Completely New to Manga

[Sailor Moon]

The thing about manga you have to remember and that makes its publishing process fundamentally different from comics is that, well..

Manga works in magazines.

You don't have a weekly issue of Naruto every week. You have a weekly issues of Shounen Jump Magazine. You don't have a monthly issue of Claymore. You have a monthly issue of Jump Square.

Sure, Naruto and Claymore are then collected in volumes, but their first exposure to the public happens through Weekly/Monthly magazines.

It means that editors can take a degree of risk as long as the material can appeal to the demographic they target. Weekly Jump has action packed battle manga like Naruto, Bleach and OP, but every so often some odd ducks appears, stuff that manages to become popular with the readers of the magazine.

If it is popular it is popular. If it is not it gets cancelled and replaced. If it is really popular you start a trend, like say Sailor Moon or Love Hina.

Sport Manga. Cooking Manga. Romance. Comedies. They are all things that found customers.

Well, I think the magazine thing is a good point for Japan, but for other places like the States? I'm not sure. Magazines generally don't sell, though I don't know the situation with Shonen Jump. The collected aspect is definitely part of it, though. You don't have to follow a series monthly. Even a long running series like Oh My Goddess! or something, you only have to worry about picking up that volume every 6 months to a year. Factor in the fact that manga is generally cheaper than trades of American comics, and that's probably a very solid factor. And yes, there is also an issue with perception. American comics are still more or less seen as superheroes by most people, albeit unfairly, but it's still a pretty common thing. I think the reason a lot of other publishers have been unable to break that mold is based partially on an unwilling public to care, plus being trapped in the direct market system.

[Inkthinker]

With the falling numbers of print, I don't think there's a way to make a Shonen Jump-style anthology work anymore... it's been tried, probably most successfully with Shonen Jump. I think they're doing better with their online release, perhaps... I know I love it.

Now, what nobody was ever able to pull off here in the US were the reader numbers and income to set up the voting system, which is a vital portion of the Jump model. Now that the English-language digital version of Shonen Jump is about to go simultaneous with Japan, I'll be interested in seeing if they start some sort of similar thing with US voting (which would probably be tallied separately, but if the numbers are sufficient then you know it's going to be incorporated into the market data).

It might be a way to create some middle ground between the whole go-it-yourself of current webcomic models (which can discourage more professional creators from entering the field, as they have rent and children and such to worry about) and the work-for-hire model that still exists in most of the (somewhat) successful remaining print comics. Pay creators a salary or page rate, share IP, survive on the votes. Of course, that would also require Western creators to either produce faster, or produce much higher quality. US fans sometimes forget that not EVERY awesome manga series is a weekly, especially the really well-drawn ones.

[Hazard]

Well, I think the magazine thing is a good point for Japan, but for other places like the States? I'm not sure. Magazines generally don't sell, though I don't know the situation with Shonen Jump. The collected aspect is definitely part of it, though. You don't have to follow a series monthly. Even a long running series like Oh My Goddess! or something, you only have to worry about picking up that volume every 6 months to a year. Factor in the fact that manga is generally cheaper than trades of American comics, and that's probably a very solid factor. And yes, there is also an issue with perception. American comics are still more or less seen as superheroes by most people, albeit unfairly, but it's still a pretty common thing. I think the reason a lot of other publishers have been unable to break that mold is based partially on an unwilling public to care, plus being trapped in the direct market system.

Not saying other places should try it. Just pointing out the difference in systems.

Japan can do it because that's the way their market has developed. However, the American market has developed in a very different direction.

[Mr. Holmes]

Then again magazines sell much better than the direct market comics in the US: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...#United_States

Question is whether people would buy comic book content.

[remydat]

I wouldn't mind reading Rurouni Kenshin. The anime was too awesome for words. Did the anime follow the manga? Did it leave out some things?

I've never read or seen Fist of the North Star. The sad part is I've been aware of it for years, just never rented it at Blockbuster. I saw a review online and the villain sounds like a real powerhouse. Don't remember his name, tho

The RK anime is a pretty faithful retelling of the managa with obvious filler. The main arc that is missing from the anime and OVAs is the Revenge Arc ie last major arc of the manga which you definitely want to read because it goes into Kenshin's history more and how that history comes back to haunt him.

As for Fist of the North Star, the manga is definitely better. And I suspect you must mean the movie and not the episodes. If that is the case, the main villain of the movie Shin is a powerhouse but the manga is full of powerhouses and Raoh is the other main powerhouse.

[Mr. Holmes]

Is the manga for Wolf and Spice any good? I started the anime, and I liked it, though wasn't blown away. I'm an Economics PhD student, so I found the premise very interesting.

Another guilty pleasure would be Gantz. This is an absurd trash series that is so ****ing extreme that it's kind of addictive in a junk food type way. A bunch of people get trapped in a game where they have to kill aliens to earn points, or they die. The art is kind of CGI-oriented and looks unique. The violence is extreme and there is a LOT of sex. It is pretty much the definition of a guilty pleasure. I think it's complete garbage but it's the kind of thing you can't stop reading anyway.

