Sundries

I don’t think I’ve posted about anime in a while.  With my little sidetrack of spending way too much time in WOW and then getting out of WOW into studying photography I had been spending way less time watching anime then I usually do.  Thankfully I recently got caught up on all my regular shows as well as finished off a few old ones I never completed watching.

The series I’m watching new episodes of each week are still Naruto, Bleach, and Soul Eater.  As much as I like Shojo and comedy I’m still a guy and these shows speak directly to my inner child’s need for shows about action, fights, and overloads of testosterone.  Plus they are filled with some good humor as well which I always love.

Tonight I just finished off a rather disappointing old series I never finished called Comic Party: Revolution.

If you have never seen the original Comic Party I highly recommend it.  It’s a great series filled with humor and interesting peaks inside the world of doujinshi making.  Granted, it’s a very “family safe” view of that world which is not very realistic but it’s still fun.  (See my description of doujinshi below)

Unfortunately the 2nd series, which is called Comic Party: Revolution, is’t very good.  Let’s face it, for the most part it sucks.  I only made it through about 8 or 9 episodes when I first watched it.  I wanted to enjoy it so much but in the end I couldn’t take it and put the series on the side, even though my favorite character, Aya Hasebe, still was a cute as ever:

It’s been a few years since I did that and I picked it up and finished watching it tonight.  It still wasn’t good but it was watchable.  Out of the 13 episodes I only really enjoyed episode 12 which was very similar to the original series.  It was all about making the stories, the artists feelings for what they create, and the process involved behind the scenes.

What exactly is Doujinshi?

Doujinshi is the term used to describe amateur artists who make their own manga (comic books), print them, and then sell them to their fans.  Many of these doujinshi are parodies of famous manga and anime in Japan.  These artists don’t get the permission to do these parodyies but for the most part the owners of these original works don’t pursue any legal actions against these amateur artists and let them continue their publications.

This is somewhat surprising since the vast majority of doujinshi are pornographic in nature.  In America it’s hard to imagine DC Comics letting someone write their own comic books using the DC universe characters and then selling them to the public.  Now imagine if they were also pornographic stories?

That’s basically what happens in Japan.  There are hundreds of artists doing pornographic comics with the characters from almost every series, even the huge ones such as Naruto, Bleach, and even Comic Party.

What’s interesting is that many of the manga artists who created the characters in the popular anime on TV got their start by being doujinshi artists.  I’ve heard that a number of them still will create doujinshi under another name because they enjoy the ability to create whatever they want.  They do not have a studio telling them what the character should look like, behave, or if they should have a cute animal mascot or not!!!!!   LOL

You may be asking yourself, ‘does anybody really go to these conventions where they sell doujinshi?’  If you only describe it as amateur artists making pornographic comic books it doesn’t sound like much but as you can see from the image above from Mizuki Signalization many artis are very talented.  The doujinshi conventions are very popular and VERY CROWDED.  At a recent ComKet there was a 5 hour wait in line before the doors opened.  This is just to be able to get into the building, wait on line at the tables of various sellers, and buy their doujinshi – it’s not being given away for free.

Here is a video clip I found showing an example of how incredibly crowded these places get:

These conventions aren’t the only places that you can buy doujinshi but many of these people are die hard fans of the artists and want to make sure they can get a copy of the Circles work.  A Circle is the term used to refer to the group of people that put together the doujinshi.  Some Circles are only a single person that does it all and others may contact a number of people who all work together.

I think it’s pretty safe to say that the most famous of the Circles is CLAMP though I don’t know if you would say they are doujinshi artist.  They are a collection of female artists who are professional manga creators and have had a large number of their stories get turned into popular anime shows:

• Angelic Layer
• Cardcaptor Sakura
• Chobits
• Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE
• XXXHOLiC

I think I should point out that CLAMP doesn’t put out pornographic material, as far as I’m aware.   If you haven’t seen any of their stuff I strongly recommend you watch Card Captor Sakura and Chobits.  Both are very good stories, funny, and at times a bit sad.

I plan on continuing to work on finishing some anime series that I started but didn’t continue for some reason.  I currently have about 25 of those left in my list on ANN:

Seen Some

At this time I’ve seen about 214 complete anime series, at least that I’ve documented at ANN:

Seen All of the Series

Granted, some of these are 1-3 episode OAVs which aren’t impressive but it’s still a good amount.  All the new ones I enter to the list I try to give a brief review to on ANN as well.  One day I’ll have to go through the entire list and get it up to date.

**James.

Manga…

I belive that manga, as a whole, is much better then American comics. At the core it’s basically the same, telling a story using drawn characters who talk using “speach balloons“. The difference between Manga (Japanese Comics) and American comic books is in the content. While there are manga intended for children and teens there is a huge amount of manga for adults. Much more complex and interesting stories then you get in a Superman or Green Lantern comic.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have any problem with American comics. When I was a kid I was a huge comic addict, spending all my money made from cutting grass on the newest issues of Batman, Green Lantern, Superman…. whatever looked good. I stopped collecting American comic books when I was about 12 or 13. I think it was when video games came out. My money shifted from buying comic books to video games – one quarter at a time!!!!

