Manga Xanadu

Since I started the week with a Kaori Yuki title, let’s stay with that theme.  And since vampires are all the rage this year, let’s make it a vampire manga.  Yorugata Aijin Senmonten – DX aka Blood Hound is a one shot volume that was serialized in Hana to Yume from January 2003 to June 2004. Blood Hound is about Rion, a loudmouthed teenager who goes to a host club full of vampires looking for her best friend.  She believes the vampires are behind her friend’s disappearance, as well as of those around the neighborhood.  During her investigation, she begins to befriend them, including their leader, Suou.  He believes that Rion is the re-incarnation of Ellone, “the one with the purest blood”, and a woman he once loved.  A romantic relationship starts to develop between the pair.  The volume ends with Rion discovering who is behind the disappearances. This title was made into a J-Drama as well, called Vampire Host, that ran on TV Tokyo from April to June, 2004.  It went for 12 1/2 hour episodes, which made 6 1 hour stories.  It’s loosely based on the manga, and has a much more humorous vibe to it.  Suou isn’t…

Growing up, my family never had a lot of spending money, and we never got allowances like kids do today! But, when you’re in that kind of situation, you learn a fun, new pastime; Window Shopping. That’s where you go to stores or malls and look at all things you would buy if you had the money. With the proliferation of the internet, it has become Screen Shopping, I guess. And it’s so much easier now, with the store only being a click away. You can “wander” for hours looking at all the things you want to buy. For me, that’s manga, of course. Amazon.com and Half.com have become my favorite Screen Shopping sites. I’ll drop in on Ebay every once in a while as well, just to see if there are any long runs I might be interested in. I’m not going to buy, just to look. But these sites have a secret weapon to use again us Screen Shoppers; Wish lists. With just a click or two of the mouse, and there’s a long list of wishes just waiting to be granted. For Christmas and birthdays, they’re useful. But for the rest of the year, they’re there, taunting…