Tag Archives: manga

Give Yourself a Hug

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“Kingyo Used Books” is the heartwarming tale of a guy who finds a used book shop that sells manga and it reignites his faith in manga which is also his faith in life. And, of course, you’re reading a manga too, and it’s a manga about how great it is that you’re reading manga, which makes your life double-plus good worthwhile with a cute manga storekeep thrown in into the bargain for you to start a meaningful flirtation with and perhaps “something more,” I wouldn’t be surprised. And that’s incredibly valuable because, after all, the book seems to say, the people reading this aren’t actually people at all — they’re glommed together homonculi made out of consumer enthusiasms and social networking software and smiley icons. Without the reassuring infrastructure of positive blogging, they’d experience buyer’s remorse and simply discorporate.

Until now! Because “Kingyo Used Books” kicks the critics to the curb and speaks to you directly. “Manga!” it says. “Manga’s great! Don’t let anyone tell you different! It’s good…and good for you!” So give that manga a hug. It likes you because you like it because it likes you — and there’s nothing more important than a beautiful relationship with the crap you buy.

Neither New Nor Manga — Discuss.

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Mammoth Book of Best New Manga
Ilya, ed.
Running Press

It’s rare to find a book with not one, not two, but three prevarications in its title. The Mammoth Book of Best New Manga is, in the first place, not manga — hardly any of the creators are from Japan (most appear to be from the U.S., England, and China.) And while some of the stories are obviously in the manga tradition, many of the others look like…just plain comics. Nor is the work in the volume necessarily “new” — the first piece, “Kitsune Tales” by Andre Watson and Woodrow Phoenix, for example, was published originally in 2003, five years before this volume’s 2008 copyright. And, finally, the volume is not a “best of” in any usual sense; the pieces weren’t selected from any defined pool that I can see. Rather, they seem to have been chosen from the author’s network of friends, acquaintances, and readings. In some cases creators came to his attention through contests he judged. A couple of the entries here are even submissions.

In other words, if, like me, you read the title and thought, “Hey, this is going to show me some of the most exciting work in Japanese comics created during the last year or so!” — well, you’re going to be seriously disappointed, because this ain’t that. Instead, it’s just another anthology, like Kramer’s Ergot or Mome, though in comparison to those two series it’s aimed at a younger, less artsy audience.

Of course, there’s nothing wrong with anthologies per se. A pulpier, all ages Kramer’s Ergot — that’d be great. Unfortunately, the confusion evinced by Brand New Manga’s title seems to reflect, not only marketing gone haywire, but a general lack of editorial vision. Even when I don’t like Sammy Harkham’s selections (Kevin Huizenga…eh) they at least feel like conscious, idiosyncratic aesthetic statements. Whereas much of the material in Best New Manga seems to have been chosen at random.

Robert Deas’ “Infinity Rising,” for example, is entirely predictable space opera, complete with a torched farmhouse lifted from Star Wars, a gratuitous revenge motif, some gratuitous violence against women, and preposterous, pumped-up anatomy, digitally-colored so that the muscles look like hunks of plastic. Mitz’s “Pilot” is a by-the-numbers sci-fi YA kid-gets-super-powers story; it’s charming and competent, enough, sure, but it’s hard to see why an editor would jump up and say, “Yes, I must have this rather than all the other work that looks much like it!” Or again, Rainbow Buddy’s yaoi entry “Snowfall” shows some kid looking up and mooning enthusiastically as images from the past bleed into each other and everything is flecked with stars — fine if you like that sort of thing, I’m sure…but if you like that sort of thing, surely you’ve seen lots and lots of similar exercises as good as or better than this one?

I could go on and on, really: why the Tank Girl rip off? The utterly clichéd coma-victim-saved-by-dream-ghost-girl riff? Why a story devoted entirely to the saccharine question, “Wouldn’t it be cute if we drew a cat as a human with cat ears?” And, good lord, if you have to print a sixth-rate “Is-the-android-really-human?” story, please try to pick one that doesn’t end with the protagonist staring up wistfully into the sky thinking to herself: “I don’t know what my future will hold, but I won’t be bound by my past.” That’s just egregious.

