EIGOMANGA LAUNCHES WEB COMIC CONTENT ON CRUNCHYROLL.COM

Online Media Distribution Leader to Premiere Newest Publications for Men and Women

San Francisco, CA (November 25, 2008) ­ Comic book publishing studio

eigoMANGA (www.eigomanga.com) <http://www.eigomanga.com)> ,  today announces

a partnership with online media distribution leader and leading web portal

for asian video content Crunchyroll.  eigoMANGA will provide their newest

publications ³Rumble Pak² and ³Sakura Pakk² to Crunchyroll¹s 4 million

membered online community.  More information can be found at

www.crunchyroll.com <http://www.crunchyroll.com> .

eigoMANGA¹s publications ‘Rumble Pak’ (www.rumblepak.com

<http://www.rumblepak.com> ) and ‘Sakura Pakk’ (www.SakuraPakk.com

<http://www.SakuraPakk.com> ) is featured on a special publisher’s page on

Crunchyroll.  ³Rumble Pak² and ³Sakura Pakk² are Original English-language

(OEL) manga anthology series published by eigoMANGA that showcases original

manga stories created by artists from around the world.  ³Rumble Pak² comics

are geared for male comic book readers while ³Sakura Pakk² is catered for

female readers.

“We’re very happy to work with Crunchyroll”, says eigoMANGA’s publisher,

Austin Osueke. “There are many great community sites out there, but

Crunchyroll is the obvious choice for us because their site features anime,

manga and the sub-cultures that surround it.  It took us a couple of years

to figure out what to do and Crunchyroll fits us like a glove”.

VIZ MEDIA ANNOUNCES AN ARRAY OF EDGY NEW MANGA SERIES TO DEBUT IN FOURTH QUARTER

New Releases Offer A Variety Of Intriguing Fantasy/Action Adventure Tales As Well As New Shojo Titles With A Twist From Internationally Acclaimed Creators

San Francisco, CA, NOVEMBER 21, 2008 – VIZ Media, LLC (VIZ Media), one of the entertainment industry’s most innovative and comprehensive publishing, animation and licensing companies, has announced several eagerly awaited new manga series scheduled for release throughout the Fourth Quarter of 2008.

Seven new series are set to debut, beginning this month, and feature a variety of captivating stories designed to appeal to Teen and Older Teen readers. The new series include BLANK SLATE, NORA: THE LAST CHRONICLE OF DEVILDOM, SOLANIN, CAPTIVE HEARTS, GABA KAWA, WE WERE THERE and ST. _ DRAGON GIRL.

“We are looking forward to bringing a diverse range of titles in Q4 which will range from slice-of-life stories to romance and more!” says Evelyn Dubocq, Sr. Director of Public Relations, VIZ Media. “As the 2008 holiday season approaches, manga fans will have multiple strong VIZ Media releases to choose from in every genre.”

SOLANIN • Rated “T+” for Older Teens • MSRP: $17.99 US / $21.00 CAN Available Now!
College graduates struggle to cope with the real world and music offers refuge in this modern manga with an American indie comic attitude. Meiko Inoue is a recent college grad working in a job that she hates and having issues with her freeloading boyfriend. Straddling the line between her years as a student and the rest of her life, Meiko struggles with the feeling that she’s just not cut out to be a part of the real world.

SOLANIN was written and illustrated by award-winning creator Inio Asano and was originally published as a two-volume series but will be released by VIZ Media in a striking omnibus edition that includes six color pages. This touchingly realistic story was brought to life through Inio Asano’s distinctive art style and excellent writing.  SOLANIN is part of VIZ Media’s Signature line, an imprint featuring manga for the experienced comic reader who seeks sophisticated stories with exceptional art.

