Forum - View topicNEWS: Toren Smith predicts manga industry to go bust
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sacchan
Posts: 277 Location: Okinawa, Japan |
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You have to be 18 and up to read porn in Japan, too. But the steamy scenes in Sho-Comi aren't actually considered porn and unfit for minors. Anyone can buy Sho-Comi here. |
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GATSU
Posts: 15310 |
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little: X looks too glamorous to be taken seriously. As for Angel Sanctuary, see X.
dman: Viz came out of the closet a long time ago. musouka: But is Zankoku popular or prevalent over here? |
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The Ramblin' Wreck
 Posts: 924 Location: Teaching Robot Women How To Love |
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Remember Sturgon's Law:
"90% of [manga] is crap because 90% of everything is crap." |
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musouka
Posts: 707 |
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I thought you meant in general. Personally I'd agree that we get all the fluff shoujo over here--though, again, Banana Fish is about as far from "fluff" as they come, and we do get some other real gems too sometimes--but I would reject the notion that's all there is to the genre. If that's not what you were getting at, then I apologize. |
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littlegreenwolf
 Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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What? I'm not sure exactly what you mean by that, but it certianly doesn't escape the fact that those titles do indeed get as bloody and violent as shonen manga. We can continue to make a list of more shoujo manga that contain these traits, but I really see no point in it. You're doing a very poor job so far in proving that these shoujo manga are "fluffy" compared to shonen manga. |
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GATSU
Posts: 15310 |
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What I meant is they get violent, but "cute" or "melodramatic" violent.
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littlegreenwolf
Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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I haven't noticed anything whatsover that is "cute" about the violence in these manga. What do you mean by "cute"? "Wow, there goes a severed head! Look at all that blood!...  He's licking the blood off of the head! This is so cute!" 
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GATSU
Posts: 15310 |
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I think the fact that the head-licking's being done by a bunch of pansies sort of takes away the credibility of the series.
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littlegreenwolf
Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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Well then, that explains a lot.  Pansies...
So all the shoujo manga mentioned so far in this subject have the same problem? They're full of pansies? |
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Zac
ANN Executive Editor
 Posts: 7912 Location: Anime News Network Technodrome |
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What amuses me, Gatsu, is that you're ripping on two series widely acclaimed as being adult, mature, dark, violent and valid titles and then pointing to Fist of the North Star as some kind of paragon of quality, even though it's only good for camp value. Your insistance that garbage like Guyver and FOTNS are better than anything even somewhat "new" amuses me to no end. "A bunch of pansies"... Yeah, 'cause your manga's for TOUGH GUYS, right? And you're a real TOUGH GUY! Man, you could take ANYONE because you read FIST of the NORTH STAR! Man, that's HARDCORE! Not that pansy girly crap like X or Angel Sanctuary! Those also have heads exploding but the GUYS look like GIRLS! Ewwww, GIRLS! Crikey. -Z |
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AnimeSensei
Posts: 18 Location: Utah |
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For one of the few times in my life, I actually completely agree with you on this one, Zac. Gatsu, stop while you're behind. You're just clogging the boards dragging this on. |
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leslina
Posts: 6 Location: http://leslina.net/ |
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This quote just inspired me to post an anecdote to this effect. My little brother who is now 18 was a huge follower of the Pokemon craze. I mean, he watched the anime religously, collected cards and kept them in plastic sleeves, he collected toys etc, basically, he was in a tantric state where Pokemon and shortly after it was the same with Digimon. At anyrate, puberty hit and the mere mentioning of his former 'hobby' sets him off like nothing else. He's thrown away all of his cards and collectibles and has even tried to pawn this 'crap' on me, 'since I like that Japanese stuff'. On the topic of Comics, graphic novels, and Shonen manga... My view on American Comicbook Culture is that it will never disappear, comic culture has been around for a very long time. There was only one Golden era, but just because the industry is doing poorly financially, does not mean that it will go