tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-62107582024-03-07T15:41:48.945-08:00Completely FutileBooks, comics, movies, music and other things, from Adam StephanidesAdamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.comBlogger462125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-28651848651215751952021-01-25T12:49:00.002-08:002021-01-27T17:37:38.223-08:00<i>BOKU WA BIITORUZU</i> [<i>I AM A BEATLE</i>] AGAIN<br /><br />
<i>Boku wa Biitoruzu,</i> written by Tetsuo Fujii and drawn by Kaiji Kawaguchi, is a ten-volume manga whose premise is that the Fab Four, a very successful Japanese Beatles tribute band, are inexplicably sent back in time to 1961, before the Beatles released their first record. Makoto, the bassist, had dreamed of making the Fab Four the twenty-first century Beatles; he now proposes that the band play and record Beatles songs before the Beatles record them, claiming them as their [the Fab Four’s] own original songs, and convinces the others to go along. He justifies this on the grounds that when the Beatles realize that the songs they were going to write have already been written, they will write new songs, thus increasing the number of Beatles songs in the world. The principal action of the series is the Fab Four’s quest for first domestic (that is, Japanese) and then International stardom.<br /><br />
As individuals, the Fab Four’s members resemble the sanitized public image of the early Beatles more than they do the actual Beatles; they don’t take drugs or get involved with groupies. (Shou, the lead guitarist, gets to know a girl fan, and they meet in a park for chaste conversation.) But that’s fine, since the whole point of the series, despite its title, is that the Fab Four are <i>not</i> the Beatles, but imitators of them. The series is very respectful of the Beatles throughout, despite its premise. If anything, it goes too far in the direction of Beatle-worship, especially in the final volume.<br /><br />
Aside from the Fab Four, the most important character is Uzuki Maki, the owner of a small production agency, who sees in the Fab Four an opportunity to break the grip of large talent agencies on the Japanese entertainment world. She fights tirelessly on their behalf, even as she gradually comes to realize that there’s something very strange about them, not least Makoto’s obsession with an unknown British group called the Beatles. Maki, not any of the Fab Four, is the series’s most developed and most sympathetic character.<br /><br />
The first time I tried to read <i>Boku wa Biitoruzu</i>, I quit in the middle of the second volume, and wrote a rather dismissive <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2012/09/manga-corner-i-am-beatles-boku-wa.html">post</a> based on what I had read. In retrospect, I gave up at precisely the wrong time. The vintage-instrument fetishism I wrote about in that post, in particular, disappears shortly after the point where I stopped. And while the series may initially hook readers by appealing to fantasies of being the Beatles, as I suggested, it also explores the dark side of wanting to be your idols. Makoto thinks of the Beatles as rivals, and looks forward to the Fab Four going head-to-head against the Beatles on the international charts, the Fab Four’s remembered Beatles’ songs against the new songs the Beatles will write; while Shou thinks that stealing from the Beatles will somehow create a link with them. And while the series sometimes seems to gloss over the morality of the Fab Four’s actions, in the end it faces up squarely to the fact that they’re plagiarists.<br /><br />
Rereading the series, it kept my attention to the end, except for a kidnapping subplot (taking up about half a volume) that felt like filler. Still, the series as a whole feels like a missed opportunity. (Mild spoilers ahead.) Initially Rei, one of the Fab Four, who is essentially John to Makoto’s Paul, wants nothing to do with Makoto’s scheme, both because he objects morally and because he has come to regard the Fab Four as an obstacle to his own efforts to express himself. About midway through the series, though, an external event causes him to change his mind. As a result, Rei’s individual story is abruptly cut off, and the conflict between Rei and Makoto disappears completely. But that conflict and that character arc were the most compelling aspects of the series for me. That Maki plays a larger role later in the series is some compensation, but not enough. The final volume is also a disappointment, as all conflicts are resolved through what is virtually a deus ex machina. Overall, the series would have been better had it spent less time on the mechanics of the Fab Four’s rise to stardom and more time on the effect this rise had on the Fab Four and those around them.<br /><br />
The series appears to be out of print, but used copies are available on amazon.com: volumes <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-406372932X/dp/406372932X/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063729320&qid=1610201844&sr=8-1">1</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063729532/dp/4063729532/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063729535&qid=1610202186&sr=8-1">2</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063729745/dp/4063729745/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063729740&qid=1610202945&sr=8-1">3</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063729893/dp/4063729893/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063729894&qid=1610228288&sr=8-1">4</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063870081/dp/4063870081/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063870084&qid=1610228840&sr=8-1">5</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063870316/dp/4063870316/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063870312&qid=1610228782&sr=8-1">6</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063870588/dp/4063870588/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063870589&qid=1610228696&sr=8-1">7</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063870790/dp/4063870790/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063870794&qid=1610228637&sr=8-1">8</a>, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Morning-KC-ISBN-4063871010/dp/4063871010/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063871012&qid=1610228544&sr=8-1">9</a> and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beatles-complete-Morning-ISBN-4063871029/dp/4063871029/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=9784063871029&qid=1610228396&sr=8-1">10</a>. (Keep in mind that these volumes are all in Japanese.)<br /><br />
Note: “I am a Beatle” now seems to me the best translation of the title. Japanese generally doesn’t distinguish between singular and plural, and in one place in the series, “Biitoruzu” is used as a singular noun. The echo of “I am the Walrus” would be stronger in Japanese, which lacks definite and indefinite articles.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-25039752714264102222017-06-22T09:32:00.001-07:002017-06-22T09:32:05.881-07:00<i>BELLADONNA OF SADNESS</i> ONE MORE TIME<br /><br />
Last night, I watched <i>Belladonna of Sadness</i> at the Art Theater. It turns out that watching it on the big screen is quite a different experience than watching it on Youtube. The disturbing scenes are a lot more disturbing, and the erotic scenes (which are more prominent than I'd remembered)[1] are a lot more in-your-face. In fact, in the erotic scenes and elsewhere, the style itself is disturbingly grotesque: it somehow taps deeply into primal anxieties about bodies. And I have to admit the film's treatment of the heroine's body is exploitative at times. Still, and despite the apparently predominantly negative reaction of the audience, I maintain that the film is brilliant.<br /><br />
Another reason to watch the film is its psychedelic soundtrack by Masahiko Satoh, a major figure in Japanese underground psychedelic rock.<br /><br />
Incidentally, one of the trailers before the film was, to my astonishment, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2008/06/movie-corner-funeral-procession-of.html"><i>Funeral Parade of Roses</i></a>. Has somebody been reading this blog? It's not on the schedule yet, but if you're a fan of the 1960s New Wave, don't miss it.<br /><br />
[1] As I was leaving the theater, I heard someone remark that the film was "all sex, sex, sex." He had a point. Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-49796846073702492202017-06-06T13:38:00.000-07:002017-06-06T13:38:58.085-07:00A HEADS-UP<br /><br />
Speaking of anime on the big screen, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2016/07/animation-corner-belladonna-of-sadness.html"><i>Belladonna of Sadness</i></a> will be playing at the Art Theater on July 21 and 22 at 10:00 PM. If you live in the Champaign area, save the date. In fact, save both dates.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-70809631799508777662017-06-05T08:54:00.002-07:002017-06-05T08:57:06.076-07:00ANIME CORNER: <i>YOUR NAME</i><br /><br />
A few days ago I saw Makoto Shinkai’s latest film, <i>Your Name</i> [<i>Kimi no Na wa</i>], on the big screen. I was so affected by it that I decided to see it again two days later. I’ve seen all of Shinkai’s full-length movies as well as <i>Voices of a Distant Star,</i> the short anime which put him on the map, but <i>Your Name</i> is his best so far. You may see it described as a body-swap anime, but it’s much more than that, and it manages to be both heartbreaking and heartwarming. An important motif of the film is the braided cords which are a specialty of the small town in which one of its main characters lives; the movie itself is like these cords in its craftsmanship and its intricate construction (which can be appreciated better on a second viewing).<br /><br />
If you happen to live in the Champaign, IL area, the film is playing at the Art Theater through Thursday, June 8. If you’re at all interested in anime and somehow haven’t seen it yet, do so.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-9067063763385361042016-09-17T09:36:00.003-07:002016-09-17T09:36:54.504-07:00A FEW CAVILS ABOUT <i>LITTLE, BIG</i><br /><br />
I recently reread John Crowley's masterwork of fantasy <i>Little, Big</i>, and was forced to the realization that it isn't perfect. The first part, set at Edgewood, is wonderful, and the ending is wonderful in a different way. But the middle part, dealing mainly with Auberon and Sylvie, while still very good, left me dissatisfied.<br /><br />
For one thing, Edgewood is an enchanted place, and New York City isn't, even though some magic takes place there. For another, the adult Auberon is less likable and less interesting than Smoky. And these weaknesses allowed me to notice other weaknesses that I might not have noticed had the fundamentals been stronger. The trope that the women of the Drinkwater clan understand the truth intuitively, while the men can't get it no matter how hard they try to understand it rationally, didn't bother me with Smoky or with John Drinkwater, but got a bit annoying when it was repeated with Auberon. (Ariel Hawksquill is an exception, but she's depicted as a "masculine" woman: rationalistic, aggressive, and power-hungry.) It really won't do to have a major character who's a demagogue with a huge popular following, and be as vague about his message and appeal as Crowley is with Eigenblick. And Fred Savage is, alas, a Magic Negro. (And he turns into a tree, which is <i>really</i> problematic and uncomfortable.)<br /><br />
But don't let any of this stop you from reading <i>Little, Big</i>, if you haven't already.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-75671151533828135352016-07-02T10:47:00.001-07:002017-06-26T13:13:39.274-07:00ANIMATION CORNER: <i>BELLADONNA OF SADNESS</i> [<i>KANASHIMI NO BERADONA</i>]<br /><br />
A long time ago, I <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2008/01/anime-on-youtube-for-those-seriously.html">raved</a> about the Japanese animated feature <i>Belladonna of Sadness</i> [Kanashimi no Beradona]. (Note that the Youtube video of <i>Belladonna</i> linked to in that post has been taken down.) At the time, it wasn't available in the U.S. Soon it <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Belladonna-Sadness-Blu-ray-Aiko-Nagayama/dp/B01FIOVRPY/ref=sr_1_1?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1466784653&sr=1-1&keywords=belladonna+of+sadness">will be</a> (only on Blu-Ray, unfortunately). In my last post I highly praised the <i>Puella Magi Madoka Magica</i> movie, and I stand by what I said there. But Belladonna is in a whole different class. It's one of the best animated features I've seen, perhaps the best. It's nothing like any anime you're likely to have seen, and is essential viewing for anyone interested in animation as an art.<br /><br />
It's also definitely not for kids. It's subject matter is unlikely to interest children, and there are a number of sex scenes, including a harrowing rape.
