Last time I said I would get to Noir soon, and now I come through!
Noir is an action/thriller set (mainly) in France (the title is French for “black”). It focuses mainly on Mireille, a Corsican-born assassin, and Kirika, a Japanese girl with amnesia. When Mireille meets Kirika, she discovers that the girl has also been trained as an assassin (despite the amnesia, the training shows through), and they team up to form Noir. Kirika is looking to discover her past; Mireille is seeking the people who murdered her family.
Although Mireille names their team on a whim—“Noir” is the only thing that Kirika remembers, beyond her assassin skills—the decision quickly plunges her and Kirika into the world of a secret society called the Soldats and the power struggles going on within it. They also soon find themselves being tailed by Chloe, another young assassin who was raised and trained by Altena, a high-ranking Soldat who believes the group has lost its way and is orchestrating a takeover to return it to its mythological roots—a takeover that hinges on the return of Kirika to the fold, and a series of increasingly deadly tasks to test whether Mireille is worthy to carry the mantle of “Noir.”
Noir is an older title; it ran in 2001, and was published by Bee Train before being licensed by Madmen and Funimation. Like El Cazador de la Bruja, Noir is an example of high quality dubbing; the action ranges over a sizeable chunk of Europe, and characters’ accents reflect where they are from or located. There is no manga or light novel version of Noir; it is an anime only.
August 24, 2011
August 05, 2011
El Cazador de la Bruja
El Cazador de la Bruja is Japan’s take on the Western, but with witches. Because that’s how Japan rolls! If you know Spanish you may not be surprised by this revelation—Google Translate tells me the title means “Witch Hunter.”
It’s a comedy/drama (I just can’t type the word “dramedy”) set in a semi-contemporary Mexico. Nadie is a bounty hunter who runs into Ellis, an amnesiac fugitive who is suspected of a murder. She initially begins traveling with Ellis in order to bring her in and get the bounty on her head, but as more clues to the suspicious murder—as well as Ellis’s own genetically engineered ‘witch powers’—arise, Nadie starts to suspect that the real bad guy in this story is the agency that’s striving to reacquire Ellis, even going so far as to hire another bounty hunter to track the two of them and unleashing another witch, L.A., who pretty much has a straight up stalkerish obsession with Ellis, he and her being the only survivors of the DNA experimentation that gave them their powers. L.A. has much better control over his powers than Ellis, who mainly only activates them subconsciously in times of dire need; that, combined with his hatred of human beings, makes him pretty much the biggest threat to Nadie of the lot sent after her and Ellis.
If this sounds a little familiar, you should know that Bee Train, the company that produced El Cazador de la Bruja, also created Noir. Much is explained! (If it’s still not explained for you, just wait, I’ll get to Noir soon.)
The anime series ran in 2007, and was licensed and dubbed by Funimation. It’s one of their better dub works; like Noir, serious effort was put into hiring voice actors who could give various characters location- and background-appropriate accents. There is also a manga series which ostensibly is still ongoing, but since only one volume’s been published since 2007, you probably shouldn’t get your hopes up. The manga has not been translated into English.
It’s a comedy/drama (I just can’t type the word “dramedy”) set in a semi-contemporary Mexico. Nadie is a bounty hunter who runs into Ellis, an amnesiac fugitive who is suspected of a murder. She initially begins traveling with Ellis in order to bring her in and get the bounty on her head, but as more clues to the suspicious murder—as well as Ellis’s own genetically engineered ‘witch powers’—arise, Nadie starts to suspect that the real bad guy in this story is the agency that’s striving to reacquire Ellis, even going so far as to hire another bounty hunter to track the two of them and unleashing another witch, L.A., who pretty much has a straight up stalkerish obsession with Ellis, he and her being the only survivors of the DNA experimentation that gave them their powers. L.A. has much better control over his powers than Ellis, who mainly only activates them subconsciously in times of dire need; that, combined with his hatred of human beings, makes him pretty much the biggest threat to Nadie of the lot sent after her and Ellis.
If this sounds a little familiar, you should know that Bee Train, the company that produced El Cazador de la Bruja, also created Noir. Much is explained! (If it’s still not explained for you, just wait, I’ll get to Noir soon.)
