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Gandhi and the Vampires: New Manga for the Week of October 4

Posted 10/6/11 2:34 pm EST by in Manga


The first week of the month always brings a wave of new manga from Viz, and this month is no exception. And at the leading edge is vol. 1 of Psyren, Viz's newest Shonen Jump series. Psyren is the story of a high school boy who tries to rescue a friend from the shadowy Psyren Secret Society and ends up in the middle of a survival game. It mashes together a lot of different elements—the faux-utopian cult of 20th Century Boys, with the deadly game of Battle Royale and a million other manga—but it's a good yarn and it moves fast.

Also up from Viz this week is vol. 13 of Vampire Knight, in which Yuki is injured and more secrets are revealed. This first week of the month tends to be heavy on Shojo Beat and Shonen Jump titles, and that means plenty of fan favorites: vol. 7 of Bakuman, vol. 4 of Blue Exorcist, vol. 37 of Eyeshield 21, vol. 5 of Kamisama Kiss, vol. 9 of Natsume's Book of Friends, vol. 5 of Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan, vol. 6 of Rosario + Vampire: Season II, vol. 4 of Sakura Hime: The Legend of Princess Sakura, vol. 8 of Seiho Boys' High School, vol. 25 of Skip Beat!, and vol. 18 of Slam Dunk. If you like your manga in big doses, there are the third volumes of the Bleach and Fullmetal Alchemist omnibuses, and for kiddies and gamers, there's vol. 3 of Pokemon Adventures: Diamond and Pearl Platinum. So really, Viz alone could keep you occupied for the whole long weekend. Read More...

JManga Rolls Back Prices for the Month of October

Posted 10/5/11 1:30 pm EST by in Manga


When the online manga service JManga launched last August, our biggest criticism was price. The website offered a lot of interesting manga titles, but they were charging print prices for digital manga—$8.99 and up for most volumes.

Brocken Blood
Brocken Blood

Well, now they are fixing that, at least for this month by marking down prices by 45% to 60% for the month of October. Manga that cost $8.99 is now priced at $4.99, and the most expensive titles will go from $19.99 to $7.99. Individual chapters have been marked down as well. And in a particularly nice twist, JManga is giving a partial refund to people who bought their manga before the sale started.

Manga on the JManga site are priced in points, not dollars. The points cost about a penny each, but you can't just buy 899 points. You have to subscribe, to the tune of $10 per month, which actually gets you 1,500 points the first month and 1,050 each month thereafter. Additional points are sold in increments of $5, $10, or $25. Read More...

Manga News: Vertical Licenses 'Flowers of Evil'

Posted 10/4/11 12:30 pm EST by in Manga


Vertical, Inc., marketing director Ed Chavez had a surprise announcement for fans at the Vertical panel at Anime Weekend Atlanta this past Friday: The company has licensed Flowers of Evil, which is currently running in Kodansha's Bessatsu Sh?nen Magazine. If you're curious to see what it looks like, Kodansha published the first chapter online for free, as part of the magazine's launch two years ago.

The story, titled Aku no Hana in Japanese, is a high-school romance with a blackmail twist: Takao Kasuga, a high school student who is more comfortable reading the poems of Baudelaire (the title refers to Baudelaire's Fleurs du Mal) than making small talk, steals the gym clothes of the girl he likes; another girl catches him in the act and uses the incident to blackmail him. It's a plot we have seen before, although more often in shoujo manga.

Sean Gaffney has some comments on Flowers of Evil at A Case Suitable for Treatment, where he notes that Flowers of Evil is ongoing, and five volumes have been released so far in Japan. He adds,

This is another ‘mainstream’ release after they announced GTO Shonan 14 Days earlier in the year. Although it does seem somewhat eccentric for a shonen title, and I suspect may be more along the lines of what Genkaku Picasso was for Jump Square. Let’s see what it does to try and grab us!

Vertical will release the first volume in May 2012 and plans to release a new volume every other month.

Related Posts:
A Week of Manga News: Special Sailor Moon Edition
Manga Review: GEN, the Online Manga Magazine

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A Week of Manga News: Special Sailor Moon Edition

Posted 9/30/11 12:30 pm EST by in Manga


This week's news was dominated by pretty soldiers in sailor suits. The first volumes of Sailor Moon and Codename Sailor V have been out in bookstores for two weeks now, and they are just showing up in comics shops this week. The first two volumes of Sailor Moon were the top two manga in terms of online sales last week, according to Matt Blind's analysis, with Codename Sailor V just behind them at number 4. I reviewed Codename Sailor V earlier this month, but with all the buzz, I thought I would devote this week's news roundup to what everyone else is saying. Wintermuted's Why the World Needs Sailor Moon, which I linked to last week, is a good starting point. And don't miss the latest Manga Out Loud podcast, which features a discussion of Sailor Moon by Ed Sizemore, Johanna Draper Carlson, Emily Snodgrass, and Erica Friedman. Read More...

