Mistakes of Youth: The Blog (Powered by ur mum)

Original Post

I really like how this comic came together. Everything from the lineart, to the colouring, to the backgrounds looks almost exactly as planned. I’m sure there are rough patches here and there, but I really like this one. I’ve actually kind of been practicing at drawing things I’m not too good at (like girls lol) and I think the fruits of that practice shows here. The lineart for the comic after this one looks pretty good, too. As far as scripting goes, I guess the humour here lies more in the comments than it does in the script. If you haven’t already guessed, this comic is a Nico Nico Douga parody, and like Nico offers, here’s a version of the comic with comments “turned off” for those who want it. But the comic’s only funny with self-depreciating comments like “kore wa hidoi” anyway!

Another week, another Anime Blog Award awarded, it seems. This time it’s the blogger’s choice Gold Award for best blog comic. So yeah, thanks to you guys who voted in that.

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Tsukuyomi Vol 2 and Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cheery Blossoms are on order since the local Borders didn’t have them.

Since I’m finally reading manga I figured I’d start with the stuff I should have been reading something like 5+ years ago!!

Well, obviously the industry isn’t having any problems, since it seems if you’re a manga publisher you’re also granted the right to print free money. This post is more about my personal problems with the US manga industry.

A quick glance at my MyAnimeList profile will tell you that I don’t read much manga at all. Upon closer inspection you will find that most of my completed manga titles are one-shots. It’s not that I hate manga or anything, it’s just that, for the most part, what’s available in English doesn’t interest me at all.

It’s no secret that the market skews towards shoujo and shounen, and very lately, as the manga section of Otaku USA will tell you, boys love. There are sprinklings of seinen, jousei and true blue otaku titles, but for the most part the manga industry seems to have their sights locked on teenagers, and your local bookstore’s manga section is an Itano Circus. I’m not going to ponder as to why this is the case, since I know– this stuff sells. Your Nartuos and Fruits Baskets always top the book listings, and when one takes a glance at what kids are reading in the stores, the pages are either filled with speedlines or flowery screen tone.

Ok. That’s great. You guys have capital. Use it. This is exactly what the anime industry wants but is not getting, and I think maybe, just maybe the manga industry is playing it too safe with what they keep licensing. I’m fascinated by manga due to the wide range of subject matters it covers, but what makes it over in English is very limited. I want to read stuff like this and this, but instead all I have available to me is… fuckin Bus Stop of Love. So, please, US manga publishers, expand your horizons. Viz putting out things like Phoenix and Golgo 13 and those smaller companies like (grumble grumble) Seven Seas putting out otaku-ish things He is My Master is a great start but… MORE.

Of course, I do have the whole wide world of scanslations at my disposal. That world is however big and scary, and once again the stuff I really care about gets neglected. I guess I could read some neverendingshounenromance (I have no problem with shounen romance) but then my aversion to manga never ending comes into play, but that’s another blog post all together.

I guess in the end what it really comes down to is me learning Japanese. I suspect the translators of the titles I care about really don’t see the point given the limited demand, and just read the stuff on their own. Kind of a pity, but them’s the breaks. I guess I’ll be hitting the books now, then.

Hay hay May

Watching
Allison & Lillia: Bit too much “for the family” polish for my tastes. Not sure if I’ll stick with it.
Chi’s Sweet Home: 3 minutes of joy
Code Goose 2: JUST ASS PLANNED hilarity and general madness. Good times.
Golgo 13: ….
Kanokon: I can’t believe it’s not porn!!
Kure-nai: Best of the season. Great animation, great writing, great acting… just perfect.
Kyouran Kazoku Nikki: Second best of the season. Good mix of craziness and drama. Fuka is too cute. Love abused lolis.
Macross F: Third best, I guess. Not much of a Macross fan, but this is good enough. Nice space battles and nyannyan dances.
To-LOVE-Ru: Guilty pleasure show of the season. I love it.
Toshokan Sensou: A good Production IG show?? And they said it couldn’t be done…
Zettai Karen Children: Decent fluff. Can’t really get past the hay 1990s art style, though.

