TNL Comic/Manga Club: Ode to Kirihito

[TODE]

If you've never read Oishinbo, go take a look at the first volume published by Viz in their Signature line. It's not a big epic or anything like that. It's a long-running manga (102 volumes in Japan, but still not as long as the Police Box manga!) about a cynical reporter travelling around the country looking for the best dishes to create the Ultimate Menu. Every story deals with a different aspect of cooking and can actually make you a better cook.

Viz seems to be picking and choosing from the run and releasing 300-page best-of volumes. Japanese Food is the first, then there's Sushi, Wine, and so on.


People following Vertical publishing... the last two PREVIEWS have only solicited Black Jack vol.4 and vol.5. One book a month in other words.

It's interesting that two years ago, Tokyopop's section in previews offered 100 titles a month and now it's down to 10-15.

[James]

Not surprising, though. The flood of manga had to slow down, there's too much crap choking the shelves. Check out the manga section of Borders and you'll drown in titles you wouldn't read if your life depended on it, most of them generic clones of each other running for a dozen volumes minimum. The occasional Ode to Kirihito doesn't stand a chance of getting noticed. I haven't seen anything new at the quality level of Planetes or Parasyte in far too long.

James

[TODE]

Yeah, I think I remember reading about Borders or some other big store telling Tokyopop to stop publishing so many or else they'd kick them out for good.

It'd be kinda neat to have a manga section as big as it is now at Borders with nothing but Viz, Vertical, and Dark Horse titles...

[James]

Dark Horse manga is obnoxious. Blade of the Immortal is a case in point, it's both overpriced and too small. The graphic novels would be worth it if they were printed full comic size, or they should be cheaper, but as that format and price is just price-gouging. Also, they never finished Shadow Star, and I just don't trust their editing policies in general.

James

[TODE]

Never finished Cannon God Exaxxion, either. And they only had two volumes to go! But I was at a Dark Horse manga panel they had at Powell's Books, and the editors there (Carl Horn and another guy) said that basically people were not buying enough copies of those manga to justify continuing them.

But DHM also publishes those wonderful Koike/Kojima sagas (Lone Wolf, Path of the Assassin) for only $10 for 300 pages so that forgives them a bit. They've never increased the price of that line.

As far as Blade goes, they should really just start unflopping it, and charge only $13 if they keep it at that trim size. But my guess is that at this point they have their audience for it, who's stuck by the current format for years, so why risk alienating them?

I think Blade's the perfect size. Keeps the art looking tight like a tiger.

[Finch]

People following Vertical publishing... the last two PREVIEWS have only solicited Black Jack vol.4 and vol.5. One book a month in other words

Vertical has never flooded the market though. Wasn't the Buddha series like 1 book every other month?

[TODE]

Yeah. I regretfully say that I've never read Buddha

BTW a really awesome horror/comedy/wtf manga is The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service. Great story, art, and Carl Horn's translator notes in the back (although there aren't nearly as many as you find in other books he edits like Excel Saga and OMG!).

[Finch]

yeah, i caught a volume of that a while ago and thought it was pretty solid!