Manga Review: GEN, the Online Manga Magazine

Posted 9/29/11 2:30 pm EST by in Digital Comics, Manga, Reviews


The online manga magazine GEN launched in April, and at first, it looked a bit dubious. The first issue, which contained the first chapters of four different series, was free. Each new issue costs $2.99, but once two more issues come out, it becomes free as well, so with the debut of issue 5, readers can access issues 1-3 for free. It's a little complicated, but it makes a lot of sense: Readers can catch up on the stories for nothing, then pay a small amount to get the latest chapters. In an interview with Otaku News, editor-in-chief Robert McGuire said that the magazine is covering its costs and looks like it will be good in the long run. Eventually, he says, he will collect the stories into volumes, just as other manga publishers do now.

While many manga publishers place restrictions on their content, allowing it to be read only in a particular app and only in certain countries, GEN is DRM-free. You download the PDF, and that's it—it's yours to keep, to move around from computer to iPad to any other device that reads PDFs. It won't expire, and if the company goes belly-up, you'll still be able to read your manga.

This is truly a subversive idea, letting readers all over the world just download the comics and read them. GEN is currently published in English and Japanese, but McGuire said that readers in other languages have expressed interest, so French, German, and Italian editions are possible in the near future. Read More...

Cuteness Abounds in I Love Kawaii

Posted 9/29/11 11:00 am EST by in Manga


How many different kinds of cuteness are there? An artist named Charuca counts the ways in I Love Kawaii, a small but beautifully produced art book that introduces 32 different artists that create big-headed children, smiling hamburgers, happy cats and dogs, and literally hundreds of other adorable mascots and characters. Read More...

Ninja Girls and the Crazy Shrine Maiden: New Manga for September 28

Posted 9/28/11 11:00 am EST by in Manga


Those of us who buy our manga in bookstores are a couple of weeks ahead of the comics-shop crowd, who are just getting Sailor Moon and Codename Sailor V this week. Since Viz and Yen Press had their big releases a few weeks ago, there aren't a lot of new volumes out this week, but there are still a few good choices.

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Manga Review: Codename Sailor V, vol. 1

Posted 9/27/11 1:30 pm EST by in Manga, Reviews


This first volume of Codename Sailor V reads like the first draft of Sailor Moon, and in a way, it is. Sailor V came first, and you can see Naoko Takeuchi working out the basic ideas that would make Sailor Moon a classic, but Codename Sailor V is a bit more raw. Nonetheless, this earlier version has a great deal of charm of its own, largely because of its spirited heroine, Minako Aino. Read More...

Manga Review: The Art of Vampire Knight

Posted 9/23/11 4:24 pm EST by in Manga, VIZ


Vampire Knight is one of Viz's top-selling series, and it's not hard to see why: While it's not for everyone, the love triangle, supernatural romance, and hint of forbidden love are like catnip for some readers. The Art of Vampire Knight, released earlier this month by Viz, is a beautifully produced art book that will be pure heaven to Vampire Knight junkies (but probably a bit boring for everyone else).

Read More...

Angry Fans, Human Insects, and Robot Cats: A Week of Manga News

Posted 9/23/11 11:00 am EST by in Anime, Manga


It's been a busy week here at MTV Geek: I looked at this week's new manga, including the next-to-last volume of Fullmetal Alchemist, reviewed the first volume of Yasuhiro Nightow's new series Blood Blockade Battlefront, and looked ahead to New York Anime Fest, and Charles Webb reviewed Osamu Tezuka's The Book of Human Insects.

The latest issue of the online magazine Gen Manga is up, at a price of $2.99, and issues 1-3 are free. Otaku USA interviews Gen editor Robert McGuire about the magazine and the type of manga it runs, and Alex Hoffman takes a comprehensive look at it at Manga Widget.

For the second time in a month, every manga on the New York Times manga best-seller list was from Viz.

Read and Discuss:

It was just disrespectful to CMX and to the manga fans who loved CMX to treat the company in such a manner. If DC had bothered to let CMX know long enough ahead of time, then the new licenses could been pulled before the fans found out and got their hopes up. Instead, it was so sudden that I have to wonder if the CMX employees found out their jobs were getting wiped in a manner similar to how I found out about Tokyopop ceasing its North American publishing operations. (I found out from news sources, not from the company itself.) That was a deeply hurtful experience for me, just to give you some emotional context.

Daniella Orihuela-Gruber on publishers that make her angry. Read More...

Anime Premieres, Special Guests Headline At New York Anime Fest

Posted 9/22/11 12:52 pm EST by in Anime, Comic Book Conventions, Manga, New York Comic Con


New York Anime Fest, which is sort of the manga/anime section of New York Comic Con, is coming up on October 13-16, in the beautiful (I jest!) Javits Center in NYC. Last year was the first time the two cons were combined, and people felt that NYAF got the short end of the stick. It's a different story this year, though, with panels from all the big manga publishers, anime premieres and visits from a number of high-profile guests. Here's a look at some of the high points

Anime Premieres

Two anime series will have their U.S. premieres at NYAF.

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Manga Review: Blood Blockade Battlefront, vol. 1

Posted 9/21/11 5:00 pm EST by in Manga, Reviews


Yasuhiro Nightow's Blood Blockade Battlefront is a fast-moving, violent but not gory tale of a future New York turned inside out and transformed into a no-mans land filled with monsters from a domain referred to only as "the beyond."

