Tag Archives: manga

Review: Monokuro Kinderbook

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Monokuro KinderbookMonokuro Kinderbook
Written and Illustrated by Kan Takahama
Publisher: Fanfare / Ponent Mon
Genre: Drama / Slice of Life
204 pg | UK £11.99 | US $19.95
ISBN-13: 9788493309398

Coming to terms with the fact the majority of content from Japan that is published in English is written for children takes a little while. The content for children and young adults is by far the most popular content that is localized. And by and large, the content for adults which is brought to the US by the few small publishers willing to take the risks generally isn’t profitable. It’s a labor of love. And books that are adult oriented are a cherished and treasured thing. One of my favorite “labors of love” is a collection of short stories written by Kan Takahama.

Short story collections are a hard sell to the manga market, which now is favoring continuity and editorially driven content like Naruto and Bleach. Despite low sales, Monokuro Kinderbook is remarkable collection of fiction. Her stories explore the ideas of death, sexuality, youthful ignorance, and the occurrence of events mundane among those that are world changing. Her stories stare into the face of darkness; they do not overcome it, but they observe it, record it. They see a world covered in darkness, and do not flinch.

IMG_8792Unique among manga published in English, Takahama’s illustrations are blurry, sometimes sketchy. Like the strangeness of memories gone by, and the clarity of those memories that are recent, Takahama deftly uses changes in style and illustration to convey mood, time, and the fogginess of the past. There is a smolder in her work that is rarely seen in the US. In facial expressions and in body language, you can see the awkward tensions, the sorrow, even the sexual desire of the characters in Monokuro Kinderbook. Her pacing and paneling are simple and effective. Gone are speed lines and screen tone, but in their place is clarity of artistic vision. Perhaps it is that clarity (or maybe the lack of clarity?) that makes Monokuro Kinderbook so fascinating.

Earlier this year I discussed micropublishers and their place in the publishing spectrum. Fanfare is the very definition of a manga micropublisher. Coupled with Ponent Mon, a Europe-based publisher, they have been bringing the works of artists like Jiro Taniguchi to the USA and the UK for some time now. Monokuro Kinderbook is a lovely book, and it is obvious that a high amount of care and attention to detail has been put into printing. This collection of short stories is a fascinating addition to Fanfare‘s collection, and a book that I recommend to all adult manga readers. It offers a unique perspective, and a subtlety to its readers not found in the market today.

For Fans Of: Lost in Translation, Ian McEwan’s Saturday, Jiro Taniguchi
Final Verdict: Highly Recommended (for adult audiences)

Review: Doubt

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Doubt, Vol. 1
Written and Illustrated by Yoshiki Tonogai
Published by Yen Press
Genre: Horror/Suspense
400 pages | US $18.99 | CAN $20.99
ISBN-13: 978-0316245302

Werewolf is a game for 7-20 people. The idea is simple. You live in a village beset by evil lycanthropes who are eating townspeople left and right. Each turn is split into two phases, night and day. Two or more players are “werewolves” who have the power to remove a player from the game during the night phase. The villagers then (along with the werewolves) discuss the killing and it impact and choose a player to hang during the day phase. Any player hung divulges their identity. Werewolves win the game if only the werewolves remain at the end of the game, and the villagers win if they manage to hang all of the werewolves.

This, with a few exceptions, sounds a lot like the basis for the plot of Doubt, the new omnibus manga from Yen Press. Players of Rabbit Doubt “a cellphone game that has taken Japan by storm” meet to hang out and go to a karaoke room. While there, the players, who really aren’t important honestly, except one girl has the power to hypnotize people (surprise, this is the big reveal). Strangely, all the folks at karaoke are knocked out and arrive at an abandoned psychiatric facility where one of the players (the hypnosis girl) has been hung. One person in the facility is the killer, all the rest are rabbits. Now everyone gets to play a real game of Rabbit Doubt!

If you sensed some apathetic hand-waving in that last paragraph, you have keyed into the biggest issue with Doubt. By a large margin the biggest flaw with Doubt is its lack of well-defined characters. The only thing that passes for development is a collection of small character tropes that aren’t even exploited; there is nothing to differentiate each character from one another. Without differentiation, there is no unique behavior. So Werewolf (Rabbit Doubt) which is normally a very brainy game based on intuiting another person’s goals and will from their behavior and speech, is turned into a husk of itself. Everyone acts shady, everyone does weird stuff, everyone attacks other people for strange reasons, and no one’s personality shines through. Maybe that is the point, but it makes for dull reading. If a major character in a comic book dies and you are supposed to care, but don’t care at all? That’s a huge problem.

