230 – Manga in Motion 35 – Alita: Battle Angel
This week we check out the 2019 Alita: Battle Angel: a live-action adaptation of Yukito Kishiro’s Sci-Fi seinen series! Have dakazu and Darfox finally found a good manga movie adaptation?!
Continue readingPACT
A sci-fi manga about a bomb defuser who must keep his promise to stop terrorists who are trying to end the world with nitrogen bombs.
This is a strange manga to say the least. I think Shinnosuke Kuji is a talented artist but his design skills leave a lot to be desired. Most of the story takes place deep underwater and you have people fighting with gatling guns, rocket launchers and M-16 rifles and it’s just a weird choice to use weapons you can recognize in unbelievable environments. The series is filled with these kinds of unoriginal choices that really prevent it from standing on it’s own.
I think the themes of self-sacrifice to fulfill promises are well done with various characters dragging their bloody bodies to help defuse the bombs. Unfortunately they never really answers questions about the terrorists because the series ended at 5 volumes. In the final chapter it says ‘End Part 1′ so I suppose they might revisit this series in the future. But personally I don’t think it’s worth it. Kuji seems like a talented manga artist and I feel like he should just try something else.
~dakazu
BLAME! and so on
An art book of Tsutomu Nihei illustrations from his manga and other collaboration projects.
This thing is fantastic and a must have item if you’re a Tsutomu Nihei fan. Some of my favorite stuff was his fantasy architecture series he did called Megalomania.
It even contains commentary about every individual piece from Niehi himself. Some of his comments like “This was a mistake” or “WTF is this” are hilarious.
~dakazu
Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
A manga about a man who is accidentally summoned into a fantasy realm. He decides to use his special skills of a dimensional shopping to access food items from his home world to make a living cooking. Unfortunately that cooking attracts the legendary beast Fenrir who demands they form a pact that will involving getting 3 meals a day from the man.
This might be an isekai story but it focuses on food so I checked it out and I’m really glad that I did! I really like the mix of modern food in fantasy worlds. It’s also down well in Isekai Izakaya: Japanese Food From Another World.
There’s a lot of typical isekai troupes here, such as the man’s net supermarket ability allowing him to purchase salt and pepper cheaply and then selling that at a high price in this fantasy world. Also, like a lot of isekai stories the main character has to be very cautious about revealing his powers in fear of them being taken advantage. However they subvert many of those overpowered skills by sharing that advantage with his Fenrir partner. Instead of having a single overpowered protagonist, the fighting is handled by the beast and the human focuses on making delicious meals. That dynamic between these two were really enjoyable and I like their relationship a lot.
I look forward to keep checking this series out.
~dakazu
Shokuryou Kyoushitsu
A horror manga where an evil creature is stalking students in a classroom and eating them.
I’ve read multiple manga about a students turning to fear and hysteria over an unknown killer within their group so the basic premise for this series wasn’t anything special. However the artwork on this one is really good. The creature has a horrific design and the violence and gore are very disturbing right from the beginning. I ended up checking out all 3 volumes mostly based on the strength of artist Renji Kuriyama.
If you’re a fan of horror then this one might be worth your time.
~dakazu
Scum’s Wish
A romance manga about a high school couple who sexually confide in each other for either of their unrequited love.
We did a full retrospective on this series that you can listen to. I really, really liked this manga. Mengo Yokoyari’s beautiful artwork only goes hand in hand with her ability to realistically display adolescent love. Just about every character has a terrific arc that fleshes them out.
However I personally HATE the epilogue Scum’s Wish decor and wish it never existed!
~dakazu
Sporting Salt
A manga about a high school student who dreams of becoming the best sports doctor in the world.
Yet another series that failed to make a mark in Weekly Shonen Jump. The art style really reminds me of Reborn! and I wonder if creator Yuuto Kubota was inspired by Akira Amano or even worked as an assistant under them.
Based on what I’ve seen I feel like slice of life series just don’t fair well in Jump unless they’re a romance or comedy or have some supernatural element that sets them apart.
This was regrettably unremarkable.
~dakazu
229 – Frankenstein: Junji Ito Story Collection part 2
On this episode we continue our review of Frankenstein: Junji Ito Story Collection with stories about Toru Oshikiri, a scary doll, unfortunate face clamps, and the Ito family dog Non-non!
Continue readingNature Jimon
A manga about real life Japanese TV personality Jimon Terakado and his almost bizarre obsession with food, bug hunting, and survival.
Man I love this manga. It entertains by being informative to an almost ludicrous level. Jimon is no doubt a strange guy. He loves wagyu beef enough to get a breeder’s license and will school you in the proper way to eat Korean BBQ. His eccentric personality shines through in this series and Jimon himself explains everything from great places to eat to the intense length he and his friends go hunting for stag beetles.
I’ve only read a couple volumes but I’d love to track down the rest!
~dakazu
Yuube wa Otanoshimi Deshita ne
A manga about a man who invites a member from his Dragon Quest X guild to be his roommate but didn’t know they were a girl.
This manga is a pretty simple sitcom setup as the guy and girl now have to adapt to living with each other. Nothing really interested me about this series except that it’s filled with non-stop references to Dragon Quest X! Many chapters introduce various aspects of the game and information about MMORPG culture in general. It almost feels like a straight up commercial. Reminds me a lot of the Netflix series Dad of Light.
This wasn’t bad by any means but I don’t care about Dragon Quest X so it’s just not for me.
~dakazu