NORA: THE LAST CHRONICLE OF DEVILDOM • Rated “T+” for Older Teens • MSRP: $7.99 US / $9.50 CAN • Available Now!
Nora, an unruly demon, has defied his Dark Liege one too many times. For the sake of his “education,” Nora is sent to live among mortals and enters a bond of servitude with cool-as-ice star student Kazuma Makkari. But this relationship is destined to become a match made in Hell. Kazuma now must learn the ways of the underworld while Nora discovers more about the “real world” than he ever thought possible. When the seal for Nora’s form is released he becomes Cerberus, the vicious dog of disaster. But Nora can only use magic when Kazuma grants him permission, and he doesn’t grant it easily. The Dark Liege wants the pair to team up and crack down on renegade demon factions in the human world, but first they must find a way to get along. NORA: THE LAST CHRONICLE OF DEVILDOM is Kazunari Kakei’s first manga series and originally debuted in Japan’s Monthly Shonen Jump magazine. Blending the conceptual appeal of supernatural cliffhangers like DEATH NOTE with the aesthetic design elements of manga series like FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST, the series will appeal to fans of character-based, supernatural genre franchises like Hellblazer and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In Japan, the popularity of NORA: THE LAST CHRONICLE OF DEVILDOM eventually spawned a second series called SUREBREC: NORA the 2nd, which also premiered in Monthly Shonen Jump.

BLANK SLATE • Rated “T+” for Older Teens • MSRP: $8.99 US / $10.50 CAN • Available Now!
BLANK SLATE is an edgy new shojo manga series by Aya Kanno that heightens the level of drama with plenty of social and political intrigue. Zen’s memory has been wiped, and he can’t remember if he’s a killer or hero, and a lot of people want to keep it that way. Zen’s unearthly charm attracts a veritable rogues’ gallery of mysterious and shady characters, each with their own agenda. A bounty hunter becomes obsessed enough to become Zen’s new partner, while the daughter of a prominent General treats him like some sort of guru. But when Zen meets a mysterious doctor who may know him from the past, he learns that the real secret of his lost memory is definitely more sinister than saintly. Creator Aya Kanno first came to the attention of North American fans with her manga, SOUL RESCUE, and her latest series, OTOMEN, is currently serialized in Japan’s popular BetsuHana magazine and is set to be published by VIZ Media in early 2009.

WE WERE THERE • Rated “T+” for Older Teens • MSRP: $8.99 US / $10.50 CAN • Available Now!
WE WERE THERE is a best-selling shojo manga by Yuki Obata that depicts the life of a high school freshman named Nanami Takahashi as she falls for Motoharu Yano, the most popular, carefree boy in class. For Nanami, it’s first love, but Yano is still grieving the death of his girlfriend who died tragically the year before. Nanami begins high school with big hopes of making new friends. But as her crush on Yano intensifies, she soon learns that he may have too many secrets for her to handle. WE WERE THERE was a smash hit in Japan, with volume one being reprinted an amazing 22 times in only three years, and the manga was also developed into a popular animated series. Creator Yuki Obata won the Shogakukan Shinjin Comics Taisho Kasaku Award in 1998 for her debut, RAINDROPS, and she went on to win the prestigious 50th Shogakukan Manga Award for WE WERE THERE.

CAPTIVE HEARTS • Rated “T” for Teens • MSRP: $8.99 US / $10.50 CAN • Available Now!
CAPTIVE HEARTS is one of the major manga releases by Matsuri Hino that first established her as one of the top creators in the shojo genre. Carefree Megumi Kuroishi was living a life of luxury until the day a girl named Suzuka Kogami walked into his life. All of a sudden, Megumi finds himself kneeling at Suzuka’s feet and prostrating himself like a servant! What Megumi doesn’t initially know is that his family is cursed to follow the orders of the Kogami family. Can anything be done about Megumi’s captive state or is he doomed to see Suzuka as his master forever? Matsuri Hino burst onto the manga scene with her first title WHEN THIS DREAM IS OVER, which was published in Japan’s monthly shojo manga magazine LaLa DX. She has gone on to gain international acclaim for her subsequent works like MERU PURI and the gothic-tinged VAMPIRE KNIGHT (both published domestically) and her ornate and eye-catching visual style has greatly impacted the manga scene both in Japan and North America as more fans discover her unique stories.