The art is gritty, and serviceable. It also has the tendency to give a lot of things away if you know where to look, which is obviously the point. You can miss stuff on the first read through if you aren’t paying enough attention to small details.

(BIG POTENTIAL SPOILER ALERT IF I’M RIGHT BUT I HAVE LIKE A 0.001% CHANCE OF BEING WRONG ABOUT)

Another problem of note: the solution to the opening problem of “who is the werewolf” is so obvious. You don’t have to be a genius to see that the “dead” hypnotist is actually alive and controlling another character in the game. The hypnosis angle is far fetched at best, mostly because of reality and the kind of stimuli you would need to force people to murder a bunch of people, but we’ve seen it in media before (Jason Bourne is a great example in literature and film). Honestly though, who cares how the violence manifests itself? Without well informed characters, there’s not really a point.

(SPOILER DONE)

Basically Doubt needs a lot of things to make it work, and the best tool it has at its disposal is smartly created, well-developed, rational players. Without good players, Doubt isn’t a very interesting game. And metagaming the “who is the werewolf” problem the way this book does (see big spoiler alert for speculation I know I’m right about) is a cop out. What could have been a really fascinating book turned out to be severely disappointing in content, style, and delivery.

For Fans Of: Durdling horror movies where things are supposed to be logical but nice try no cigar, Saw 4, great ideas that whiff on execution
Final Verdict: Not Recommended

Review: Unico

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Unico
Written and Illustrated by Osamu Tezuka
Genre: Fantasy/Children’s Fiction
Publisher: Digital Manga Publishing Inc.
410 pages | $ 34.95 US
ISBN-13: 978-1569703120

Unico is the first book of Digital Manga Publishing Inc.‘s Kickstarter quartet from 2012, is a collection of short stories about a lovable unicorn from a full color glossy Japanese magazine called Lyrica. Originally published from 1976 to 1979, Unico was a comic for children that tackled some tough ideas.

Unico tells the story of a baby unicorn named, appropriately, Unico, who has amazing magic, but only for those who love him. The series starts in ancient mythological Greece, where Unico is the pet of Psyche, the beautiful human woman from the story “Cupid and Psyche.” Tezuka pulls heavily from ancient myth here, but the similarities between the ancient myth and Unico’s origins quickly widen as Venus extracts her revenge on Psyche by stealing Unico away and forcing him to forget everything about his past. Each story then begins and ends with the same premise – Unico, dropped to the ground by Zephyrus, the West Wind, must make his way in a new world. At the end, when things turn out good for our hero, the wind comes again to scoop him up and take him to another place.

What is remarkable about Unico is the extreme variations on the theme that Tezuka can evoke by changing the setting and characters that Unico happens to fall into. Tezuka quickly brings the full weight of his writing talent to bear in “Buffalo Hill” a story about a pioneer girl and a Native American boy who fall in love. The innocence of these two characters is overwhelmed by the anger and hatred of their own people, despite how the two flail against it. Tezuka dazzles readers with an almost Kantian ethos of right and wrong in “Buffalo Hill,” but the complexity he layers upon his characters refuses to be explained absolutely. Tezuka uses his characters to engage the concepts of Eros and Pathos, in a way that is funny and tragic. In the end, Unico is scooped up by Zephyrus as a great calamity befalls his befriended people, and he is powerless to save them from their ultimate fate. Other stories have similar philosophical heft. “Rosaria the Beautiful” deals with appearance and the effects of superstition and lying. “The Cat on the Broomstick” works with false expectations, the power of a people willing to give up anything to depose a dictator, and even the responsibilities of family.

While there are some very impressive ideas bouncing around inside Unico, it’s still a simple enough book for children to read. This means that there inevitably are some issues with storytelling that might not pass inspection with older readers, but Tezuka does a very good job talking up to kids and allowing them to do much of the heavy lifting – he doesn’t tell you who is wrong and who is right, with only a few exceptions. Even better for younger readers, this book is full color and oriented in the Western format. All of this means it’s a good book to share.