The anime series ran in 2007, and was licensed and dubbed by Funimation. It’s one of their better dub works; like Noir, serious effort was put into hiring voice actors who could give various characters location- and background-appropriate accents. There is also a manga series which ostensibly is still ongoing, but since only one volume’s been published since 2007, you probably shouldn’t get your hopes up. The manga has not been translated into English.
June 10, 2011
Sunshine Sketch, by Ume Aoki
I’ve been posting a lot of four panel comic series lately. I blame it on this past winter: when you have a record snowfall from December on, it makes you want to read something that’ll make you laugh.
Sunshine Sketch is a slice-of-life comedy set in modern Japan. It’s about six girls who live in the Hidamari (Sunshine) apartment complex and go to Yamabuki High School across the street. The main characters are Yuno and Miyako, their upperclassmates Hiro and Sae, and their underclassmates Nazuna and Nori; but the central character is Yuno.
Yuno moves into Hidamari apartments when she’s accepted to the art department of Yamabuki H.S. In fact, the majority of the people in the apartments are artists: Miyako, Hiro, and Nori all are, and Sae is a writer attending the art department in order to learn how to draw her own illustrations. Only Nazuna attends the "normal" department--a Hidamari first!
The story mainly follows Yuno’s life as she interacts with her friends in the apartments and improves her art--unlike some of the other characters (like Miyako, who despite being a flighty sort of girl is a super impressive artist), Yuno’s drawing skills are a little below par. But she works hard to make up for it, and improves over the course of the series.
Sunshine Sketch is another Yen Press translation. (Can you tell I have a favorite company? Okay, not really, but their wide genre range means there’s a lot to like.) It’s currently ongoing with 5 collected volumes, 4 of which are currently available (volume 5 will be out this month!). There’s also a two volume light novel, and three anime series: the original Sunshine Sketch that ran for 12 episodes in 2007, x365 that went for 14 episodes in 2008, and xHoshimittsu that had 12 episodes in 2010; and there’s also a two episode OAV for each series! Only the original series and x365 are currently available; they’re both licensed by Sendai Filmworks and are English subtitles only--no dubs. The light novels, as usual, have not been translated.
Sunshine Sketch is a slice-of-life comedy set in modern Japan. It’s about six girls who live in the Hidamari (Sunshine) apartment complex and go to Yamabuki High School across the street. The main characters are Yuno and Miyako, their upperclassmates Hiro and Sae, and their underclassmates Nazuna and Nori; but the central character is Yuno.
Yuno moves into Hidamari apartments when she’s accepted to the art department of Yamabuki H.S. In fact, the majority of the people in the apartments are artists: Miyako, Hiro, and Nori all are, and Sae is a writer attending the art department in order to learn how to draw her own illustrations. Only Nazuna attends the "normal" department--a Hidamari first!
The story mainly follows Yuno’s life as she interacts with her friends in the apartments and improves her art--unlike some of the other characters (like Miyako, who despite being a flighty sort of girl is a super impressive artist), Yuno’s drawing skills are a little below par. But she works hard to make up for it, and improves over the course of the series.
Sunshine Sketch is another Yen Press translation. (Can you tell I have a favorite company? Okay, not really, but their wide genre range means there’s a lot to like.) It’s currently ongoing with 5 collected volumes, 4 of which are currently available (volume 5 will be out this month!). There’s also a two volume light novel, and three anime series: the original Sunshine Sketch that ran for 12 episodes in 2007, x365 that went for 14 episodes in 2008, and xHoshimittsu that had 12 episodes in 2010; and there’s also a two episode OAV for each series! Only the original series and x365 are currently available; they’re both licensed by Sendai Filmworks and are English subtitles only--no dubs. The light novels, as usual, have not been translated.
May 12, 2011
Tokyo Godfathers, by Satoshi Kon
Tokyo Godfathers is a 2003 anime movie written by the late Satoshi Kon and Keiko Nobumoto. It's a dramatic comedy (I just can’t bring myself to write "dramedy") about three homeless people who discover an abandoned baby on Christmas Eve, and the convoluted process they go through to return her to her birth parents.