The book is almost 450 pages long, and at that length even the most benighted editor is bound to include at least a few decent pieces. Michael Kacar’s Ramen Jiman does a funny take on Iron Chef with some genuinely loopy gags (generations of heifers force-fed red-hot-chili to fulfill their destiny as a component of spicy beef ramen) and very accomplished black and white shonen style art. Gilian Sein Ying Ha’s “Darumafish” features beautifully scratchy but controlled linework, almost as if Edward Gorey had decided to draw shojo. Laura Howell’s “The Bizarre Adventures of Gilbert and Sullivan” made me laugh out loud several times. Gilbert’s mischievous nieces run amok, but Arthur Sullivan is oddly placid. “Even now, they’re filling your trousers with offal and you’re entirely unconcerned,” muses the hyper-deformed and disgruntled librettist. “Woman + My trousers = Good!” exclaims Sullivan. Against such successes, though, you have to balance James Romberger and Marguerite Van Cook’s unforgivably pretentious “Ground Zero-The Wedge,” in which a couple of New York hipsters burble on endlessly about lots of, like, far-out ideas, man, while the trendy, graffiti-inspired art tries desperately to be witty and self-referential. (Look! The characters are pulling up the edge of a panel! That’s so post-modern!)

In the intro, Ilya declares “Best New Manga exists to showcase the best of what’s new from the rising generation of international talent.” If I thought that this were really the best of what the rising generation of international talent had to offer, I’d be seriously depressed. Luckily, all you have to do is glance through, say, Dokebi Bride or Nana or even Bizenghast to know that there’s much superior work out there. Manga doesn’t need Ilya to promote it, and it will suffer no especial harm from having this anthology take its name in vain. Still, it’d be nice to have a title that more accurately reflected the contents. The Mammoth Book of Randomly Selected, Relatively Recent Comics has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?

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This review was originally published in the Comics Journal.

Review: Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms

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“The ultimate defeat is, in short, to forget; especially to forget those who kill us. It is to die without any suspicion, to the very end, of how perverse people are. There is no use in struggling when we already have one foot in the grave. And we must not forgive and forget. We must report, one by one, everything we have learned about the cruelty of man. Otherwise we cannot die. If we do this, then our lives will not have been wasted.”

Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Le Voyage au Bout de la Nuit (as quoted by Kenzaburo Oe in Hiroshima Notes (“On Human Dignity”))

Fumiyo Kouno’s famous work on the after effects and survivors of the Hiroshima bomb needs little by way of introduction. Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms has won a Tezuka prize and has received near unanimous acclaim from American comic critics. This includes a book of the year citation from Dirk Deppey as well as high and consistent praise from the noted manga critic, David Welsh, who counts it among his very favorites.

The opening pages of  Kouno’s narrative are intentionally filled with a sense of the ordinary: there is a period of communion over a recently finished dress; the protagonist’s, Minami’s,  tranquil passage through the city of Hiroshima with its period detail; and her quiet austerity as she collects bamboo wrappers to make a pair of sandals. The gentle rhythms of life and conversation are interrupted only by Minami’s exclamations and flashbacks.  Her past ordeals are inseparable from her present reality and triggered by the simplest of suggestions: in one instance, that she would make “a good wife” and, later, a combination of memory and the senses as the shadows, heat and steam of a bathhouse produce unwelcome reminiscences. Another flashback is triggered by the hint of romantic love which becomes mixed with descriptions of swollen bodies, melting shoes and of walking over the dead. Her friends and family remain at a distance, almost placid observers of her gradual descent into darkness. It is this tragic lyricism, the slow but measured pace conferring a sense of dignity, which seems to have earned Kouno’s story a place in so many readers’ hearts.

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Poison, Parakeets, Valets, and Ink: Godchild

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This week I’m taking a brief break from rooting around in the comic racks for new titles. I need to make a trip to a local comic store rather than Borders because I’d like to take a break from the X-Men. I thought I might pick up the most popular comics and do those instead of just whatever catches my eye; but that’s for the future.

What’s now is Godchild and it is awesome.