My quibbles with Unico are all surrounding pricing and delivery. At $35 US, it’s pricey for most casual readers; it is unlikely that people unaware of Osamu Tezuka are going to be willing to pay that price for 410 pages of kids’ comics. And with such great paper and color, it would have been nice for this book to be a hardcover to increase its durability and collectability. Those buying the book now are likely able to get discounts from retailers on the first edition (I got my version from the Kickstarter, so no discounts available!)

I really enjoyed Unico. Its stories can appeal to a wide range of readers, and could be easily converted into bedtime stories read to younger kids, read together with an older age-group, or consumed wholesale by independent advanced readers. Tezuka is never talking down to his readers here, and it makes for good reading that stays fresh even through analysis. Unico is a fascinating look at Tezuka’s children-oriented work Tezuka fans, and Digital Manga Publishing has done a good job with the printing and binding of this color edition. However you consume Unico, whether as a collector, parent, or child, this book is a great addition to your library.

For Fans Of: The Story of Babar, Cute woodland creatures, stories that pack an emotional punch, empty wallets 
Final Verdict: Recommended

Another Tezuka Kickstarter – But What Does It All Mean?

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kansaiclub

Another year, another Osamu Tezuka Kickstarter.

Wait.Whaaaat?!

News of a new Osamu Tezuka Kickstarter came at the beginning of April. Previous Kickstarter projects for Tezuka licenses have all come from Digital Manga Publishing (New licenses of Barbara, Unico, AtomCat, and Triton, reprint of Swallowing the Earth). This time though? The publisher is a new-guy-on-the-blocker, Kansai Club Publishing. Billing themselves as a small company publishing manga from the 40s-70s, Kansai is coming out of the gates with a license of a collection of Osamu Tezuka’s shonen short stories titled The Crater.

According to the folks at Kansai Club, The Crater was a book that was going to be published regardless of whether or not this Kickstarter succeeded  However, the company’s future depended very greatly on what people would be willing to pledge,  and if they could sell their full print run of 2,000 units.

If you’ve looked at my position on Kickstarter on Manga Widget in the past, you’ll know that I am pretty gung-ho for it. Kickstarter gives creators and publishers a way to circumvent the regular restraints of publishing by using an old fashioned patronage model of economics. The patronage model is appealing to folks interested in art because it allows increased creative freedom and more risk-taking, and puts the risk of the venture on the consumer and not the entrepreneur. Unfortunately, this strength can also be a major weakness. Kickstarter does not offer you protections if a project creator decides not to deliver, and people can abscond with your hard earned cash without much retribution.

Crater

I’ll give you the link to the Tezuka in English site, where you can read more about The Crater, and find out if you would be interested in backing the Kansai Club Kickstarter.

One thing that I find interesting is the opening orientation of these big Kickstarter projects. Almost without fail, they have started out with Tezuka titles. And while DMP is potentially looking at other works for its Platinum Manga Line, and Kansai Club has mentioned that they are interested in publishing older works and works by more contemporary authors like Junji Ito and Mitsuru Adachi, they’re both primarily focused on the work of Osamu Tezuka currently.

Tezuka has a pretty stable fanbase in the English speaking market.Part of the reason for this is Vertical Inc.‘s curatorial vision for Tezuka’s seminal works like Buddha, Message to Adolf, and others. His work transcends the traditional manga reader – alt comics fans, historical comics fans, and others are willing to pay for hardcover Tezuka manga. Couple this fan enthusiasm with a creative trust that seemingly wants to have all of Tezuka’s manga published in English, and this leads to license deals for Kickstarted projects that would otherwise have never happened.

The question is, though: Is Tezuka the jumping off point, or an end unto himself? I certainly am excited to see more Tezuka manga, but is Tezuka the opening arena of public fundraising, to be followed by other more exciting works? Is Kansai Club only doing a Tezuka Kickstarter because they know it will be a relatively successful venture? I hate to make this reference, but is Tezuka the level 1 tutorial mission for Kickstarter manga?

sorako

Another interesting question: Are there other exciting works out there, or is Tezuka the only product that’s readily available? This is a little bit facetious, because manga Kickstarters have existed in the past. But these Kickstarter projects either did not do extremely well, or were unsuccessful in obtaining enough funding. How many publishers/rights holders are cool with the Kickstarter methodology and risk? What happens if a big publisher allows a Kickstarter project to get off the ground, only to have it fail? What would the result be there?

The Kansai Club Kickstarter has hit $30,000 at the time of this writing, so barring some odd circumstances, this project is going to print, and it looks like the publisher is going to recoup some of its money already invested prior to the Kickstarter. I’m excited for The Crater, but I’m more excited about the future of Kickstarter in manga publishing.