<br /><br />[Updated to correct my faulty memory.]Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-91021832314654547782016-04-08T09:23:00.001-07:002016-07-02T10:48:50.856-07:00THE PUELLA MAGI MADOKA MAGICA MOVIE<br /><br />
I recently had occasion to watch the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puella_Magi_Madoka_Magica">Puella Magi Madoka Magica</a> movie in Japanese without subtitles.[1] I had already watched it with subtitles, so I could broadly understand what was happening, but I could only understand snatches of the dialogue. Therefore I was compelled to focus on the visuals. From that perspective, the movie is one of the most amazing works of animation I've ever seen: a seemingly endless flow of inventive, surprising, frequently surreal, often dazzling images. The TV series was already known for its original and startling visuals, but the movie takes a huge leap beyond the series.<br /><br />
The movie seems to be out of print in the U.S., but it's still available (with subtitles) on Amazon, and no doubt elsewhere, under the title <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Puella-Magi-Madoka-Magica-Movie/dp/B00VSBK47E/ref=sr_1_5?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1460047558&sr=1-5&keywords=puella+magi+madoka+magica"><i>Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie - Rebellion</i></a>.<br /><br />
[1] Technically, it's the third movie, but the first two "movies" are compilations of the TV series.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-79438753540576640202014-09-22T12:04:00.000-07:002014-09-22T12:04:30.816-07:00 MANGA CORNER: <i>SUPERCONDUCTING BRAIN PARATAXIS</i> [<i>CHOUDENNOU PARATAKUSHISU</i>] BY SHINTARO KAGO<br />
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<i>Superconducting Brain Parataxis</i>* combines two of Kago' characteristic themes: treating humans as machines, and breaking down the body's integrity. It's a collection of linked short stories, set in a futuristic world in which human DNA is used to produce giant naked women's bodies, or parts of bodies, which are "ridden" by normal-sized humans and used as organic machines. (At least this is what appears to be happening; the reality is a bit different.) Despite this bizarre premise, it was serialized in the mainstream shounen magazine <i>Weekly Young Jump</i>. Correspondingly, there is no explicit sex or scatology, and the gore is toned down. It also takes a more standard approach to storytelling than most of his other work: its world building is semi-plausible, and there are characters you can sympathize with. In fact, to a large extent it reads like mainstream SF, if you pretend that the "fleshbots" are regular robots. There are even moments of poignancy, as in the first story, in which a scientist persuades one of the giants to escape, but this brings her (the giant) only suffering.<br />
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<i>Superconducting Brain Parataxis</i> is not the best of Kago's tankoubons that I've read (that would be <i>New Banji Kaichou</i>), but it's better than either of the ones I've reviewed. It's also much less offensive than many of Kago's other works. It's out of print, but if you get a chance to buy it I'd recommend it.<br />
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<i>Superconducting Brain Parataxis</i> was published by Shueisha in the YJ line. It's 194 pages long, and its list price is 1200 yen. It's ISBN is 978-4087826722. <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E8%B6%85%E4%BC%9D%E8%84%B3%E3%83%91%E3%83%A9%E3%82%BF%E3%82%AF%E3%82%B7%E3%82%B9-%E3%83%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0%E3%82%B8%E3%83%A3%E3%83%B3%E3%83%97%E3%83%BB%E3%82%B3%E3%83%9F%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%82%B9-%E9%A7%95%E7%B1%A0-%E7%9C%9F%E5%A4%AA%E9%83%8E/dp/4087826724/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1411330857&sr=1-1&keywords=9784087826722">Here's</a> its amazon.co.jp page.<br />
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*"Parataxis" has two meanings, but the <a href="http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/parataxis">one</a> relevant here is: "the psychological state or repository of attitudes, ideas, and experiences accumulated during personality development that are not effectively assimilated or integrated into the growing mass and residue of the other attitudes, ideas, and experiences of an individual's personality."<br />
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</div>Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-25252380857906934842014-06-28T10:17:00.000-07:002014-06-29T13:01:35.148-07:00FINALLY, SOME ANSWERS: <i>BILLY BAT</i> VOL. 14<br /><br />
The latest volume of <i>Billy Bat</i> begins with an excerpt from one of Kevin Yamagata's <i>Billy Bat</i> stories. A text box at the end announces that the story has ended without revealing the answers to several questions, one of which relates to the plot of the real-life <i>Billy Bat</i>. This got me worried that <i>Billy Bat</i> itself would end with this volume, leaving its mysteries unresolved. In hopes of reassuring myself I flipped to the end of the book (a bad habit of mine which has several times resulted in spoiling myself), where I saw that the title of the last chapter was "Last Scene," which didn't reassure me. Unable to stand the uncertainty, I went to the net (another bad habit), where a <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/review/R2VMMU8Q8IAS1J/ref=cm_cr_dp_cmt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=4063883264&channel=detail-glance&nodeID=465392&store=books#wasThisHelpful">comment</a> on a review on amazon.co.jp stated that volume 14 wasn't the last volume. And it isn't.<br /><br />
More importantly, this is the volume that finally explains the plot so far. There are still mysteries left, including the ultimate origin of the Bat. But we learn the relationship between the two Bats, the purposes of their manipulations, why there is a drawing of the Bat on the Moon, and why the fate of the world is at stake. And the answers aren't letdowns.<br /><br />
Aside from this, volume 14, along with the previous volume, reveals a lot about one of the principal bad guys, whose shadowy presence in the first eleven volumes I had noted in my <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2013/06/manga-corner-billy-bat-vols.html">overview</a> of those volumes. And his story is unexpectedly moving, especially the last page of volume 14.<br /><br />
Considering volumes 12-14 overall, I'll admit that volume 12 was a little slow, but the other two volumes are back up to speed. In my overview of volumes 1-11, I wrote that "if Urasawa and Nagasaki can maintain the level of the first eleven volumes until the end, [<i>Billy Bat</i>] may well turn out to be Urasawa's best work." The more recent volumes have only strengthened this opinion.<br /><br />
You can follow the links in the overview referred to above to see my reviews of the first eight volumes as they appeared.<br /><br />
<i>Billy Bat</i> is written and drawn by Naoki Urasawa, with Takashi Nagasaki assisting on the story. It's published by Koudansha in Japan, in their Morning line. Volume 12 costs 648 yen, while volumes 13 and 14 cost 619 yen. (At least, those are the prices on the books themselves; I just noticed that amazon.co.jp lists higher prices.) Their ISBN numbers are:
Vol. 12: 978-4-06-387230-9<br/><br/>
Vol. 13: 978-4-06-387272-9<br/><br/>
Vol. 14: 978-4-06-388326-8.<br /><br />
Here's the <a href=http://www.amazon.co.jp/BILLY-BAT-14-%E3%83%A2%E3%83%BC%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0KC-%E6%B5%A6%E6%B2%A2/dp/4063883264/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1403975116&sr=1-1&keywords=billy+bat+15+%E6%B5%A6%E6%B2%A2%E7%9B%B4%E6%A8%B9">amazon.co.jp</a> page for <i>Billy Bat</i> volume 14, follow the links there to get to the pages for the previous volumes.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-10084116197076467962013-08-19T09:30:00.003-07:002021-01-21T14:35:00.576-08:00CHICAGO SANSEIDOH CLOSING SALE<br /><br />
I was up in Chicago last week and on Thursday I visited the Sanseidoh Japanese-language bookstore in Arlington Heights, one of my regular stops. The store was having a closing sale, with most items 80% off (unfortunately, not including manga magazines), and a lot of manga tankoubons on sale for one dollar per volume. Around half the stock was already gone, and naturally the popular stuff went first; but there was still some worthwhile stuff left.<br /><br />
On September 1st, the store will close. It will be replaced by a Kinokuniya -- another Japanese-language bookstore chain -- but not immediately; the cashier said maybe in October.
Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-4393280171149982792013-06-11T14:16:00.001-07:002013-06-11T14:19:22.620-07:00MANGA CORNER: <i>BILLY BAT</i> VOLS. 1-11<br /><br />
<i>Billy Bat</i> is Naoki Urasawa's most recent, and still ongoing, series (with Takashi Nagasaki assisting with the story). Unlike <i>Monster,</i> <i>20th Century Boys</i> and <i>Pluto,</i> Urasawa's most ambitious completed series, <i>Billy Bat</i> has not been licensed in the U.S. But the eleven volumes published in Japan so far already show it to be a major work on a par with those series. If Urasawa and Nagasaki can maintain the level of the first eleven volumes until the end, it may well turn out to be Urasawa's best work.<br /><br />
(I've tried to avoid spoilers, as much as is compatible with giving a picture of the series as a whole; but if you want to come to the series with a completely fresh mind, you should stop reading here.)<br /><br />
<i>Billy Bat's</i> labyrinthine plot revolves around a pair of supernatural bats, one of whom is said to be "white" and the other "black" even thought they are identical in appearance. These bats have been manipulating human history by influencing people's actions for at least two millenia, and there are hints that they have been doing so for much longer. They have appeared before a number of well-known historical figures, some of whom we meet in the series, and a number of cartoonists. Nearly everything else about the bats is mysterious so far. (Since we rarely see both bats at once, and since there are generally no indications of which one we are seeing, I will refer to both bats indiscriminately as "the Bat.")<br /><br />
Among the cartoonists the Bat has spoken to is Kevin Yamagata, <i>Billy Bat's</i> main protagonist so far. When the series opens in 1949, Kevin, a Japanese-American, is writing and drawing a successful comic he has created called "Billy Bat," starring an anthropomorphic bat of the same name. Yamagata's character was unconsciously inspired by a drawing of the Bat, but once he becomes aware of the Bat during a trip to Japan, it begins appearing before him. It plants story ideas in his subconscious, which he feels compelled to draw, and which turn out to predict the future. Eventually, it starts giving him orders outright. Because of his connection with the Bat, Kevin becomes the object of unwelcome attention from at least two groups of conspirators hoping to manipulate the Bat.<br /><br />
While <i>Billy Bat</i> shares this lone-man-vs.-conspiracy aspect with <i>20th Century Boys</i> and <i>Monster,</i> Kevin is not a heroic figure like Kenji or Tenma. Though the Bat insists that the tasks he assigns Kevin are vital, Kevin just wants to be left alone. In fact, he spends several years (offscreen) in a drunken stupor to avoid seeing the Bat or drawing the Bat's stories. He repeatedly needs to be prodded into action by the Bat or by Smith, an investigator who becomes Kevin's ally. Likewise, rather than being charismatic villains, the apparent leaders of the two conspiracies (if indeed they are the leaders) are shadowy figures with little in the way of characterization so far. In compensation, the characterizations of several secondary characters are among Urasawa's best: perhaps most poignantly, a character whose name would be a gigantic spoiler, but who first appears early in volume four. (When you read it, you'll know who I'm talking about.)<br /><br />
<i>Billy Bat</i> is a narratologist's dream. Both <i>20th Century Boys</i> and <i>Monster</i> made frequent use of flashbacks, but <i>Billy Bat</i> takes the scrambling of chronology much further, freely leaping both forward and backward across years, decades and even centuries. (The earliest scene shown so far takes place two millenia ago.) The narrative also frequently doubles back upon itself, cutting away in the middle of a scene and returning to it later. The result is that <i>Billy Bat</i>'s chronology is fiendishly complex; yet Urasawa's storytelling is so clear that I almost never got lost. At one point Urasawa sets a deliberate trap for his readers, which I didn't realize I'd fallen into until I reread the series.<br /><br />
Urasawa plays another game with his narrative, which I don't recall having seen before. Since the comics that Yamagata and other cartoonists draw under the Bat's influence depict future events accurately, Urasawa can narrate scenes in two ways: in "reality," and as transformed into anthropomorphic comics.<br /><br />
Dirk Deppey, iirc, once called Pluto Urasawa's Watchmen. But when one considers the intricacy of its plot and its density of information and connections, it's <i>Billy Bat</i> that is more like Watchmen. There's hardly a line of dialogue which doesn't advance either its plot or its themes. Even the example of Yamagata's "Billy Bat" comic which opens the series isn't just a hard-boiled detective pastiche, but foreshadows later events. In fact, in order to fully understand and appreciate the early volumes, you have to go back and reread them in light of the later volumes.<br /><br />
Not only does <i>Billy Bat</i> cover several historical periods, it incorporates several genres. The Bat gives it an overall ambience of fantasy, or perhaps horror. But individual sections read like a detective story, a ninja drama, a political thriller, a serial killer thriller, science fiction, and even a Western (the small Western town where they don't cotton to strangers sticking their noses where they don't belong).<br /><br />
Unlike Urasawa's other major series, <i>Billy Bat</i> is structured to a large extent around actual historical events. The Shinoyama case, a notorious mysterious death in post-WWII Japan that has never been solved, plays a major role in the plot. So does another well-known murder case. And the Apollo Moon landing also serves as a touchstone. In fact, one could say that <i>Billy Bat's</i> subject is History itself. And its view of history is decidedly conspiratorial. In addition to the Bat's hidden hand, several Urasawa incorporates several real-life conspiracy theories.<br /><br />
Unlike Urasawa's other major series, much of <i>Billy Bat's</i> action is set in the U.S. And Urasawa's portrayal of the U.S. is far from flattering. Racism, both against African-Americans and Japanese, is prominently displayed. And American cultural imperialism is a major theme of the series. Through a shady (and so far unclear, at least to me) maneuver Kevin loses control of Billy Bat to "Chuck Culkin Enterprises." Culkin Enterprises has made Billy cuter, turned the comic into a children's comic, and erased Kevin's role as creator and original writer-artist from the public memory in favor of Chuck Culkin (who was actually Kevin's assistant). It's also made Billy hugely popular, and turned him into a massively merchandised brand, which is expanding worldwide, including Japan. And it's determined that <i>its</i> Billy Bat should be the only Billy in existence. To that end, it's sent an operative all over the world to destroy all other comics inspired by the Bat. The parallels with Disney and Mickey Mouse are obvious. The political aspect of this is made clear in a scene in which a general tells an executive of Culkin Enterprises that their two organizations, working together, can dominate the world, adding that "the missile and Billy Bat should work together."<br /><br />
<i>Billy Bat</i> is not perfect, of course. Its biggest flaw is that it is occasionally prone to sentimentality, especially in the early volumes, though not to the extent that <i>Monster</i> and <i>Pluto</i> are. There are also some failures of research in the U.S. scenes, which don't affect the overall plot but are still irritating.<br /><br />
Since I wrote the above, the chapters that will make up volume twelve have been serialized in Japan. I've read them, but decided not to make any changes in what I wrote, though there's little or nothing I'd be inclined to change in any case. I will say that I don't see any indication that the series is approaching a conclusion.<br /><br />
<i>Billy Bat</i> is published by Kodansha, in its Morning line. <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/BILLY-BAT-11-%E3%83%A2%E3%83%BC%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0-KC/dp/4063871967/ref=pd_bxgy_b_text_y">Here's</a> link to the eleventh volume's amazon.co.jp page; you can follow the links on that page to get to the earlier volumes' pages.<br /><br />
Here are the reviews I wrote of the first eight volumes of Billy Bat as they came out: <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2009/08/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">vol. 1</a>, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2010/01/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">vol. 2</a>, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2010/09/manga-corner-billy-bat-volumes-3-and-4.html">vols. 3 and 4</a>, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2011/01/manga-corner-billy-bat-by-naoki-urasawa.html">vol. 5</a>, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2011/07/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">vol. 6</a>, and <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2012/03/manga-corner-billy-bat-by-naoki-urasawa.html">vols. 7 and 8</a>.
Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-24281217131469492112013-03-24T12:18:00.001-07:002013-03-24T12:18:30.652-07:00MANGA ROUNDUP<br /><br />
Recently, I was up in Chicago, and I bought some manga at Sanseidoh in Arlington Heights. I haven't had time to read any of them yet, but I thought I'd share some of my impressions upon looking at them. These aren't the only manga I bought, but I'll put these up to start with.<br /><br />
<i>Swan</i> vol. 11 by Kyoko Ariyoshi: <i>Swan,</i> a classic shoujo manga from the 1970s about a Japanese girl who becomes an internationally recognized ballerina, was published in the U.S. by CMX, but despite good reviews it never caught on. When CMX shut down it was left unfinished, and it seems unlikely to be rescued. In Japan, however, it remains popular, with two editions in print, of which this is one. Because this edition groups the series into only fourteen volumes, this volume doesn't correspond to CMX's volume 11. Instead, its first half contains most of what was in CMX's vol. 15 (the last volume it published), while its second half carries on from the end of that volume, for 149 more pages. Looking through this volume, there doesn't seem to be a lot of dancing, which is too bad, because those are the best parts. <i>Swan</i> vol. 11 is published by Akita Bunko and costs 562 yen. Its ISBN is 9784253171670, and its amazon.co.jp page is <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/Swan%E2%80%95%E7%99%BD%E9%B3%A5-11-%E7%A7%8B%E7%94%B0%E6%96%87%E5%BA%AB-%E6%9C%89%E5%90%89-%E4%BA%AC%E5%AD%90/dp/4253171672/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364151413&sr=8-1">here</a>. If you want to pick up where CMX left off, make sure you buy <i>this</i> edition of vol. 11; the other Japanese edition groups the series into fewer volumes than this one, so that edition's volume 11 will be later on in the story.<br /><br />
Incidentally, in the Japanese original Masumi and Leon work not with the fictional choreographers Bilanovsky and Bronstein, but with the real and renowned choreographers George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins, and the dance they work on with Robbins in not "Morning of a Satyr" but "Afternoon of a Faun." The Japanese guest dancer, as well, is not Yuko Kamimori but Youko Morishita, a real and internationally known ballerina.<br /><br />
<i>Subete no Jidai o Tsuujite no Satsujinjutsu</i> [<i>Murder Methods of All Eras</i>] by Shintaro Kago: This is Kago's latest tankouban, having come out late last year. The jacket proclaims it to be a collection of horror stories. You might ask how that differs from Kago's usual stuff. Based on looking through the volume, the answer seems to be "not much," although there may be more emphasis on violence and less on sex than usual. At any rate, Kago hasn't lost his obsession with adolescent girls, although there are male victims as well. <i>Subete no Jidai o Tsuujite no Satsujinjutsu</i> is published by Kubo Shoten and costs 1200 yen. Its ISBN is 9784765930284, and its amazon.co.jp page is <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/4765930289/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364151572&redirect=true&sr=8-1">here</a>.<br /><br />
<i>Hataki</i> vol. 2 by Eiji Nonaka: Hataki is an animal which is described on the cover as a "very pretty and very very mysterious pet." Actually, it's pretty ugly and looks something like a pig's head with short legs. I bought this on a whim, because it's by the guy who did <i>Cromartie High School</i> (with his art style unaltered) and because I was curious about the pig-thing. Looking at it, I can't even tell whether it's a comedy or not, although at one point there's an invasion of anthropomorphic pig paratroopers. I guess it wasn't that popular in Japan, since it was published in 2009 and is already out of print. <i>Hataki</i> vol. 2 is published by Kodansha under the Evening [Ibuningu] label, and costs 533 yen. Its ISBN is 9784063522570, and its amazon.co.jp page is <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%83%8F%E3%82%BF%E3%82%AD%EF%BC%882%EF%BC%89-%E3%82%A4%E3%83%96%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0KC-%E9%87%8E%E4%B8%AD-%E8%8B%B1%E6%AC%A1/dp/4063522571/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1364151772&sr=8-1">here</a>. Or if you want to start with the first volume, its amazon.,co.jp page is <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%83%8F%E3%82%BF%E3%82%AD%EF%BC%881%EF%BC%89-%E3%82%A4%E3%83%96%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0KC-%E9%87%8E%E4%B8%AD-%E8%8B%B1%E6%AC%A1/dp/406352230X/ref=la_B004LPRTQ8_1_35?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1364152060&sr=1-35">here</a>, although it's also out of print.
Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-5267847705361925322012-10-19T12:27:00.000-07:002012-10-19T12:27:05.702-07:00IS KASUGA A PERVERT? A NOTE ON <i>FLOWERS OF EVIL</i><br /><br />
In the manga <i>Flowers of Evil</i> by Shuzo Oshimi, the protagonist Kasuga is repeatedly told by his classmate Nakamura that he's a pervert. Kasuga insists that he isn't, even though he had impulsively stolen the gym clothes of the girl he loves. Who is right? The end of volume two may provide an indication. But earlier in that volume there's a very revealing clue, though only those who read Japanese can pick it up.<br /><br />
The bottom panel on page 82 depicts a bookshelf in Kasuga's room. For several of the books on it, enough of the spine is showing that we can determine the title and/or author. Most of these are unexceptionable books for an intelligent, literature-loving high schooler to own.* But the book in the most prominent position, adjacent to Kasuga's dialogue balloon, is <i>Kachikujin Yapuu,</i> also known as <i>Yapoo the Human Cattle</i>.<br /><br />
<i>Yapoo the Human Cattle,</i> by Shozo Numa, is a "classic" Japanese novel of male masochism. It's about an aristocratic German woman and her Japanese fiance, who fall into the hands of a future interstellar empire in which descendants of East Asians are regarded as subhuman and permanently treated as animals or in even more degrading ways. In the course of the book the Japanese man is reduced to the status of an animal, and his fiancee comes to think of him as an animal. (In fact the book is even more extreme than this description makes it sound, but I think I've said enough to make my point, and I don't want to turn reader's stomachs unnecessarily.) This sounds like something you would find in the darkest corners of the internet, but a number of Japanese critics and writers have taken it seriously as literature. (For an example, see <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=TAmPIYnMekMC&pg=PA140&lpg=PA140&dq=goro+yapoo&source=bl&ots=OPqynghg1A&sig=ZVk2Iq4crWv99N8vnDpHkeipXrg&hl=en&sa=X&ei=PKeBUJvQDoPxygH1zYCQAg&ved=0CDgQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=goro%20yapoo&f=false">here</a>.) It's been repeated multiple times since it was first published in 1956, and is still in print.<br /><br />
In view of the way Oshimi calls attention to Kasuga's ownership of <i>Yapoo the Human Cattle,</i> my answer to the question posed in the title of this post is "Yes, he probably is."<br /><br />
*The author of the book to the right of the photograph is the French novelist J. K. Huysmans, <i>not</i> J. K. Rowling.
Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-36536061573312481922012-09-07T10:33:00.000-07:002012-09-07T10:34:59.834-07:00MANGA CORNER: <i>I AM THE BEATLES</i> [<i>BOKU WA BIITORUZU</i>] BY TETSUO FUJII AND KAIJI KAWAGUCHI, VOLS. 1 & 2<br /><br />
At a <a href="http://www.comicsreporter.com/index.php/comic_con_resources_two_best_of_worst_of_manga_lists/">panel</a> at this year's Comic-Con, Carlo Santos named <i>I Am the Beatles</i> as the never-licensed manga he'd most like to see published in the U.S.* I happen to have read the first volume and part of the second, so I thought I would write up my impressions. Note that this review is mostly from memory, so there may be inaccuracies.<br /><br />
The Fab Four are the top Beatles tribute band in Japan, and have been invited to compete for the Beatles tribute band world championship. Makoto, the band's "Paul," has even greater ambitions for the Fab Four: he dreams of the band writing its own "Beatles" songs and becoming the 21st century's Beatles. Before the world championship, though, Rei, the band's "John," stuns the rest of the band by announcing that he's quitting. While he and Makoto are fighting about this, Makoto and Shou, the band's "George," are mysteriously transported back to 1961, a year before the Beatles' recording debut.<br /><br />
Makoto and Shou have to make a living, but there's obviously no demand for a Beatles' tribute band in 1961. So Makoto comes up with the idea of recreating the Fab Four and playing Beatles songs, but presenting them as their own original songs, since nobody in Japan has heard them. In effect, they would <i>become</i> the Beatles, only Japanese. This might seem like a crappy thing to do to your idols, but Makoto has a justification, or at least a rationalization: when the Beatles discover that the songs they were going to write have already been written, they'll have to write new songs, thus doubling the number of Beatles songs in the world.<br /><br />
Despite this tantalizing premise, I quit reading partway through the second volume. Near the start of the series, the manager of a club for Beatles tribute bands remarks that the Fab Four are unusual in being young, since most Beatles tribute bands are middle-aged. And the primary audience for the series seems to be people like the members of those other tribute bands: nostalgiac middle-aged men who fantasize about being the Beatles. I like the Beatles, but I don't dream of being them. Nor am I excited by the thought of playing instruments exactly the same as the ones the early Beatles played, as Makoto and Shou are and as the reader is supposed to be. Still, the art is good and so is the writing so far, despite my reservations. If I have time, I might pick it up again one day.<br /><br />
The series, which finished recently, is ten volumes long, and is published by Koudansha in Japan in their Morning KC line. <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E5%83%95%E3%81%AF%E3%83%93%E3%83%BC%E3%83%88%E3%83%AB%E3%82%BA-1-%E3%83%A2%E3%83%BC%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0KC-%E3%81%8B%E3%82%8F%E3%81%90%E3%81%A1-%E3%81%8B%E3%81%84%E3%81%98/dp/406372932X/ref=pd_sim_b_4">Here's</a> the amazon.co.jp page of the first volume, and you can follow the links from there to find the others. As you'll see, the series has mixed reviews on amazon.co.jp, but some of the bad reviews are by Beatles fans outraged at what Makoto and Shou are doing to the Beatles. If I thought that the authors endorsed Makoto and Shou's actions, I'd agree with their criticisms, but I don't think so, based upon a <a href="http://yositeru.blogspot.com/2011_07_01_archive.html">spoiler</a> for later volumes I happened to come across.<br /><br />
*In the article I've linked to, the title is translated as "We Are the Beatles," and elsewhere I've seen it translated both ways.
Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-26433764317366053592012-07-17T09:06:00.000-07:002012-07-17T09:11:45.642-07:00MANGA CORNER: THREE BY SHINTARO KAGO<br /><br />
About a month ago, having decided that Shintaro Kago is seriously underrated, I ordered from Sanseidoh, the Japanese bookstore in Arlington Heights, almost all the Kago manga amazon.co.jp carried which I didn't already own. Three of them have come in so far, all recent, including two that came out this year. A few days ago I picked them up. I've looked at them, but haven't read much yet, so these aren't reviews.<br /><br />
<i>Antlion vs Barabara Girl,</i> the oldest of the three, was published in 2009 and contains stories published between 2006 and 2008. In <i>Fraction,</i> the "Shintaro Kago" character said that he needed to write more mainstream manga. Though that was a fictional character, the stories here apparently were published in mainstream magazines: slightly over half appeared in <i>Young Jump</i> and the rest in <i>Horror M,</i> which I've never heard of but I'm guessing is also a mainstream magazine.<br /><br />
To what extent did this affect the stories' content? I didn't spot any explicit sex or scatology and there's little nudity. Compared to other mainstream manga, however, these stories are still very bloody and grotesque; and looking at them, I don't get the sense that they're watered down.<br /><br />
<i>Toko Tochu no Deai Gashira no Guzen Kiss wa Ariuruka? Experiment</i> [<i>When Two People Collide on the Way to High School, Is It Possible that They Will Accidentally Kiss? Experiment</i>], published in April of this year, mostly contains very short stories. It starts off with a color section containing nineteen twisted single-page -- and frequently single-panel -- gags which originally appeared in <i>VICE</i> magazine. The rest of the book contains twenty four-page stories, most of which appeared in <i>Ax,</i> and six longer stories ranging from seven to sixteen pages. Some of the <i>Ax</i> stories revisit the formal experimentation that first attracted me, and no doubt others, to Kago.<br /><br />
<i>Harem End</i> [<i>Haarem Endo</i>] was published only last month. Thicker than an average <i>tankoubon,</i> the title story itself is almost two hundred pages long. It starts out like the most banal, cliched "harem manga" imaginable, as a new college student finds himself, through a series of improbable plot contrivances, living with five women representing various stereotyped "girlfriend" types: the <i>tsundere,</i> the glasses girl, the silent girl wearing an eye bandage and so on. But after seventeen pages of this the story abruptly turns into a "normal" Kago story. A second plot strand concerns a sinister anime studio. Rounding out the volume are five eight-page stories. The first three of these, at least, appear to be linked.<br /><br />
I picked up some non-Kago boos too, which I'll try to report on soon.<br /><br />
The Kago books' amazon.co.jp pages are <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/4765930149/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1342540542&redirect=true&sr=8-1">here</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E7%99%BB%E6%A0%A1%E9%80%94%E4%B8%AD%E3%81%AE%E5%87%BA%E4%BC%9A%E3%81%84%E9%A0%AD%E3%81%AE%E5%81%B6%E7%84%B6%E3%82%AD%E3%82%B9%E3%81%AF%E3%81%82%E3%82%8A%E3%81%86%E3%82%8B%E3%81%8B-%E5%AE%9F%E9%A8%93-%E9%A7%95%E7%B1%A0-%E7%9C%9F%E5%A4%AA%E9%83%8E/dp/4883793656/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1342540700&sr=1-2">here</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%83%8F%E3%83%BC%E3%83%AC%E3%83%A0%E3%82%A8%E3%83%B3%E3%83%89-%E9%A7%95%E7%B1%A0%E7%9C%9F%E5%A4%AA%E9%83%8E/dp/4864362424/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1342540853&sr=1-1">here</a>.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-26083200279998350372012-06-03T13:25:00.000-07:002012-06-03T13:31:28.341-07:00MANGA ROUNDUP<br /><br />