For those who don’t know, Godchild (and it’s sister series Count Cain), follows the story of the young Earl of Hargreaves and his valet, Riff. It’s created by Kaori Yuki and available in its entirety from Viz.

The Count is young and beautiful, as per usual for manga:

But there are a whole lot of manga about beautiful young men and their butlers. Well, OK, maybe not with their butlers. But why is this manga worth talking about? Why am I recommending it?

First, I think the art is gorgeous. The style in Count Cain (which was written before Godchild) has the older Kaori Yuki style, but Godchild has a sophisticated, lush, beautifully inked style that makes my heart sing. The negative space and the elegance of the line is often enough for me to just stare at a page for a while:

The layout in Godchild is much more varied than the usual manga. The shots focus on a face, then a place, then a hand or symbol, and then back again. It creates a deep rhythm that adds to the Victorian lushness.

Then there’s the story. Godchild is about the Earl of Hargreaves and his adventures, but to say that is both accurate and misleading. While Cain is a hero, he’s also something of an anti-hero. His personal hobby is poison and in the first story, he uses his dark skills to manipulate a murderer into a vile killing. Cain’s hands are clean of blood, but he’s still very much responsible for the death. He wound up the murderer and pointed him at the target. He is well aware of this and it doesn’t bother him.

This story is dark. It includes abuse and incest, zombies, heads in jars, and death everywhere. One theme in Kaori Yuki’s work is scars. Abuse and violence leave permanent marks that can never be fully washed away. Manipulation is everywhere and reality is often fluid. And dark.

Many beautiful old poems, nursery rhymes, and horror themes show up. This is very much an adult story but it includes many looks back towards childhood and the vulnerability of being a child as well as the trappings of childhood.

The beginning volumes are semi-episodic.  They contain small mysteries which the Count solves, but they slowly add in larger story arcs.  One of the things that makes this such a fun story is the horror elements and the twisty character revelations as time passes.  It also includes girls who eat parakeets, killer parrots, heads in jars, zombies, ominous violin players, Tarot groups, deadly treats, and dolls.

I would like to discuss some of the larger themes, but to do so would constitute a major spoiler for the entire series.  Suffice to say that the story slowly builds an amazing amount of information in the strangest and most fun places that are only understandable looking back.  This series bears up well under rereads.  Highly recommended.

Some other excellent essays on Godchild are here: CoffeeAndInk’s review of Godchild Volume 1; Oyceter’s review of Godchild volume 1.

Ooku Volume 1: Some Impressions

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Fumi Yoshinaga’s Ooku is set in an alternate Edo period Japan where the male population has been halved by an epidemic known as the Redpox with the women taking the majority of male societal roles as a result. Noah has a short synopsis and glowing review of the first volume at the previous HU site and is probably its most articulate proponent. In fact, his gushing enthusiasm for the series is the reason why I picked up a copy of volume 2 without even bothering to read the volume I had at hand.

I’m a bit more ambivalent about what I’ve read so far.

One of my problems with Ooku is that it asks us to accept a logical leap of faith without sufficient justification: that a Japan reduced to a population consisting of 25% men would be ruled and dominated by women over the course of 3 Shogunates (80 years). The haste with which the scenario is dispensed to the readers in the initial pages of the first volume suggests that Yoshinaga is less concerned with the internal consistency of her scenario than with its final consequences.

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Torturing Children for the Honor of the Nation – A Comment

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(or Torturing Children can be Ignored, but only sometimes)

This is a reply to some of Noah’s comments following his review of Lady Snowblood which can be found here. From the looks of things, this might be a manga themed week at The Hooded Utilitarian.

In his final comments, Noah writes:

“Well, there’s appalling morality and then there’s appalling morality. I don’t have any trouble with lots of things that are variously horrific, from Johnny Ryan to Female Prisoner Scorpion to slasher films.”

It’s difficult for me to mount an adequate defense of the manga of Kazuo Koike (and Lady Snowblood is somewhat typical of Koike) since I’m not really that much of a fan. In fact, I’m pretty much totally detached from his works in the same way I’m pretty detached from Alex Raymond’s Flash Gordon – interested enough to recognize him as an important voice in manga but not enough to recommend him to anyone with only a peripheral interest in comics.

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