ST. _ DRAGON GIRL • Rated “T” for Teens • MSRP: $8.99 US / $10.50 CAN • Available December 2
Momoka Sendou, nicknamed “Dragon Girl,” and Ryuga Kou are childhood friends. Momoka is a skilled martial artist while Ryuga is a Chinese magic master who banishes demons. The action heightens when a demon serpent king that appears only once every hundred years to select a bride abducts Momoka’s friend, Shunran. Will Momoka and Ryuga be able to defeat this powerful entity before Shunran is lost forever? In order to increase his power, Ryuga calls on the spirit of a dragon to possess him, but the spirit enters Momoka instead. Now the two must unite forces and fight the demon together in this exciting fantasy shojo adventure from Natsumi Matsumoto. St. _ Dragon Girl was a popular hit in Japan that also spawned a sequel, St. _ Dragon Girl Miracle.

GABA KAWA • Rated “T” for Teens • MSRP: $8.99 US / $10.50 CAN • December 2
Gaba Kawa is a new supernatural shojo story from Rie Takada, who also created the popular Happy Hustle High and Punch! (both available from VIZ Media). GABA KAWA introduces readers to Rara, a young and spunky female demon who is only supposed to cause mischief in the mortal world and draw humans to the dark path. She’s not supposed to help mortals and definitely not supposed to fall in love with them! But that’s just what happens when Rara enters high school, where a hot guy named Retsu Aku calls her “Gaba Kawa,” referring to someone who is so persistent, it’s cute. But while demons gain power by causing mischief, the opposite is also true – if Rara uses any of her powers to help mortals, she’ll immediately lose that very power. And if she loses enough power, she’ll disappear! What’s a “Gaba Kawa” demon to do? Readers will delight in the funny and romantic answer.

Creator Rie Takada has captivated millions with her innovative shojo series PUNCH! and HAPPY HUSTLE HIGH, which have sold more than 80K copies in North America combined. Her whimsical artistic style, called chibi (meaning short person” or “small child”), is an exaggerated style of manga illustration that’s currently the rage in Japan and is characterized by hyper-cute and often very petite characters bursting with bubbly personalities. The style also lends to a fun degree of comedy and zaniness that further typifies the chibi genre. GABA KAWA was also serialized in VIZ Media’s SHOJO BEAT magazine.

KDDI unveils manga-themed mobile phone

Mainichi Daily News reported:

KDDI Corp., which operates the “au” mobile phone brand, will offer a new model featuring the popular manga series “Shacho Shima Kosaku” by Kenshi Hirokane.

Kosaku Shima, or President Kosaku Shima, the hero of the manga published by Kodansha Ltd., is the leader of a company named Hatsushiba Electric, which is inspired by Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. (current name Panasonic Corp.), the author’s former employer.

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Golgo 13 creators celebrate the 40th anniversary of the manga series

Mainichi Daily News reported:

A party to celebrate the 40th anniversary of “Golgo 13,” a popular manga series for adults about a professional hit-man, was held in Tokyo on Thursday, with about 300 participants including manga artists and editors joining the fun.

“I couldn’t have done it without the support of fans,” 72-year-old author Takao Saito said during his speech at the party. “Fortunately, I’m still doing fine. I hope you will let me continue my work for a little longer,” he added, receiving warm applause from the attendees.

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manga review: Feel 100%

Here is an excerpt of a recent manga review of the popular HK series “Feel 100%” by Tom Baker:

On the cover of the Hong Kong manga Feel 100 Percent, Jerry’s shirtlessness reveals his muscley torso, and his low-slung jeans reveal the waistband of his Dolce and Gabbana underwear. On the first inside pages, American Jerry’s handsome Chinese friend Lok keeps his jeans up with a big-buckled Armani belt, above which he wears an ostentatiously labeled Calvin Klein T-shirt.