One of the original purposes of this blog was to be a source of information about Japanese-language manga. In line with this, each time I've come back from a trip with a bunch of Japanese-language manga, I've planned to post descriptions of them. And each time I never get around to it. This time, I was determined that things would be different. Thus, here are brief descriptions of some of the manga I bought on my most recent trip to Sanseido. These aren't reviews; I even haven't read any of these yet, except for a quick reading of the first chapter of one manga (because otherwise I would have had no idea what it was about). I've included links to the books' amazon.co.jp pages.<br /><br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/BILLY-BAT%EF%BC%889%EF%BC%89-%E3%83%A2%E3%83%BC%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0-KC-%E6%B5%A6%E6%B2%A2-%E7%9B%B4%E6%A8%B9/dp/4063871096/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1338754204&sr=1-1"><i>Billy Bat</i> vol. 9</a> by Naoki Urasawa: I haven't glanced at the interior yet, for fear of spoilers. I haven't even removed the shrink-wrap, and I'm doing my best to not look closely at the covers. All I can tell you is that the front cover has a striking image: the artist with the bushy white hair and beard whom I mentioned in my review of the last two volumes is painting a large outline of the Bat in red, which seems to be between the artist and the viewer, as if he was painting on a transparent glass sheet placed between himself and the viewer.<br /><br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%83%BB%E3%83%AF%E3%83%B3%E3%83%80%E3%83%BC%E3%83%A9%E3%83%B3%E3%83%89-BEAM-COMIX-%E8%96%AE%E5%86%85%E8%B2%B4%E5%BA%83/dp/4047262722/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1338754409&sr=1-1"><i>In Wonderland</i> (vol. 1)</a> by Takahiro Yabauchi: This pastoral fantasy manga is another variation of <i>Alice in Wonderland.</i> Its protagonist is a girl named Elise who is not visiting, but lives in Wonderland along with many of Lewis Carroll's characters. Thankfully, there's no attempt to make Wonderland grim and gritty. In fact, this Wonderland is a happier, more peaceful place than the original, in which there was a lot of shouting and people being rude. I bought this mainly because of the artwork, which does have much of the flavor of John Tenniel's original illustrations, though Yabauchi's line, unlike Tenniel's, is thin and fragile. (I put "vol. 1" in parentheses because there's no indication in the volume that the story is not complete, but in fact it continues beyond this volume and as far as I know is still ongoing.)<br /><br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E5%A4%9C%E3%81%AF%E5%8D%83%E3%81%AE%E7%9C%BC%E3%82%92%E6%8C%81%E3%81%A4-%E3%83%93%E3%83%BC%E3%83%A0%E3%82%B3%E3%83%9F%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%82%B9-%E4%B8%8A%E9%87%8E-%E9%A1%95%E5%A4%AA%E9%83%8E/dp/4757726341/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1338754737&sr=1-1"><i>The Night Has A Thousand Eyes</i></a> [Yoru wa Sen no Me o Motsu] by Kentaro Ueno: This is a hefty (478 pp.) collection of 4- to 8-page gag stories. It's pretty meta stuff, with Ueno obviously parodying a wide variety of artists, though I'm not familiar enough with manga to recognize more than a few of the artists parodied, and of these the only one I've read is Shiriagari Kotobuki. Also of note is a single-page adaptation of <i>Les Miserables</i> in 175 tiny panels. The stories here all appeared between 1998 and 2003, but the series is still running in Comic Beam.<br /><br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/R%EF%BC%8D%E4%B8%AD%E5%AD%A6%E7%94%9F%EF%BC%881%EF%BC%89-%E3%83%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0%E3%83%9E%E3%82%AC%E3%82%B8%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B3%E3%83%9F%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%82%B9-%E3%82%B4%E3%83%88%E3%82%A6-%E3%83%A6%E3%82%AD%E3%82%B3/dp/4063618846/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1338754854&sr=1-1"><i>R - Chuugakusei</i> vol. 1</a> [R - Middle Schooler] by Yukiko Gotoh: Unlike the previous two manga, it's not easy to tell what kind of manga this is without reading it. But it appears to be a romantic comedy with a rather weird premise. The male protagonist, a second-year middle schooler, is a self-proclaimed "smell fetishist" who is especially turned on by dirty articles that girls have discarded. When he meets a girl who is willing to give him her used sanitary napkin, he's in heaven. Despite the premise, there's no sex in the manga (or at least none that I noticed when I skimmed it) and virtually no nudity. Again, I picked this up mainly for the art: Gotoh has an unusual style, and her used of solid blacks is striking.<br /><br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E9%9B%A3%E6%B3%A2%E9%89%A6%E7%95%B0%E6%9C%AC-%E4%B8%8A-BEAM-COMIX-%E3%82%82%E3%82%8A%E3%82%82%E3%81%A8%E5%B4%87/dp/4047262757/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1338754997&sr=1-1"><i>Naniwadora Ihon</i> vol. 1</a> by Takashi Morimoto: Again, it's hard to tell what kind of manga this is without reading it, but it appears to be a drama set in Edo-period Japan about an elegant but ferocious woman and her young daughter. To be honest, I don't remember why I special-ordered this. Maybe I was just in an expansive mood. But it turns out, just like the two previous manga, to have a distinctive style influenced by Edo-period prints, the faces in particular. It won a <a href="http://comipress.com/article/2007/07/12/2289">Tezuka Osamu Cultural Award</a> in 2004.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-73521363689751895952012-05-30T12:47:00.004-07:002012-05-30T13:06:52.263-07:00JAPANESE-LANGUAGE BOOKSTORE CLOSING SALE<br />
<br />
Six years ago I wrote about <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2005/12/kotobuki-shiriagari-alert-ive-raved.html">JBC</a>, a small used book store in Arlington Heights, a suburb of Chicago, which sold Japanese-language books, including manga.* I was there yesterday and learned that the store would be closing: "perhaps by the end of next month" is what the guy told me. This is sad news, of course. On the other hand, this provides opportunities for bargain-hunters. Not only have prices been cut on their regular stock, but they are selling their rental manga in sets for two dollars per volume. You have to buy all the volumes they have of a series at once (and as far as I could see they were complete series, or complete up to recent volumes): you can't pick and choose individual volumes. But there were plenty of short or reasonably short series there. On the other hand, if you've been waiting for an opportunity to buy 105 volumes of <i>Oishinbo</i> for $210, or even 173 volumes of <i>KochiKame</i> for $346, now's your chance. (Unless they've been sold already, of course.)
Instructions on how to get there are in the post I linked to. Note that I'm not talking about the JBC in Mitsuwa, which doesn't sell books. I don't know if that one is closing or not.
*The Shiriagari Kotobuki volumes I wrote about in that post are no longer there, though. (I think.)Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-83365960655354165722012-05-12T11:27:00.003-07:002012-05-30T13:07:22.277-07:00MANGA CORNER: A BRIEF REMARK ON <i>KINECOMICA</i><br /><br />A long time ago I briefly <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2004/10/some-manga-i-bought-recently-heres.html">wrote about</a> <i>Kinecomica</i> by Tori Miki. This is a collection of short gag manga, each one parodying or riffing on a well-known movie. What I didn't notice at the time, because I didn't have enough experience with manga, was that some of the pieces also parody or imitate the styles of other manga artists. "Star Wars," for instance, is quite obviously in the later style of Shigeru Sugiura. "Ghostbusters" is equally obviously in the style of Shigeru Mizuki. Though it's not as obvious, I believe "The Bible" is in the style of Hideo Azuma. And "Robocop" is evidently in the style of some 50s or 60s robot manga (the panels are even numbered), but I don't know which. I'm sure there are more parodies that I don't recognize. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if every story in the book is a parody of a different artist.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-42842205918984205882012-04-30T14:32:00.001-07:002012-05-30T13:07:48.991-07:00MANGA CORNER: <i>DOLL</i> VOL. 1 BY OKADO TATSUYA (NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH ANY OF THE OTHER MANGA TITLED "DOLL")<br /><br />Embarrassment is a frequent source of humor in manga, but it's rare that a series is actually based upon embarrassment. However, <i>Doll's</i> opening scene is excruciatingly embarrassing for both parties. A young woman named Izumi drops in uninvited on her former art teacher (referred to only as "Sensei"), and finds the sex doll he's stashed away. Not one of the compliant robots of Japanese adolescent male fantasies, but an ordinary, inert, though realistic-looking sex doll.) In fact, he owns three sex dolls. While Izumi is disgusted, she sticks around. In fact, she insists, for reasons that aren't clear to me, that he bring the dolls out of hiding and display them openly. Further embarrassing situations follow: for instance, at one point Izumi is roped into helping one of Sensei's friends photograph his sex doll in bondage.
Despite the subject matter, there is very little nudity, not even of the sex dolls, and very little crude dialogue. In fact, the manga is not really about sex at all. Instead, it's about the prickly relationship between Izumi and Sensei, to which the sex dolls provide a silent, and slightly creepy, counterpoint. We don't learn all that much about Izumi or Sensei in this volume, but their awkward conversations make enjoyable reading. The art is realistic-looking and flows smoothly, with the dolls falling appropriately into the "uncanny valley."
