Pick of the Litter Volume 1 (Buy Now) By Yuriko Suda Published by: Tokyopop Age Rating: Teen Genre: Comedy RRP:$9.99 Rating: Riku joins his whacky long-lost family in the mythical land of Yamato and finds he’s got a few new siblings! On cat, two rabbits… Sounds more like a zoo than a home! He may be new in town, but Riku’s pledged to lead the family business of Hiyokoya to the top—and no sneaky competitors, smart-mouthed cats, or mysterious magic stones are about to stop him! Well…not really. Riku only said he’d work part-time.
I may as well jump into the Tokyopop fray, as I’ve had a draft about the TP.com website sitting here for a while. I may as well add my two cents (rant) to the current discussion as well. Tokyopop’s Pilot Program pact has stirred up a lot of people in the last few days, with it’s casual language and questionable practices. But, is this really a surprise to anyone? Tokyopop is about as two-faced as you can get in the manga publishing industry. Their public face, the one they put out in press releases and at conventions, is one of a teen friendly publisher that is trying to help new artists get a break in the comics/manga industy, get them published, and give them a place to meet, talk and share their work online. Take a closer look at them, and you’ll see the truth that lies hidden underneath.
Phantom Volume 3 By Ki-Hoon Lee/Seung-Yup Cho Publisher: Tokyopop Genre: Action Rating 13+ RRP: $9.99 Rating: Reviewed by Brian Henderson After K activates the untested Cerebus with the newly installed Aurora system, he takes on Kas Stein, the evil corporate warrior who has a mysterious past with Matilda the drill instructor in the skimpy outfit. We find that AIs like Cerebus aren’t very useful for fighting against experienced TC pilots, except this time when K and his mech sync perfectly and take out Kas at the last second. Everyone gets picked up just before the base self-destructs; K and Matilda are injured but will recover, but Kas, dragged out of his mangled TC, has lost his arm and likely his sanity.
Kingdom Hearts Volume 1 By Shiro Amano Publisher: Tokyopop Rating: All Ages Genre: Fantasy Price: $5.99 Rating: Storyline: It’s about Sora, Donald and Goofy trying to destroy the Heartless. They go through space, and go through stories like Alice in Wonderland. What did you like about the story? I liked the characters Sora and Riku. I also liked it when this guy used a camera like the Kamehameha from Dragon Ball. What didn’t you like about the story? I was scared by Sora’s happy face. (Page 73) (Not really) Would you recommend the story to other kids your age? Yes.
Genju no Seiza Volume 4 By Matsuri Akino Publisher: Tokyopop Genre: Fantasy Rating: 16+ RRP: $9.99 Rating: After a string of animal murders are discovered throughout town, Fuuto and his guardians vow to bring the killer to justice. But after the return of Sohki leads to a startling turn of events, the young king begins rethinking what justice really is. Also, what happens when Fuuto pays a visit to the mysterious new pet shop that just opened in Tokyo? Find out in this volume’s bonus story starring Pet Shop of Horrors’ Count D! This volume is all about fathers and what it means to have great responsibility. Is helping people the right thing to do? Or should their destinies be left to fate? What is the true responsibility of a king?
Phantom Volume 2 By Ki-Hoon Lee/Seung-Yup Cho Publisher: Tokyopop Rating: 13+ Genre: Action/Mecha RRP: $9.99 Rating: Reviewed by Brian Henderson K agrees to work for the anti-corporation organization Athena, mostly because they promise to help his girlfriend recover if he does. He goes off to their training facility in the middle of the desert to prepare to fight against the mega-corporations, still not quite convinced that the people he’s fighting with aren’t just as much terrorists as those they fight against. Unfortunately, the mega-corps discover their secret base and launch an all-out attack to cut off the head of the serpent. K and his fellow trainees are left to defend the base and allow the civilians to escape and finally, K is reunited with Cerebus, the super TC that no one but him can operate.
