Almost the weekend!

Dorian at (Postmodernbarney.com) lists the manga he’s still reading, which includes many of my own favorites.

At Love Manga, David Taylor comments on these comments and muses about the demand for “vintage” manga.

At ADD Theater, Shannon likes Fruits Basket but not Tohru.

Of course, Fruits Basket really isn’t about Tohru- she’s just sort of a catalyst whose innate goodness opens up the world of the other characters. But I’m like eh, it’s ok to have a feeling for yourself once in a while! Show some depth!

To which I say: Don’t watch the anime, because Tohru’s inane and self-deprecating giggle will send you right over the edge! I have always found Tohru problematic—she’s such a Polyanna and so annoyingly unselfish—but the one issue I admire her for is her insistence on working a night job to earn her own money. I think there is a bit of steel beneath all that sugar.

Selling manga at retail: A livejournal entry by someone who works in the manga section of a chain bookstore talks about how she keeps the customers happy. (Keep your regulars’ favorites in stock, and don’t diss anyone’s taste—seems logical to me.)

Yaoi Suki has an Exclusive Advance Review! of Hybrid Child. The short take: “BL Chobits.”

Gearing up for SDCC: Viz has announced that Rurouni Kenshin manga-ka Nobuhiro Watsuki and Vampire Knight manga-ka Matsuri Hino will be their guests at the con. Watsuki will help chair the Shonen Jump panel and will discuss RK. Cool!

The Boston Globe does Graphic Novels 101. David Taylor notes a few similarities. This is actually a regional section of the Globe that covers the area I live in. When I was the reporter for my hometown paper, that section used to occasionally pick up on a story I had written, re-interview my sources, and do their own version. I took it as flattery and got a good laugh. This time, however, it was sheer coincidence. As I was finishing my interview with Liza Craig-McCormack, I asked her how I could contact the teenagers in her manga club and that was when she told me the Globe was coming around to photograph them. Ulp! I think Robin Brenner’s talk was the reason we both wrote the story at the same time; I had been kicking around the idea of a manga article for a while, but when you’re writing for a newspaper you need a news hook to make it timely. Anyway, they covered slightly different territory and did a nice job.

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Comments

  1. LOL, I liked that Boston Globe article and I think it worked quite well as a follow on from yours.
    It just struck me as a little comical that it could have slipped so easily into identical articles.

    Of course now I know more then I will ever need to know about the workings of Hamilton-Wenham library. ^.^

  2. I’ve always found Tohru endearing, but, as someone who’s been following the series in scanlation*, I think even readers who dislike her may discover there’s more to her than cotton candy as the series progresses. One of the things I love about Fruits Basket is how it takes very typical manga characters and shows you the real pain behind the cool or angry or blustering or sweet facade.

    * Dear local Tokyopop reps, I am buying your versions when they come out, I swear. For one thing, your translations are better.

  3. Here’s an alternative to scanlations: the French releases of Fruits Basket seem to be up to vol. 18. I’m seriously thinking of ordering them, along with Pink Diary.

    Because like her or not, I’m hooked on the series too.

  4. Tohru has grown on me tremendously since the beginning, and I did find her improbably cheerful back then. Over the volumes, though, I think she’s demonstrated real courage and genuine compassion rather than what initially seemed like some default courtesy setting. I do agree that she’s much less interesting in the anime, though I like that as well.

  5. I came late to Fruits Basket and so was reading it roughly at the same time as Hot Gimmick and to me Tohru is a veritable wealth of strength and determination by comparison.

    //I think there is a bit of steel beneath all that sugar.//

    Pretty much sums up how I feel about Tohru. Yes she is overly unselfish but I think it would be wrong to look at her as weak or subservient.

  6. I’ve seen all of the anime, and the music is good enough to make up for Tokru, but I’ve only read 4 volumes of the manga. I hope she improves.

  7. Umm, like some predecessors wrote, don’t give up on Tohru until the end of Furuba the manga (I’m reading summaries and looking at some of the raws and there is a lot of development for her in the last five to seven volumes of the series). AND do watch the Funimation sub version, her giggle and her personalit comes across quite a bit different from the dub, which wasn’t bad, though.

    I am obsessed, in any case: http://furuba.bookish.net – sadly out of date.

  8. David, I’ve long thought a Fruits Basket/Hot Gimmick comparison is a graduate thesis waiting to happen.

    And Shannon, I really agree about the music. Now I’m going to have to see if there’s a soundtrack out there.

  9. Thanks, Pata! More stuff to put on my MP3 player!

Trackbacks

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