips. One of the big stories of the day was that Elfquest creator Wendy Pini is doing a webcomic for Go!Comi, and I interviewed Wendy after the panel for Digital Strips.

Another tidbit that came out in a panel yesterday is that manhwa publisher Netcomics is going to be licensing Japanese manga and publishing global manga as well.

I heard on the floor that Yotsuba&! is not dead; the next volume will be coming out … eventually; that despite the demise of Monthly Shonen Jump, Claymore will continue; and that volume 3 of Museum of Terror will be the last.

I ended the night at the CPM panel, where John O’Donnell talked frankly, and quite entertainingly, about the tough year they just had (with retailers Musicland and Tower Records and supplier Biblos filing for bankruptcy) and then persuading the crowd that manhwa really is better than they think. Details tomorrow.

I’m elated and exhausted but wanted to post a bit of news before I hit the sack.

The Viz panel included a number of new title announcements. I’m not sure how many are truly new (i.e. haven’t been announced somewhere) so I’ll just throw ’em all out for you to sort out. They announced the titles by imprint so I’ll do the same.

Editor Urian Brown calls the Signature imprint “manga for smart people,” which makes me feel good because I like so many of these titles. The new Signature titles are both horror manga from Junji Ito: Gyo and Uzumaki.

If you’re getting a deja vu feeling, it’s because Viz has already published Gyo. “It was so dang good we said let’s do it again with new formula,” said Brown, who described it as “mind-blowing.” It’s something to do with fish with mechanical legs coming up on shore and smelling bad… You don’t have to take his word for it, though, as Viz still has a preview up, probably of the older version.

Uzumaki, Brown says, is “the kind of manga that infects your brain. It’s about spirals and how different people in this cursed town become infected by this spiral disease… by the time you’re done with the book you’re seeing spirals everywhere, you’re looking at your cinnamon buns in the morning going ‘What’s in that thing?'”

So yeah, that makes me want to read that.

In the Viz Media imprint, which sounds like a catchall for books that don’t fit into any of the other imprints, the titles were Togari and Portus.

The Shonen Jump title was Hoshin Engi, which Brown described as “sort of a mixture of Chinese mythology with a shonen action story.”

There were two SJ Advanced titles, Gin Tana, which has already been previewed in Shonen Jump, and Pretty Face, about a guy whose face is reconstructed to look like the girl he loves, and who ends up living with her as a long-lost twin. As Brown says, “Imagine the hijinks.”

In the Shojo Beat imprint we have Millennium Snow, a new title from Ouran Host Club manga-ka Bisco Hatori about a vampire and a dying girl; Yurara, about a girl who can see ghosts, and Love*Com.

OK, my eyes are glazing over, more tomorrow.