May
11
A trufax theme for all Shounen Jump fans
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I didn’t believe this at first but my good Japanese friend gave me a copy of a song, a fervent anthem for Shounen Jump! I don’t know if this is a real song but it seems to be sung by a real band named ザ・ブレッスン・フォア. They seem to have sung other anime songs such as Combattler V theme and the Kamen Rider theme.
The song is actually quite amusing and captures the spirit of the magazine’s kickass nature. So it tells you to share a punch or two with your siblings and never give up when you fall. Well, what do you expect from a song about Shounen Jump?
Enjoy listening to it. It’s quite a treat!
For those who wants to sing it, here are the lyrics. Sorry if I don’t translate it to romaji. A little pressed for time here. But for those who can read, enjoy!
Continue reading A trufax theme for all Shounen Jump fans
Feb
13
#14 - Historie by Iwaaki Hitoshi
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Historie by Iwaaki Hitoshi
Serialized in Afternoon
Published by Kodansha
Life has its strange ways of twisting fate. It can take you to the deepest trench of fandom only to fish you out and show you something your heart has always longed for. In this case, it took a simple reminder of Parasyte and its author and how he has that strange new title running in Afternoon, Historie.
It didn’t take me a chapter to be swept away. A young man fleeing the Persian continent, dragging Aristotle with him in his makeshift pedal boat. The historian in me could not help but squee over this romantic tale of a young man following the footsteps of Odysseus. And did I add that you have Alexander the Great in manga?
Oh yes, Historie has one great history to offer.
Continue reading #14 - Historie by Iwaaki Hitoshi
Jan
8
2008 was all about Morning
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Morning New Year Cover" src="http://www.punkednoodle.com/champloo/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/cover_6.jpg" alt="Kami no Shizuku welcomes the New Year" width="206" height="288" />
Hrmm… a little late, but it’s better late than never! \o/
This year, rather than talking about the animes I’ve seen and loved this year, I’d share to you one of the best things I’ve had for a year.
I’ve always been hesitant to buy manga magazines. I think for the longest time, I’ve been pondering over subscribing to Shounen Sunday or Shounen Jump. For a while, I even pondered about subscribing to Kiss. Somehow, I never really had the chance to subscribe even if I was actually interested in it. Until last year, when a little trip to the grocery store got me wondering if I could actually get a subscription locally.
When 2008 started, I realized that a local Japanese Grocery store1 carried the magazine, Morning. Now, I’ve been eternally curious about Morning since Ed from Mangacast spoke highly of it. More so, a couple of titles I’ve been interested in were running there, such as Kami no Shizuku and Kinou Nani Tabeta. It wasn’t my usual cup of tea (really, I was more interested in Shounen Jump), but I thought I’d give it a shot. So I bought a copy. The next thing I know, I was already asking the manager if I can get a subscription.
Sure, Morning doesn’t have the most popular titles among kids but it does have a great array of reads that I did not expect. It ranges from the unexpectedly cute with Chi’s Sweet Home to the intense Zipang. As I flip through the pages, I fell in love more and more with the magazine, unexpectedly drawn to read stories that I’d probably wouldn’t give a second look if I was browsing a shelf. And for this I’m grateful for the magazine. Morning has nice stories to tell and if I hadn’t read the magazine, I wouldn’t know how wonderful these stories are.
In a year, I found myself enjoying a couple of titles. Here’s a rundown of my favorites currently running in the magazine.
- Kami no Shiziku (The wine manga we’ve all been dying to get translated!)
- Kinou Nani Tabeta (The Yoshinaga Fumi foodie manga we long to read about.)
- Piano no Mori (A story of a young boy who found love for music in the middle of a forest)
- Uchuu Kyoudai (A story of brothers gunning to take over space)
- Shima Shima (Can’t sleep? Then let the boys of Strip Sheep cuddle you to bed)
- Chi’s Sweet Home (Ah~ Cute little Chi~! Who can’t resist this kitty!?)
