Manga Xanadu

(Originally posted on Popculture Shock) Rin Amami is a regular middle school student—regular, that is, except for his gruff, gravelly voice. Though his classmates tell him he sounds like Godzilla or a toad, Rin has a secret dream: he wants to sing. He has an idol’s looks, and can pick up any dance style after seeing it once, but his voice crushes any attempts to go after that dream. While working on a street corner selling pictures of pop stars and taking dance requests, he literally runs into The Beatmen, an up-and-coming boy band. He becomes entangled with the group when the owner of Red Shoes, The Beatmen’s agency, declares that Rin possesses the legendary “Dragon Voice,” possessing the qualities of both a demon and an angel. Boss is determined to prove that Rin that will blend with The Beatmen’s already balanced sound, and adds Rin to the group. Dragon Voice Volumes 1-7 By Yuriko Nishiyama Publisher: Tokyopop Age Rating: Teen Genre: Music Price: $9.99 Rating: So begins Rin and The Beatmen’s rocky journey to become idols in Japan’s cutthroat entertainment industry. Their career gets off to a rocky start after The Beatmen lose a bet to a rival band,…

I really shouldn’t be surprised. This certainly isn’t the first time I’ve been disappointed with Tokyopop. But this really shouldn’t have been *that* hard. What am I talking about? The touted “12 days of Manga Holiday”, they were doing on the website. They just couldn’t finish it, with just two days left to go. Did they not have this planned out? Did all the programmers go and vacation and no one told the interns what to do? Do they just don’t care? More and more I’m feeling it’s the last. Either that or they just keep trying to do *too* much and everything gets dropped. Oh well. Merry Christmas anyway. Edit:  Well, Tokyopop did finally manage to update their page, not that they told anyone…  The eleventh day was an mp3 of some sort.  Couldn’t find out from what.  Some imanga no doubt.  And the twevlth day was the first volume of Dramacon.

“On the Tenth day of Christmas, Tokyopop gave to me…more avatars!” By popular request it seems, Tokyopop has created two more of their holiday avatars.  These two are from Dramacon and Fools Gold.  You can grab them know at the Tokyopop website along with the previous avatars.  Collect the whole set! Once again, these will be available for the weekend.  Check back again Monday, after 5pm PST here or Tokyopop.com to see the next gift.  We’re down to the last two days.  Let’s hope Tokyopop makes them worth it.

ANN has reported that two new anime series’ for the spring have been announced that are based on manga; Golgo 13 by Takao Saito and To Love-Ru -Trouble- by Saki Hasemi and Kentaro Yabuki. Manly men can rejoice that one of their idols is finally getting his own series. Golgo 13 is about an amoral assassin that takes on assignments from all over the globe. This series started in the 1960’s, and is still published today. It’s 147th volume was published on December 5 in Japan. Duke Togo, code name Golgo 13, is a crack shot and a magnet for the ladies. He can pop off a target in one panel and then score with a beautiful woman in the next. Few men are more manly than Golgo 13. But for all his manliness, Golgo 13 has never had his own series. He’s only had a live action movie and 2 animated movies. Finally, he gets to come into his own. Viz Media has published 12 volumes of Golgo 13’s adventures under their Viz Signature line. To Love-Ru -Trouble- is a sci-fi romance comedy drawn by Kentaro Yabuki, best known here for his Black Cat series, also being published by…

“On the Ninth day of Christmas, Tokyopop gave to me…another iManga mp3!” This is from Riding Shotgun again, Make Ya Self by Far East Movement. You’ve only got 24 hours to get it, so go to Tokyopop.com now and download it! It’ll be gone by 5pm PST tomorrow (12/21/07). Check back here or Tokyopop.com for the next present!

“On the Eighth day of Christmas, Tokyopop gave to me…Pantheon High vol 1!” Yeah! More manga! I read the first chapter of this, and have been wanting to read the whole thing! Now I can! And you can too. But just until 5pm PST. Check it out, and then check out vol 2 which comes out in January. Something to spend your Christmas money on! Check back here or at Tokyopop.com for the next gift.

