Manga Thread

[Bebpo]

We don't really have a thread for manga that's not One Piece here and it just gets lost in the comics or anime thread, so Manga thread.

Just spent a lot of my free time in the last two weeks reading through all 20 volumes of Naoki Urasawa's Billy Bat since it just finished last month after an 8 year run.  It's actually the first manga outside of keeping up with One Piece that I've read in about 6 years, but for a new completed Urasawa work, I'm there.  If you haven't read Urasawa, he's pretty legendary and one of the only great mangaka of the late 90s/early 2000s that's still pumping out major works with Monster, 20th Century Boys, Pluto and now Billy Bat.  Urasawa's both amazingly good and amazingly cursed.  Dude writes some of the most page-turning entertaining mystery thrillers of our time, but he also consistently falls apart in the end and never delivers answers as satisfying as the mysteries he's created.  The best example of this is 20th Century Boys, which during its highs is one of the most interesting sci-fi thrillers ever, but the lows and payoffs are :|  The thing is, no matter how things turn out, in Urasawa's manga, every chapter is entertaining and once you start you're hooked for the ride.  Billy Bat in a lot of ways is his most Twin Peaks-ish bizarre story yet, a story that has Jesus, JFK, and graffiti art all in the same tale.  It was very enjoyable, with some great characters and excellent highs.  Urasawa's art is always distinct and quality and Urasawa tales are nice in that they're about middle-aged and old men and women and not more than what's realistic kids.  They have a wide appeal to people of every generation.  Anyhow, in the end I'm not really sure what the longass comic was really about and it dragged a bit in the end, but it was fun and I'd recommend it.  If you haven't read any Urasawa, just start with Monster though.

[Momo]

I just read the first 9 volumes of Boys on the Run and cant find volume 10 in English anywhere. I feel terrible rage boiling up inside  :'(

[Bebpo]

Also, to get the thread going.  What manga have you read?  I know even though I've read manga since I was a teen, because most are so long, I haven't read a ton.  These are the ones I can remember:

X - Super awesome emo for my teen-self.  Ended on a cliffhanger in biggest troll ever
Clover, Chobits, Lawful Drug, entire library of CLAMP sexy guys shoujo - Was fun with striking art for the time.
Trigun - Great art and some cool stuff, but by the end got really shitty sci-fi. 
Rurouni Kenshin - Awesome shounen fight manga for my teen-self.  Pretty good overall even if it just sorta glides to the ending after the Enishi arc.
Kenshin guy's next manga - Yikes.
Hikaru no Go - Awesome sports manga!  Really enjoyed this from start to finish.
Death Note - Lol, we all know Death Note at this point.
GTO - Fun, but really cheezy and hasn't aged well at all.
The GTO prequel one - I remember this being a lot more funny.
Azumanga Daioh - Speaking of funny, this was great.
Yotsubato - This was even better.
Berserk - Really good, but never ending so don't really care anymore.  Every 5 years I catch up on like 2 volumes worth...maybe.
One Piece - Best adventure.
The Jump Trio - Naruto/Bleach/HxH - All were good at parts, gave up on all three years ago for various reasons. 
Fushigi Yuugi - First shoujo, was manga twilight for my 16 year old emo self.
Ayashi no Ceres - Yuu Watase kick kept giving.  Was entertaining,but Twilight 2.0
Monster - Book that got me hooked on Urasawa.  Great thriller.
20th Century Boys - Damn good until it really, really wasn't
Pluto - Alright.
Hellstar Remina - My only Junji Ito; was goofy as fuck but entertaining and my style of planet eating fun.
Hellsing - Badass, story was ok.
Drifters - Haven't read it in a couple of years but was enjoyable pulp coming from Hellsing
Beck - Enjoyed this A LOT early on when it was about a Band (like the anime better because real music), but the 2nd half is like dumb mobster shit.
Gantz - Good pulp horror until it got really fucking terrible in the last arc.
Gundam mangas - I like Gundam so therefore they are all good enough.
Full Metal Alchemist - Was great for a lot of it, but felt it kind of fell of a generic stupid shounen manga cliff in the ending arcs.