The main characters of Tokyo Godfathers are Gin, Hana, and Miyuki, who’ve formed a semi-family in a tent city within Tokyo. They find a baby within a trash pile, name it Kiyoko, and after convincing Hana--who never knew his own parents and developed the quickest bond with the infant--that there was no way a group of hobos could properly raise a child, they strike out to find who she belongs to and return her (and to find out why she was abandoned in the first place). Along the way, they wind up running into their individual past lives and mulling over the reasons that they became homeless in the first place: Gin and his gambling, which wrecked his family; Hana and his past in a drag bar; and Miyuki’s fight with her parents over her pet cat. There’s also yakuza, foreigners, lottery tickets, lies about maternity, lies in general, falls off tall buildings, and a ton of action.
The film was produced by Madhouse, of Paranoia Agent, Hellsing Ultimate, and FFVII: Last Order (the short found in the super fancy edition of Advent Children) fame. It was distributed in the U.S. by Sony Pictures as a subtitle only release.
The main characters of Tokyo Godfathers are Gin, Hana, and Miyuki, who’ve formed a semi-family in a tent city within Tokyo. They find a baby within a trash pile, name it Kiyoko, and after convincing Hana--who never knew his own parents and developed the quickest bond with the infant--that there was no way a group of hobos could properly raise a child, they strike out to find who she belongs to and return her (and to find out why she was abandoned in the first place). Along the way, they wind up running into their individual past lives and mulling over the reasons that they became homeless in the first place: Gin and his gambling, which wrecked his family; Hana and his past in a drag bar; and Miyuki’s fight with her parents over her pet cat. There’s also yakuza, foreigners, lottery tickets, lies about maternity, lies in general, falls off tall buildings, and a ton of action.
The film was produced by Madhouse, of Paranoia Agent, Hellsing Ultimate, and FFVII: Last Order (the short found in the super fancy edition of Advent Children) fame. It was distributed in the U.S. by Sony Pictures as a subtitle only release.
April 28, 2011
Black Butler, by Yana Toboso
I mentioned Black Butler in my post about Yen Press, and since it’s one of our new series here at Mooresville Public Library, I wanted to bring it up!
Black Butler is a supernatural adventure/dark comedy series, slanted towards girls but definitely not shojo. It’s set in Victorian England, specifically in the late 1880s--the time of Jack the Ripper. The main characters are Ciel Phantomhive, 12-year-old head of the Phantomhive earldom, and his butler Sebastian. While the Phantomhive family (such as it is, since Ciel is an only child and an orphan) heads a toy and candy empire, it’s also secretly the watchdog of England’s seedy underbelly for Queen Victoria. This means Ciel must track down any criminal threats that drift up from the underworld into polite society (like the aforementioned Jack the Ripper) and eliminate them. Ciel typically accomplishes this via Sebastian, who is not really your typical butler, on account of he is a demon.
Literally.
When Ciel’s family was murdered, he was kidnapped, and the anger and pain caused by his mistreatment at the hands of his captors summoned Sebastian. Ciel then entered into a Faustian compact, promising Sebastian that if the demon helped him avenge his family, he would have his soul in return. While hunting for the truth behind the murders, Ciel continues to fulfill the Phantomhive duties of destroying threats to the British crown, and Sebastian continues to obey his orders until the final day comes. (Funny as this manga is--and it is--there’s a reason I called the comedy dark. This is an older teen series.)
Black Butler is translated by (obviously) Yen Press. It’s currently ongoing, with 5 volumes available in English; we have the first four here at MPL! It’s also serialized in the magazine Yen Plus. In addition, there are two anime series, both complete. The first ran for 24 episodes from 2008 to 2009; and the second ran for 12 episodes in 2010. The first anime has been licensed and dubbed by Funimation as “Black Butler season 1,” but so far the second has not been brought over.
