Currently Running Manga Discussion

[Daikun]

Well, this is interesting: An officially translated manga that's only available through Patreon.

Motoka Murakami has his own Patreon page where you can read Jin. $5 per month gets you the manga.

https://www.patreon.com/motokamurakami

I wonder if more mangaka will continue following this trend.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Read the most recent chapter of KnY. I think this arc might have topped Spider Mountain.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

This arc already topped the Spider Mountain arc when we realised that a demon turned into a train....like, an entire fucking train that people were riding in.

Also, this chapter....them feels, man....

[Spark Of Spirit]

I'm a sucker for train arcs like this in general, but this one is too good. The rankings appear to be reflecting it, too. I'm so glad this series is taking off now.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

You know what I noticed about this series? In the hands of a lesser writer, it could have easily become one of those "dark and edgy" hyper-violent revenge against [insert any enemy type here] stories. You know the kind of tripe that I'm talking about.

I mean think about it: you have a main character who's family was brutally slaughtered, a land terrorized by demons where innocent people die on a daily basis, tons of violent acts occurring between heroes and villains, and as this latest chapter has shown, this series isn't afraid to kill off characters who seem to be set up to be important pieces of the ongoing story.

Yet it doesn't come off that way at all, despite dealing with some unquestionably dark subject matter. Instead, Gotogue writes characters like Tanjirou, a layered main character who isn't annoyingly obsessed with "killing all demons" to the point of being one-dimensional. He cares far more about protecting the only family that he has left. There is actual nuance to this character that slowly gets built upon over time. His sister Nezuko is a layered character as well, and she doesn't even have any dialogue! And Inosuke and Zenitsu are more than just sidekicks; they are bonafied comrades-in-arms, and now feel just as integral to the main story as Tanjirou and Nezuko.

There's humor too. Despite living in dark times, these characters never seem to forget that life always moves on and can genuinely enjoy the brighter moments that they experience. The heart of this entire series, and how I interpret it's main theme, is that life continues to move on, with both joy and tragedy, and the main heroes of this story are those who can accept living with both and still make the most out of their lives, whereas the villains are all people who have rejected their humanity and bonds with others in pursuit of eternal life, yet they are ironically living the most miserable existence of all, which is why Tanjirou seems to pity them more than blindly despising them.

And even when loss is suffered, like in the most recent chapter, we see that the dying can happily leave the world of the living without regret for the path that he chose, and those that he protected and left behind, while inevitably sad and heartbroken, will only become stronger people with even deeper bonds due to this painful experience.

In short, this series doesn't shy away from being dark, yet it is most certainly NOT a dark story. It's one of the most hopeful and inspiring manga that I've read in a while. At least, that's personally what I get out of it.

[Spark Of Spirit]

I do like the tone Gotouge goes with. Though it can be dark or light depending on the chapter, it never goes overbearing in one direction or the other. There's no edgelord darkness, though things can get really brutal, and there's no obnoxious humor (and typical anime/shonen humor), though characters are free to make jokes.

This has what those series like Reborn during the Silver Age lacked. It has an author who cares about the story and how the characters would organically live and grow in it. It has a spark to it that the Golden Age series all had. KnY is written and drawn by someone who enjoys storytelling and carefully avoids relying on easy cliches to push the plot forward. The Silver Age really was full of series like that.

Like MHA, I think KnY is a series that could have run alongside YYH, Dragon Ball, and JoJo, and would have gathered the same amount of popularity back in the day.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Berserk is back on hiatus until the winter.

No real surprise there.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

So, MHA is still my second or third favorite currently running Jump series (I kind of consider it to be tied with TPN at this point), with OP being at the top and KnY being just barely behind (and arguably may eventually match or even usurp one or more of my current top three).

That said, I've gotta be honest and say that I'm really not feeling this current arc too much. Unlike Stain or All For One, the head of the Yakuza (and just the Yakuza in general) don't really come off as intimidating or menacing as Horikoshi wants them to. Even so, it could still work out better if I were more invested in the actual raid attempt by the heroes, but something hasn't been clicking for me so far, and I think that it has to do with the perspective of this arc. The Hideout Raid and All For One arcs worked for me because despite involving teachers and pro heroes, it was presented to us from the perspective of the students, who we could more easily relate to and identify with. This arc feels like it's really more from the perspective of the pros, with Deku and the others only coming off as supplementary characters so far, which makes sense in terms of the context, but feels undeniably less interesting from a narrative standpoint.

It's fine, to be clear. I don't exactly dislike this arc, but it just lacks that certain punch that most of MHA has had for me since the Field Training arc.

[Spark Of Spirit]

I can see where you're coming from, but only partially agree.