Hmmm, might be missing a couple but I think that's basically the manga I've read.  Duckroll is trying to get me to read Silver Spoon next.  I dunno, farming school slice of life seems pretty boring.  I also heard Bakuman's good too.  Would definitely be up for recommendations.

[Momo]

I've read way too many to list

I'll give it a try later though

[Syph]

Ikigami

A national prosperity law has been passed in a dystopian nation resulting in citizens between the ages of 18-24 being randomly selected to die for the good of the nation. These citizens are given 24-hour notification of their impending death. These notifications are known as "ikigami"—the ostensible reason for this system being to help demonstrate the value of life.

protag is one of the people whose job it is to give notice

[bork]

I used to read a lot but have really trailed off.  Need to start reading One Piece badly.  I have all the chapters, up through the current one, downloaded and ready to go.

Been keeping up with Prison School.  The current storyline has been dragging on for months- it's a 'stand-off' at the school field day with the underground student council/boys and student council/w monstrous Andre that has been going on for what feels like the last 3-4 months.  Every week it's just more crazy dialogue.  There's also a sub-plot with the principal that has been fun in breaking all that up.

Another series I've been reading is Hantsu X Trash.  It's a sports manga about water polo.  The artist is a (former?) hentai guy, I think so there's lots of perverted situations and insane attention to details.  The main character is a goofball who joins the team to get closer to the captain who he likes.  All the boys on the team are huge perverts, but he actually tries.  Then it kind of changes into more of a love trigangle thing.  It's not bad for what ti is.

[Van Cruncheon]

dolly kill kill ain't bad, it's modern day attack on titan with giant clowns as alien bio weapons. it veers haphazardly between junji ito and full shounen, and yet somehow i'm enjoying it

[curly]

Used to read a ton of manga, dropped off a bit but still keep up with a fair number of series.

Favorite authors/artists are Kengo Hanazawa, Adachi, Taiyo Matsumoto, Yuki Kodama. Of stuff that's coming out now, I really like I Am a Hero, Hinamatsuri, and Mob Psycho. Probably forgetting a lot.

[Tasty]

spoiler (click to show/hide)

My relationship with HxH:

[close]

[Bebpo]

My relationship with Hunter x Hunter is like a lower quality Berserk.  Has the same always on Hiatus status, and some of HxH was AWESOME, but unlike Berserk that's felt consistently great throughout the long ass wait, I haven't really enjoyed the direction HxH went halfway.  I really liked HxH until Greed Island, which was ok but I couldn't get into because I didn't care for any of the new characters or all the dumb game rules, then the ant bug people arc I couldn't get into either because bug people are lamo like furries.  Haven't read it since the bug people arc ended, but Togashi kinda lost me after those two arcs.   

Actually, wait was the Killua arc with the little sister who grants wishes after the bug arc?  Because I remember reading that, and the election part.  But I think those were the last parts of HxH I read.  I'll probably read the rest when it's finished since unlike Naruto & Bleach I didn't end up hate dropping it.  Just lost interest when it was on hiatus.

[Momo]

My relationship with Hunter x Hunter is like a lower quality Berserk.  Has the same always on Hiatus status, and some of HxH was AWESOME, but unlike Berserk that's felt consistently great throughout the long ass wait, I haven't really enjoyed the direction HxH went halfway.  I really liked HxH until Greed Island, which was ok but I couldn't get into because I didn't care for any of the new characters or all the dumb game rules, then the ant bug people arc I couldn't get into either because bug people are lamo like furries.  Haven't read it since the bug people arc ended, but Togashi kinda lost me after those two arcs.   