What do you think? Is Tezuka the gateway to build operating funds? Is he the only guy you can get a Kickstarter license for? What do you think the future of Kickstarter and manga looks like? I’m interested in your thoughts here, or on Twitter @mangawidget.

Manga and the Problem of Discovery

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Manga as an industry has had a  lot of rough beats in the past few years. The market crash of 2007, fueled by mediocrity and the $9 trade paperback. The fall of Borders allegedly put TOKYOPOP out of business. Small publishers are relying on preorders now more than ever.  And piracy is as rampant as it has been in the past 5 years. Mangafox Manga aggregators like Manga Fox and Manga Reader are high on the list of the world’s websites (Manga Reader recently clocked in at site #720), with around 18-20% of all traffic coming from the USA.  Searching the term “manga” at Google or Bing brings up the Wikipedia article, two legitimate companies (Manga UK and Manga University) and 7  manga aggregators. Using some simple web tools, something else becomes apparent – that while search engines like Google are still the major source of hits for aggregators, the number of people accessing them from Facebook is increasing (7-9% of all incoming traffic in the past 12 months, and growing). MangaFox’s facebook page has 494,000+ likes, and cheerily states “Be sure to suggest this page to your friends!” There is more egregious behavior out there; the mere fact that MangaStream calls itself an “Arts/Humanities page” seems boldly offensive. And the sad fact is that none of these readers are paying creators while reading – but are consuming comics at a breathtaking rate. Mangahere

So manga itself – people out there get that. It’s become fairly common as the world gets smaller. Free is a great price. But manga as an industry, manga where you actually pay someone for a book? That is not so common. Onto the questions then: How to manga companies promote their existence?  How do we make paying for manga more appealing than piracy? How can we get new readers to discover manga in a way that is beneficial for the creators? I posed this question on Twitter and got an answer from Ben Applegate:

I think step one for publishers is to make an example out of a major manga aggregator and settle with the others. — Ben Applegate (@benapplegate) March 7, 2013

I agree in principle about aggregators – they’ve been making a profit by advertising for a long time, and their business model, if you can call it that, does not pay creators or license holders. Manga aggregators are the source of most of the market’s woes. But would people reading manga on aggregators today actually buy comics if their online hotspots for all things free and fun disappeared? Ben seems to think so, but I’m less convinced.

Many if not all of manga’s newest readers find it in a few ways:

  1. Randomly at a bookstore
  2. A friend convinces them to read a volume that he or she already owns
  3. Local library groups or library selection
  4. The internet

Assume you get into manga in one of the top three ways – manga is a physical product, a book that you borrow or buy. It’s an actual physical thing. But if you find manga through the internet, it’s a digital thing – and it’s free no matter what. If you were used to free (and had never considered manga a consumable, purchasable thing) paying for volumes might not come so quick. According to a recent twitter message from Vertical, they have 3,000 steady readers who purchase content. I am happily within that 3,000. But who knows how many people are reading the content Vertical has licensed on aggregators? It may be upwards of 100,000 (or more) readers a month.

So what else can we put on the table? Ben has a thought:

Other things I think pubs can do: Actually work to engage the direct market, which is woefully uninformed about manga.

— Ben Applegate (@benapplegate) March 7, 2013

While I don’t know all of what that would entail, it’s a broad suggestion that carries a lot of weight. I have a few thoughts of my own:

1. Free reading services for various chapters of books online from the publisher - a JManga7, if you would, for big titles like Naruto, Bleach, One Piece. I’m not talking “free preview” either. I’m talking 1 chapter a week, maybe older content, with easy access to current Shonen Jump. Pay X to view as many comics as you want for Y amount of time or buy the latest chapter of the series for $0.69 USD. This might help some readers who are into manga week by week, and digitally – but it gives you a platform to fight against the free. Pay artists to write digital only stories that can only be retrieved through the digital platform. Offer promotional materials and other extras that are hard to find in aggregators. Maybe have previews of a few panels that haven’t been published anywhere. In short, make it the digital platform of choice, because of availability, and because it is worth paying for. And, since I’m in a land of dreams, make it universal – all publishers on a single platform.

