Currently Running Manga Discussion

[LumRanmaYasha]

I actually thought that this week's DGM chapter happened later because I remembered it taking place farther into the anime version, so I wasn't expecting it this week. But yeah, it was a much better chapter, and combined with next week's, would have made for a way stronger debut chapter than the actual first one did.

Not getting to read more WT for another two weeks is going be tough considering that cliffhanger. I think a lot of the series chose a good point to leave off for this break. They left off on really interesting and climactic points, which works to keep hyped for them during a one-week hiatus.

Not sure what I'm going to do next week since Jump'll be off. Maybe I'll try to get up a cluster of reviews of other manga. I've been meaning to resume doing a Monthly Manga Roundup alongside the Jump reviews, but just haven't found the time.

Speaking of manga reviews, Weekly Manga Recap is having their first patreon-sponsored monthly Q&A episode tonight! I wonder if they'll get to the questions I sent them a while ago.

[LumRanmaYasha]

The first volume of My Hero Academia debuted as #4 in the NYT best selling manga list. That's a pretty strong debut considering it's competition, and I'll be curious to see how sales for it will continue to fare.

[Spark Of Spirit]

My friend got it, and I have to say it was really well done. Really dig the classic X-Men font for the title, too.

I'd get it myself, but long-running shonen scare me off these days. It's one thing when you're twenty volumes or so, or even Dragon Ball's forty-two, but looking at Naruto, Bleach, and One Piece's length is quite scary from a collector's standpoint. I'd have to see how long it runs first.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Weekly Manga Recap will become a video podcast. It's cool to see them get so much support on their patreon. I'll be interested in seeing what they decide to settle on as future milestone goals.

[Spark Of Spirit]

How about you? Still working on the one for the most recent issue?

I'd really like to see your comments on SotE. 

[LumRanmaYasha]

How about you? Still working on the one for the most recent issue?

I'd really like to see your comments on SotE. 

Still have to finish writing it; I'm only about half-done. I went on vacation with the family last week and I had to work on stuff for my internship, so finding time has been an issue, especially since there's 12 series to write about and there's plenty to say about all of them. But I'm hoping to have it done tonight or tomorrow morning. Thank god there wasn't an issue this week!

And yeah...safe to say I don't have very pleasant things to say about the latest Seraph.

[LumRanmaYasha]

In other news, a massive shakeup will supposedly be going down in Shonen Sunday. Curious to see what that'll mean in terms of what new series they'll create. Not sure what "familiar series" they'll be gutting, since there's no way Conan or Magi are going anywhere right now. As far as big-names go, I guess they might end Hayate, Zettai Karen Children, and maybe Rin-ne, though the fact the latter has an anime will mean it's safe for a while. Though, I would welcome them making Takahashi end the series and getting her to create something more inventive. I've been thinking she should try doing a horror manga again, or at least try doing another romantic comedy that isn't based in anything supernatural like MI.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Oh, and here are the rankings for the August 24th issue of Weekly Shonen Jump:

Food Wars: Shokugeki no Soma (Cover, Lead CP)
1- One Piece
2- My Hero Academia
3- Assassination Classroom
Genjui Toteku (One-Shot, Center Color, 47 p., Participant in the 2015 Gold Future Cup)
4- Black Clover
Haikyu!! (Center Color)
5- The Mishaps of Kusuo Saiki
6- Hinomaru Sumo
7- Toriko
8- Straighten Up! Welcome to Shika High's Competitive Dance Club
Gintama (Center Color)
Best Blue (Not ranked)
9- Kagamigami
10- Bleach
11- Nisekoi
12- Kochikame
13- Lady Justice
14- Devily Man
The Story of Isobe Isobee

[Spark Of Spirit]

I wonder if this might be why Fujita isn't writing a new manga for them for the first time since 1990. Somebody might have told him a culling was coming, so he decided to focus on the U&T anime with Nishmura and MAPPA instead. He's been there for a quarter of a century, I'm sure he has an idea of how they work after what they did to Raiku who was his assistant.

But SS's sales have been dipping for awhile. It's not that they need fresh blood, but they need fresh ideas. They have too many long-running series that scare off newcomers, and their originals haven't been all too interesting in many years.

To be honest, I thought Jump was heading this way with the Big 3 and their battle shonen glut a few years back, but they course corrected and are now better off than they've been in a while. Shonen Sunday needs to do the same.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Oh, and here are the rankings for the August 24th issue of Weekly Shonen Jump:

Food Wars: Shokugeki no Soma (Cover, Lead CP)
1- One Piece
2- My Hero Academia
3- Assassination Classroom
Genjui Toteku (One-Shot, Center Color, 47 p., Participant in the 2015 Gold Future Cup)
4- Black Clover
Haikyu!! (Center Color)
5- The Mishaps of Kusuo Saiki
6- Hinomaru Sumo
7- Toriko
8- Straighten Up! Welcome to Shika High's Competitive Dance Club
Gintama (Center Color)
Best Blue (Not ranked)
9- Kagamigami
10- Bleach
11- Nisekoi
12- Kochikame
13- Lady Justice
14- Devily Man
The Story of Isobe Isobee

That Bleach ranking had to be for how stupid it was. Because, man, were the recent reveals dumb! Congrats at Kagamigami cracking the top ten and MHA ranking so high after an awesome series of chapters.

Can I be honest and say that I don't understand why Black Clover is rated so high? I mean, it's a good series. I'm enjoying it. But it really isn't doing anything all too great or original so far. I guess people just wanted a series that reminded them of early Naruto, not that I can particularly blame them. I just don't see what makes it top 5 material.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Maybe, or he might just be taking a break. They say that they plan to bring in some veterans for new series too, so he might come back with another one for the magazine after the U&T anime is done.