My thanks to Mangacast for catching this. At the NYAF, Bandai Entertainment quietly announced the licensing of 3 new manga and one light novel: Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion. This was an anime series that premiered in Japan last year, becoming an instant hit. With character designs by CLAMP, and a well written story, this series has spawned not only a second season, but three manga adaptations and light novel. 10 years ago, the Empire of Britannia invaded Japan, using it’s mecha called Knightmares and overwhelmed the Japanese people. The country became known as Area 11, and the Japanese called Elevens. Now, a 17 year old boy named Lelouch, a Britannian, seeks revenge on his father, the Emperor, for the assassination of his mother and crippling of his sister Nunnally. That’s just the basic plot, and doesn’t even begin to cover what going on in this series. Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion is a direct adaptation of the series. It follows Lelouch as he gains the power he needs to enact his revenge and possibly bring down an empire. The complexity of the plot and how well it stays true to the series will determine it’s success. The…

“On the Seventh day of Christmas, Tokyopop gave to me…another imanga mp3!” Now we’ve got the mp3 for the iManga Bizenghast. Closer from Divine Madness. I really liked this song when I first watched the imanga of Bizenghast on MySpace. You’ve got until 5pm PST to grab it, so go to Tokyopop.com now to get it. Check back here or Tokyopop.com after 5pm PST to find out your next gift!

“On the Sixth day of Christmas, Tokyopop gave to me….Tokyopop Universe Wallpaper!” Yes, this time, it’s a wallpaper of at least one character from all of Tokyopop’s OEL manga. It looks a little cheesy if you ask me. Most of the pictures are just taken from cover art. It’s also a very crowded picture as you can imagine. You really have to be very familiar with the Tokyopop library to know them all. It’s kind of hard to believe they’ve come out with so many original story books. Can you name them all? (No searching the TP website!) You can get this wallpaper until 5pm PST today (12-18-07). Check back here or the tokyopop website for the next present!

“On the Fifth day of Christmas, Tokyopop gave to me, Biiiiizenghast Vol 1!” For the whole weekend you can read Bizenghast vol 1. I’d really encourage people to check out this series. It’s very good, involving riddles that must be solved to put spirits to rest. I enjoyed it anyway.  And it also goes over the usual 3 volume model of most Tokyopop OEL! Check back here Sunday night/Monday or go to Tokyopop.com for the next gift!

“On the Fourth day of Christmas, Tokyopop gave to me…more mp3s!” Yes, it’s another mp3 from their iManga.  This time it’s Home from Riding Shotgun.  Looks like we’re going to get a chance to get all the main songs from the iManga.  Hey, how about a chapter of a mangapod to preview? Once again, the mp3 is available free until tomorrow (12-14-07) until 5pm PST.  Check back here or at Tokyopop.com for the next gift.

Erin F. of the PopCultureShock website has some great coverage of the Industry talks that went on during the New York Anime Festival. At the panel called “Marketing to the Otaku Generation”, it seems quite apparent that the people making the decisions about what to license and how to do it is completely out of touch with their audience. Particularily Funimation and 4Kids though the second is a foregone conclusion. 4Kids is just in it for the money. Mr. Kahn made that very clear from his comments. If a property doesn’t instantly make them lots of money, then it’s obviously a failure to them. And because the Japanese won’t automatically bend to their will and do what they want, then “there’s a real systemic problem in Japan”. Uh, Mr. Kahn? Ever hear the saying about beating a dead horse? Everyone needs to move on. That’s not a problem, it’s nature. Maybe you should try it. Read Erin’s coverage here, which also includes a link to the unedited audio recording she did of the panel. I found this really insightful and interesting. This is a must read if you’ve ever wondered what’s wrong with the companies that license and release anime.