Forum - View topicJason Thompson's House of 1000 Manga - Akira
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timesteel
 Posts: 202 Location: California |
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Woot Akira!
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taster of pork
 Posts: 594 Location: My House |
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I finished the 6th volume yesterday. Great series. One of my all time favorites. I thought the movie was pretty good too, but no where near as good as the manga.
Last edited by taster of pork on Thu Apr 28, 2011 6:13 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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ss-hikaru
 Posts: 269 Location: Western Australia |
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I read Akira in my early teens and it kind of scared me. Now that I think about it, it's a really good manga, I just couldn't appreciate it back then. However...for some reason I don't remember how it ends. Like, what happened to Akira in the end. I do remember Kaneda spoiler[telling the Americans to 'get lost' in the epilogue bit with Tetsuo's ghost riding a bike with the rest of the gang] but not what happened in the grand finale before that...
Unfortunately I've realised now that I don't like science fiction so I'm never going to revisit Akira (and I guess won't rediscover what happened in the end). I guess it's worth noting that my public library actually has the entire Akira series on it's shelves! Most series only get random volumes (like...volumes 2 and 5, what use is that?), so this is great for anyone in my area who randomly picks up volume 1, you CAN easily access the rest! The only other manga titles from memory that my library owns (or shares with other libraries in the city/council boundaries) all the volumes of would be Oh My Goddess and Astro Boy. Rozen Maiden also almost makes the list, although the first volume is missing (weird right?). |
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Tenebrae
Posts: 486 |
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All hail Katsuhiro Otomo! Akira was one of the things that really got me into anime (though not the first one I saw).
BTW, the third image needs either a clear: left; CSS rule or moved to the start of next paragraph as it breaks the layout in current location. |
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Moomintroll
 Posts: 1600 Location: Nottingham (UK) |
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Great stuff!
It's the Moebius-influenced artwork, combined with Otomo's incredible feel for panel composition and page layout, that makes Akira such a stunning piece of work. Any time there's a small hiccup in the plotting or pacing, it's more than compensated for by the visuals. Overall, it's one of the best - and most ambitious - Japanese comics I've ever read. Domu is even better. |
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pachy_boy
Posts: 1323 |
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I remember hating the movie when I first watched, because I felt violence was its only substance and that alone was what made the movie popular. Ten years later I have a different appreciation for it. The only reason I can guess is because Akira was one of the first I've ever watched and I've seen a multitude of titles since then, which helped me have a broader perspective. But to this day I still see next to no point to spoiler[Kaori's death scene].
My question is this: When Kodansha took back the Ghost in the Shell manga from Dark Horse, it was pretty much the censored version. Has Akira been given similar treatment, or is it the same as when Dark Horse had it (minus whatever translation changes there may be)? |
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GATSU
Posts: 15305 |
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pachy: Well, the point is that Tetsuo loses so much control of himself that he can't even protect the person he loves by that point. And I don't think Kodansha's Akira's censored, but I haven't read it through myself.
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Lord Geo
Posts: 2545 Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey |
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So good a line that it needed to be used twice in the article, right Jason? Anyway, I never really saw or read Akira until this past October at MangaNEXT, when I saw a fair portion of the movie. It still looks great, even today, but it also was really weird and somewhat confusing. But no one ever said that SF had to make sense all the time... |
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Brand
 Posts: 1028 |
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Ack, I've actually own all of Akira but haven't finished reading it. Last time I took a break half way though. When I went back to jump into it again, I was like "Oh Crap, there was to much going on I can't remember it all" (this isn't a problem I normally have). I'm going to have to re-read the volumes I've read already. Which is fine, but it's been a bit of a stopping point, but I guess I should really get on that.
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Highway Star
 Posts: 227 Location: Ireland |
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"He spent some time in New York, which made a big impression on him; one of his first manga collections—which he now refuses to allow to be printed in English, apparently because he doesn't like it anymore—was Sayonara Nippon, a collection of New York stories."
Really? I didnn't know that. Shame, it looked pretty interesting from the few images I've seen of it. I wonder if he's like that about all those Japanese-only collections? |
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ptolemy18
Manga Reviewer/Creator/Taster
Posts: 357 Location: San Francisco |
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Ahh, curses! -_- Good catch, my typo! |
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ptolemy18
Manga Reviewer/Creator/Taster
Posts: 357 Location: San Francisco |
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Re: GATSU (for some reason the forum's not letting me actually quote your post)... you're right, Hiroya Oku is definitely following in the footsteps of Katsuhiro Otomo, with the ultra-realistic art style (computer-assisted in Oku's case), the hard sci-fi, graphic violence and constant action. (Although Oku has a sense of humor that Otomo doesn't show in Akira. He also has that giant-breasts thing going on.)
Yeah, the bikers are definitely a bit of yankii culture creeping through there. Looking back at Akira, thank god Tetsuo and Kaneda weren't drawn like banchos or stereotypical yankiis with pompadours... (shudder) The sheer power escalation and psychic transcendental body-morphing craziness in Akira is really amazing, even today, 30 years after it came out. Another thing that sticks out to me about the manga, in retrospect, is how none of the characters have any families. Even friends are in short supply. We find out just about zero about the backgrounds of any of the characters; they're just people caught up in this insane situation. The lack of tragic backstories for anyone does make Akira a sort of anti-emo manga... although I wouldn't say it's entirely free of emo, since Tetsuo's tragic descent into madness and inhumanity is pretty powerful and shocking. |
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ptolemy18
Manga Reviewer/Creator/Taster
Posts: 357 Location: San Francisco |
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I'd have to doublecheck that actually. I remember hearing on several occasions that he refused to allow Sayonara Nippon to be printed in English because he's no longer happy with them -- more than one manga publisher has asked -- but I don't know why he's dissatisfied with them. I don't think it was some other reason, like too many licensed brands being used, though. |
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FaytLein
 Posts: 1260 Location: Williamsburg, VA |
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I'm patiently waiting for volume 6 to arrive any day now so I'm pretty jazzed up about finally completing the series. Back in the 90's, I was actually unnerved by the end of the movie but now I really enjoy sitting down andwatching it. The manga is really superior though.
Any truth to the belief that Otomo was inspired from Tetsujin 28 when he was writing Akira? I mean, Akira being the Number 28 psychic, Kaneda and Tetsuo's last names (I think Col. Shikishima might be related to this as well) or is it all a big coincidence? Inquiring minds want to know! |
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ptolemy18
Manga Reviewer/Creator/Taster
Posts: 357 Location: San Francisco |
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Hmm... Wikipedia says there is a connection.  I haven't actually read the original Tetsujin 28, though.
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