<i>Doll</i> is 192 pp. and costs 533 yen. It's published by Kodansha and its ISBN is 978-4-06-314564-9. Its amazon.co.jp page is <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/DoLL%EF%BC%881%EF%BC%89-%E3%82%A2%E3%83%95%E3%82%BF%E3%83%8C%E3%83%BC%E3%83%B3KC-%E5%B2%A1%E6%88%B8-%E9%81%94%E4%B9%9F/dp/4063145646/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335578763&sr=8-1">here</a>.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-5088996505450129892012-03-10T07:16:00.000-08:002012-05-30T13:08:21.102-07:00MANGA CORNER: <i>BILLY BAT</i> BY NAOKI URASAWA, VOLS. 7 AND 8<br /><br />I didn't review <i>Billy Bat</i> vol. 7 when it came out, because I didn't have much to say about it. The confrontation that volumes four through six had been leading up to took place, and as I had predicted it wasn't a decisive showdown. It didn't even seem to advance the plot much. Nor did Urasawa introduce any new surprises in volume seven. In fact, I was a little disappointed when I finished it. Much of the preceding volumes' tension had been dissipated. Now that I think about it, volume seven could be seen as the end of an arc. (By my count, the third, after what might be called the First Modern-day Japan Arc and the Ninja Arc.)<br /><br />Now that I've read volume eight, I have a lot more to talk about. On the one hand, this volume, along with the last, binds the various plot strands more closely together. In volume seven, we learned why Billy Bat wanted the interracial couple to get together and the true importance of that whole plotline. In this volume, we learn that the Bat's choice of Jackie, the Japanese-American girl introduced in volume six, was not random: she turns out to be indirectly connected to both the interracial couple plot and the ninja plot. (One advantage of writing about an entity manipulating history over millenia is that it makes what would otherwise be unbelievable coincidences more plausible.)<br /><br />Things are being pulled together in other ways as well. Kevin returns to Japan, very reluctantly, and we again see the veteran manga-ka from whom he had unconsciously plaigarized Billy Bat. This manga-ka, who now sports an enormous bushy white beard and mustache, is revealed to have a more direct connection to the plot. And once again, many of the characters seem to be converging on a single location.<br /><br />But in the middle of all this, Urasawa throws yet another curve ball, which may turn out to be his wildest yet. Chuck Calkin introduces a time machine into his version of the Billy Bat comic, and this is followed by a several page-long explanation of the fourth dimension. No real time machine appears in this volume. Nor, as far as I can recall, has there been any hint that the Bat, or anybody else, can travel in time. But the laws of dramaturgy now require that an actual time machine, or at least the potentiality for one, should eventually show up.<br /><br />Aside from that, the biggest novelty in this volume is a new bad guy who's in Japan to buy up land for a Japanese version of Billyland (an obvious allusion to Tokyo Disneyland). This guy is genuinely scary, in part because he appears so affable.<br /><br />I was going to reread the entire series so far before posting this, which might have given me more to say. But I can't find the vocabulary notes I made for some of the volumes. Once I've found them, maybe I'll write another post on vols. 7 and 8. Anyway, I'm now excited again to see the next volume.<br /><br /><i>Billy Bat</i> is published by Koudansha (Japan). Both vols are 196 pp. and cost 600 yen. The ISBNs are 978-4-06-387037-4 (vol. 7) and 978-4-387078-7 (vol. 8).<br /><br />Here are the amazon.co.jp pages for vols. <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/BILLY-BAT%EF%BC%887%EF%BC%89-%E3%83%A2%E3%83%BC%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0KC-%E6%B5%A6%E6%B2%A2-%E7%9B%B4%E6%A8%B9/dp/4063870375/ref=pd_sim_b_2">7</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/BILLY-BAT%EF%BC%888%EF%BC%89-%E3%83%A2%E3%83%BC%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0-KC-%E6%B5%A6%E6%B2%A2-%E7%9B%B4%E6%A8%B9/dp/4063870782/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1331177941&sr=1-1">8</a>.<br /><br />Reviews of earlier volumes are <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2009/08/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">here</a>, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2010/01/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">here</a>, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2010/09/manga-corner-billy-bat-volumes-3-and-4.html">here</a>, <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2011/01/manga-corner-billy-bat-by-naoki-urasawa.html">here</a> and <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2011/07/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">here</a>.<br /><br />(I had jotted some notes about vol. 7 when it came out, and one of these was: "If you can read Japanese, DO NOT look at the lower left portion of the front cover (to be precise, the part of the obi which is above that portion of the cover). In large characters is printed a major spoiler not just for previous volumes of the series, but for vol. 7 itself." To which I would now add, on looking at the book again, don't look at the back-cover obi either, or at the English-language blurb under it.)Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-54241774901858890252012-01-25T19:25:00.000-08:002012-06-03T13:29:03.637-07:00MANGA MOVEABLE FEAST: <i>THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE</i> BY USAMARU FURUYA, VOLS. 1 AND 2<br /><br />The Furuya manga currently available in the U.S. don't do justice to his abilities as a writer. <i>Genkaku Picasso</i> is one of the worst works of Furuya I have read, while <i>Lychee Light Club</i> and <i>No Longer Human</i> are both adaptations of works written by others, unlike the majority of Furuya's works. Those who only know Furuya through these works may conclude that he's a poor writer when not adapting someone else, while even those familiar with masterpieces like <i>The Music of Marie</i> and "Book of the Moon" may think he's lost his touch. But in <i>The Children's Crusade</i> [<i>Innosan Shounen Juujigun</i>], one of Furuya's most recent works (the third and final volume has not even been published in Japan yet), which is an original story, his writing is as powerful as ever.<br /><br /><i>Genkaku Picasso</i> was an attempt to create a shounen manga which avoided the cliches of shounen manga. <i>The Children's Crusade,</i> on the other hand, while not shounen, engages with shounen manga in a different way: it takes a familiar shounen scenario -- a group of teenage boys fights for justice armed with idealism, an indomitable spirit, and the power of friendship -- and shows it leading to disaster.<br /><br />Based upon a real event, though one about which little is known, <i>The Children's Crusade</i> begins in a town in Northern France in 1212. Nicholas*, an impulsive and hotheaded twelve-year-old, longs more than anything to be a crusading knight like his father, but given his poverty and lack of social standing this seems impossible. To show his determination, he goes so far as to carve a large cross into his forehead with a knife. (He bears the scar prominently throughout the two volumes.) His friend Etienne is also twelve, but their personalities are complete opposites. Etienne is a gentle, devout, contemplative shepherd.<br /><br />One day while tending his sheep, Etienne finds a letter and an unusual-looking trumpet. Then a vision of the crucified Jesus appears to him and tells him that he has been chosen and that the trumpet's sound will lead him to Jerusalem. When he returns to the town and publicly describes his experience, Nicholas acclaims him as a Savior, and declares that he will accompany Etienne to Jerusalem. Soon Etienne's pilgrimage has become a crusade to "liberate" Jerusalem from the Muslims, led by Nicholas, who declares that nobody over fourteen is allowed to participate, since previous crusades have failed because the faith of adults is too weak.<br /><br />Spurred by a rumor that those who reach Jerusalem will have any wish granted, a diverse group of boys enrolls, including a puppeteer; an intellectually-minded, skeptical merchant's son; a leper; and one of the bandits who had attacked the village, whom the villagers had captured and are abusing as revenge. These latter two are allowed to come at the insistence of Etienne, who publicly embraces both of them. (To be sure, it's unrealistic that all these types would be found in the same small town, but it helps keep the secondary characters from blurring into each other, a common problem in stories with lots of characters of approximately the same age and sex.)<br /><br />Soon after they set out, they meet Hugo, a member of the powerful Knights Templar. After he witnesses Etienne perform a miracle, he not only declares the Children's Crusade under the Templars' official protection, but accompanies it himself. From then on, in each town they pass through the Crusaders receive a rapturous reception, in good part due to Hugo's advance work. In each town Etienne miraculously heals the sick and injured. And in each town, they gain both generous donations and new recruits, some as young as eight, whose parents are eager to entrust them to the "miracle boy." Nicholas is living out his dream and practically worships Hugo, but Etienne grows concerned at the increasingly martial tone Nicholas's rhetoric has taken under Hugo's influence.<br /><br />The crusaders have plenty of friendship and perseverance, the first two parts of <i>Shounen Jump's</i> famous formula. But this won't bring victory, the third part of the formula. Furuya raises the crusaders' and reader's hopes only to crush them. Legend has it that the historical Children's Crusaders were sold into slavery by the ship captains they trusted to carry them across the sea. I don't know how <i>The Children's Crusade</i> ends, but they, too, have their innocence and naivete betrayed. And the end of the second volume promises much worse to come.<br /><br />One of <i>The Children's Crusade's</i> chief strong points is characterization. With Etienne, Furuya succeeds in one of the most difficult tasks for a writer: convincingly depicting a character who is good to the point of saintliness but not sanctimonious. Nicholas's characterization is also very well done. The other "apostles" receive less attention from Furuya, but he succeeds in giving almost all of them distinct personalities.<br /><br />The characters' lively, expressive faces as drawn by Furuya contribute substantially to the characterizations. And the art in general is excellent, both in visual storytelling and page design, and is frequently cinematic in scope and detail. Furuya isn't particularly well known for his action scenes, but the ones here are dynamic.<br /><br />In manga and anime, Christianity is generally treated very superficially (e.g. <i>Evangelion</i> and <i>Hellsing</i>). In contrast, Furuya gives a convincing depiction of a devout Christian in 13th-century France. And in general, even though Furuya takes substantial liberties with the few known facts about the historical Children's Crusade, his setting feels authentic. This makes it all the more disappointing when, in the last few chapters of volume two, Furuya introduces a frequent cliche in modern-day works set in the Middle Ages, the female heretic with modern attitudes. But so far, at least, this is a minor flaw.<br /><br />I would rank the first two volumes of <i>The Children's Crusade</i> below <i>The Music of Marie</i> and "Book of the Moon," simply because it lacks the soaring imagination of those two works. But it's still an outstanding series.<br /><br />Like <i>The Music of Marie,</i> the volumes of <i>The Children's Crusade</i> are not numbered, but labelled by the kanji for up, middle and down. Each of the first two volumes is 288 pages long and is published by Ohta Press. Their ISBNs are 978-4-7783-2086-3 and 978-4-7783-2105-5, and they cost 1200 yen each. Their amazon.co.jp pages are <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8E%E3%82%B5%E3%83%B3%E5%B0%91%E5%B9%B4%E5%8D%81%E5%AD%97%E8%BB%8D-%E4%B8%8A%E5%B7%BB-Fx-COMICS-%E5%8F%A4%E5%B1%8B/dp/4778320689/ref=sr_1_11?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1327541125&sr=1-11">here</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8E%E3%82%B5%E3%83%B3%E5%B0%91%E5%B9%B4%E5%8D%81%E5%AD%97%E8%BB%8D-%E4%B8%AD%E5%B7%BB-Fx-COMICS-%E5%8F%A4%E5%B1%8B/dp/4778321057/ref=pd_sim_b_1">here</a>.<br /><br />The Furuya Manga Moveable Feast Archives, along with links to other reviews of Furuya, can be found <a href="http://experimentsinmanga.blogspot.com/2012/01/usamaru-furuya-manga-moveable-feast.html">here</a>.<br /><br />*The Japanese is "Nikora"; I'm guessing at the romanization.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-80830910293818180902012-01-11T07:59:00.001-08:002012-05-30T12:57:54.429-07:00BOOK CORNER: <i>A LOVESOME THING</i> BY PATRICIA S. BOWNE<br /><br />
