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.
Popularity: 19% [?]
- Oh yes! Orientalism plays a key part here! [↩]
Mr. Welsh, I feel you. There is an ongoing frustration among English manga readers of not getting their hands on some really good mangas. My friends alone would make it a habit to ask me what happened in the latest Nodame or Moyashimon not because they can’t buy the manga in Japanese (it’s a lot easier for us here) but because they cannot read it. At least for Nodame, it’s being translated (you just have to be patient about it), but there are a wealth of mangas that would some time to get translated, or probably will never get translated at all.
I always wondered why some mangas never see the light of licensing among the US publishers. For most, it’s whether it will make a sale. 20 or so manga bloggers who blog about Japanese titles wouldn’t probably make a difference in the grand scheme of things. Putting it into english and in a quality that readers like would mean costs. And I think most of us know that. Although fans would say they’ll buy it, more often than not, it’s only those who really can afford it do buy the manga the moment it comes out in the list. And they’re not a lot among manga fans. But sometimes, they do take a risk. Who knew Nodame would hit big when Del Rey got it? So there must be something other than costs on why they license and probably not license a title.
In a conversation with Ed, he told me how publishers in Japan sometimes push titles for licensing. He asked me about a particular title and what I thought of it since it was in consideration for licensing and I was thinking “Why not get Chi’s Sweet Home instead?” Ed enlightens me that even if english publishers want to get something more popular (e.g. Moyashimon), because they are already popular in Japan and probably earning a lot, publishers won’t push these titles for licensing and would probably place it at the end of their agenda. It’s not saying that they won’t be licensed, but instead, they just want to perhaps make up for the cost of a manga that was probably eating up their resources, hence the push for the obscure titles that are good but not exactly popular in the Japanese market.
To be honest, that’s rather upsetting because it only means that for some titles that we like, we’ve got to lobby for it to get it and that would take some time. A manga’s popularity sometimes ride on its popularity in Japan. When you hear the buzz about it from those who are in the scene, you wish that you can easily get it. Like I’m sure fans of Moyashimon who managed to see the anime want to get their hands on the manga. The manga’s richer in story compared to anime, but yes, it’s only in Japanese and quite difficult to read too (especially since it doesn’t have furiganas for those sc). When the hype for a series is gone and your patience has worn down, sometimes you lack interest in getting that said title to the point that you don’t wish to get it at all. And there is little market in nostalgia for mangas and this is probably why Slam Dunk never really got past the first two volumes in my country. We can at most, be really hopeful that eventually, it will come to our english-speaking shores. Hopefully not too late because we’re really missing out on a lot. Because there are lots of mangas that are left untranslated and they have stories that I’m sure we’ll learn and enjoy. Stories like St. Oniisan, Moyashimon, Detroit Metal City, Touch, H2, Cross Game, Rough, Himawari, Kimi ni Todoke, Arigatou, Zipang, Candy Candy, Kaze to Ki no Uta, Glass no Kamen (Glass Mask), Cat’s Eye, Tokimeki Tonight… As more time passes, more and more mangas are coming with great stories.
In this scenario, would our best bet to get these read in English would be those scanlating groups online? Scanlating’s a whole post altogether (and a lot of people have said a word or two about it) but although I see the convenience and accessibility of scanlations, it’s still nice to read a manga leisurely in your couch knowing that you fed your favorite mangaka and his assistants for at least a day.
Popularity: 7% [?]
I’m in the midst of post amazement season. I’ve been watching/reading this really funny series named Moyashimon. It’s been running for a month and I’ve been pimping their widget, the yellow thingie at the side that has rounded floating objects that would scream “Kamosuzo1” and every second or so. To the untrained eye, they’re just mascots. But for those who know, they’re actually… bacteria.
Yes. Those icky microbes that some of us are afraid to mess with has a manga of their own named Moyashimon and I’ve been pimping it to everybody I know at work, at home, at my friend’s blogs (and my personal blog), and basically everywhere!
Honestly, bacteria. Who would have thought of that?! A true cohesive story about a boy who can communicate with bacteria. As Itsuki-sensei says it in every episode, “Sugoi yo ne2”. The series even has E.Coli and Dysentery presented as cute and lovable characters. YES! Even E.Coli and Green Fungi (P. Chrysogenum) are too cute to resist!! I’m completely forgetting that they’re lethal and icky bacterias!!