Black Butler is a supernatural adventure/dark comedy series, slanted towards girls but definitely not shojo. It’s set in Victorian England, specifically in the late 1880s--the time of Jack the Ripper. The main characters are Ciel Phantomhive, 12-year-old head of the Phantomhive earldom, and his butler Sebastian. While the Phantomhive family (such as it is, since Ciel is an only child and an orphan) heads a toy and candy empire, it’s also secretly the watchdog of England’s seedy underbelly for Queen Victoria. This means Ciel must track down any criminal threats that drift up from the underworld into polite society (like the aforementioned Jack the Ripper) and eliminate them. Ciel typically accomplishes this via Sebastian, who is not really your typical butler, on account of he is a demon.
Literally.
When Ciel’s family was murdered, he was kidnapped, and the anger and pain caused by his mistreatment at the hands of his captors summoned Sebastian. Ciel then entered into a Faustian compact, promising Sebastian that if the demon helped him avenge his family, he would have his soul in return. While hunting for the truth behind the murders, Ciel continues to fulfill the Phantomhive duties of destroying threats to the British crown, and Sebastian continues to obey his orders until the final day comes. (Funny as this manga is--and it is--there’s a reason I called the comedy dark. This is an older teen series.)
Black Butler is translated by (obviously) Yen Press. It’s currently ongoing, with 5 volumes available in English; we have the first four here at MPL! It’s also serialized in the magazine Yen Plus. In addition, there are two anime series, both complete. The first ran for 24 episodes from 2008 to 2009; and the second ran for 12 episodes in 2010. The first anime has been licensed and dubbed by Funimation as “Black Butler season 1,” but so far the second has not been brought over.
April 14, 2011
Publishers: Yen Press
Since I’ve mentioned Yen Press a few times in the last months (in reference to K-On and Kobato, as well as some upcoming titles), I figured I should give a little background on them.
Yen Press is a subset of Hachette Book Group USA, a company owned by Hachette Livre (a French company, so it’s not surprising that they’ve tackled such a wide range of manga titles--there's a lot more manga translated into French than there is into English, and titles tend to come out faster over there, too. The entire run of Yugioh was out in France when Shonen Jump was just getting into the start of the card game). Yen Press is also one of the newest of newcomers (that are still around) to the manga translation world: it was founded in 2006.
Yen Press took a page out of Del Rey Manga’s book and published translation notes with their volumes. They also tend to include honorifics; there are some exceptions, such as Black Butler, where they’ve eschewed honorifics because they would feel out of place to an English-reading audience (since that series is set in Victorian London). Unlike Del Rey, however, Yen Press doesn’t usually include a few translated or untranslated pages of the next volume at the end of a manga; they default more to a ‘teaser,’ similar to Tokyopop’s model. The difference is that Yen Press tends to do a full page teaser complete with summary and a panel from the coming volume, while Tokyopop typically only does a summary.
Yen Press is also what I would consider the most otaku of manga translators--they pretty much dived in assuming that their predecessors (Del Rey, Viz, Tokyopop, and some smaller companies like CMX or DrMaster) had sufficiently introduced manga and basic Japanese culture to the mainstream that they could dispense with Anglicizing their titles. They’ve also been the main introducer of manhwa, or Korean manga, to America (like Cynical Orange and Hissing); and they’re also publishing a few original English titles, like the Maximum Ride series and the Twilight graphic novel. So while they may not be the best place to start if you’re unfamiliar with manga, once you get the hang of it I highly recommend them!
Yen Press is a subset of Hachette Book Group USA, a company owned by Hachette Livre (a French company, so it’s not surprising that they’ve tackled such a wide range of manga titles--there's a lot more manga translated into French than there is into English, and titles tend to come out faster over there, too. The entire run of Yugioh was out in France when Shonen Jump was just getting into the start of the card game). Yen Press is also one of the newest of newcomers (that are still around) to the manga translation world: it was founded in 2006.
Yen Press took a page out of Del Rey Manga’s book and published translation notes with their volumes. They also tend to include honorifics; there are some exceptions, such as Black Butler, where they’ve eschewed honorifics because they would feel out of place to an English-reading audience (since that series is set in Victorian London). Unlike Del Rey, however, Yen Press doesn’t usually include a few translated or untranslated pages of the next volume at the end of a manga; they default more to a ‘teaser,’ similar to Tokyopop’s model. The difference is that Yen Press tends to do a full page teaser complete with summary and a panel from the coming volume, while Tokyopop typically only does a summary.