When Patricia S. Bowne offered me a review copy of <i>A Lovesome Thing</i>, the sequel to <i>Advice from Pigeons</i>, I accepted readily. I'd enjoyed the earlier book and expected to enjoy the second. Just as important, since I'd already <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2011/08/book-corner-advice-from-pigeons-by.html">reviewed</a> the first book, I assumed that writing a review of <i>A Lovesome Thing</i> would be easy. That proved not to be the case. In part, that's because things usually turn out to be harder to write than I expect. But mainly, it's because <i>A Lovesome Thing</i> turned out to be quite different from <i>Advice from Pigeons</i> in several ways. Most importantly, it's much darker.<br /><br />Although most of <i>A Lovesome Thing's</i> main characters are academics, it's not really an academic novel in the way that <i>Advice from Pigeons</i> was; the academics appear primarily in their public service role. And most of the main characters of <i>Advice from Pigeons</i> are absent from <i>A Lovesome Thing</i>, the only exception being postmodern feminist demonologist Teddy Whin, who is again a major character here. The other academic protagonists were secondary characters in the earlier book. One of them is Bill Navanax, the angry alchemist from <i>Advice from Pigeons</i>, who is actually happy at the start of the book, because Neil Torecki has become his lover and moved in with him. Neil, also a major character, is happy himself, except for a compulsion to paint pictures of Bill's ex-lover being burned at the stake, a compulsion he has kept hidden from Bill. Cham Ligalla the exorcist also returns, and is summoned to deal with a demon who possesses people and makes the nasty demon from <i>Advice from Pigeons</i> look like Mr. Rogers.<br /><br />There's a new major character as well, Father Rameau, a priest of the Church of the Sacred Flame, who unlike the others has no connection with the Royal Academy. Through him we learn about religion and the gods in Bowne's world, something that didn't appear in <i>Advice from Pigeons</i>. There are many gods, all of whom are in some sense manifestations of a single divine power, although believers worship only one god at a time. And the gods are tangible, at least occasionally, so that when a murdered woman is found in Father Rameau's church, it's natural for a policeman to ask Rameau "'when was the last time you saw this god?'"<br /><br />There is actually not much humor in <i>A Lovesome Thing</i>, especially compared to <i>Advice from Pigeons</i>. This may be partly because we're more familiar with Bowne's world, so there are fewer opportunities for the incongruity-based humor that enlivened <i>Advice from Pigeons</i>. But mainly, <i>A Lovesome Thing</i> is a much darker book, as mentioned above. The demon mentioned above likes to make its victims torture themselves, tortures that are graphically described. Much of the action takes place in a truly hellish garden. And while in the earlier book Rho's basic problem was his mix of arrogance and insecurity, <i>A Lovesome Thing</i> explores much darker regions of the human heart.<br /><br /><i>A Lovesome Thing</i> is well-written, and the characters are complex -- more so than in <i>Advice from Pigeons</i> -- and well-drawn. Conversely, the plot in <i>A Lovesome Thing</i> is weaker than in <i>Advice from Pigeons</i>. Father Rameau's story in particular feels undeveloped and doesn't add much besides an opportunity to convey information about religion in the world of Osyth. The plot in <i>A Lovesome Thing</i> is also harder to follow, and the fact that there are multiple copies of several characters doesn't help things. <br /><br /><i>A Lovesome Thing's</i> main problem, though, is that after the grimness of most of the book, its happy ending is unconvincing. After Cham has finished expelling a possessing demon from its victim, who was forced by the demon to mutilate himself horribly and is now dying, "She heard the enchanter's voice again, lying to [the victim]. Bad things happened, the voice said, but what mattered was how you faced them. Whether you had been brave and kind. And if you were brave and kind, it said, everything turned out for the best and everyone you loved would be safe." (135)<br /><br />The book's ending appears to show that the enchanter's "silly lie" (135) is true after all. But looking at the book as a whole, Cham's original judgment seems more accurate.<br /><br />Despite these reservations, I would recommend the book to those who want to know more about the world of Osyth, or the characters. But don't expect a fun read like <i>Advice from Pigeons</i>.<br /><br /><i>Advice from Pigeons</i> is available as an ebook from <a href="http://www.double-dragon-ebooks.com/single.php?ISBN=1-55404-863-X">Double Dragon Publishing</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/A-Lovesome-Thing-ebook/dp/B005IY44R8/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1314410205&sr=8-4">Amazon</a>.<br /><br />[Disclaimer: I received a free e-copy of the book from the author.]Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-39119383647777220972011-08-27T07:28:00.001-07:002012-05-30T13:06:40.118-07:00BOOK CORNER: <i>ADVICE FROM PIGEONS</i> BY PATRICIA S. BOWNE
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<br /><i>Advice from Pigeons</i> is the first novel in a nascent series which Bowne describes as "academic satire and fantasy for faculty" (though the satire is so gentle that it's usually unnoticeable, and you don't need to be a faculty member to enjoy the book). According to Bowne's website, a second novel has just been <a href="http://raosyth.com/blog/?p=322">released,</a> and <a href="http://www.raosyth.com/thebooks.htm">more novels</a> are forthcoming. There have also been several short stories, published in small-press magazines, which I haven't read; but most of the novel's potential readers won't have read them either. Much of the book's originality and pleasure comes from the world Bowne has created, so I'll discuss that first.
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<br /><i>Advice from Pigeons</i> takes place in a world which is not ours, but very much like our present-day world, except that magic is commonplace and is integrated into everyday life. Users of magic are divided into five classes, although only two of these classes appear in more than bit parts in the book. Wizards build things. Sorcerors heal. Alchemists can change the laws of nature for everything, everywhere, but they have to get approval from their Guild on pain of death, which can be a headache: as one alchemist complains, "People let nature get away with murder, but as soon as they realize a person is designing it, they start to think he ought to be able to please everyone." (p. 282) Practitioners of the Arcane Arts "explore the links between human creativity and the arcane." Magicians, who are the principal subject of <i>Advice from Pigeons,</i> study the spiritual world and the principles of magic, though that doesn't mean that they can't do magic themselves.
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<br />Magicians are themselves divided into various sub-classes, according to the type of spiritual beings they study, among other things. In <i>Advice from Pigeons</i> we see magicians who study imps, vampires and incubi (the study of incubi is known as "venery" and its practitioners are referred to as "lechers"). But the focus is on demonologists. Every weekday morning the collective faculty of the Demonology Department of the Royal Academy at Osyth gathers and attempts to summon a demon. Demons in <i>Advice from Pigeons'</i> world don't come from Hell, but they're still dangerous to deal with, not so much because of their capacity for violence (though there is that) as because of their ability to covertly influence one's mind.
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<br />We don't learn much about the actual mechanics of magic, but charms seem to work through persuasion, either logical or emotional. The Demonology Department uses "charms of discourse" -- philosophical arguments -- to persuade demons to take on bodily form, and these charms only work until demons learn how to refute them. And the Department's exorcist banishes demons by being dismissive, which she's very good at.
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<br />The book takes place almost entirely in its world's version of academia, which is almost exactly like our academia, except with magic. Anyone who's gone to an American university, or read a novel set in one, will find the Royal Academy at Osyth and its faculty instantly recognizeable. The wider academic world, too, will be familiar (although academic feuds between demonologists can be deadly). Unlike many academic novels, though, the faculty of the demonology department are all competent and, with one exception, content with their positions.
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<br />The exception, Hiram Rho, is the book's main protagonist. Rho had a troubled adolescence. He lived on the streets, scavenging and selling his body, until he met a magician who took him in and introduced him to the academic world. The academy where he did his graduate work was ancient and prestigious. Now, fresh out of grad school, he alternates between looking down on his new colleagues at Osyth as provincial, bourgeois mediocrities and feeling inadequate to his new position. This makes him easy prey for the blandishments of what turns out to be a particularly unpleasant demon. Rho is the best character in the book: his personality and his actions throughout most of the book would make him a villain in most books, but I found him sympathetic, even while I cringed at his mistakes and poor judgment.
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<br />The book's other major plot strand revolves around Warren Oldham, the head of the department, and Russell Cinea, the department's top magician. Both are suffering from midlife crises, and midway through the book their souls depart from their bodies, leaving their bodies walking and talking but without personality and technically dead (and therefore without health insurance). Warren' wife Lillian, one of the few non-academic characters, and Teddy Whin, Russell's colleague and friend (who enjoys pointing out the phallocentrism in Russell's charms of discourse), together struggle to return the magicians' errant souls. I didn't find this plot strand compelling, although the descriptions of the magicians' souls' experiences outside their bodies were interesting.