Actually, wait was the Killua arc with the little sister who grants wishes after the bug arc?  Because I remember reading that, and the election part.  But I think those were the last parts of HxH I read.  I'll probably read the rest when it's finished since unlike Naruto & Bleach I didn't end up hate dropping it.  Just lost interest when it was on hiatus.

[Beezy]

I really liked HxH until Greed Island, which was ok but I couldn't get into because I didn't care for any of the new characters or all the dumb game rules, then the ant bug people arc I couldn't get into either because bug people are lamo like furries.

 

[Bebpo]

Well, like I said, it's not necessarily a bad arc, just didn't do anything for me.  I can't take talking insects fighting with kung-fu seriously, sorry.  Also didn't help that I was reading the arc while it was running weekly with the Togashi "I'm on my death bed drawing scratches" art, but the combination of the two really killed my interest in HxH, which had already diminished from Greed Island.  Then again, I think I was at the point that I kinda got tired of shounen manga in general since that was around when I dropped Naruto & Bleach as well.  One Piece is the only shounen I still like because of the adventure aspect.

[Tasty]

I can't take talking insects fighting with kung-fu seriously, sorry.

This is in a series with

- A pedo clown that "SCHWING"s his dick when he's excited for a fight
- One of its tensest fight scenes being a game of dodgeball
- The ultimate power-up for a character looking like this:

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

- Leorio's entire character
- An arc based around a Magic the Gathering MMO
- Two twelve-year olds being some of the strongest human characters in the world
- A "little girl" who actually looks like this:


Really? The one thing you can't accept in a world with all this shit is ant-people?

It's like not getting into Dragon Ball because there's a giant dude called the "Ox King" and the president of the world is a dog. Come on.

[eleuin]

this was awhile ago but my 5 recs are the top row

tokyo ghoul was kind of a joke entry but its still worth reading 

also kangoku gauken (prison school) best art right now bar none

[Momo]

You must really hate people to recommend Boys on the Run, the last volume isnt in english anywhere

[Momo]

Just what I can remember now (i'll update this list as i remember shit)

xxxHolic
Tsubasa Chronicles
Aku no Hana
One Piece
Bleach
Boys on the Run
Teppu
Naruto
Hunter X Hunter
Berserk
Onani Master Kurosawa
Prison School
ReLife
Kimi ni Todoke
Ao Haru Ride
Hitman Reborn
Suzuka
Natsu no Arashi
School Rumble
Skip Beat
Kimi no Iru Machi
H2
Hajime no Ippo
History's strongest disciple Kenichi
Unbalance x Unbalance
Haikyu
H2
Ookiku Furikabutte
Diamond no Ace
Banana Fish
Terra Formars
Gants
Yakitate!! Ja-pan
Fruits Basket
Boys on the Run
Zombie Powder
Addicted to Curry
That fucked up manga where there is a country with a revolution and everyone dies at the border
Uzumaki
Air Gear
Ga Rei
Kekkaishi
Tenjou Tenge

[toku]

been meaning to get into tokyo ghoul, looks like a very toku thing

[Great Rumbler]

Yotsuba is the best manga ever. The End.

[eleuin]

You must really hate people to recommend Boys on the Run, the last volume isnt in english anywhere

and HxH actually stands for hiatus x hiatus

manga reading is misery 

[Vizzys]

things yall should read:

holyland
goodnight punpun
iam a hero
qualia the purple
berserk
homunculus
hunter x hunter
tsumi to batsu
boku no hero academia
prison school
one punch man
mob psycho 100

some are finished, some arent, some never will be ;_;

[bork]

I loved Detroit Metal City.  Loved it.  So much that I bought all the manga books and even went to see the live action movie in Japan.

But I never checked out the other stuff that artist/writer Kiminori Wakasugi has done.  Looks like mostly shorts, and one called "Kappei," about a martial artist living alone and out of touch with reality who moves back to the city.

But he has another series called Minna! Esper da yo!  (Everyone is a psychic!)