Yen Press is also what I would consider the most otaku of manga translators--they pretty much dived in assuming that their predecessors (Del Rey, Viz, Tokyopop, and some smaller companies like CMX or DrMaster) had sufficiently introduced manga and basic Japanese culture to the mainstream that they could dispense with Anglicizing their titles. They’ve also been the main introducer of manhwa, or Korean manga, to America (like Cynical Orange and Hissing); and they’re also publishing a few original English titles, like the Maximum Ride series and the Twilight graphic novel. So while they may not be the best place to start if you’re unfamiliar with manga, once you get the hang of it I highly recommend them!
March 31, 2011
K-On, by Kakifly
K-On is a slice-of-life comedy series set in modern Japan, about four girls who join the pop music club at their school to keep it from being disbanded. Like Azumanga Daioh or Hidamari Sketch, it’s in a four panel comic format.
Ritsu, drummer and club president, is the one who sets everything in motion to ensure the club won’t be disbanded before she can join: she literally rips up her friend Mio’s application to the choir club and drags her into joining the pop music club as a bassist instead. Tsumugi, keyboardist and super-rich girl, joins them at the same time; but that leaves one space still blank. Enter Yui, who kind of gets sucked into the club. Yui doesn’t know how to play an instrument (other than the cymbals), so part of the club’s activities involve teaching her how to play the guitar.
The club continues to be plagued by troubles, however. The president isn’t really on the ball about things like turning in the official application, or engaging in visible activities; and they acquire a faculty sponsor by blackmailing a teacher into doing it: Sawako was a former member of the pop music club, back when it was a death metal band. Because she now presents herself as a mild-mannered woman, she doesn’t want her past to get out (plus, she likes having a place in the school where she can drop the act and show off her ability to thresh and play the guitar with her teeth. Seriously, she really does that). Plus, Yui has a bad habit of slacking off when studying for tests, so she’s often teetering on the edge of being kicked out of the club.
K-On is translated by Yen Press. It ran from 2007 to 2010 and wrapped up with 4 volumes, only 2 of which are currently translated. There’s also an anime series that ran for 13 episodes in 2009, which will be brought over in April by Bandai in with subtitles and a dub (maybe; the product details for the DVD are conflicting).
Ritsu, drummer and club president, is the one who sets everything in motion to ensure the club won’t be disbanded before she can join: she literally rips up her friend Mio’s application to the choir club and drags her into joining the pop music club as a bassist instead. Tsumugi, keyboardist and super-rich girl, joins them at the same time; but that leaves one space still blank. Enter Yui, who kind of gets sucked into the club. Yui doesn’t know how to play an instrument (other than the cymbals), so part of the club’s activities involve teaching her how to play the guitar.
The club continues to be plagued by troubles, however. The president isn’t really on the ball about things like turning in the official application, or engaging in visible activities; and they acquire a faculty sponsor by blackmailing a teacher into doing it: Sawako was a former member of the pop music club, back when it was a death metal band. Because she now presents herself as a mild-mannered woman, she doesn’t want her past to get out (plus, she likes having a place in the school where she can drop the act and show off her ability to thresh and play the guitar with her teeth. Seriously, she really does that). Plus, Yui has a bad habit of slacking off when studying for tests, so she’s often teetering on the edge of being kicked out of the club.
K-On is translated by Yen Press. It ran from 2007 to 2010 and wrapped up with 4 volumes, only 2 of which are currently translated. There’s also an anime series that ran for 13 episodes in 2009, which will be brought over in April by Bandai in with subtitles and a dub (maybe; the product details for the DVD are conflicting).
March 21, 2011
The Sky Crawlers
The Sky Crawlers is a 2008 anime movie, based off a book within a series of novels by Hiroshi Mori. It's a war movie, although in this case it's set in an alternate history, and the "war" is between two martial corporations. It's the story of a group of fighter pilots.
Although the world is (seemingly) at peace, the argument goes that people are unused to a world without wartime aggression and casualties, so corporations contract soldiers and fighter pilots to engage in real battle with one another to provide the necessary headlines. The companies have specific people who do this: the "Kildren," a group of genetically engineered young adults who neither age nor die--at least not of natural causes. Because they only die if killed, like in battle, it's the perfect solution to the companies' need to fill their pilots and tanks.