Nightow is best known for his Trigun and Trigun Maximum series, in which Vash the Stampede travels around causing mayhem (directly or indirectly) wherever he goes. Blood Blockade Battlefront is similarly action-packed, although the hero is a bit more conventional—just a bit.

The setting is Jerusalem's Lot, which used to be New York City until a portal to the beyond opened up one night, causing the city to be destroyed and replaced with a new city that bears a strong resemblance to the barroom scene in Star Wars: It's dark, smoky, and filled with strange creatures from all over the universe. Except that this city is also incredibly violent.

Leo, the main character, starts out as your basic shonen manga hero, a bit self-effacing and not particularly talented. At the beginning of the manga, he can't even afford a hamburger. Leo has come to Jerusalem's Lot on a sort of journey of redemption: He first came to the city with his family, including his wheelchair-bound sister, six months previously. Some sort of supernatural being appeared and commanded Leo and his sister to choose: One would be given special sight, the other would be struck blind. Leo got the gift, and now he is in the city hoping to make enough money to somehow help his sister.

Leo's new talent isn't all that obvious at first, but from the beginning it's clear that he can see things that other people can't. We first see that when a monkey steals his camera—a monkey that only he can see. While he is chasing the monkey, Leo gets caught up in a violent incident and then dragged off, in a case of mistaken identity, to the headquarters of Libra, a secret society that is sort of an underground resistance fighting the evil and chaos that dominates the city. All the members of Libra have some sort of special gift, and by the time the other members realize Leo is not the guy they were looking for, they have also seen him use his special vision, and they realize he can be a valuable member of the team. Read More...

New Manga For The Week Of Sept. 20: Alchemists, Vampires, And An Apprentice Artist

Posted 9/20/11 11:35 am EST by in Manga


After all the excitement last week, this is a slow week for new manga, although some of last week's releases will be showing up in comics stores for the first time.

This week brings vol. 26 of Fullmetal Alchemist, and the story hurtles toward a final showdown before winding up in volume 27 (due out in December). If you're new to the adventures of the Elric brothers, or if, like me, you started reading it and then wandered off, Viz is making it easy to catch up by publishing the early volumes in 3-in-1 editions that bind three volumes into a single hefty omnibus. Read More...

Sailor Scouts and Lovelorn Schoolboys: A Week of Manga News

Posted 9/16/11 11:21 am EST by in Manga


It has been a busy week for manga lovers, with the debut of the new edition of Sailor Moon (and the prequel, Codename Sailor V), word that Tokyopop is considering coming back to life to publish the third and fourth volumes of Hetalia, the news that Fantagraphics is planning to publish the classic early BL manga Heart of Thomas, and the release of a Gurren Lagann artbook that will benefit the Japanese Red Cross Society.

At Rocket Bomber, Matt Blind takes a look at the past week's manga sales (tracking online sales, including pre-orders) and finds that Sailor Moon tops the charts.

Erica Friedman posts a manga reader's manifesto describing how she wants her digital comics—available anytime, anywhere, and cheaper than print.

Attention would-be creators: An English version of ComiPo!, a manga creation software from Japan, was released this week. Patrick Macias made a comic of his own to demonstrate the possibilities, and creator and critic Jason Thompson took it for a test run at Anime News Network.

Read and Discuss

Up front, I’ll say I found Usagi grating. She is also a good-natured, caring person. However, she is also very lazy and seems to always need rescuing. She certainly starts out having the steeper incline of development and maturity needed. She is the least likable character in the series. The other guardians are much more mature and developed persons.

Read More...

Fantagraphics To Publish Vintage Moto Hagio Manga

Posted 9/15/11 11:51 am EST by in Manga


Good news for fans of classic manga: Fantagraphics announced plans yesterday to publish Moto Hagio's Heart of Thomas (Thomas no Shinz? /??????) in a hardcover omnibus edition that collects all three volumes of the Japanese original.

First published in 1974, Heart of Thomas was one of the first boys-love manga, and it had a strong influence on the genre in the years that followed, but beyond its historical importance, Heart of Thomas is a manga that packs a strong emotional punch. When I interviewed Thorn for Publishers Weekly a few years ago, he described reading Heart of Thomas as "a life-changing experience." “The biggest shock to me was that it made me cry," he said. "I mean really cry. I had never imagined that a comic could do that.”

Hagio was one of the first manga creators to be translated into English, but her books They Were Eleven and A' A" have been out of print for years. Last year, Fantagraphics published a collection of her short stories, A Drunken Dream and Other Stories, which was also translated by Thorn.

Heart of Thomas is a tale of unrequited love between teenage boys, set in an all-boys boarding school in Germany. It begins with the suicide of Thomas, who leaves a note for Juli, the boy he loved but who did not return his affections. In a 2004 interview with Thorn, Hagio said

The theme is ... hmm ... "When does a person learn love? When does one awake to love?" Something like that. [Laughs.] So the whole crazy premise — a boy leaving a letter and dying right at the start of the story — is something I could only have come up with when I was so young. [Laughter.]

Read More...

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