Description:

The psychic comedy follows an ordinary (virgin) high school boy named Yoshirō "Yocchan" Kamogawa. His life changes overnight when he wakes up with the ability to read other people's minds. Yoshirō is not the only one to gain powers in his town. Teru-oichan, an (apparently virgin) worker at a café near Yoshirō's school, gains telekinesis but he uses it for sex toys.
Yōsuke Enomoto, a (probably virgin) senior and former basketball player at Yoshirō's high school, gains teleportation but only while naked.

I must read this now.    I see that there was a live-action TV series and also a theatrical live-action movie released last year.  The movie is up on Youtube.  Some have changed the name to "The Virgin Psychics."



"What made us psychics?"
"One, you are a virgin.  Two, when the space rays hit, you were having an orgasm."

Sounds like a winner to me!

[Bebpo]

I was informed the other day that Attack on Titan manga just became very good.  I'd avoided it as I heard it starts good and then it gets not good, but apparently the latest reveal retroactively fixes the not good stuff and the whole manga makes a lot of sense and is great now and heading to end in the next 1-2 years.  Probably gonna wait until it ends but will read it.

[Tasty]

http://www.gamenguide.com/articles/93617/20161218/hunter-x-hunter-chapter-361-release-date-news-update-yoshihiro-togashi-finally-returns-creator-not-giving-up-his-rights.htm

(Low-quality) rumors seem to have been Takeuchi taking over but I guess Togashi is back and 361 is coming "soon?"

Can't find solid sources for any of this lol.

[Himu]

I don't follow manga as much anymore but I fucking love it

When I get the chance I'll list some of my faves.

[Rufus]

It's a hidden gem, yeah. I think it's underrated because of the art style and the strangeness of the world. Neither have immediate appeal. Though "a guy cursed to have a lizard head on a quest to reverse it" was an interesting enough premise to hook me back when.

[bork]

Never heard of it...will check it out.

The last manga I read through was Blame!, which was really enjoyable.  I loved the sheer size and scope of the world in that series.   Beyond that, not much else.  I keep meaning to start One Piece and never do.    Prison School is what I read on the regular. 

[toku]

dorohedoro is great, q hayashida is cool

As far as why it's not popular thats how a lot of the weirder seinen shit goes. If they're lucky (or really good) you get years of being gassed up by bigger more popular artists then eventually some one off anime gets made.

[Rufus]

- Shigurui
Severe, earnestly ridiculous Samurai homoeroticism. Lots of blood and gore, too. It's mentioned in the interview Toku linked above.

- I am a Hero
Zombie apocalypse which goes into very strange (uniquely Japanese, I find) places later on. Conventional but great art. Main character is a mess though, and most others are assholes in some way, as is typical for zombie stuff.

- Kamisama no Iutoori (and its sequel)
What if children's games were deadly? Neither great art nor great characters, but it's a pageturner. Can be safely skimmed, as all the developments are guaranteed to be convenient nonsense.

- Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou
About an android who runs a café after a global environmental disaster. The stories are about her shopping trips. (I'm trying to re-read this myself right now, but I always get distracted by something else. )

- Otoyomegatari
Never read this myself (the premise is too boring for a child like myself). But it does have amazing art. The attention to detail is insane.

[Rufus]

And updates are few and far between.

[hampster]

I haven't read a ton of manga but my favorites from what I have read are:

Yona of the Dawn - Self described as a thrilling fantasy/romance, Yona might be my favorite series. The slow progress from sheltered princess to strong queen is really satisfying. Plus she gets her own little harem

World Trigger - My favorite of the various battle series. I like the emphasis on team fights, the fake bodies premise lets them avoid over the top injuries other series obsess with, and I appreciate how average the protagonist is. He's not strong, smart, or even particularly brave. Just an average guy surrounded by very talent people.   

