Tomatoypoo no Lycopene

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Tomatoypoo no Lycopene

A comedy manga about Lycopene, an adorable Toy Poodle born from a tomato stalk.

I have to be honest. I completely forgot this manga ever existed in Weekly Shonen Jump. I personally had no interest in this series while it was serialized. Now that I’ve gone back and read it, I can see how the juxtaposition of cute characters with 4th wall breaking jokes makes for some decent comedy bits.

This series was transferred over to Jump+ when Kouji Ohishi suffered from health issues and is still on-going right now. I’m glad Ohishi is still continuing this series compared to the fate of all the other canceled series in Jump.

~dakazu

Full Drive

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Full Drive

A manga about a young ping pong player who returns from Germany to make his debut in Japan.

Here is yet another example of how sports manga typically do not do well in Weekly Shonen Jump. Works like Full Drive are well drawn and Genki Ono should have found success and popularity but it didn’t and it was canceled. I truly feel like Haikyu!! and Kuroko’s Basketball are oddities for gaining popularity in Jump.

~dakazu

321 – Guest Gaiden 8 – Pop Life & Look Into My Eyes with Matt Haasch of Star Fruit Books

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321 – Guest Gaiden 8 – Pop Life & Look Into My Eyes with Matt Haasch of Star Fruit Books

This week we’re joined by the owner of Star Fruit Books, Matt Haasch! Matt talks about what prompted him to start his publishing company and what he hopes to accomplish in the future! Then we discuss two series from Star Fruit Books: Q-ta Minami’s Pop Life and Look Into My Eyes by Yoko Miyako!!!

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BOZEBEATS

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BOZEBEATS

A manga about a wolf raised human who is recruited to join religious monks who incorporate modern weaponry to battle demons threats.

We’ve discussed this on an older episode.

I feel bad for BOZEBEATS because Ryoji Hirano is such an incredible artist. His action scenes are flashy and exciting and the weapons the boze use are highly detailed. Unfortunately this series suffers with it’s overly complex main character. Making him a wolf child is just going too far. The one shot version of this manga focused on the adult monk who recruits the wolf boy and honestly they should have just kept him as the protagonist. I wonder if Hirano and his editor changed the main character to appeal to Weekly Shonen Jump readers but ultimately that back fired and this was yet another series that got canceled quickly.

~dakazu

Ziga

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Ziga

A manga about a young man who’s nightmares come to life when a giant monster destroys his city.

We’ve discussed this on an older episode.

I think there’s a fundamental problem with your story if your twist is obvious to the reader. Writer Rokurou Sano tries to setup this big reveal a few chapters down the line but it made the preamble was just a waste of time. Kentarou Hidano is a fine artist but nothing in Ziga really stood out and impressed me. I think the readers of Weekly Shonen Jump agreed as this one was canceled really fast.

~dakazu

Invade You!

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Invade You!

A comedy manga about an alien trying to hide his secret identify from his inquisitive classmate.

We’ve discussed this on an older episode.

There isn’t too much to say about this series. It was decently drawn and decently funny and therefor it didn’t do well in Weekly Shonen Jump and was canceled. Kazusa Inaoka is currently doing a short serialization called Bunkiten limited for the digital version of Jump. I hope he finds success in that.

~dakazu

I’m From Japan

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I’m From Japan

A comedy manga about high schooler Japan Hinomoto, who is a master of the Todofu-ken: the Metro-territorial Pre-fist-ure Style.

I really am baffled why this manga debuted under the VIZ Jump Start initiative. My guess is that it was pushed by Shueisha since it had an anime adaptation they were promoting at the time. But by all accounts, I’m From Japan is probably one of the least suitable choices for an English adaptation. The jokes are so tightly tied specifically to the 47 different prefectures in Japan, translating them to make any sense must have been a herculean task. My heart goes out to the translator.

Personally, a lot of the cultural jokes flew over my head so I didn’t care much for this. It lasted almost a year in Weekly Shonen Jump but again, I think that’s due to the anime tie-in they had. This is an extremely Japanese-centric comedy by Seiji Hayashi so I don’t really recommend it for foreign readers.

~dakazu

Yui Kamio Lets Loose

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Yui Kamio Lets Loose

A manga about honor student Yui Kamino who unleashes a violent second personality whenever her hair gets loose.

This manga is by Hiroshi Shiibashi who previously ran a successful serialization of Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan in Weekly Shonen Jump. His return to Jump was not nearly as successful as this was canceled after 36 chapters. I thought Yui Kamio Lets Loose didn’t play to Shiibashi’s strengths of drawing evocative action scenes. Yui would get into some battles but since this series was trying to be more of a comedy, they never played out.

This series is available from VIZ but I recommend you read Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan instead.

~dakazu