2. Increased access to physical copies at libraries - manga has a unique and compelling case to make in many different libraries, from school libraries to the monolithic library partnerships like CLEVNET. Manga is a popular borrowing item, but it doesn’t get a lot of time in the sun at these libraries. Publishers could work more with library representatives to create informational sessions about manga and comics for kids and parents. Increasing physical copy readership via the library increased manga purchasing in my local area (when I worked in the library business), and I suspect the same would happen on a larger scale.

3. Partner physical copies to digital ones - again, this is about building value for the paperback or hardcover book, but why not allow a person who has bought a physical copy to have a digital copy as part of their physical purchase? How many people with paperback One Piece collections are actually buying the same volumes on Viz Media’s app? I think that the benefits of a digital + print release has a lot of potential. This has a lot of different possibilities, from allowing book purchasers to be able to follow their favorite stories in multiple formats to giving multiple chapters of other similar manga to the physical copy purchaser.

Ultimately, the industry needs to add physical value to an otherwise digital world. If publishers make buying content easy and cross-platform, and make sure their customers know that they are delivering a quality product they can’t get anywhere else, the industry will do itself a great service. Aggregators aren’t helping the issue of the market,  but if 90% of manga readers are getting content online, manga publishers need to consider how to incorporate digital content, add value, and be responsive to the changes in reading habits. Until then? MangaFox will still have its thousands of fans, while manga publishers struggle to make ends meet.

Edit: After a discussion with Ed Chavez of Vertical today, I’ve edited some statements for clarification. My points still stand.

Do We Need More Manga Micropublishers?

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A Zoo in WinterI’ve been reminiscing over A Zoo in Winter and rereading my small collection of Jiro Taniguchi manga lately. Taniguchi is a fantastic draftsman, and has some truly remarkable comics under his belt. Sadly, there are not a lot of these comics published in English.

Western comics and manga can live together peacefully, if not joyously, but there are certain business models that work better in a land without translators and licensing fees. One of these is the micropublisher. Now, to be fair, all comics publishing is essentially niche publishing, and art comics like Fantagraphics are an even smaller niche. But the micropublisher is phenomenon that goes beyond publishing as a business. It looks at publishing as an art form, and the publisher, often one or two people, decide to publish a book. They may only have two or three books under their banner.

The Voyeurs, By Gabrielle Belle

A good example that comes to mind is Uncivilized Books, with 16 titles to its name, most of which are the work of Jon Lewis or Gabrielle Belle.  Another is Koyama Press. The powerful thing here is the relationship between the micropublisher and their writers. These publishers, because they are so small, can have an intimate connection with their creators in a way that a Penguin Group could never have.

This is very difficult with Japanese media. With translations, licensing fees, and the like getting in the way of that intimate relationship, we see much fewer micropublishers that work with Japanese comics. Even if there is a person who would like to create micropublishing work with Japanese comics, going through the licensing and translating would likely scare off or present a high barrier to entry to all but a few dedicated publishers.

The essence of the micropublisher (to me) seems to be the almost archival nature of the business. The idea that something is worth the money to be printed and distributed for sale and consumption is powerful. And we see this mentality in some of our smallest publishers, like Ponent Mon/Fanfare, Vertical,TopShelf and Fantagraphics. These publishers have a history of choosing titles that are both archival worthy and representative of the art they believe should be available to American audiences.

A question is: does this selection of publishers really present the content that you want to read?

My own answer is no. These publishers have released amazing content. Without them, I wouldn’t own copies of Wandering Son, Ayako, A Distant Neighborhood,  or AX. But there is a lot of josei manga (which typically does poorly in the wider bookseller market) that I would like to read, and while Vertical has done a good job picking very “Vertical” josei titles, I want more.

Your own answer could vary. I want more geikiga, more historical manga, you might say. I want to read garo or experimental/avante garde manga. I want to read more sports manga. Mecha manga, cooking manga, etc. What do you want published that isn’t published right now?

Micropublishing is a labor of love. And sometimes it is hard business. But, another question: If you aren’t satisfied with the manga output in the US – why not do it yourself?

Review: Limit, Vols. 1-2

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Limit, Vol. 1Limit, Vols. 1-2
Written and Illustrated by Keiko Suenobu
Genre: Shojo/Survival/Horror
Publisher: Vertical Inc.
176 pages | $10.95 US, $11.95 CND
ISBN-13: 978-1935654568 (vol. 1)
ISBN-13: 978-1935654575 (vol. 2)

Seeing Vertical get into shojo was a bit of a surprise. Princess Knight, a Tezuka classic, was a highly demanded piece of work from the Tezuka fan-base that Vertical has cultured, so it wasn’t a surprise to see that published, but Limit is arguably their first attempt to break into a vampires, glitter, and flowers market (I say this endearingly, since the majority of manga I read is shojo).

