MIMC winners announced, with commentary

The results of the third Morning International Manga Competition are up, and the chief judge’s general comments make for fascinating reading. For one thing, they did not choose a second runner-up this year because of the sharp drop-off in quality between the first two winners and the rest of the pack. They also comment that they are determined to support international artists and announced that the second-place winner from last year’s contest, Yovova, will have a 50-page story in an upcoming edition of Morning Two. They are interestingly upfront about the fact that the story was revised several times. And then there’s this:

Finally, as has been the case in each of these contests, many of the current entries have focused on bishojo, giant robots, ninja and the like, leaving a very narrow impression of “manga” style. As the judges are Japanese, we are biased toward a more creative association for the word that foreigners have come to know as “MANGA.” We cannot define exactly what manga is, but our version of manga is much broader in context and content.

In order to bring this point home, they are changing the name of next year’s competition to the Morning International Comic Competition. And if you think you can do better than this year’s crew (the judges’ comments on individual entries are posted at the site as well), then the instructions for entering next year’s competition are here. Ed Chavez, who translated the MIMC materials into English and did some writing for them as well, has some comments at MangaCast.

Yay! Robots Never Sleep is back, and the anonymous (sort of) blogger takes a break from translating Moyashimon for Del Rey to do some triage on his manga collection. I always enjoy his posts on unlicensed manga, and I’m looking forward to more in the days to come.

John Jakala gets with the economic program and seeks out the cheapest comics he can find at Sporadic Sequential. The exercise also causes him to reflect on how waiting for lower prices has affected his buying and reading habits.

This is sort of an interesting cultural comment: A Chicago TV station uses the popularity of Oishinbo in Japan as a lead-in to a story on local Japanese cooking lessons. Granted, the writer can’t avoid referring to manga as “a form of Japanese animation,” but it’s a start.

News from Japan: Erin Finnegan has some photos from the Tokyo Anime Fair at Manga Recon. Gottsu-Iiyan posts a lovely splash page from the latest chapter of Vagabond. Satori Nagasawa, creator of Maria-sama Ga Miteru, will do a remake of the romance manga Nichiyōbi wa Issho ni in an upcoming issue of Margaret magazine. Weekly Shonen Sunday is 50 years old, and a host of manga creators showed up for the celebration. And ANN posts the Japanese comics rankings for the weeks ending March 9 and March 16.

Reviews: Erica Friedman notes the unfortunate effects of the turmoil at Tokyopop on the production of vol. 2 of Burst Angel at Okazu. The Manga Recon team check in with some short reviews for their On the Shojo Beat feature. Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane also posts some short reviews at Manga Life.

Joy Kim on vol. 1 of 20th Century Boys (Manga Life)
Lissa Pattillo on vol. 2 of Hero Heel (Kuriousity)
Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane on vol. 8 of High School Debut (Manga Life)
Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane on vol. 1 of Honey Hunt (Manga Life)
Greg Hackmann on vol. 1 of Jyu-Oh-Sei (Mania.com)
Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane on vol. 11 of Love*Com (Manga Life)
Ed Chavez on Mr. Flower Bride (MangaCast)
Oyceter on vol. 15 of Nana (Japanese edition) (Sakura of DOOM)
Julie on vol. 3 of The Prince of Tennis (Manga Maniac Cafe)
Snow Wildsmith on Stop Bullying Me (Fujoshi Librarian)
Oyceter on vols. 1-4 of Yotsuba&! (Sakura of DOOM)