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<br />Of the other characters, the most interesting is an angry alchemist named Navanax (the one quoted earlier). His story is left unresolved, though, evidently being saved for another book.
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<br /><i>Advice from Pigeons</i> is fun, though lightweight. As mentioned above, much of the fun comes from the way its world smoothly blends magic into everyday life. It has flaws: because the mechanics of magic are only described vaguely, the significance of what seems intended to be a major plot development is unclear. But I recommend it, and look forward to reading future books in the series.
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<br /><i>Advice from Pigeons</i> is available as an ebook from <a href="http://www.double-dragon-ebooks.com/single.php?ISBN=1-55404-808-7">Double Dragon Publishing</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Advice-From-Pigeons-ebook/dp/B004MYFSHU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2&s=digital-text&qid=1297556744&sr=8-1">Amazon</a>.
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<br />[Disclaimer: I received a free e-copy of the book from the author.]
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<br />EDITED TO ADD: I forgot to mention that you can read the <a href="http://www.raosyth.com/excerpts/afpexcerpt.htm">first chapter</a> for free on Bowne's website. You can also read the <a href="http://www.raosyth.com/excerpts/altexcerpt.htm">first chapter</a> of the second book.Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-30298024468796785442011-07-29T18:26:00.000-07:002011-07-29T18:55:00.775-07:00<i>FRUITS BASKET</i> MANGA MOVEABLE FEAST: A PERFECT MOTHER?*<br /><br />Among other things, <i>Fruits Basket</i> is a relentless catalogue of the ways parents can damage their children. From major characters like Kyo, Yuki and Akito, through secondary characters like Rin and Momiji, to minor characters like Machi, character after character suffers the scars of their parents' indifference or active dislike. But there's one shining counter-example: Tohru's mother Kyoko. Far from messing Tohru up, she made her into the good, loving person she is. In fact, Kyoko is a model parent. At least, she appears to be one during most of the series.<br /><br />There's one discordant element from the start, though: Tohru's constant self-denigration. Even as she's unselfishly helping everyone, she feels guilty for not being unselfish enough. My favorite example is the time when, after visiting Rin (who doesn't even like her) in the hospital, she condemns herself for having forgotten for a moment about her goal of lifting the curse. If Kyoko was so wonderful, why was Tohru so bent on punishing herself?<br /><br />The first hint that Kyoko was not as perfect as Tohru and Arisa's recollections made her out to be is Kyo's flashback of Kyoko completely freaking out when Tohru had gotten lost. But it's not until volume sixteen that we get a more complete picture of Kyoko and Tohru's relationship. In another flashback, Kyoko tells Kyo that after Tohru's father Katsuya had died, she (Kyoko) had been plunged into despair, and was on the verge of killing herself so that she could be with Katsuya again. At the last moment, she heard a kid yelling "Mom!" and was reminded of Tohru (then a very young child) and realized that she had been neglecting her. She rushed home, apologized in tears to Tohru and embraced her. After telling this to Kyo, Kyoko says: "Maybe the world doesn't need me. But there's still one person who's kind enough to need me. I only need that to live."<br /><br />A heartwarming story with an affirmative moral, at least on the surface. But when you look more closely, there's a darker side. Whether she realizes it or not, Kyoko is in effect imposing upon Tohru the responsibility of keeping her alive, which is a terrible burden for a parent to place upon her young child.<br /><br />Am I reading too much into this scene? Am I being overly cynical? I might have thought so if not for volume nineteen, where we see this dynamic from Tohru's side. At Kyoko's grave, Kyo meets Tohru's grandfather, who in the course of conversation asks him if he knows why Tohru speaks in such a polite manner. When Kyo says no, Tohru's grandfather tells him that she's imitating her father. At Katsuya's funeral, she heard some relatives saying that because she didn't look like Katsuya, she would be "no consolation" to Kyoko. When Kyoko fell into depression, Tohru asked her grandfather: "Daddy went somewhere far away, didn't he? Will Mommy go there too? Is Dad calling her? She's been sad for a long time. She won't talk to me. Is she sad because I don't look like Dad? What can I do to be like him? Will Mom get better if I'm just like him? Will she stay here?"** Since Kyoko's return, Tohru has been talking like her father.<br /><br />Pondering this conversation, Kyo asks Tohru herself if her father looked like her. Nervously and with a forced smile, she tells him that they didn't look too much alike, but everybody said that they talked alike, even her mother. Then, in one of the most heartbreaking moments in a series full of heartbreaking moments, Tohru says "That's a lie.... I'm just mimicking the way he talked."*** She had been afraid that her father would take her mother away. and to try to hold on to her, she had imitated her father.<br /><br />When I read this, everything about Tohru's character fell into place. Ever since her father died, she had been afraid that her mother would go away -- i.e., kill herself. And she had been continuously making an effort to keep her with her. She was always cheerful on the outside so that Kyoko would want to stay. She was unselfish to the point of abnegation because any demands of her own might drive Kyoko away. And she constantly felt guilty because the real Tohru wouldn't be able to keep Kyoko from going away, as she wasn't after Katsuya died. Even after Kyoko died (which she blamed herself for) the patterns of behavior she had learned continued. Without meaning to, Kyoko profoundly damaged her, even though she loved her.<br /><br />Once I realized this, I saw some of the earlier scenes in a new light. For instance, it was now clear to me that for a schoolgirl to live alone in a tent when she has friends who would gladly put her up, so as not to bother them, isn't an endearing quirk but a sign of serious psychological problems (something I should have realized before).<br /><br />Of course, Tohru is genuinely kind and good, and Kyoko is responsible for that too. Kyoko isn't a bad person, but in <i>Fruits Basket</i> even good people keep hurting each other without meaning to. Though Takaya gives her characters happy endings, her vision in <i>Fruits Basket</i> is hardly a cheerful one.<br /><br />*This post may come off as a rebuttal to Kristin Bomba's <a href="http://comicattack.net/2011/07/bbwfurubammf/">contribution</a> to the <a href="http://mangacurmudgeon.com/fruits-basket-mmf/">Manga Moveable Feast</a>. I do have some disagreements with what Kistin writes about Tohru and Kyoko, but I've had these ideas for a long time, and I had decided to write them up for the MMF before I read Kristin's post.<br /><br />**In the Tokyopop edition, there are quotation marks around each of these sentences, but not in the Japanese edition. <br /><br />***I've used my own translation here. The Japanese, for those who want to check, is "Uso ... desu ... kuchimane o shite iru dake desu" (first ellipsis Takaya's).Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6210758.post-21680554945812995042011-07-25T08:56:00.000-07:002011-07-25T08:57:12.185-07:00MANGA CORNER: <i>BILLY BAT</i> VOL. 6<br /><br />I recently bought a copy of <i>Billy Bat</i> vol. 6, which came out a few weeks ago, and I just finished reading it. The first three-quarters of this volume continue the story of the previous volume. We learn more about how Chuck Culkin replaced Kevin on "Billy Bat," and we see Chuck in the present as well. And we continue following Kevin and the man whose identity I'm withholding because it would be a huge spoiler. The last quarter of the book takes place in New York in 1963 and introduces a whole new batch of characters. When I first skimmed through this portion I saw a figure who looked like Bob Dylan and saw the <i>katakana</i> for "Bob Dylan," and I thought "Urasawa wouldn't ... would he?" As it turns out, he didn't: it's just a character who looks like Dylan and is a big Dylan fan. And he's not the main character of this section, anyway: his Japanese-American ex-girlfriend is. This volume doesn't reach the storytelling heights of some of the earlier volumes, and it dissipates some of the urgency I felt coming out of the last volume. But it's still a good volume, without the lenghty weak section that mars <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2011/01/manga-corner-billy-bat-by-naoki-urasawa.html">volume five</a>.<br /><br />The blurb on the <i>obi</i> (the paper band that wraps around the bottom half of the jacket) says "Mysteries will be made clear!!" But they aren't, for the most part. We do learn the motive behind the Shinoyama case, which played a prominent role in the first volume-and-a-half but has pretty much gone unmentioned since then. And the Bat reveals something of his true nature (if we can believe what he says, that is), but his words raise at least as many questions as they answer.<br /><br />Though there are no shocks in this volume to compare to those delivered in vols. 2 and 4, it nevertheless changed my expectations for the series. At the end of the last volume, everything seemed to be building towards a decisive confrontation at a certain place and time, and sooner rather than later. But now my guess would be that we're in this for the long haul. If that confrontation takes place, it will probably be indecisive, like several such confrontations in <i>Monster</i> and <i>20th Century Boys.</i> And the introduction of what looks to be a major new character, and a major new arc involving her, makes it unlikely that Urasawa will be wrapping this up very soon.<br /><br />I'm getting a bit worried about the licensing prospects for <i>Billy Bat</i> in the U.S., though. Again, I have to be vague for fear of spoilers. But I can say that an American historical figure is depicted in a way that, while patently fictional, might still anger and even outrage some people, and Kodansha, <i>Billy Bat's</i> publisher, might possibly be worried about offending the U.S. market.<br /><br />A note for those who have read, or are reading, this volume in Japanese. You may have come across the word "Angorumoa" and been baffled, as I was. Upon searching, I eventually discovered that it's not the <i>Sgt. Frog</i> or <i>Transformers</i> character: it's the Japanization of "Angolmois." (To avoid creating false expectations among those who recognize the word or have Googled it, I'll add that nothing in this volume takes place later than 1963. If this makes no sense to you, don't bother trying to figure it out; it's not that important.)<br /><br />Billy Bat is 196 pages long, and sells for 600 yen. It's published by Kodansha in their "Morning" line, and its ISBN is 9784063870015.<br /><br />(Reviews of the previous volumes are <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2009/08/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">here,</a> <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2010/01/manga-corner-billy-bat-vol.html">here,</a> <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2010/09/manga-corner-billy-bat-volumes-3-and-4.html">here</a> and <a href="http://completelyfutile.blogspot.com/2011/01/manga-corner-billy-bat-by-naoki-urasawa.html">here</a>.)Adamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13524952709453904676noreply@blogger.com3