May
14
Congratulations to Ishikawa Masayuki for winning for Moyashimon!! Finally, they notice the genius of processed foods and the power that bacteria has in our favorite foods!
The 32nd Annual Kodansha Manga Awards has just been announced and Moyashimon got an award for Best General Manga. It also won the grand prize for the Tezuka!! Yay! I’m not so sure if the anime played in its popularity or at least exposure, but a lot of interesting things did happen to the manga last year so it’s quite amazing that way. :3
Another personal favorite of mine won. It’s called Kimi ni Todoke and it won for Best Shoujo. I’m not so sure if it’s licensed yet, but yeah, this is another great shoujo story and I hope it gets translated in english too. Its story is similar to The Wallflower without being too repetitive and stubborn. Its delightful without containing too much drama from shoujo mangas.
Manga awards are a great way to find titles outside your usual haunts. Some people are always iffy about award-winning mangas because some think it’s for those with sophisticated tastes and all that. However, it would never hurt to understand why it was shortlisted or why it even won for that award. I was a Naoki Urasawa fan and was pleased to see Pluto win for a Tezuka before. That same year, there was that shortlisted manga named Nodame Cantabile that got me curious. After checking it out, I was blown away with Nodame’s insanity. That experience convinced me that there’s a greater world out there other than those deemed as ‘popular’. So don’t be afraid to check these mangas out if you can. It’d be quite an experience. :3
So for a short quip, congratulations to Moyashimon for winning the lot this year!!
みんな！かもすぜー！
Apr
23
Yotsuba and Danboard, the environmentally friendly robot, wants to remind you some environmentally friendly tips that otakus like you and me can do to make the earth breathe every now and then.
- Turn your PC off tonight. Make it rest. Someone will still be seeding those torrents tomorrow.
- Got some old issues of Shounen Jump or Ace lying around that you just bought for knack but never read? Tear them up to pieces and use it as bed for your cat or dog.
- Reuse all those amazon and yes asia boxes. You can store all your undisplayed figures and outgrown mangas there. lol.
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Stand up from your desk and have a walk at the park. Turn off your PC while you’re at it.
- Use a bike going to work pray that somewhere in between your home and work, you go into a time slip.
- Don’t use your aircon for a day and give some lovin’ to the earth by opening your window for fresh air.
We otakus can take a part in saving the environment despite our dependency on technology and material things. It’s the least that we can do before some alien further destroys our earth and we go to an epic journey of finding a way to get rid of them.
Feb
25
This weekend’s bacterial invasion
Filed Under Blog | 9 Comments
We had a three day weekend in Manila and I was caught by surprise when my mailman knocked at my door last Saturday telling I had a package. He gave me TWO big boxes of things. One box, we won’t be really concerned about, but the other… WHOO BOY! It’s too cute to pass up.
Let’s just say that last Friday, there’s a riot in Akihabara for something yellow and something cute. As announced sometime ago, those who will buy the Limited Edition of Moyashimon Vol. 6 will receive a 40cm A. Oryzae stuffed toy. Months ago, I was struggling between getting this or getting the DVD stuffed toy. The DVD stuffed toy was a palm’s width and when you press it, it says “Kamosuzo!” It was cute and all, but somehow at the last minute, I backed out and didn’t decide to buy it. On the other hand, there was that 40 cm. cuteness which I thought was too big for you to actually enjoy as a bacteria. Time came and went and I was supposed to cancel my order again at the last minute, but my reliable vendor has already shipped it. I was partially aghast, then thoughts of “Imma sell it when it arrives.” came to my head.
Then it arrived Saturday, just a day after its release in stores in Japan. YES!!1 I’ve got this huge box and when I opened, the cutest and LARGEST A. Oryzae just popped out and I can totally hear him/it screaming “Kamosuzo!!” It was too cute to pass up that I literally washed my hands and my face just to cuddle the BIG BACTERIA!
A. Oryzae was so cute!! He was so cute that all my thoughts of selling the damn bacteria just disappeared. Funny how it had a big big box for Oryzae and right at the bottom was the manga for volume 6 of Moyashimon plus a clear file that served both as book cover. Sweet. Really sweet.
A friend of mine has told me that I’m picky to buy mangas for because I always enjoy the limited edition stuff. Well, partially true. The Japanese have a knack for creating GREAT limited edition stuff. I mean, for a doll bigger than my head plus a manga and a clear file, that’s got to be the best 2,500 yen (1000 peso) buy that I have ever bought!! My word of advice, if you love a series too much and YOU KNOW they’re releasing something that is limited edition and it’s to your fancy, buy it without regret. It’s bound to be good.
I’m totally happy with my moyashimon buy! :3 Had I known moyashimon when volume 4 came out with those chibbi bacteria figures, I would have bought it. ><;; But this deal is good enough for me. I wonder if US Publishers would ever release limited goods like this with their manga. I’ve heard about the Naruto cabinet, but other than that, have there been fun ones released with the manga? The Japanese Nodame comes out with a special audio CD for their supposed ‘art book’ that contains feature on the music and stuff. Volume 18 came with a keychain. Hmm, I wonder when US would start having cool stuff like that. I might be buying more english mangas if they do. I’m such a sucker for stuff that way. XD
- This is why I love BK1 [↩]
Nov
27
Making manga out of anything
Filed Under Features, Insights | 9 Comments
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
Oct
25
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.
- Link via Manga Blog [↩]
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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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