The characters’ love of brand-name clothes is a trait they presumably share with their creator, Lau Wan Kit, who generously scatters names and logos such as Polo, Izod, DKNY, Benetton, Max Mara and Paul Smith throughout the text and pictures of this manga.

Actually, the book refers to itself with the Chinese word “manhua,” but the 1992-2007 series was manga enough to win the this year’s second annual International Manga Award, which was created by the Foreign Ministry.

The manga has been published in Chinese, Malaysian, Thai, Korean, Indonesian and Italian, and now, thanks to a small British publisher called Bamboo Press, English-language readers finally can see what all the fuss is about.

Judging by the first volume (the second and third should be out in the near future), the series is a fantasy whose main audience must be heterosexual boys in their mid-teens. On top of being well coiffed and snazzy dressers, best friends Lok and Jerry are pick-up artists par excellence, enticing a parade of lovely ladies into their beds. They are also artists of a more literal sort, working together for an advertising company in a glamourous Hong Kong office and living in a beautifully maintained three-story house in the heart of that expensive city.

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Tezuka Gene: Light in the Darkness

In a recent column for Daily Yomiuri, Tom Baker writes about the “Tezuka Gene: Light in the Darkness” show at Parco Department Store in Shibuya, Tokyo.

A crudely stitched scar slashing diagonally across his face makes Black Jack instantly recognizable. It’s easy to spot this Osamu Tezuka manga character at the “Tezuka Gene: Light in the Darkness” show at the Parco department store in Shibuya, Tokyo, even though he has been reimagined by several artists in different styles.

Tezuka (1928-1989) had his own distinctive style, but the early influence of Walt Disney animation remained clearly visible in it. Even when his material was dark and sinister, his characters were cute.

Present-day artist Kyotaro Aoki has taken Black Jack and characters from Tezuka’s Dororo, MW, Ode to Kirihito and other manga and changed their cartoon faces into lifelike pencil portraits, showing what they might look like in the real world.

While Aoki adds detail, Akihiro Soma (Concorde), strips it away, presenting Black Jack in a minimalist torn-paper collage resembling the work of American illustrator Eric Carle (known for his kids picture books such as The Very Hungry Caterpillar).

An art collective known as Enlightenment takes the liberty of making Black Jack a woman, in a large painting in which the outlaw surgeon is partly hidden by drugs, money and other symbolic objects flying out of her billowing cape.

The group also painted an image inspired by MW in which two nude men embrace behind an ornate crucifix. In that convoluted manga story, a young terrorist genius uses his sexual magnetism to torment a Catholic priest (who earlier in life had been a gang member who kidnapped him), turning the older man into a pawn in an apocalyptic plot.

Manga “Black Jack” adapted for the stage

Mainichi Daily News reported:

TAKARAZUKA, Hyogo — He may not have his trademark black coat, nor his surgical equipment, but one of acclaimed comic artist Osamu Tezuka’s most famous characters, surgical genius Kuroo “Black Jack” Hazama, will be stepping off the page and onto the stage as part of celebrations marking the 80th anniversary of the manga legend’s birth.

The comic is being adapted for a comic variety of traditional Japanese theater called kyogen, a style related to the more famous forms of noh and kabuki, by the Takarazuka Foundation for Culture Promotion in Hyogo Prefecture.

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manga review: Cat Eyed Boy

In a recent manga review for the Daily Yomiuri, Tom Baker wrote:

“The story, characters and incidents mentioned in this publication are entirely fictional.” Thank heavens Viz Media decided to make this clear, even if only in tiny print on the copyright pages of the English-language version of Cat Eyed Boy, a collection of horror stories by Kazuo Umezu, a mangaka who is best known for his series The Drifting Classroom.