extinct, that's why it's called cult. Holographic foil covers, and A,B,C, D editions are meaningless to the cult follower (speaking for myself anyways). But sadly, it all comes down to the power of the mighty dollar, and the recent backlash in the American industry, I feel, is something that has been building for the past decade as a result of the gimmicking (lest we X-Men fans forget the Age of Apocolypse, though some might argue that that god awful venture kept Marvel afloat) and most recently, the powerhouse of taking comics from the page and putting them onto the screen with the successes of X-Men, Spider Man etc. Yes, these new ventures have brought back a bit of the cashflow, but at the cost, I feel, of turning away the cult follower. The cult follower is hard core and has a difficult time with changes. I do anyway, again, I don't want to speak for the masses, but color me surprised when I walked into my local comic shop to pick up my monthly subscriptions shortly after the release of the first X-Men movie and discovered that virtually all of the X-men were suddenly all dressed in black leather and looking a little too much like their cinematic counterparts. Um, HUH? Bottom line, this catering to the clueless newbie fan, although it may rake in the cash as its supposed to attract these masses to pick up the books, is cheapened by the compromising of some pretty well established canon. Now to be fair, can you fit 40 years of canon in a two hour movie? Of course not, but I still don't like, and I rather that this accomadating NOT be transferred onto the shelf and be left in the theatre. Thank you. Graphic Novels I did not discover until very late, when I was in college, and yes it is an artform all on to itself and rather relieved that it hasn't been exploited to the extent that recent comic book enterprises have. I'll be quite happy if stories like Kabuki and Sandman were not mass marketed to the chillin'. Although... I do wonder what fans of these genres, Sandman in particular, feel about the 'manga'-nization of these series. For example, Death is being released in a manga form by TokyoPop I believe, I'm not quite certain, but I could have sworn I saw something to that effect on the manga shelf. As for manga, another media I didn't discover until college and my first foray into this genre was Samura Hiroaki's Mugen no Jyuunin or as it's known in the states, Blade of the Immortal. I was seduced instantly. My interest in anime only fueled my interest in manga, as I came to learn that, a lot of these anime series I watched were first manga! Who woulda thought?! And just to give folks an idea as to where I'm coming from with my nonsensical ranting. I'm a girl, non-tomboy, non-prissy, just a girl, who's been reading comic books since she was 12 yrs old and absolutely despises shoujo manga/anime. Don't know where that puts me exactly, but I thought it worth mentioning. I'm not one to rant like this, but I felt this was such an interesting thread and wanted to share some of my own thoughts on the subjects. Arigato! 
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Neilworms
 Posts: 155 Location: Chicago IL |
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Let me speak as a fan of the series myself and a long with my friend who is a self proclaimed alternative cartoonist (of the sort of cartoonist that does Graphic Novels such as Maus, Jimmy Corrigan etc) what they did to Sandman was horrible completely and utterly ruining the series. Our responce was pretty much there is no god, turning a very serious and artsy comic into a "goofy fun tale full of wacky hyjinks" with every cliche in manga was a total disaster in my mind :). It would be one thing if the people actually tried to make something creative still in the spirit of the original with a slight manga influence... instead the whole thing was tanted by fandom going overboard... I'm frankly surprised that Neil Gaiman allowed it to be published, yes I know Gaiman has no problem with anime/manga since he worked with people in the industry that actually had TALENT like Yoshitaka Amano or Hayao Miyazaki.... not the kind of people that would fall onto stereotypical cliches found throughout anime/manga (or manga that we get in the US :P) In short: it's something I want to get out of my mind. |
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Aaron White
Old Regular
Posts: 1365 Location: Birmingham, Alabama |
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I haven't read Jill Thompson's manga-style Death book, but bear in mind that she's highly regarded by Neil Gaiman and by the same art-comics crowd that centers around Jimmy Corrigan, Eightball and so on. Now that Sandman has spawned a slew of pseudo-artsy Vertigo comics, beating the flowery poesy and goth stylings of the original into the ground, why not take the franchise in a fresh, funny direction? Jill Thompson's Scary Godmother series is funny and smarter than most vertigo comics, and her art on the actual Sandman book was some of the best in the series. I have complete faith in her. I certainly doubt she could do anything worse than Gaiman's continuity-wonking van-art 1602.
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Aaron White
Old Regular
Posts: 1365 Location: Birmingham, Alabama |
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Anyway, I'm just glad Tempest started this thread.
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