Project D.O.A. Volume 1 By Jeffrey Nodelman & Wagner Fukuhara Publisher: Tokyopop Genre: Action Rating: 13+ RRP: $9.99 Rating: Reviewed by Brian Henderson I’ll do this review, even though I don’t really consider Project D.O.A. to be a manga. To me, and some may disagree, it needs to be written and published initially in Japan in order to be a manga. Graphic novels that come from Korea or China or France or the United States, while they may be generally modeled after the manga artform, are not manga, any more than animation that comes from anywhere but Japan is not anime. That said though, Project D.O.A. is from one of the minds that brought you the wonderful Cartoon Network show Venture Bros.and in a lot of ways has that kind of vibe. In other ways, it strikes me as similar in feel to Buckaroo Banzai and maybe a little bit like Crusher Joe although officially, Jeff Nodelman attributes his inspirations to films like Indiana Jones, Flash Gordon and the works of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett. In any case, it’s a not-quite-serious romp around the world, adventure-style. Meet Dr. Dylan Oliver (also the name of Jeff Nodelman’s real life son)…
It was really hard getting through Previews this month. In the catalog, May is Manga Month, so along with all the regular series, there were new ones coming out that had to be evaluated. Top that with a weakening economy, and you get some really tough decisions to be made with this month’s order. More after the cut.
Phantom Volume 1 By Ki-Hoon Lee/Seung-Yup Cho Publisher: Tokyopop Rating: 13+ Genre: Action/Mecha RRP: $9.99 Rating: Reviewed by Brian Henderson K is a mech pilot for the Neo Seoul Police, chasing down terrorists in his TC (Tactical Costume) in the near future. This is after the deadly “Meteo Rain” that showered the Earth, toppling governments and bringing about the rise of the mega-corporations that now rule the planet. K has never really given much thought to his job but when an arrest goes horribly wrong, he’s trapped in a world that wants him dead and forced to side with the terrorists against the megacorps at the helm of a new type of TC, controlled by the AI Cerebus which identifies K as it’s sole pilot.
Wandering around the web yesterday, I stumbled upon a Livejournal group for an unlicensed manga called 07-Ghost. It’s a shonen sci-fi that I read a few chapters of a few years ago and liked. No new chapters came out after the initial few, so I figured it was dropped as happens so often in scanalations. But, on the community, there was a message about the possible licensing of this manga based on a Take Down notice Tokyopop had sent to this manga trading website. The list of manga Tokyopop asked to be taken down can be found here. The Take Down notice was sent in January of this year. I found this list rather odd though. Yes, all of Tokyopop’s titles were there, as well as 07-Ghost. There were also a couple of other titles on the list that were not announced licenses such as Saiunkoko Monotagari, Sayuki Gaiden, and Mobile Suit Crossbone Gundam. These are all series I would love to have, and Sayuki Gaiden just makes sense since Tokyopop has published Saiyuki and Saiyuki Reload. But, what made me wonder about the reliability of this list is that there were several series’ on this list that were licensed,…
Oh! Pay me! (If you get that….) It that time of the month again. Yes, that’s right. It’s time to do my Previews order. It wasn’t so bad this time. Only eleven titles on my first count, and two weren’t too hard to drop. I had considered getting the title Kannazuki no Miko. It’s only two volumes longs, but it’s an “only if I’ve got nothing else to get”, and I’ve got more to get . The other was Good Witch of the West. That was a little harder to give up. The story was finally getting good. We’re out of the courts and into the wilds, facing the “dragons” (dinosaurs), and finally searching for the meaning behind the Star Queen. But the other titles that are scheduled to come out are more interesting to me. That takes me down to 9 titles, and a total of $60.72, right at the top of my limit. There are some new titles coming out in April that I’d like to read. Two are from Viz; Fairy Cube by Kaori Yuki. I’ve become a big fan of her work. And Record of a Fallen Vampire. I don’t know much about this series, but…
A situation has arisen at Tokyopop.com that I don’t think should be kept only there. As many of you may know from Brigid’s posts on the Mangablog, people have been frustrated about the condition of the Tokyopop.com website. Namely, since the “upgrade” to 2.0, it has been buggy and not well managed. One of the users of the site, an artist known as Sixxx, has been very vocal about the bad code and poor management on her blog. Last weekend, she was banned from the site and her profile was wiped from the system. Sixxx was a popular person around the site. She was on the front page every day as a “Most Popped” user. Her art was used as avatars, and was often featured in other blog posts. She also spoke her mind about the problems on the site. Her posts weren’t mean or nasty. They were written by someone who obviously cared about the site and was frustrated at what it had become. Apparently, after another venting on her blog, which Sixxx had the comments set for moderation before posting, the webmaster of Tokyopop.com, Matt Paladino, aka MP (who was also on Sixxx’s ignore list) left a comment…