The main character of The Sky Crawlers is Yūichi Kannami, an ace pilot of the Rostock Corporation who transfers to a small rural base at the start of the movie. He works with three other pilots, and with Suito Kusanagi, the girl in charge of the base, who also flies when a pilot is injured/killed or when a plane is damaged. All the pilots and the commander are Kildren; the only people on the base who are not are the mechanics. In fact, there is only one pilot in the whole war who is an adult: The Teacher, a former Rostock pilot who joined its rivals. He is the main enemy of the Kannami and his fellow pilots, the one no one else has been able to beat. While the wider story involves plans of a siege attack on the rival corporation and the discovery of secrets surrounding the Kildren, it's really the battles with the Teacher that absorb Kannami, and all the pilots', attention. For a movie full of aerial dogfights, it's surprisingly slow.
An interesting aspect of the film is that all the characters typically speak Japanese in their daily lives; but when they're in the cockpit of their planes and flying, they speak in English. It raises some neat questions about the training the Rostock Corp. provides.
The film was produced by I.G. Production and the soundtrack was done by Kenji Kawai, so it has a similar feel to the Ghost in the Shell series (which was done by the same people). It was distributed in the U.S. by Sony Pictures, without an English dub. There is also a game for the Wii, Sky Crawlers: Innocent Aces, which has been translated into English; and a manga and the aforementioned novel series, which have not.
Although the world is (seemingly) at peace, the argument goes that people are unused to a world without wartime aggression and casualties, so corporations contract soldiers and fighter pilots to engage in real battle with one another to provide the necessary headlines. The companies have specific people who do this: the "Kildren," a group of genetically engineered young adults who neither age nor die--at least not of natural causes. Because they only die if killed, like in battle, it's the perfect solution to the companies' need to fill their pilots and tanks.
The main character of The Sky Crawlers is Yūichi Kannami, an ace pilot of the Rostock Corporation who transfers to a small rural base at the start of the movie. He works with three other pilots, and with Suito Kusanagi, the girl in charge of the base, who also flies when a pilot is injured/killed or when a plane is damaged. All the pilots and the commander are Kildren; the only people on the base who are not are the mechanics. In fact, there is only one pilot in the whole war who is an adult: The Teacher, a former Rostock pilot who joined its rivals. He is the main enemy of the Kannami and his fellow pilots, the one no one else has been able to beat. While the wider story involves plans of a siege attack on the rival corporation and the discovery of secrets surrounding the Kildren, it's really the battles with the Teacher that absorb Kannami, and all the pilots', attention. For a movie full of aerial dogfights, it's surprisingly slow.
An interesting aspect of the film is that all the characters typically speak Japanese in their daily lives; but when they're in the cockpit of their planes and flying, they speak in English. It raises some neat questions about the training the Rostock Corp. provides.
The film was produced by I.G. Production and the soundtrack was done by Kenji Kawai, so it has a similar feel to the Ghost in the Shell series (which was done by the same people). It was distributed in the U.S. by Sony Pictures, without an English dub. There is also a game for the Wii, Sky Crawlers: Innocent Aces, which has been translated into English; and a manga and the aforementioned novel series, which have not.
January 31, 2011
Kobato, by CLAMP
Kobato is something between a slice-of-life and a mystery series, with a touch of fantasy (more along the lines of xxxHolic, where the story is set in current Japan with supernatural events occurring, rather than Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, where supernatural events occur in strange worlds). On the surface it's the story of a girl named Kobato Hanato who gets a job working at a kindergarten plagued by money troubles; but below that is the mystery of why the yakuza threatening to close the kindergarten is married to the woman running it, and who Kobato really is.
Because Kobato has a wish: she wants to go somewhere. And in order to do so, she has to fill a magic bottle with the fragments of injured hearts that she has healed. I'd almost say this series has a magical girl angle, except Kobato (so far) doesn't transform and hasn't fought anyone. But the reason she asked for her job at the kindergarten was to try and help the owner of it with her problems, thereby healing her heart and making Kobato one step closer to her wish.