Finishing Dennou Coil tomorrow. It is a good show.

Reading
Gunslinger Girl: Makes me want to watch the anime again. Great stuff.

Read some Ichinensei ni Nacchattara. It’s good.

Not much now. Will update when new things have started.

Current
Chii’s Sweet Home: Three minutes of stuff.
Ghost Hound: I don’t really care about this one anymore. Almost over.
Hakaba Kitarou: Subs have slowed down. Still decent entertainment with above-average art direction.
Kaiji: HOLY SHIT TISSUE BOXES THIS SHIT IS WILD
They Are My Noble Masters: Bleh.

Finished/Almost Finished
Clannad: Rushed but acceptable ending. I hope this after-story thing won’t be too long… but I suppose having questions answered would be nice.
Dragonaut: One episode to go. As horrible as this show was, I don’t regret watching it, since it was one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a while.
Hayate no Gotoku: I’d welcome 50 more episodes. Nagi~
Minami-ke ~Okawari~: Yeah, I’m thinking asread didn’t get their Shuffle! budget for this one. Looks good, but moves awkwardly. Ending was fine.
Rosario + Vampire: One episode left. Decent for a crappy show.
Shakugan no Shana II: lol
Wolfy Spices: Well thank god that’s over!!
Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei: Waiting for Strato to sub the rest, but finished it raw. Very difficult to understand raw ;__;

Reading
Shinigami no Ballad: Past the deadline for the review, so trying to finish this one up. Works better as a cartoon.

Reading some KnJ chapters when they surface, and just finished another wonderfully confusing volume of Trigun MAXIMUM. I still have volumes of GSG unread, am almost caught up on OTAKU USA issues and have lots of unread Macias books from Christmas.

Can anyone recommend me any manga series that aren’t adaptations/have been adapted into an anime that I may like? I kind of wanna be an elitist manga reader, hur. Extra points if it’s not shoujo and not over 10 volumes.

I like how you can tell how old the second Gunslinger Girl manga volume is by the Animerica quote on the back.

I bought the first three volumes of some random manga called Gunslinger Girl. Perhaps you’ve heard of it.

The cover of the first volume is really quite sexually suggestive, and I’ve never noticed it until now. It features an adorable Henrietta blushing with a gun on her chest. Her expression makes it look as if she was just touched inappropriately, and the gun only suggests the violent means the toucher used to make her comply (actually if such a thing actually happened she’d probably just break his fingers.)

So yeah, I bought these out of frustration over how horrible the new TV show is. I’ll read them after I’m done reading other things.

…so much better than the anime.

Here you are

Is this a lost cause yet?

Sorry for the delay, but here is chapter 12!

Spoilers for Death Note after the jump

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Here is a scanslation

Mention SaHa and I’ll black list you as spam

Go nuts.

Here you go you disgusting lolicon perverts who fap to images of little children being sexually handled by adults you bunch of disgusting weirdos

Also, you may notice there’s no comic today. Sorry.

Here.

It actually went up yesterday. Silly me. 8 in the works.

Chapter 6 can be acquired like so.

The super secret scanslation group does it again! Second prototype chapter is available for download.

Type setting was so much easier in Photoshop 7! I guess my CS2 getting mad at me was a good thing.

Be sure to give big thanks to the translator and editor! They did most of the hard work :)

Super Secret Scanslation Group has put out the “test run” chapter of Kodomo No Jikan. The second “test run” chapter is on its way, then after that we’ll do the rest of the series. Nothing to fear though, I’m just the typesetter. Someone who actually knows Japanese is doing the translation.

Also, if you missed chapters 1-5, they can be acquired thusly.

nice going seven seas

Kind of sad that there aren’t much in the way of scans. I was kind of looking forward to this release.

yeah i know its from death note volume 1 shut up