Please note that this review may contain spoilers. Find out how to win the first two volumes of the series here!

Despite the genre it has been lumped into, Limit certainly follows Vertical‘s edgy, indie ethos. The story follows Mizuki Konno, a self-described “popular girl” who hangs with the right people in school and does the right things to stay popular. On the outside, she is bubbly, careless, but cute, hiding a calculating and stone-cold personality. Her clique picks on a few people, but none more than Morishige, a tarot otaku, making her the brunt of jokes and putting her in situations that embarrass her. The beginning of the book is very Mean Girls, but things suddenly change when the school trip to a week-long camp-out crashes deep into the Japanese forest. Suddenly, the matriarch of Konno’s clan is dead, and the girl at the bottom of the heap, Morishge, now controls the group of survivors with social manipulation and by wielding a scythe (a “tool” brought a long to the camp to cut long grass).

The power twist and destruction of social order in Limit is very reminiscent of Lord of the Flies. Controlling the one weapon gives Morishige all the power, and her rage at being tormented by her peers corrupts her decision-making. There are survival things going on here too, like catching fish and collecting other food, but the real action is Morishige’s maniacal leadership. Seeing how Konno and the other girls in the group react to Morishige is the strength of Limit, and its real draw for me in future volumes (plus a major plot twist I won’t reveal here at the end of volume 2).

Limit, Vol. 2Keiko Suenobu has had another piece of work published in the USA (Life, which was published in 2006 by TOKYOPOP) and her art seems to have improved substantially since that time. Limit is gorgeous. Great shading, dynamic panels, and some of the best power and action lines I’ve seen in shojo manga (or any manga for that matter) to date. Suenobu’s characters are well drawn and well conceived. Morishige as a tarot otaku is a great touch in the middle of volume one; the creepiness of the girl sitting in the middle of a pentagram performing tarot ritual is almost unbearable after seeing some of the proceeding scenes.

One thing that I don’t understand about Limit is its proposed audience. While Vertical claims it is a shojo manga (Limit was published in Bessatsu Friend a manga anthology for teenage girls, and the original publication place of The Wallflower, My Heavenly Hockey Club, Othello, and Mars) it doesn’t seem to fall in line with any of the shojo trends that are currently popular. This doesn’t mean it’s not good manga, just that I find it hard to accept that the target age group is going to really dig Limit. I expect that Limit is more likely to be read by horror fans, josei/seinen fans, and less by those looking for a standard rom-com.

For my money, Limit is one of the better series released in 2012. It has amazing art, really interesting social power interactions, and a riveting storyline. 2013 is going to be a great year of manga because of Limit.


For Fans Of: The Lord of the Flies, Mean Girls, revenge thrillers, any survival story ever
Final Verdict: Highly Recommended

Holiday Giveaway: Vertical Inc

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Heroman, Vol. 1

Earlier this month, I gave away two copies of Osamu Tezuka’s Barbara, a fantastic geikiga manga from Digital Manga Inc.’s Kickstarter initiative. This time I’m stepping it up by giving away copies of books from three separate series, all from indie/small press publisher Vertical Inc.

Vertical has published a lot of interesting manga this year, with plenty to come in the 2013 publishing year. I am looking forward to quite of few of their 2013 titles. But I liked a lot of their 2012 titles, including 5 Centimeters per Second, Limit, and Message to Adolf With that in mind, here’s the giveaway:

I’m giving away three separate prize packages:

A) 5 Centimeters per Second, by Makoto Shinkai and Yukiko Seike
B) Heroman vol. 1, by Taimon Ohta, Stan Lee, and Bones
C) Limit, vols. 1-2, by Keiko Suenobu

Rules/Guidelines:

1. In order to enter the contest, please leave a comment in this post telling me which of the three you want to enter for (you can enter for more than one or all if you choose), and then tell me what Veritcal Inc. manga you are looking forward to most next year. This can be a new release, something you’re already enjoying, or something they’ve already released and you are planning on getting, so think about it!

2. Non-North American readers are welcome to participate. Winners will be asked to verify their address via Twitter or email after the contest has ended. Participants have 3 days to respond to my request, or another participant will be drawn.