- Himawari (The dreams of a small town OL to become a mangaka2)
- Billy Bat (Urasawa’s Morning contribution. It’s becoming more trippy by the chapter! I love it!)
See, I didn’t expect to actually end up reading more than the 2 titles I actually bought Morning for. Last year, they even published a New Year’s St. Oniisan chapter in Morning and I owe it to that chapter for introducing me to St. Oniisan.
If there’s one thing I love about Morning, it’s how their catch phrase is not a lie. On every cover of Morning, there’s a catch phrase that says “読むと元気になる” (When you read this, you’ll feel great). And certainly my mornings feel great, thanks to Morning.
- For Metro Manila residents, this is Yamazaki, the Japanese Grocery store near Makati Cinema Square [↩]
- Don’t know much about this, but I caught Himawari during this said arc [↩]
Nov
18
Oh My Jump Heroines
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How do you like your Shounen Jump heroine?
Do you love her dressed in a pristine school uniform, where her smiling face (and possibly panties or if your lucky, cleavage) grace every panel? Do you like her making bentou for the hero, sharing laughs right before he enters the greatest of his greatest battles? Or do you love her strong, the type who would smack the hero when he is wrong and is generally unforgiving to anyone who insults her short skirt but is soft to the hero who basically ignores her D-size bra? If she has one.
For years, legions of Jump readers, particularly women from the Western frame of thought1, would write a post or two complaining why women in a particular Shounen Jump manga is often misrepresented. An interesting rant came by my timeline today, a disheartened Katekyo Hitman Reborn! fan who cannot forgive Akira Amano for making cooks out her heroines. In her blog, she pines about why the female characters in Reborn have been ill-presented, nothing but dolls whose only purpose in the story was to make the boys look better.
Yeah. Right.
Continue reading Oh My Jump Heroines
- Oh yes! Orientalism plays a key part here! [↩]
Oct
29
Distracted by Urasawa’s Billy Bat
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I can’t get it out of my system. I’m compelled to spazz.
Three weeks ago, Morning announced that they’ll be bringing a set of new titles for magazine, the first of which was a story named Billy Bat written by Naoki Urasawa. The story, as they published in the presses, is a mix of Mickey Mouse, Superman, Spiderman, Batman, Dick Tracy, and slew of other American comic icons combined. Seeing the cover art made me think once or twice about what Urasawa was up to. They even showed a cover spiel at the Morning website. First, it looked like a superflat Batman. Second, honestly, it didn’t feel like it was Urasawa’s line of work. I started to think, was Urasawa undergoing some mangaka mid-life crisis and wanted trying something very new to him? Either way, I patiently waited for my Morning issue the next week. Maybe I’ll get my answers there.
True enough, Billy Bat was on the cover in last week’s issue and the first chapter was printed on a paper that reminded me of old American comics. It was packaged in such a way that there were ads for Billy Bat and on it was a name that shook my senses over lunch: Kevin Yamagata. When I saw that name, I turned to my friend and told her, “I have a feeling that Billy Bat is not Urasawa’s work.” So I speculated to my friend a theory. That Billy Bat was a front and the real story revolves around the author, this Kevin Yamagata. I even imagined how in a chapter, the comic will pan out and it will show Mr. Yamagata working on Billy Bat. This was of course, my speculation. And really, a good part of me that week wanted to wait for the next few chapters before spazzing1 because… it was a very different Urasawa and I found it difficult to see how the hell he will spin Billy Bat’s world and art in the same way he has spun the lives of Johann, Miyuki, and Kenji. So my theory is, if he managed to shift people’s vision of Atom in Pluto, he can do the same for Billy Bat. And so this week came, and you know what… Urasawa and I mindmelded2.
Continue reading Distracted by Urasawa’s Billy Bat
- although at this time, I was already spazzing because I find his drawings cute [↩]
- Insert my fangirling screams here [↩]
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Otaku Champloo is...
a small serving of bittersweet manga bits by a manga addict named Khursten.
She currently digs mangas about boys who live to be men. -
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