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"Dear American Comics: Here's Why You're Losing Readers to Anime & Manga"
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74 posts in this topic

On 7/15/2017 at 10:38 AM, october said:

Anyone read Attack on Titan? 

Premise sounds cool. Haven't read much Manga though...

Read it up to Volume 9. The art is really rough, as in "so hard to take" it took me off the book. For a manga, after the first 9 first volumes, I thought it moved too slow and dropped it.

One-punch Man is fun and they are really quick reads. The first few volumes really have some laugh out loud moments, esp. for someone knowing the tropes of super-hero comics. Most people really enjoy it.

Another currently popular series is Tokyo Ghoul. The story is told from the part of a new ghoul which gives it empathy. It's obviously horror driven but so (up to volume 13 in the US), the story has held up nicely.

In the traditional "battle manga" style of story-telling whereby there is a challenge every so many issues, I really loved Bakuman (from the team who did Death Note) about the manga industry. Another one I don't miss a volume as soon as it comes out is Food Wars! Just give that a try and I'll give you your money back if you don't like it. My Hero Academia is also the perfect entry point for someone who knows super-hero comics - think of it as a Manga version of the original X-Men or rather Generation X.

Dimension W (up to volume 6) is a nice recent series which reminds me of a techno version of Martin Mystery (out of Italy) and has the advantage of having contained mysteries resolved along with a longer arc to the series.

Good Night Punpun by Inio Asano is fantastic. Watching Punpun evolve (and stay prey to his inability to act and react to his life) is riveting, infuriating and fascinating.

For a more classic approach to story-telling, Monster is awesome. Nisekoi, False Love is my guilty pleasure. It's Romeo and Juliette with a comedy twist. Always brings a smile to my face, even after 22 volumes.

I enjoy sports manga as well, be it Ikaru No Go (about Go), Yowamushi Pedal (cycling) or the very good HaiKyu!! (volleyball).

There is plenty to enjoy for every one out of what is published and that's without recommending Naruto, One Piece, Fairy Tales, Full Metal Alchemist, etc.

 

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To get back to the original post, I agree 100% with the point made: the simplicity of a "single-minded" story-line makes Manga a winner lately in my reading choice over the Big 2. Same reason my pull list is heavily invested in Image series. The stories do not get side-tracked (i.e., ground to a halt) by company-wide events / reboots / restarts / movies coming out. The focus on the story and carrying the characters through their evolution is enjoyable. By contrast, many long-lived European series tend to be fairly episodic whereby the hero is thrown in a new adventure, solved the issue at hand and leaves it unaffected to live another one next year. Manga beats that model by offering progression to the characters; the same recipe that made Gasoline Alley a winner in the '20's.

Dismissing the story because of a fear of "big eyes" or I've never tried it before is unfortunate. Sure, some of the sensitivities in the stories can be different but they are not so completely alien that they can't be enjoyed readily. Go to your public library and start there. Risk-free approach to starting. Chances are too that one of the librarians really cares about that section and can help you out.

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10 hours ago, Scrooge said:

I enjoy sports manga as well, be it Ikaru No Go (about Go), Yowamushi Pedal (cycling) or the very good HaiKyu!! (volleyball).

Have you read "Hajime no Ippo" sport boxing manga? It is a good long series. 

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On 7/16/2017 at 10:51 PM, Scrooge said:

To get back to the original post, I agree 100% with the point made: the simplicity of a "single-minded" story-line makes Manga a winner lately in my reading choice over the Big 2. Same reason my pull list is heavily invested in Image series. The stories do not get side-tracked (i.e., ground to a halt) by company-wide events / reboots / restarts / movies coming out. The focus on the story and carrying the characters through their evolution is enjoyable. By contrast, many long-lived European series tend to be fairly episodic whereby the hero is thrown in a new adventure, solved the issue at hand and leaves it unaffected to live another one next year. Manga beats that model by offering progression to the characters; the same recipe that made Gasoline Alley a winner in the '20's.

Dismissing the story because of a fear of "big eyes" or I've never tried it before is unfortunate. Sure, some of the sensitivities in the stories can be different but they are not so completely alien that they can't be enjoyed readily. Go to your public library and start there. Risk-free approach to starting. Chances are too that one of the librarians really cares about that section and can help you out.

Good post.

And the Image comparison makes sense... both Walking Dead and Saga have storylines that continue to evolve and they regularly publish (WD monthly) to keep their fans interested and growing. Characters evolve and sometimes even die (for real!) which creates an emotional investment with the reader.

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9 minutes ago, Chuck Gower said:

Good post.

And the Image comparison makes sense... both Walking Dead and Saga have storylines that continue to evolve and they regularly publish (WD monthly) to keep their fans interested and growing. Characters evolve and sometimes even die (for real!) which creates an emotional investment with the reader.

Yes, this is the kind I like to read. But since I am also old school type, I like to see my favourite superheroes continue in their classic style like as were since 1950/60s. The present style I see in today's books just doesn't work for me ... too bad. Not worth the $3.99/4.99 per month for me in my wallet. That is where the local library come in handy with volumes to borrow. 

Reading comics is my craving daily :nyah:

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I’m still working my way through the Kodansha Manga to Anime Humble Bundle I purchased a few months ago.

Extremely generous amount of digital material.

Full runs of Ghost in the Shell,  Battle Angel Alita, Seven Deadly Sins, Inuyashiki and Ajin : Demi-Human.

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1 hour ago, Ken Aldred said:

I’m still working my way through the Kodansha Manga to Anime Humble Bundle I purchased a few months ago.

Extremely generous amount of digital material.

Full runs of Ghost in the Shell,  Battle Angel Alita, Seven Deadly Sins, Inuyashiki and Ajin : Demi-Human.

Oh man, I loved Alita back in the day, one of my all time favorites. I used to pick up all of that Viz stuff, back when they still published them in individual floppy format. Especially loved the Rumiko Takahashi stuff like Lum, Ranma 1/2 and Maison Ikkoku. Great books.

It's also been a while since I read GitS, but I used to really be in love with that series. I'm helping a buddy sell his comics right now, and there's a minty set of the Dark Horse GitS books, and the longer I look at them, the more convinced I am that I need to buy them for my personal collection, as I sold mine long ago. Such pretty stuff.

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It is interesting reading this thread as a retailer. Manga and Anime in general are obviously areas where we realize there is great demand. But from a small retail perspective the product is super low margin and fraught with downside. Anytime we have access to order these products we are worried that they will show up at huge discounts through big box or book store retailers of through Amazon. And all of those retailers can order on long credit 100% returnable while the specialty shop comic industry has had very little access to any returnability. Makes for tough decisions when trying to stock sellable material to make up for the recent downturn in new issue sales.

Edited by MrBedrock
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On 7/16/2017 at 11:39 PM, Scrooge said:

I really loved Bakuman (from the team who did Death Note) about the manga industry.

I enjoyed the first 3 books of this so much that I bought the Box Set. Great insight into the Manga Industry, and lots of interesting characters.

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On 12/6/2018 at 8:36 AM, Ken Aldred said:

I’m still working my way through the Kodansha Manga to Anime Humble Bundle I purchased a few months ago.

Extremely generous amount of digital material.

Full runs of Ghost in the Shell,  Battle Angel Alita, Seven Deadly Sins, Inuyashiki and Ajin : Demi-Human.

At least three of those now have live action movies (Two U.S. and on Japanese) including Inuyashiki (great manga series!)...

Here's the Japanese trailer:

 

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