3. You can enter for a second chance to win by tweeting about the contest! Just make sure to mention my twitter handle, @mangawidget, when you do, so that I can see your entries.

4. Winners will be announced on December 27th! All entries must be sent in by 12 PM December 27th.

Good luck!

Review: Heroman, Vol. 1

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Heroman, Vol. 1Heroman, Vol. 1
Written and Illustrated by Tamon Ohta | Original Concept Stan Lee + BONES
Genre: Shonen/Science Fiction
Publisher: Vertical Inc.
203 pages | $10.95 US, $11.95 CND
ISBN-13: 978-1935654582

Imagine, for a moment, that you could turn a toy robot into a hulking super hero, just by wanting to be special. In a nutshell, that is the premise of Heroman, an anime from studio BONES, in coordination with Stan Lee. Tamon Ohta’s adaptation of this  television show into the medium of comics has its high and low points. Let’s run it through. Joey Jones is a pretty average kid who ends up finding a toy robot that’s been smashed. He uses his scientific know-how to fix it up, but when a strange calamity strikes, Joey finds out that his toy robot can transform into Heroman, a powerful semi-sentient robot.

First, without getting too specific about plot, Stan Lee’s influence is immediately visible. From the setting, the stereotypes (the nerd, the blonde cheerleader, the football jock, the supportive minority friend), to even the names of the characters, its clear that Stan Lee’s influence is pervasive. For those of you who don’t read American comics, Stan Lee is the creator of comics like The Amazing Spiderman, X-Men, The Fantastic Four, and more. Lee is even featured in some of the panels of the comic (much like his walk on appearances in most of the Marvel movies). And while Lee can construct some interesting fantasies, he requires that your suspension of belief be at maximum – and that’s not something that generally works for Heroman for an analyzing or critical reader.

Most stories in manga are implausible. Psyren for instance, is about a game where people travel back and forth through time, called forth by a mental psychic program called Nemesis Q. Not exactly believable. But what makes these implausible stories interesting is how characters interact, how the fantasies are called forth, and if the world created by these fantasies is cohesive. While Heroman certainly has its own breed of storytelling, I can’t say that it works for me as a critical reader. I find the characters to be what are essentially one-note stereotypes (our hero, Joey Jones is especially so, being nothing but a characterization of faith and doubt), and their interactions are then doomed to be similar stereotypes (the jock vs. the nerd, the hottie defends the nerd vs. the jock, etc.). The fantasies constructed are interesting enough (bug creatures invade the Earth, Heroman is our only hope, “with you, I can fight!”) but the way that they are constructed is haphazard.

More interesting is Joey Jones’ internal struggle in the later half of the book, although it ends in a very spectacular, over-the-top manner like the beginning of the book. We see him trying to come to grips with Heroman and his abilities, and his responsibilities (a la Peter Parker). Our hero manages to come out of his slump and successfully battles more bugs – with a bit of a twist ending that is certainly going to escalate the action in Volume 2.

Dispite my misgivings about the story construction, Heroman feels great for younger readers. There are a lot of messages about hope and friendship that we often see in shonen manga, but they are amped to 11 in Heroman. Younger readers who are more likely to suspend their disbelief, will find this bug squashing, ghost busting beat-em-up to be a real thrill, and it has a typical shonen ethos. I like this comic a lot in the traditional shonen age group, because it looks good, there is a lot of action, and it doesn’t bother getting technical about the fantasy. It’s all POW and WOW, and very little else. This is an untapped audience for most manga in the USA, Chi’s Sweet Home being a notable exception.

The production value on Heroman seems a bit lower than Vertical‘s regular releases. I assume this is because they are trying to fit into a price slot controlled by Viz Media, Kodansha, and Yen Press, but I am used to cleaner, whiter paper and higher-quality inks. This type of production is also present in releases of The Limit, which I will likely review next week. (of note, josei works like Sakuran and Paradise Kiss both have beautiful production, Vertical‘s standard).

Overall, I recommend Heroman to younger readers, but find that if you want your science fiction to be better explained, you aren’t going to enjoy Heroman. If you are turned off by stereotypes, Heroman again might not be your thing. Slightly lower production quality keeps it in an affordable price range, and this book (plus or minus a Heroman DVD) would be a great present for a 8-12 year old.

For Fans Of: The Amazing Spiderman, One Piece, “Friendship, Hard Work, and Victory”
Final Verdict: Recommended with reservations