My problem with the arc is that I know this is leading to something bigger due to the insane amount of hints dropped that I feel like the current raid is holding back those events from happening. I want to see Midoriya and Mirio atone for their mistake. I want to see what Shigaraki is up to. I want to see what Gran Torino is doing. I want to know what Night Eye's vision actually was. I want to see if All Might is really in danger. I want to see Overhaul get put in the ground and I want to see Eri saved. The problem is that Horikoshi's pacing (as good as it is) is still not quick enough for me to sit still through watching jobbers like Overhaul's men get bulldozed week after week.

I guess what I'm saying is that this arc has had a lot of set up and character growth, but I want to get to the meat of it already. It's the longest arc in the series so far, and we should be near the end, but it doesn't feel like it.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Silver Spoon is resuming on July 5th.

[VLordGTZ]

Silver Spoon is resuming on July 5th.

YES! 

I suspect that this may be the final batch of chapters for Silver Spoon, given that most of the major plot threads were tied up prior to the last hiatus.  In any case, I'll be looking forward to seeing what Arakawa has in store for readers this time around.

[Spark Of Spirit]

For Jump's 50th anniversary, Shueisha is reprinting two old issues.

They include the first issue which has:

Kujira Daigo by Sachio Umemoto
Oobakare Apache by Fujio Akatsuka
Jigoku Ken by Yoshiteru Takano
Chichi no Tamashii by Hiroshi Kaizuka
Harenchi Gakuen by Go Nagai
Doru Yarou by Mikiya Mochizuki
Flash Gordon by Dan Barry
Te by Kazuo Umezu

And a second issue from the Golden Age of Jump. This has a lot more series:

Slam Dunk by Takehiko Inoue (in color)
Shadow Lady by Masakazu Katsura
Mind Assassin by Hajime Kazu
Dragon Ball by Akira Toriyama
Midori no Makibao by Tsunomaru
Tottemo! Luckyman by Hiroshi Gamou
Rurouni Kenshin by Nobuhiro Watsuki
Bonbonza Kakou Kouen Gekibu by Yutaka Takahashi
Nanpo U Den by Haruto Umezawa
Jigoku Sensei Nube by Sho Makura and Takeshi Okano
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure by Hirohiko Araki
Captain Tsubasa: World Youth by Youichi Takahashi
Kochira Katsushika-ku Kamearikouen-mae Hashutsujo by Osamu Akimoto
Shin Jungle no Ouja Taachan by Masaya Tokuhiro
Dragon Quest: Dai no Daibouken by Riku Sanjou, Kouji Inada and Yuji Horii
Kagemusha Tokugawa Ieyasu by Tetsuo Hara and Keiichirou Ryou
Ninku SECOND STAGE by Koji Kiriyama
RASH!! by Tsukasa Hojo
Rokudenashi Blues by Masanori Morita
Hareluya II BOY by Haruto Umezawa
Bakudan! by Akira Miyashita
Osama Haroba: Hattari Teikoku no Gyakush? by Kokichi Naniwa

There will be a third one focusing on pivotal moments like Raoh against Kenshiro. No idea what that full listing is yet. There's also a fourth one, but there's no hint as to what it is. I'm going to guess it will be the full color final chapters collected in one place.

Here's hoping Viz decides to license these if only for bonus issue material for their Jump. That's a lot of cool stuff.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Flash Gordon had a reprint published by Weekly Shonen Jump? 

Well, you learn something new every day.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Flash Gordon had a reprint published by Weekly Shonen Jump? 

Well, you learn something new every day.

They did it a few times at the beginning. They also published Mandrake the Magician and Secret Agent Corrigan. It makes series like Cobra, Cat's Eye, and City Hunter feel like they fit in with roots of the magazine more than originally thought.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Weekly Shonen Jump Issue #31 (June 29th, 2017):
Yuna of Yuragi Manor (Cover, Lead CP)
1. One Piece
2. Kimetsu no Yaiba: Blade of Demon Destruction
Food Wars!: Shokugeki no Souma (CP)
Hunter x Hunter (Not Ranked)
3. My Hero Academia
The Promised Neverland (CP)
4. Hinomaru Zumou
5. Haikyu!!
Dr. Stone (CP)
Cross Account (Not Ranked)
Omoiyo Todoke ~Butsuri-teki Niwa Todokanai~ (One Shot)
6. Gintama
Shudan! (Not Ranked)
7. Spring Weapon No. 1
8. Robot x Laserbeam
9. The Disastrous Life of Saiki K.
10. We Never Learn
11. Hungry Marie
Chronicle of Isobe ~Life is Hard~

No surprises here. Robot gets a bit of a bump, but WNL falls as a consequence which probably doesn't matter since its getting a color page next week. At this point it looks like Hungry Marie is definitely on the way out. Kimetsu and MHA are doing great (which is okay by me) and everything else looks about the same as usual. Next week, Gintama gets the cover, and Saiki, WNL, and Boruto, are getting color pages. Gintama has to be nearing the end at this point, but I don't read it so I wouldn't know. That's just what I hear.