I just finished reading a 21 volume Manga called Kare Kano by the manga-ka “Masami Tsuda”. A manga-ka is a person who creates manga. The full title of Kare Kano is actually (Kareshi Kanojo no JijÃ…?) which basically means (His and Her Circumstances). In Japan it’s shortened to “Kare Kano” and that’s how the manga was release here in the U.S.

Masami Tsuda is a fantastic story writer and she wrote some of my most favorite scenes in manga. The story is basically a romantic comedy but as the story progresses it becomes much more a drama. The story was created over a 10 year period (1995 to 2005) and it really went through some changes as it developed.

“Warning – spoilers will be posted below.”

The firt 9 volumes of the manga were turned into a TV series called His and Her Circumstances that was very good and one of the funnier animes I’ve ever seen. It’s almost entirely a romantic comedy and only has a small amount of time spent on the underlying problems some of the characters have. They don’t avoid it but the story in the later volumes is much more intense.

The main characters are Yukino Miyazawa, a beautiful young girl getting ready to enter high school. Above all she craves the attention and praise of others and works hard on putting up a false “perfect student” profile that will get her what she wants.  Basically, she’s an ego-maniac.  The other main character is Soichiro Arima, a handsome and intelligent student who unknowingly steals the attention and praise that Miyazawa seeks by being the best student in the school.

If you like a romantic story where the characters find true love, have it tested, and remain together and even more in love because of it then you will really like this. It’s also very funny, especially in the earlier 10 – 12 volumes. The following 2 pages are from the time Miyazawa stopped by the gym after class to find Arima practicing Kendo with his club. They are dating at this time and starting to fall in love with each other:

As I mentioned, the story does get much more dramatic. It’s revealed that Arima has some serious emotional problems. On the surface he appears perfect. One of the highest ranked students in Japan, won the national competition in Kendo, comes from a rich family, he’s handsome, modest, and very friendly. The problem is that he was seriously abused as a child and almost died.

His birth mother hated him. She both verbally and physically abused him. Leaving him at home alone for days when he was just a few years old. He suffered many beating and malnutrition. He almost died when left alone in their apartment at just a few years old he went out but fell down the stairs and was knocked unconscious while laying in the snow.

He was finally found and taken in by his uncle. He was raised from that point in a loving and caring home but the damage had been done. He only managed to get on with his life by burying his feelings, emotions, and memory far down in himself. He was alive but not really living.

He became a perfect student and son because he didn’t want to disappoint his new parents who were so kind to him. He wanted them to be proud and not cause them any problems. The problems arose as his love for Miyazawa grew and his buried emotions and feelings were finally being touched after years of being dormant.

As Arima starts to fall apart inside he realizes he’s just going to hurt Miyazawa and tries to push her away from him. This was a tough part of the story to read because Ariama, who’s always been such a nice guy, starts acting like a real prick. The rage deep down in his heart starts coming out and as Miyazawa is the one pushing hard to try to find out what’s wrong with him she gets the brunt of his anger:

Thankfully, even tough Arima gets so distraught to resort to self mutilation at one time by driving a box cutter through one of his hands, Miyazawas persistence and love help to bring him back. The story finishes up with the problems in the Arima family and our leading couple deciding to get married as Miyazawa is now 3 months pregnant.

As I mentioned, Kare Kano is 21 volumes long. Each volume is about the size of a small paper back book and the entire story covers over a 3 year period of their entire High School life. In Japan there is 3 years of Elementary School and then 3 years of High School. Oh, I guess I’m not counting the last 1/2 of the final volume that actually takes place 16 years in the future where you get to learn about their children as well as the many other characters in the show.

I can’t recommend Kare Kano enough, especially if you are new to manga. The story starts out very light hearted with lots of comedy and romance so it’s easy to get into.  Then it evolves into a much more intense story of inner pain and struggle. Thankfully there is a happy ending that does show, as all good romantic stories should, that love is what is most important.

This is the final image of Kare Kano from Masami Tsuda as she talks about the characters she created and says goodbye.

**James.

Manga = Good
Free Manga = Better
Good Free Manga = The Best!!!

If you haven’t seen MegaTokyo yet you need to take a look. It’s been going on for almost 6 years now so I know it’s nothing new to many of you out there. The manga starts out with two bone-head video game junkies, how they end up getting stuck in Japan and what they do while trying to get home. The best part about this manga isn’t the art, though it is very nice, it’s the character development and interactions.

The main characters are Piro, the otaku, anime fan-boy, self loathing artist type and his friend Largo, the video game master, computer expert, hacker, delusional beer lover. It takes a little while before the story starts to really develop and you get the see the characters grow so don’t give up on it too early.

There are currently over 800 postings to the comic now and if you have never read this before you have a few good hours of reading that you can get caught up on. The site is currently updated about 3 times a week so it’s growing at a good pace.

I strongly suggest checking this out: Mega Tokyo (First Post).

**James.

*****
And to those who say that MegaTokyo is not manga because it’s created by an American…. Well, “Excuuuse…Meee!“