I found this in Barnes and Noble the other day and flipped through it.

Yeah it was basically trash like you said. I didn't find it appealing in a guilty pleasure way either.

[Badou]

I would still recommend Gantz. It might appear to be some type of gore/sex fest, but it isn't. There is a lot of strong character work in it. The main character goes through so much development that alone is worth it in my eyes, and of course Nishi is amazing. Got to love that little asshole, haha. He's a better troll/dick than Damian.

Also just to add to your already long recommendation list you should read Mushishi. It is really amazing. Set in the 19th Century you have Ginko who wonders the country helping people deal with the supernatural 'mushi' as they encounter them. It is very slice-of-life like, but the story carries a lot more weight and emotion with dealing with these supernatural creatures as they interact with normal people. There is a reason why it has won so many awards. You can give the anime a shot too.

Also, earlier today I went to the mall, and in the B&N, the manga section is at least three times as large as the Comics/GN section, and it was crowded with a lot of pre-teen girls. I know Japan's market is much larger, but it seems like manga is more popular even in the US?

I'd say that more people 25 and younger are probably more familiar with manga than comics. I mean you can walk into your local high school and more people would probably know what is going on in the current Naruto chapter/episode than what is happening in the latest Batman comic. I'd bet money on that. Of course because of piracy it is difficult to gauge the popularity just by looking at sales numbers.

Also with companies like Vertigo, Image, and ect. they still market towards the same people who currently buy traditional comics. Adult men. So I do think the greater diversity, from demographics to genres, in manga help make it more appealing especially to younger readers and female readers, but also the fact that many of the lead characters are teens helps too. You really don't see much of that in traditional Western comics anymore. I am 24 now and grew up in the manga boom of the 90s and 2000s and seeing characters around my age back then was very appealing.

[Inkthinker]

I would still recommend Gantz. It might appear to be some type of gore/sex fest, but it isn't.

Well, it sort of is that, but it uses that in illustrating its themes.

Gantz makes no apologies for being exploitative, but it shouldn't be dismissed just for exploiting sex and violence. It's an interesting examination of how people might behave in a scenario where you are dead, resurrected, put back in your old life but with the knowledge that you're effectively a clone of yourself, with a bomb in your head that will kill you if anyone finds out, and forced to battle vicious, violent supernatural entities on a regular basis. And while you're given tools that make you stronger and tougher and able to kill, you aren't given any training and you are effectively just you, whatever that means... fat, slow, scared or stupid, you'll be thrown into the deep end of the gore pool and you'll swim or drown.

Do you give up on morality and give in to sociopathy? Do you hold fast to your ethics and try to act as a team? Does anyone care one way or another, and does it matter when the odds are strong that you'll die the next time, and this time you'll be dead for real... unless someone else cares enough and is good enough at the game to spend their goal resurrecting you. And what type of person is better at the game anyhow, the person who gives in to their dark side and descends wholeheartedly into the killing, or one who tries to rise above it and act as a leader?

These themes are strongly presented and examined in Gantz... it's just sometimes overshadowed by the sex and violence (the former often presented in the context of the latter).

[Badou]

I mean just some gore/sex fest. I didn't mean it wasn't excessive, but to pass it off as just those two things is overlooking what the series really is. That was what I meant.

[Mr. Holmes]

I watch Game of Thrones, so I don't really have a problem with excess sex and violence. But I still didn't think Gantz was particularly insightful or interesting enough to continue, considering how much of it was there.

[LoneNecromancer]

I've never actually touched Gantz because of the thoughts of a couple friends who I trust a lot when it comes to recommending manga, one dropped it and he never looked back, saying it got too stupid for him, and the other reads for pretty much El Sombrero's reasoning, that it's so retarded she finds it mostly hilarious.

[Mr. Holmes]

Okay I read Osamu Tezuka's Buddha book. I thought it was pretty good, though there were a lot of inaccuracies. Is there anything that's rooted in a Taoist or Buddhist mysticism/philosophy?

I kind of like the Avatar the Last Airbender in concept, but I find the execution to be clearly aimed at kids. Nothing wrong with that obviously.

[Bakasama]

Taoist? Isn't that Chinese? Anyway, maybe you were looking for the word, Shinto.

[Mr. Holmes]

Sorry I didn't mean to overgeneralize China and Japan. I just meant more Eastern philosophy in general. I've browsed and found quite a bit of Shinto-based stuff though.

[Badou]

Gantz's third phase is pretty mediocre, which is the current one, but the first two are still more than worth a look in my opinion. Of course it is over the top, but I wouldn't want it any other way. It has to be otherwise the concept would collapse in on itself. Like Battle Royale. It doesn't hold your hand and outcomes are genuinely unexpected a lot of the time, which for most series it is difficult to pull off. In one arc you are fighting giant dinosaurs in the city and in the next you are fighting legions of Japanese mythological demons. I remember reading that arc as the chapters were being released individually for it. It took forever, but the forum discussions for it were insane back then. Good times. xD

Though I wouldn't put the series in my top 20 seinen series even though I've been following such a long time. I'd recommend a number of series before it still, like I have, but there really isn't another series out there like it.