Ahira's Hangar

As I said a few messages ago, I'm starting our own thread to discuss manga.

Manga, AKA Japanese comics. Recently in the US, a trend of reading Japanese comics (or Manga) is exploding on the scene. A Borders by my house has recently reselved its Manga (along with other graphic novels) into their own section, and the section is nearly as large as the romance section; FYI, the amount of shelf space devoted to a given book category is indicative of their improtance to the book business (and now you know why the romance section is so large). So let's talk manga, and I'm not a purist so if you want to discuss OEL (original English Language) manga; examples, Megatokyo and DramaCon, they'll be fair game, too.

So in no way detracting from the previous message and its request for a more generalistic discussion. However, here I'll discuss specific things I've read or are reading. The list is a little long so it might be split in at least two parts.

Series I've finished:
Genshiken, Kio Shimomoku: Kanji a new university student is deciding what school club to join, school clubs are a big deal in Japan . He chooses the 'Society for the study of Visual Culture', and its short name in Japanese is 'genshiken'. This group is the ultimate nerd, or otaku, possible, and this group feeds his nerd habits of anime, gaming and manga. After Kanji joins this group gets energized and starts sponsering 'cosplay' (costuming), making its own doujinshi (fanzine, or fan comic). It's a lot of fun.

Love Roma, Minoru Toyoda. HS based romantic comedy. Very sweet.

Mail Order Ninja, Josh Elder. This title won Elder the Tokyopop's Rising Stars of Manga contest. Indiana boy mailorders a Ninja in order to save his town and his middle school from the evil social clique taking the school over.

DramaCon, Svetlana Chmakova, canadian artist. Young women who is a writer, and writes fan comics, has personal drama all centering at her big comic book convention she goes to every year.

Densha Otoko: Demo Ore Tabidatsuyo(AKA The Story of a a Train Man who fell in Love with a Girl), Hitori Nakano and Wataru Watanabe, and Train Man: A Shujo Manga, Hitori Nakano an Machiko Ocha. Two different versions of the same allegedly true story based on a story played out on an internet forum (2ch) and there's an original version as a Japanese 'light novel'. A typical Japanese otaku (nerd boy, geek) rescues a beautiful girl from a subway groper, and later the girl sends the geek a thank you gift along with an invitation to stay in touch with each other. The hero goes online to his favorite geek forum, 2ch, asking advice how to handle this. There's been a live action Japanese movie and a Japanese TV drama both story.

Kaze no Sho (AKA Samurai, Jiro Taniguchi and Kan Furuyama. Story set during the Meiji Restoration but the action centers around 17th century founding of the Edo shogunate and the famous swordsman Jubei Yagyu.

More to follow.

The preceding list concerns what I've finished and now we will get to what I've not finished yet.

Monster by Naoki Urasawa. Japanese doctor in Germany tracks down serial killer. That eight word synopsis while accurate, does not fully capture the depth of this plot; in other words, it's a lot more complicated than it sounds. This is great narrative. This is number one on my list to finish. Completed series.

xxxHolic by CLAMP. HS student who sees spirits seeks(?) and gets help from a wish granting witch. One of Japan's most popular series, not finished in Japan, by a popular group of authors. Past titles by Clamp, Magic Knight Rayearth, Card Captor Sakura, Tsubasa Chronicle. More great narrative. This is number one on my list to read new volumes when they're available. Ongoing series.

Nana by Ai Yazawa. Two young women meet on th train to Tokyo and both by go by the name 'Nana'. Nana Komatsu is going to Tokyo live and meet her current boyfriend (Shoji) who left their hometown a year earlier to go to art school, along with her BFF (Junko) and Junko's boyfriend Kyosuke. Nana Ozaki is going to Tokyo to make it big as a punk rocker and maybe bring her hometown band to Tokyo with her. In the next few days in Tokyo the two Nanas meet while apartment hunting and decide to share. From there hijinks follow. Sounds like a soap opera, yeah. And I'm disinclined from band dramas anyway. But this is more. The relationship between the two Nanas is so central to the plot; even though a lot of the narrative is regarding the two Nanas and their respective relationships with the men that come in and out of their lives and it still passes the Bechdel test. It's very popular in Japan and has given rise to a live action TV drama and a live action movie, plus anime. Ongoing series

Marmalade Boy by Wataru Yoshizumi. The parents of HS students Miki Koishikawa and Yuu Matsuura decide to all live together in a big 'happy' family. This decision by Miki's parents sends completely wiggs her out, and of course Yuu turns out to be a cute fellow who will transfer to Miki's HS. From there hijinks follow. More soap opera. Completed series.

Gunslinger Girl by Yu Aida. Girls with seriously debilitating physical conditions are given cybernetic bodies and trained to become government assassins. Echos of Leon: The Professional, GitS: Stand Alone Complex, and more. Again the short explanation does not do the depth of the plot any justice. On hold in Japan.

The following is a list of recommended manga from a recent book about the fan subculture in Japan.

In August/October , Ph.D. student at University of Tokyo, wrote The Otaku Encyclopedia: An Insider's guide to the Subculture of Cool Japan. As an appendix to the text, Patrick has added a list of "manga you can't miss". The list is: Akira, Berserk, Cyboorg 009, Dragon Ball, Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, La Blue Girl, Lone Wolf and Cub, Maison Ikkoku, Monster, Phoenix, Sailor Moon, Slam Dunk, The Rose of Versailles, The Song of the Wind and the Tree's, Tomorrow's Joe. It's to bad but I wish that Galbraith had added reasons these manga would be considered can't miss, but the list is non-annotated.