Plus some of last week’s. We like variety here at MangaBlog Headquarters!
Nymphet manga-ka Kaworu Watashiya reflects on the cancellation of her book in the U.S. in a blog post translated by Japanator. She attributes the problems to an incestuous situation and a scene of an adult bathing with a child in the second volume, which is not what we heard from Seven Seas. (Via The Beat, where Heidi and her commenters have quite the discussion.)
The Wall Street Journal (still not owned by Rupert Murdoch!) notices the trend of marketing comics to women. And what might have put that into their heads?
Total sales of manga books jumped 22% to 9.5 million units in 2006 from 7.8 million a year earlier, according to Nielsen BookScan, which collects point-of-sale information from 6,500 retail locations across the country, including those operated by Borders Group Inc. and Barnes & Noble Inc.
And those “manga books,” as observed earlier in the article, are girl-friendly, with less fightin’ and more lovin’. Then they talk about Minx, with some cover scans, and mention in passing that DC also has a manga line. Marvel, apparently, also has a strategy for attracting girls, but it’s rather oblique:
Instead of starting a separate line dedicated to the demographic, the company has been hiring writers known for their established female following. In format, these comics are more like traditional superhero periodicals, but the company’s strategy also involves repackaging the material in hardcover and graphic novel formats.
In other words, same stories but with girl-friendlier authors. I’m not familiar enough with Marvel to know whether this is an actual strategy or someone in PR straining to be included. At The Beat, Sequential Tart’s Katherine Keller comments:
I’m glad that “the big two” keep hiring writers in an attempt to attract women readers.
So where’s the part about the artists who draw in a style that makes women not want reach for an eyefork? Comics being a visual medium and all.
Oh, yeah, right.
David Welsh has more at Precocious Curmudgeon.
At the Mangamaniaccafe, Julie hunts for good manga in the June Previews.
ComiPress has a three part article on online copyright issues that includes an interview with yours truly, as well as David Welsh, Ed Chavez, and other manga bloggers. For once, we all agree: plagiarism is bad, giving credit is good, asking permission and giving credit is even better.
Speaking of Ed Chavez, he has a podcast up about the Tezuka exhibit.
Shaenon Garrity has another Overlooked Manga Festival up, this one celebrating the weirdness of Junko Mizuno.
ANN translates a Japanese blog post claiming that Japanese manga magazines include over 100,000 pages of manga per month.
Erica Friedman is hard at work on vol. 5 of Yuri Monogatari.
Reviews: At the MangaCast, Mangamaniac Julie reviews vol. 2 of Zombie Powder, and Readilbert reviews Kocchimuite Miko and Sabbath Cafe. Anime on DVD’s Connie Zhang checks out vol. 1 of Parasyte. At Manga Life, Michael Aronson reviews vol. 6 of Tezuka’s Buddha and vol. 12 of Death Note, and Dan Polley reads vol. 8 of Young Magician and vol. 2 of Free Collars Kingdom. At the Mangamaniaccafe, Julie checks out vol. 5 of Real/Fake Princess. And at Prospero’s Manga, Ferdinand liked vol. 1 of Canon a lot less than I did.
If I get a chance to see the Tezuka exhibit is there anything in particular you would like for me to take a picture of? Since this is the only U.S. exhibit I am really going to make an effort to trek up to San Francisco to see it.
It’s hard to tell, but I think they’re talking about Marvel’s digests (I didn’t recognize it until I read this particular part excepted… even though I read in in the article) which does have writers like Sean McKeever and Brian K. Vaughan. It’s interesting that they fail to mention it, but they also have gotten artists with female followings like David Hahn and Adam Warren… though, like Minx, the creators are almost all men. For me the notable digest was the Emma Frost series which female bloggers noted would be a great series if not for the Greg Horn covers. Most of those were gone in the digest, save for a few normal-looking ones.
Thanks for the offer, Deni! I can’t think of anything, but if you see something striking, take a pic and I’d be happy to post it here.
And thanks for the enlightenment, Lyle. It doesn’t sound like a full-blown strategy, does it?
Marvel’s “strategy” with the digests comes off as quite haphazard when you look at it, with the occasional moment of brilliance (adapting Emma Frost, for example) followed by a number of successes that seem to be pure luck.
I think the comment about Marvel might have been referring to the hiring of Tamora Pierce to write a “White Tiger” miniseries, or their adaptation of Laurell K. Hamilton’s Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter. And they also are doing a Dark Tower comic; Stephen King has female fans, right?