Uhyo! Tokyo-to Kita-ku Akabane

This is manga artist Tooru Seino’s wacky tales of real life residents in the city of Akabane. While it’s great to see a manga covering crazy-but-true stories it felt a bit exploitative to be sharing information on some people there, like the local homeless lady. While Seino writes her in a positive light, he is still using her and others he meets for his comedy material. I think it’s important to keep that in mind, even if the city of Akabane has embraced this manga as a source of local pride. 

I do appreciate manga(or any entertainment) that is based on real people and real stories so I enjoyed it.

~dakazu