Same as last week, I’m the one chiming in too late on points others have talked about in depth (and in internet terms, for ages); too late to make any difference in the fast moving, run-and-gun world of comic fansite debate, at any rate. And I prefer to post in my own column, rather than […]

Hey, anyone out there with a line into Seven Seas know anything on the status of the Pita-Ten, Strawberry Panic, and Vamp! novels? (excuse me, “light novels” in the 7seas parlance). I was in the process of adding them to my list (and hell, I pre-ordered Strawberry Panic) but after checking gomanga.com all I saw […]

Matt’s Capsule Manga Reviews, Edition 4:
Yakitate #5, ROD: Read or Dream #4, Kashimashi #2.
I am running seriously behind on my reviews.
I currently have 80 (give or take a few) volumes of manga and a smattering of manga-tie-in novels lurking in odd corners of my apartment in beckoning stacks, most of it as yet unread, and […]

The story went out over the news wires yesterday: there’s a new manga award, and while some details (and of course the first winner) are still largely to be determined, there are two aspects of the award that are worth noting: first, it’s for foreigners, not native Japanese manga artists, and second, it’s being given […]

This is about as slow a week as any I’ve seen. It’s as slow as molasses in January. It’s as slow as actually finishing any of the fights in the DBZ anime. It’s as slow as ADV Manga releases. (checking… yep, still no Yotsuba&!. There’s a light at the end […]

You’re never going to learn Japanese just from reading the manga and watching anime Japanese language tracks, with or without subtitles. At most, you’ll pick up one or two very often repeated phrases (“OneEEee-chan!”) and that’s about it. You’d be better off signing up for classes — but if all you need are your kana […]

Anime and Manga III
(make that: Anime, Manga, and Games)
You know, if I had an editor, she would be demanding my chestnuts for roasting right now, first because of last week’s filler column, and now especially for wasting days before getting a new 5by8 up for general consumption. Well my actual “editor,” such as he is, […]

As usual, my list is a bit different from everyone else’s because I’m using the inventory and availability information from work (a bookstore) as opposed to Diamond (just one of our vendors), or trusting to the vagaries of the internet — where even publishers’ web sites occasionally have bad info.
This doesn’t make my list any […]

So, how many of you out there forgot that T’pop has a Hamburg office? Be honest. (Yeah, I thought so.)
German Manga? Yep.
Kinda throws all the standard arguments about authentic vs. OEL manga out the window, doesn’t it? One also supposes that titles like this one and A Midnight Opera and the Manga Fieber […]

So– much like an anime breaking down and doing a clipshow for ep 11 because the series got picked up for another 13 episodes two months ago and now we have to stretch a couple of scripts to bridge the plot into the second season, rather than wrap it up in the initially planned two-part […]

So first, I have corrections: It seems either I (or rather, my sources) missed a few Tokyopop releases this past week. It was kind of nice actually; I was about to order a pair of titles, only to find out the store already had them in stock. Once again I have need to call upon […]

The Professor’s Daughter, aka La fille du professeur
Published by: First Second
Writer: Joann Sfar
Artist: Emmanuel Guibert
80 (60) pages.
Original Language: French
Orientation: Left to right
Vintage: 1997. US edition May 2007.
Translation: Alexis Siegel
Design: Danica Novgorodoff
Cover Design: Mark Seigel
Cover Art: Emmanuel Guibert
Publisher’s Rating: none given; for death, some […]

Warriors, vol. 1, Dragon Drive, vol. 1, & Disney’s Kilala Princess, vol. 1
Now, we all know that I have a decided preference for properties aimed at a more adult audience — or at least, those items wrapped in plastic so the kiddies can’t (supposedly) get into them — but since I like comics, I try […]

You may have found yourself defending anime at some point to a nonbeliever, telling them that “Well yeah, it’s all ninjas and robots and occasionally, duelling giant robot ninjas piloted by smokin’ hot high school students in skintight outfits, but really the reason *I* watch it is for the character development.”
Time to put some money […]

The Ages of Fan:
– first — previous — next –
The on-going series where we look at just how American anime & manga fandom developed — to the point where today we use the phrase otaku, we know what it means, we know it’s not complimentary, and we call ourselves otaku anyway.
Hey, you guys remember when […]