{"id":3830,"date":"2013-03-01T00:01:17","date_gmt":"2013-03-01T08:01:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/?p=3830"},"modified":"2013-02-28T23:15:36","modified_gmt":"2013-03-01T07:15:36","slug":"he-said-she-said-weekly-shonen-jump-alphaweekly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/2013\/03\/01\/he-said-she-said-weekly-shonen-jump-alphaweekly\/","title":{"rendered":"He Said, She Said: Weekly Shonen Jump Alpha\/Weekly"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"MV-hesaidshesaid\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Reviews are subjective things. A reviewer is drawing on many things when they write their review. Besides technical things such as story structure, character development and art, a reviewers personal preferences and experiences can affect their feeling about a book. And sometimes, even their gender can make a difference as to whether a book gets a good score or bad. In the following discussions, reviewers Alex Hoffman and Lori Henderson will look at different books and examine the similarities and differences they have over each of them.<\/p>\n

\"ShonenJumpAlpha\"<\/a><\/strong>Shonen Jump Alpha\/Weekly Shonen Jump Magazine<\/strong>
\nPublisher:<\/strong> Viz Media
\nAge Rating:<\/strong> Teen
\nGenre:<\/strong> Action\/Food\/Supernatural\/Historical\/Game
\nPrice:<\/strong> .99\/week; 26.99\/yr<\/p>\n

Lori:<\/strong> It\u2019s been quite a year for Shonen Jump<\/em> Magazine. The digital edition started running weekly at the end of January 2012, with chapters 2 weeks behind it\u2019s Japanese counterpart. The print magazine officially ended in April. And now, in 2013, the magazine has gone same day with the chapters as the Japanese print edition. I\u2019ve been a subscriber to Shonen Jump<\/em> since it debuted back in 2003. How long have you been reading Alex?<\/p>\n

Alex:<\/strong> I\u2019ve been with Shonen Jump<\/em> since it went digital – although I read a few of the paper versions while I worked at my small town library. I loved the idea of the anthology, but at the time I wasn\u2019t that into shonen manga.\u00a0 I\u2019m a Shonen Jump Alpha<\/em> adoptee, since the digital format worked a lot better for me, and I don\u2019t have to deal with the physical copies. So much of the problem with Yen Plus before it went digital was that the anthologies took up so much space. But I\u2019m definitely sticking with Shonen Jump<\/em> for now. Lori, what are your thoughts on SJ<\/em>\u2019s first year as a digital product? Did it meet expectations?<\/p>\n

Lori:<\/strong> Being a collector\/borderline packrat, the piles of issues never bothered me much. They fit into comic book long boxes and nicely fit under the bed. I didn\u2019t buy Yen Plus<\/em> because of price more than space. But I have to say, I wasn\u2019t happy with Shonen Jump<\/em>\u2019s transition to digital. The big problem for me was the ENORMOUS<\/strong> gap in story that the jump to 2 weeks behind Japan meant for print Shonen Jump<\/em> readers. For some of the regular titles like Bleach<\/em> and Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan<\/em>, that meant 10-20 volumes of story just got bypassed. That might be okay for those who read scanlations to keep up with the story, but I was just fine with SJ<\/em>\u2019s slower pace, so this jump was really jarring. If, like with other speed-ups of One Piece<\/em> and Naruto<\/em>, there had been some acknowledgement of this gap and there had been something, arc descriptions, anything<\/em>, I wouldn\u2019t have been as disappointed as I was when I read the first digital issue after reading the last print issue.<\/p>\n

\"Weekly_Shonen_Jump\"<\/a>Alex:<\/strong> I also found myself lost – and I found that if I was reading a series in paper or on the VizManga app, I refused to read the Shonen Jump<\/em> content because I didn\u2019t want to spoil it for myself (Bakuman<\/em> is a prime example – the series ended in Shonen Jump<\/em> with 6+ volumes left to be printed). I\u2019m about as lost with One Piece<\/em> as I possibly can be (I only got to volume 12 in the combined tankobon and didn\u2019t\u00a0 want to get 60 volumes deep on the series). But the saving grace of Shonen Jump Alpha<\/em> (and why I reupped my subscription) was the new series that were introduced through SJA<\/em>. What did you think about the new content introduced in SJA?<\/p>\n

Lori:<\/strong> I was like that at first, not wanting to read Bakuman<\/em>, but I figured (at the time) that the issues would expire, and I probably wouldn\u2019t remember most of what happened anyway, so I went ahead and read them. As for the new stories, I haven\u2019t been too impressed, but as far as Japanese sensibilities go, I seem to be justified. Barrage<\/em> wasn\u2019t bad, but it was too generic. Barrage wasn\u2019t an interesting protagonist. I like Tiamat more, and I felt more sympathetic to Black, the main villain of the first arc, than Barrage. I didn\u2019t find anything appealing about Takama-ga-hara<\/em>, in either art or story. But since both have been ended, I guess I wasn\u2019t alone.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t enjoy the new Rurouni Kenshin: Restoration<\/em> either. I don\u2019t mind reboots or showing characters in a different light, but I really didn\u2019t care for the way Watsuki went about Kenshin\u2019s reboot. I also don\u2019t like the art. It\u2019s very sharp and angle-y (if that\u2019s a word). I didn\u2019t think I would like Cross Manage<\/em>, but that has surprised me. I\u2019ve enjoyed the chapters I\u2019ve read so far. I like the main character Sakurai and am interested in seeing his story. I haven\u2019t read Nisekoi<\/em> or One-Punch Man<\/em> yet. I\u2019m still in November.<\/p>\n