Iris Zero - A slice of life / high school series where everyone has a small power, except the main character. It mostly revolves around the MC solving high school drama but I find the writing and scenarios interesting. I tend to only check out slice of life stuff when it has a sci-fi or fantasy hook and the hook here is really good.

Gate - A fun series about the Japanese military finding a gate to a fantasy world and just curb stomping the inhabitants. Love their fight with the dragon!

The most recent manga I read was Welcome to the Ballroom, I picked it up after watching some of the show and its enjoyable (the manga looks much better than the show which has a creepy style to it).  I'm excited to see where the current arc goes. That said, I like pretty much any sports show/manga.

[chronovore]

I was hugely in love with GANTZ through volume 15 or 16. I went back many years later and read through v.28 or so, as there was a Max Factory Figma gantz-suit figure that came with that one. I've meant to go back to it and see where it wraps up, but haven't yet manifested the will.

I read a fair amount of Vagabond, and enjoyed it. It was in my chiropractor's office, so it was a freebie, but I haven't felt compelled to go back and rent/buy any more of them.

[Rufus]

Gantz crawls up its own ass, but it does end appropriately for an ever escalating series.

Vagabond has been on pause for years now, so you might as well keep waiting.

[Rufus]

Can't blame them for milking it. They never know if they'll have another successful series, and they can't exactly transition into something else easily.

[Himu]

Manga is cool and all but... manga is basically really, really slow story-telling.

So many manga have been going on for so long. Vagabond isn't done, Berserk isn't done... even the authors themselves think "oh I'll do this for a few years..." then it ends up being several decades. I guess it's okay if you start reading and it's already ended or it's about to end.

Reading Nausicaa right now.

Not really reflecting reality. You only listed a few stories. The reality is that most manga are one and done and relatively fast. The more popular manga stay around a while. But to say manga is a slow storytelling format because of Berserk makes no sense.

[Himu]

I understood what you meant. But I don't think something like Berserk is a great example that proves this to be true.

[Tasty]

Togashi going on Hiatus x Hiatus again, but will be back "before the end of the year."

He got nine issues out before stopping this time which is pretty good at least.

[Himu]

Berserk owns

[Rufus]

Maybe by the time I'm done catching up with the manga, Berserk will be finished? kekeke

If you limit yourself to one chapter per week.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

...Maybe.

[close]

[Rufus]

Miura is a perv. One of his short stories features a magical loli whose bodily fluids have healing properties. She's implied to be pissing on the protagonist at one point.

Also, he adores the Idolmaster games, and they're probably the reason he's taking so many breaks.

[Rufus]

How far have you read?

[Rufus]

If you've seen the old anime series, you know what's around the corner already. If you've only seen the new one, strap in. There's more fucked up shit later on. By that time though, Guts travels with his little RPG posse, which offer some comic relief between all the grim darkness.

And then, the ship. The fucking ship. You picked a good time to start reading, since they're finally off the fucking ship now.

[Himu]

Oda will never be beat. GOAT.

[Tasty]

Berserk, like Belzeebub and Dragon Ball, make me question the Japanese proclivity to draw completely naked underaged males.

[Rufus]

Casca is just now having her mind fixed (in perhaps the most literal, kinda funny way). Should be volume 35 or something? Somewhere in the 30ies, anyway. Some crazy stuff will happen, but the story won't actually go anywhere for a looong time.

[toku]

I'm not really feeling Berserk anymore.

It's good and I get it when some people think it's amazing, but it's too... I dunno.

The art is absurdly good though, and consistent also.

I don't like Guts, basically. And Casca has been mentally distinguished mentally-challenged for so long (on volume 23 now) that she's not really there anymore.

I thought Guts was a total edgelord when first introduced, but I guess that was on purpose, then there was that scene early on (volume 3?) where Guts was crying and Puck was like

But I don't really feel it. I dunno. It's still good though, but I enjoyed Dorohedoro much more.

thats because the book is really about a bunch of edgelord broken people trying to build/become part of new healthy family/families

[Bebpo]

There's a new Kenshin manga 

wtf

[Himu]

HOLY FUCK

[Himu]

If One Piece is my number one, Kenshin is my number two.

