Independent Opinions, News, and Reviews of Graphic Novels, Manga, and Comic Books
I wasn’t as blown away by the first volume as I’d hoped to be, after hearing wonderful things about this title by Chica Umino, but after reading the second, I suspect that this is going to be a series that grows slowly on me. After reading this installment, I felt as though I knew the characters better. They were less figures of fun, defined by their quirks, and closer to being people with deeper emotions. The mood’s different, less sitcom, […]
Read more
In this volume, Suguri, her dog Lupin, and her boss Teppei have left the Woofles pet shop for a field trip. They’re visiting the ranch of the shop’s owner, where he raises the puppies they sell. That provides plenty of opportunity for lots of wonderful drawings of various dog breeds by Yukiya Sakuragi — Corgis, a husky, Labradors, and Bernese Mountain Dogs, the breed Suguri calls “stuffed animals” because they’re so cute and fluffy. That’s what keeps bringing me back […]
Read more
I’m sure everyone who has a webcomic strip in competition at Zuda has at various times encouraged their friends (and mailing lists) to vote for them. However, this is the highest-profile attempt to swamp the voting that I’ve seen: Valerie at Occasional Superheroine wants everyone to vote for Action, Ohio. In the post (link no longer available), she says it’s also about figuring out how much influence her blog has; later, in the comments, she says “vote Zuda” isn’t a […]
Read more
The Undying Butterflies is the latest volume, the seventeenth, in the recommended Kindaichi Case Files mystery manga series. It opens with a day at the beach for Kindaichi, Miyuki, and Reika, a young singer who’s previously appeared in the volumes Death TV and Playing the Fool. The sleuth finds himself juggling time alone with the two young women in a sequence that could have appeared in an Archie comic, in which the authors do a good job combining tenderness and […]
Read more
Writer Christopher Hart is responsible for more than 60 how-to books about creating manga and comics, including the incredibly popular Manga Mania and its many spinoffs. But I’d never heard of him creating any actual comics until now. The Reformed is described as “original English language (OEL) crime noir vampire manga”, and the promotional text will give you a good idea of just how clichéd it is. Immortality is his, but love never will be — only an eternity of […]
Read more
Guest review by Ed Sizemore Covering EduManga: Mother Teresa and Great Figures in History: Mother Teresa. The Life of Mother Teresa Mother Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu on August 26, 1910, in current day Macedonia. Her parents were both devout Catholics. Drane, Agnes’ mother, constantly helped the poor with deliveries of food and clothing. She modeled for her children a compassion that expressed itself in meeting the tangible needs of the less fortunate. By age 12, Agnes was convinced […]
Read more
Out Tuesday on DVD was the live-action version of Honey and Clover (subtitled). I’m curious about it. I enjoyed reading the manga, but I suspect seeing the characters “in person” would make them even easier to relate to (and distinguish). The plot is the same — college students find love and make life decisions while pursuing their art. However, in the manga, the childlike Hagumi appears elfin and blonde. Based on pictures, in the movie, she still looks young and […]
Read more
Alex Robinson (Tricked, Box Office Poison) is best known for his mastery of handling a sprawling, connected, soap opera-style cast. In his new graphic novel, Too Cool to Be Forgotten, he changes gears to focus on a single protagonist. Andy Wicks is a middle-aged man who, when he undergoes hypnosis to stop smoking, finds himself back in high school in 1985. It’s a common fantasy, to wonder how things would go if you had the chance to do it all […]
Read more