Alex:<\/strong> So overall not very overwhelming. And that\u2019s kind of what is going on with me too. I liked Barrage<\/em> well enough, but it didn\u2019t capture my imagination. The same could be said for Takama-ga-hara<\/em>, which had a rough set of characters and rough art and direction. The comic was \u201cfunny\u201d but in reality, it wasn\u2019t that good.<\/p>\n

Cross Manage<\/em> has been the overwhelming winner out of the new starts in Shonen Jump Alpha<\/em>. The way that the story has developed, its unique and interesting characters, and how it makes the game of lacrosse interesting makes it a delightful read. Nisekoi<\/em> starts in the middle of the series, and you have to really start at the beginning. It reminds me of a mix of Love Hina<\/em> and Wild Roses<\/em>, but it\u2019s got a lot of humor and I\u2019ve been really enjoying it. The first volume is available digitally in the Viz Manga storefront.\u00a0 I am also not caught up with the latest edition, so I haven\u2019t read One-Punch Man<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"WSJ-012113-Contents-sm\"<\/a>Lori:<\/strong> Well, it looks like we mostly agree on the new series. What do you think of SJA<\/em> adding some monthly titles from other Jump magazines like Blue Exorcist<\/em> and Rurouni Kenshin<\/em>? I do like being able to check out other Jump titles that aren\u2019t necessarily WSJ<\/em>. Would you like to see more of these Monthly titles?<\/p>\n

Alex:<\/strong> I think it\u2019s a great idea to add non Jump titles into the mix. I like reading Blue Exorcist<\/em> and while the Ruroni Kenshin<\/em> remake isn\u2019t really my favorite, it\u2019s nice to see some variety in WSJ<\/em>\u2019s lineup. I would be glad for other titles to go into WSJ<\/em>. One of Viz\u2019s recently announced Shonen\u00a0 Sunday title, Magi<\/em>, would be a great choice.<\/p>\n

Overall, I think the WSJ<\/em> has a lot of room to grow, but it\u2019s on the right foot. And with new titles being added, it\u2019s a great service for such a low-cost. I\u2019m happy to keep buying WSJ<\/em> subscriptions if they are delivering new content and getting more licenses for the US market.<\/p>\n

Lori:<\/strong> I\u2019m looking forward to the new title Magi<\/em> too, but I think that might be too big of a line to cross. The monthly titles we\u2019ve seen so far are still Jump titles. I would still love to see more Shonen Sunday though. Really, I wouldn\u2019t be adverse to seeing a monthly digital magazine from Viz. The return of Shojo Beat<\/em> would be awesome.<\/p>\n

While I agree that Viz has taken a lot of good steps with Weekly Shonen Jump<\/em>, they are just too big of steps for me. Ten years ago I was thrilled to get to read so many great titles in one magazine for a great price. But the titles have changed, and I have changed. I just don\u2019t have time to keep up with the weekly reading, and trying to marathon issues just feels like slogging through a swamp. I will be moving to the collected volumes, and letting go of my subscription.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviews are subjective things. A reviewer is drawing on many things when they write their review. Besides technical things such as story structure, character development and art, a reviewers personal preferences and experiences can affect their feeling about a book. And sometimes, even their gender can make a difference as to whether a book gets a good score or bad. In the following discussions, reviewers Alex Hoffman and Lori Henderson will look at different books and examine the similarities and differences they have over each of them. Shonen Jump Alpha\/Weekly Shonen Jump Magazine Publisher: Viz Media Age Rating: Teen Genre: Action\/Food\/Supernatural\/Historical\/Game Price: .99\/week; 26.99\/yr Lori: It\u2019s been quite a year for Shonen Jump Magazine. The digital edition started running weekly at the end of January 2012, with chapters 2 weeks behind it\u2019s Japanese counterpart. The print magazine officially ended in April. And now, in 2013, the magazine has gone same day with the chapters as the Japanese print edition. I\u2019ve been a subscriber to Shonen Jump since it debuted back in 2003. How long have you been reading Alex? Alex: I\u2019ve been with Shonen Jump since it went digital – although I read a few of the paper versions while…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":3844,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9],"tags":[41,122,123,135,208,191],"class_list":["post-3830","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-he-said-she-said","tag-digital","tag-shonen","tag-shonen-jump","tag-teen","tag-viz-media","tag-weekly-magazine"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/files\/2013\/02\/Weekly_Shonen_Jump.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2umma-ZM","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3830"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3830"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3830\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3851,"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3830\/revisions\/3851"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3844"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/manga.jadedragononline.com\/village\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}