In addition, there's another story going on: Kobato has some kind of spirit guide (this is the best term I can think of to explain the abusive, animate stuffed animal who is helping her on her quest--think Cerberus with a lot of rage), Ioryogi, who has his own motives for wanting to see her wish come true. He has no chance of being freed from the form he's currently in unless Kobato succeeds. And Ioryogi isn't the only supernatural creature stuck in a body that isn't his own; there are other creatures, too, and it's been implied that Kobato herself isn't human (or at least, sure isn't a normal one). There's clearly something going on in the spiritual world, and Kobato is involved, regardless of whether she knows it or not.
Kobato seems like a sweet, fun read; but if you're like me and you've read a lot of CLAMP's works, a warning light probably went off as soon as I mentioned that she had a wish. The series is cute and sweet; but there's a darker undercurrent to it that has me counting pages until we learn that one character is blind in their right eye. After all, it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye: then it's CLAMP.
Kobato is translated by Yen Press, which is something of a newcomer in the field of manga, but which is a company I've always admired for both their diverse titles and their translations. The series was put on hiatus by CLAMP in 2005, and then was not so much resumed as restarted (opening at an earlier point in the timeline) in 2007. There are 5 volumes so far; 3 have been translated into English, with volume 4 coming out in May. There is also an anime of the series that ran for 24 episodes from 2009-2010, but so far it has not been brought over in subtitled or dubbed form.
Because Kobato has a wish: she wants to go somewhere. And in order to do so, she has to fill a magic bottle with the fragments of injured hearts that she has healed. I'd almost say this series has a magical girl angle, except Kobato (so far) doesn't transform and hasn't fought anyone. But the reason she asked for her job at the kindergarten was to try and help the owner of it with her problems, thereby healing her heart and making Kobato one step closer to her wish.
In addition, there's another story going on: Kobato has some kind of spirit guide (this is the best term I can think of to explain the abusive, animate stuffed animal who is helping her on her quest--think Cerberus with a lot of rage), Ioryogi, who has his own motives for wanting to see her wish come true. He has no chance of being freed from the form he's currently in unless Kobato succeeds. And Ioryogi isn't the only supernatural creature stuck in a body that isn't his own; there are other creatures, too, and it's been implied that Kobato herself isn't human (or at least, sure isn't a normal one). There's clearly something going on in the spiritual world, and Kobato is involved, regardless of whether she knows it or not.
Kobato seems like a sweet, fun read; but if you're like me and you've read a lot of CLAMP's works, a warning light probably went off as soon as I mentioned that she had a wish. The series is cute and sweet; but there's a darker undercurrent to it that has me counting pages until we learn that one character is blind in their right eye. After all, it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye: then it's CLAMP.
Kobato is translated by Yen Press, which is something of a newcomer in the field of manga, but which is a company I've always admired for both their diverse titles and their translations. The series was put on hiatus by CLAMP in 2005, and then was not so much resumed as restarted (opening at an earlier point in the timeline) in 2007. There are 5 volumes so far; 3 have been translated into English, with volume 4 coming out in May. There is also an anime of the series that ran for 24 episodes from 2009-2010, but so far it has not been brought over in subtitled or dubbed form.
January 17, 2011
Tokyo Vice, by Jake Adelstein
While this isn't quite manga, it goes into so much depth about Tokyo, Japan, and Japanese culture that I have to recommend it.
Jake Adelstein is an American who went to college in Japan and then became a reporter for the Yomiuri Shinbun, one of Japan's largest newspapers (one chapter gives a great description of the entrance exams and training that he went through to do it). There, he went into the Vice Beat area, and began covering the seedy aspects of Tokyo and nearby Saitama, including yakuza (the Japanese mafia) activities, murders, host club scams, and a group of robbers who once stole an entire ATM machine using a forklift.