I mean, this is, part in part, a fan who is just in awe of the extent of manga’s topics. What have they not done? Giant Robots. Done. Soo done. Animals. Done. Talking animals. Done too. Zombies. Done. A galactic bakufu that features a pet duck, a lazy rounin, cross-dressing geishas and the shinsengumi. DONE! Mermaid Yakuzas. SOOO DONE. What is left?
…I’m actually stumped.
So let’s play a little game, shall we? I’d like to ask my readers (and if you want, ask your friends too, if they’re interested) if they think that there’s a topic or a theme that manga hasn’t handled yet. And readers can also answer if these topics have been done. Think the craziest!
Like I’m sure there’s no manga yet that has one of those chemistry cooking things wherein you cook your food (like curry or pasta in liquid nitrogen). I’m also sure that I haven’t read a sentai BL manga (ooooh! Imagine the tension among teammates!). I was about to say about a super pessimist guy that not even a ghost can make him more negative (Oh wait, Oda Eiichiro just did that in OP). I’m stumped… honestly! I’m really stumped. So, do you have any themes that you think mangakas haven’t written and should write about it? :3
On a side note… if you can read Japanese, read Moyashimon manga. If not, then watch the anime. There are subs lurking around in places. :3
Popularity: 15% [?]
Okay. So Japan requests that America should put some kind of regulation with the distribution of anime online1 . Perhaps in the same strength that Odex tries to control the Singapore market? A part of me says that this kind of deal is fair. When I read stories of animators and mangakas and their hard lives, it’s just right to put some money in their pocket for the thousands of animes and mangas downloaded at a time.
But, there’s also a part of me who is rather troubled. For a small country like mine, a country who doesn’t have a large array of licensed animes and mangas for sale on the shelves (except for Voltes V and Daimos and a dreadful set of mangas), downloading online seems to be the best option if you’re really a big fan of this genre. Some can wait. But for those who can’t, IRC and torrents are the way to go. Not everyone has big paychecks to order their favorite mangas and anime online. $15 dollars for a manga (if you include the shipping) is quite costly for many fans. All the more if they have to spend $30 for a DVD of an anime. Many anime fans are students and many (like myself) wait until they get a decent job for them to even start investing on these kinds of things.
Popularity: 9% [?]
- Link via Manga Blog [↩]
This weekend, I can’t help but enjoy John Jakala’s slew of ideas with regards to mixing mangakas with amecomi. :3 Actually for the past two weeks, he’s been enjoying the idea of mixing eastern stories with that of the west. My favorite was the Yotsuba with Calvin and Hobbes (soo cute!) and now, even drabbling with the idea of Takeshi Obata drawing Batman. Well, why not!? Although I highly doubt they will ever drabble into creating something like that, it’d be amazing if they were commissioned to do something like it. Just make sure you have someone like Jeph Loeb as the genius to write a story for Obata, I’m sure he’ll pull it off. I mean, he made go interesting! There’s so much he can do! (obviously, I’m a fan. lol.)
What was interesting was Ed of Mangacast pointing out which of the American counterparts would draw something from Mangadom. Would you see Frank Miller drawing something like Monster or maybe Vagabond? Would you imagine Jeph Loeb writing something like Liar Game? I know a Filipino comic artist, Elmer Damaso, is drawing Speed Racer for Seven Seas (Yay, Mer!), but I guess he counts now for the American manga industry. Going back to Seven Seas, imagine Madeline Rosca drawing Card Captor Sakura and other youthful Clamp stories. It’s quite interesting, and perhaps if America’s doujin community is as nurturing as the Japanese market, we could have seen the likes of these experiments in the West.
Another interesting mix is the study on the concept of Superheroes being similar in both the West and the Japanese. Many manga fans have scrutinized the American heroes saying they don’t compare with their American counterparts. Some of my comic reading friends think that manga charas don’t compare with their superheroes. Well, read and weep, disbelievers! This article fleshes it out for you how they can be similar too… in some aspects. :3
Lovely weekend reads that made me wish that there was a Kinokuniya nearby for me to flock and oggle over books for. *prays December*. Well, this three day weekend allowed me to catch up on some fun reads, including some highly sought after Metal Gear doujins! (Yay!! Snakey-wakey schmex!!) *sigh* I hope next week, I don’t get eaten by work again. :3
Popularity: 2% [?]
Kreuz on 