Just imagine how much more terrifying it would be to see the results of a mad scientist’s attempt at a brain transplant between a man and a leopard if such an event were real. Imagine the chill you would feel if the howling song of the shaggy, one-eyed creatures known as Tsunami Summoners really could bring doom to an entire town. Imagine how your heart would stop at the sight of a severed human leg coming to life and sprouting teeth.

Such are the types of creatures and incidents encountered by the Cat Eyed Boy, the nomadic hero of this series of stories. “Wherever I appear, something frightening happens,” he says, in one of several asides directed at readers.

The frightening events are rarely his fault, but he usually gets blamed for them. This is true even when he tries to help humans who are threatened by monsters. Once the danger passes, the people whom Cat Eyed Boy has saved turn against him.

Driven from town to town, he begins to profess that he does not care about helping humans, but his comments are no more true than Rick Blaine’s declaration in Casablanca that “I stick my neck out for nobody.”

Cat Eyed Boy looks basically human–aside from clawlike nails and enormous feline eyes–but his lineage is a bit murky. In his origin story in Volume 1, we see dozens of grotesque supernatural beings gathering around a mountainside grotto at night to await the prophesied birth of a mighty cat goblin. (The similarities to a Christian nativity scene may not be entirely coincidental.)

manga review: Kaze Hikaru

In a recent manga review, Midori Matsuzawa reviews “Kaze Hikaru”.  Midori wrote:

The closing days of the 1603-1867 Edo period were among the most eventful in Japanese history, particularly after the U.S. fleet of Black Ships sailed into Edo Bay (now Tokyo Bay) in 1853. This eventually led to the end of the Tokugawa shogunate’s national isolation policy, a change that sparked dissatisfaction against the shogunate, with some feudal powers even trying to overthrow it.

Kaze Hikaru is set in this time of upheaval. The series has been appearing in comic magazines for girls since 1997.

The story centers on a fictitious character named Tominaga Sei, a teenage girl who disguises herself as a boy so that she can join what would later become known as Shinsengumi, a troop of skilled young samurai established in 1863 by the shogunate to fight against its enemies. While respecting bushido, or the ethical code of samurai, the group became greatly feared in Kyoto because of its cold-blooded manner in assassinating the shogunate’s opponents.

The heroine’s action comes from her determination to seek revenge for the murders of her doctor father and older brother. Their killers apparently belonged to a powerful, anti-shogunate clan from the Choshu domain, which is now part of Yamaguchi Prefecture.

Soon after the heroine is admitted to Shinsengumi, however, her identity is discovered by Okita Soji, a senior member of the troop known for his exceptional swordsmanship (and one of the group’s most popular figures, due in part to his tragic fate to die from tuberculosis).

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manga review: CVN 73

In a recent manga review by Tom Baker for the Daily Yomiuri, Tom Baker reviewed “CVN 73″.  Here is an excerpt from that article:

For 10 years, the U.S. Navy base in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, was the home port of the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk. But the Kitty Hawk sailed away from Japan for what was probably the last time in May of this year, replaced by the USS George Washington, which arrived in Yokosuka in September.

The Kitty Hawk is the U.S. Navy’s last conventionally powered aircraft carrier. The George Washington is nuclear powered.

This distinction makes some people uneasy, and there have been protests against the deployment of the George Washington in Japan.

In an effort to get started on the right foot, the navy’s public relations campaign includes a manga that puts a human face on the aircraft carrier. The face belongs to Petty Officer Third Class Jack Ohara, a fictional character who is newly assigned to the carrier as it sets sail for Japan.

The book, titled CVN 73 after the ship’s hull number, does not address nuclear safety directly, instead subtly implying that it is a non-issue by having the crew go about their business without any apparent concern on the topic. The real focus is on the day-to-day lives of Jack and his crewmates.

According to the military newspaper Stars and Stripes, 30,000 copies have been printed, mostly in Japanese. Both the Japanese and the English editions can be downloaded for free at www.cnfj.navy.mil/Manga.html.

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