I AM SCREAMING.

[Himu]

Manga has always been awesome.

Most anime worth their shit are based on manga.

Still haven't given my suggestions. I'll do it later tonight.

[Himu]

Kenji is so cute!

[Rufus]

there haven't been many moments where im like "why can't i... hold all these feels " like with one piece

Try Naoki Urasawa's stuff if you want more of that. Pluto, Monster and 20th Century Boys are good.

the best moments have been action moments i guess... its pretty interesting how guts swinging that massive sword around basically never seems to get old

And it only got better with the berserker armour. Self-destructive, unhinged brutality.

[Momo]

Finished nijigahara holograph for the first time over the weekend and boy oh boy did it take me a minute to unpack all that

[Van Cruncheon]

solanin was a straight up feelpocalypse 

[Rufus]

Solanin put me off reading more of his stuff.

[bork]

Been getting my read on a lot more lately-- ditched my Surface (replaced with a laptop), which was just heavy for comic reading, and picked up an Amazon Fire HD 8 tablet, which works great for comics and was cheap as hell.

Been reading through Gantz, which I was only recently exposed to by the movie on Netflix.  It's one of those series I completely missed out on back when it was a big thing.

[toku]

Idk what you're looking for out of Gantz but just be aware it pretty much never gets above "good looking people dying horribly" and it kinda dips around the 100-150 chapter mark into just really mean/nasty territory even by Gantz standards. It's just cool tech and ultra violence.

[bork]

Finished Gantz and enjoyed it overall.  I don't know if I would describe it as being as shallow as what Toku said, but there definitely were parts that felt like it.

I liked that there was some character growth, with certain characters turning more into selfless hero-types and not being assholes the whole time.  The stuff with Tae on the alien ship was also crazy.

What I didn't like:

-Izumi.  What the fuck was his deal?  He wants to become a Gantz member, so he goes on a killing spree and murders a ton of people and never pays for it?  That was just straight garbage.

-The initial Gantz "origin" story.  The whole subplot with the reporter in Germany was just stupid and didn't make much sense.  The later reveal that this was all alien tech was better.

-Reika.  She was shallow as hell.  Her creating a second Kurono was some selfish, selfish shit.  But I did like how there were two Kuronos running around for a while.

-The vampires.  Just felt shoe-horned into the plot and was over too quickly.

I liked the whole concept of characters being digital copies brought back to life and was glad that things went a bit more past that first female character finding out she was a "clone" of herself.  But it took a really long time for that to come back with the second Kurono.  I would have liked to have seen this expanded upon and had them maybe a meet an entire team that was comprised of multiple copies of the same person or something.

Also read Gantz G, which was...OK I guess.  Just a little spin-off story focusing mainly on female students.  Weird that they named the main character Kei Kurona.

[chronovore]

Haven't done Gantz G.

Everything else you said is dead-on the same opinion I had.

[Bebpo]

After lots of bugging, duckroll got me to pick up the US release of Gundam: The Origin in the nice big hardcover books. Since they're fucking expensive ($25 a volume), I just picked up the first 2 volumes to check it out.

Other than the extremely wonky translation that sounds written by a non-native English speaker "I can't believe I am made to war", "you must employ the gundam more efficiently in battle", the manga is really good. At first I figured it was just a retelling of the show with some changes, but by the 2nd half of Vol.1 it'd become its own engrossing tale. Lots of great character development, and the little touches in the character art to add to that are super nice. The mechanics also look gorgeous, lots of really great mecha spreads. Definitely a pretty awesome book. Looking forward to reading through all the volumes. Also the nice covers and pages with big art (considering how good the art is) makes it worth the expensive price. Some of the color pages are pure gorgeous art. Feels almost like an artbook.