I think it speaks to people's lack of interest in Sunday that out of the 30+ series they currently run, only 10 have wikipedia pages, and only five are published in the U.S., and the only one of those that's been made in the 2010's is Magi. It's not really that they have too many long-running series. The only series in the magazine right now that are over five years old are Conan, Hayate, Zettai, Arata, Rinne, and Magi, and the latter two were only made in 2009. It's really just that their new series haven't been particularly interesting or entertaining in a long while, rare exceptions like Silver Spoon notwithstanding. If they want to compete with Jump and Weekly Shonen Magazine, they need interesting, fresh and innovative ideas, a renewed distinct identity to set them apart, and furthermore, a way to spread their manga to a wide audience overseas. Having manga that appeals to a broad global audience and getting legal simulpubs out internationally should be a key point in their strategy; both Jump and WSM have been doing this for years now, and they can't afford to be behind them on that anymore.

I'll be curious to see how SS shapes up and if they can create series that get public attention both in Japan and overseas like Jump and WSM have been doing. At the very least, if Shogakukan doesn't try and have Viz made a Weekly Shonen Sunday digital imprint at some point in the next year, I'll be surprised.

That Bleach ranking had to be for how stupid it was. Because, man, were the recent reveals dumb!

Rankings for a series are based on survey responses for the issue eight weeks prior, so the chapter of Bleach that was voted on was the beginning of the Bazz B vs. Jugo fight. I guess japanese readers sorta liked that. The more curious thing is Nisekoi ranking so low when last week it was #5. Looking it up, and the chapter that was ranked was the one where the girls got drunk and basically rehased a chapter the series already did a couple years ago. Yeah, that was a pretty bad chapter and I remember seeing a lot of negative comments about it, so it's nice to see that japanese readers agree about that and are also more interested in reading more of the story-driven arcs we've been getting from the series recently than the standard rom-com hijinks.

Can I be honest and say that I don't understand why Black Clover is rated so high? I mean, it's a good series. I'm enjoying it. But it really isn't doing anything all too great or original so far. I guess people just wanted a series that reminded them of early Naruto, not that I can particularly blame them. I just don't see what makes it top 5 material.

I guess it's striking a chord with younger readers who couldn't get into Naruto because of it's length and haven't read enough to notice the similarities between the two. It's sorta like how kids in Japan are drifting away from Pokemon in favor of Yo-kai Watch because the latter is newer, easier to get in to, and doesn't have as many older fans and thus feels more "for them." That it's doing so well is a little head-scratching for me too, but I suppose it fills the void of a battle manga with the same kind of tone and style as Naruto did for kids when that series first started, and it does have pretty strong art and decent enough characters and story so far that I can see being really appealing to them as well. So, I think it's probably a generational gap kind of thing.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Well, we can easily compare their original popular works back then to now.

Shonen Sunday in the 90s:

Ushio and Tora
Go!! Southern Ice Hockey Club
Ghost Sweeper Mikami
H2
Detective Conan
Major
Ganba! Fly High
Jaja Uma Grooming Up!
Flame of Recca
Firefighter! Daigo of Fire Company M
Inuyasha
Monkey Turn
Project ARMS
Karakuri Circus
Salad Days


Shonen Sunday in the 00s:

Zatch Bell
Yakitate!! Japan
Midori Days
MAR
Kekkaishi
Hayate the Combat Butler
Cross Game
Zettai Karen Children
Moonlight Act
Bakegyamon
The World God Only Knows
Arata: The Legend
Rin-ne
Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic


Shonen Sunday now:

Uh, Silver Spoon, Ultimate Otaku Teacher, and Asaoka High? Their best stuff is usually of a much different style than what Jump puts out, but those three series aside, there isn't much new that is making a splash.

Which us a shame, because I think they offer good variety contrasted with Jump. If they can get over their crappy policies that sent talent like Raiku packing and get back to what they're best at, they can really carve out a niche for themselves again and really build up that base.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Yeah, the decade is half-over, and they really only have two series to come out of it in the last five years that could be called big hits, compared to how many they had in previous decades. It's no wonder their circulation keeps dropping so dramatically. But yeah, if they get the right talent, nurture that talent, and get the best out of them, I think they can make some interesting, good series and make a comeback.

In other news, the Toei released a trailer for the World Trigger anime dub. It sounds...alright. I just wonder what their plan for it is, though? Are they just going to put the dubbed episodes on Crunchyroll and Hulu? Is it for a physical release of the show over here? Are they trying to get it on U.S. tv? For the latter, maybe they can use FUNi as a go-between to get the show on Toonami in the 3am slot or something, but that's still kind of a stretch. I'm just confused at what exactly Toei wants to get out of dubbing the show.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Toei really seems to have a lot of faith in World Trigger in general. Not only did they give it a 50 episode anime so early in its run, they also ordered a whole filler season next, and now this. The dub sounds pretty standard to me, but I'm also not quite sure what they're planning to do with it. Though it would have been perfect for Toonami back in the day, I'm not sure if anyone would go for it now. It would certainly work better as a daily series instead of weekly.

I'm not sure what other recent anime are similar in potential international appeal other than World Trigger is, though. Maybe Ushio & Tora, but it's a short list.

[LumRanmaYasha]

A week late, but hey, there wasn't a Jump this week so it worked out alright! In this issue, Yu tries to make his half-vampire brother turn into a monster against his will, Yukio gets existential, and Yuda has a sobering backstory about how he learned to treasure the value of a human life...and then he goes and kills a guy. ...Huh. All this and more, After the Jump!