In the process, Adelstein learns a lot about the workings of the police, the give and take between police and reporters, and especially about yakuza-related crime (this is because one of his stories gets his life threatened by the head of one of the biggest yakuza groups--in fact, it's the reason Adelstein and his family are currently living back in the United States). He also writes a lot about Japan, including real-life examples of sempai-kohai relationships, host clubs (most are not, in fact, run like Ouran's), and basic details about Japan that are really interesting: I've been reading manga for nearly 11 years, and I was well aware of the public bathhouse system in Japan, but I had no idea that there are also coin-operated showers! (At the time of Adelstein's writing, 100 yen would get you five minutes of hot water.)
Since one of my favorite manga, Sanctuary (by Sho Fumimura and Ryoichi Ikegami) is about yakuza and politicians, I had to pick this up. And I definitely learned a lot about yakuza from it, and even some about Japanese politics: I had no idea that the reigning party in Japan, the (quite misnamed and very conservative) Liberal Democratic Party, was founded by yakuza money given to the creator of the LDP--apparently this is an open secret in the country! The things you learn.
What fascinated me the most, however, was Adelstein's breakdown of the different districts within Tokyo. I knew the main names--Shibuya, Shinjuku, Roppongi, Akibahara--but I didn't know much about the different aspects of them. The one I knew most about was Akibahara, and that's because any otaku worth their salt has to know the electronics/manga/doujinshi/otaku playground. (Plus, a good chunk of Genshiken takes place there, so.) But Adelstein goes a lot more in-depth about the areas, including what businesses (mainly shady) tend to be where and what each district is most famous for (for Roppongi, it's apparently catering to foreigners. No wonder I never see that place much in manga).
Tokyo Vice contains a ton of information about Japan, including a whole lot about the side that you don't see much in manga (at least, outside of seinen, or manga geared toward adult men), on top of all the vice beat stories. If you're interested in more details of Japan and Japanese culture to better understand the background behind your favorite manga, this book is a great place to start.
Jake Adelstein is an American who went to college in Japan and then became a reporter for the Yomiuri Shinbun, one of Japan's largest newspapers (one chapter gives a great description of the entrance exams and training that he went through to do it). There, he went into the Vice Beat area, and began covering the seedy aspects of Tokyo and nearby Saitama, including yakuza (the Japanese mafia) activities, murders, host club scams, and a group of robbers who once stole an entire ATM machine using a forklift.
In the process, Adelstein learns a lot about the workings of the police, the give and take between police and reporters, and especially about yakuza-related crime (this is because one of his stories gets his life threatened by the head of one of the biggest yakuza groups--in fact, it's the reason Adelstein and his family are currently living back in the United States). He also writes a lot about Japan, including real-life examples of sempai-kohai relationships, host clubs (most are not, in fact, run like Ouran's), and basic details about Japan that are really interesting: I've been reading manga for nearly 11 years, and I was well aware of the public bathhouse system in Japan, but I had no idea that there are also coin-operated showers! (At the time of Adelstein's writing, 100 yen would get you five minutes of hot water.)
Since one of my favorite manga, Sanctuary (by Sho Fumimura and Ryoichi Ikegami) is about yakuza and politicians, I had to pick this up. And I definitely learned a lot about yakuza from it, and even some about Japanese politics: I had no idea that the reigning party in Japan, the (quite misnamed and very conservative) Liberal Democratic Party, was founded by yakuza money given to the creator of the LDP--apparently this is an open secret in the country! The things you learn.
What fascinated me the most, however, was Adelstein's breakdown of the different districts within Tokyo. I knew the main names--Shibuya, Shinjuku, Roppongi, Akibahara--but I didn't know much about the different aspects of them. The one I knew most about was Akibahara, and that's because any otaku worth their salt has to know the electronics/manga/doujinshi/otaku playground. (Plus, a good chunk of Genshiken takes place there, so.) But Adelstein goes a lot more in-depth about the areas, including what businesses (mainly shady) tend to be where and what each district is most famous for (for Roppongi, it's apparently catering to foreigners. No wonder I never see that place much in manga).
Tokyo Vice contains a ton of information about Japan, including a whole lot about the side that you don't see much in manga (at least, outside of seinen, or manga geared toward adult men), on top of all the vice beat stories. If you're interested in more details of Japan and Japanese culture to better understand the background behind your favorite manga, this book is a great place to start.
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