Revision of Manga Blog

Manga is a topic that I've always been very interested in. I've been reading it for as long as I can remember. It started when I was younger and watching anime on cartoon network. Sailor Moon and Pokemon and Cardcaptor Sakura were the ones that I would watch. Then when I found out that they made comic forms of all of those, I was amazed. Of course I didn't know that with a majority of animes, the manga came first... But I didn't realize that at the time. I was just reading them because I loved the series that I had seen on television and now was getting to read it with more interesting story lines and things that hadn't happened in the anime. What came next was realizing how much manga I could buy at comic stores and book stores like Barnes and Nobles. Once I found their comic and graphic novel section, I wanted to go there all the time. I started reading primarily shounen or shojo mangas. I liked getting to read adventures with a hint of romantic capacities between the two main characters. I would always wish that I was in such series and that's actually what got me to start drawing. I would try and draw myself as a sailor moon character, or a pokemon trainer.

By the time I was fifteen I had about 200 volumes of manga. I would collect series as they were released, wanting to know what was happening next to the characters and what sort of plot twist was coming for me. But now that I look back on it, most mangas are incredibly repetitive. Take InuYasha by Rumiko for instance. It was one of the other series that I read all the time. I loved the characters and what would happen to them. But taking a second glance, it's all the same. The characters fight some evil lackey and yet never defeat the main bad guy. They think they do, but it's just a fake. It's just the same thing happening over and over again. Pokemon is another example of that. They fight and overcome their adversaries, but nothing really changes. And maybe that's something that works in the series. People do like stability. But I feel it's just the author using the same devices over and over, just changing it slightly so that it's not exactly the same. I find that's the case in most shounen or shoujo mangas. It's not exactly that I have a problem with that. It can work. But it's just something that I notice.

That's probably what's lost my interest in reading most manga now a days. I used to read the mall the time, but now I don't really. Sometimes I'll get on mangafox.com or onemanga.com and see if there's anything I can pick up and read online. I do wish I had found these sites back when I was collecting manga. That really would have helped my parents with not having to spend all that money on me. Plus, I'm on my laptop quite often when I have nothing else to do. It's just so much easier reading through scanlation sites. And there's the added bonus of getting to read them when they're released in Japan. No longer do you have to wait for the next volume to come to the US. That would take so much longer than reading it online. The manga is usually released by chapter in Japan, so someone scans it and translates it and thus it's on the internet for me to read. Otherwise I would have to wait for all the chapters to come out in Japan before they put the volume together for the US to produce. Thank you, internet.

Although I do not read much manga any more, like I said before, I do keep up with certain ones. There is one series that I still occasionally buy in the store. This is Minekura's Saiyuki. The story is basically about four guys traveling and having to fight demons. It falls under the category that I mentioned before. It's the same plot basically redressed and redone over and over. But for some reason, I really just enjoy reading it. There are about three series within Saiyuki and I try to stay caught up on them. I would read them all online, but I find there a surprising lack of scanlations for a manga that's fairly well known. So because I like to keep up with the series, I have to buy them in stores. And I understand why some people say actually collecting the volumes are that much better... But I don't really care about that. Reading online saves me money and I still get the same story. So it works well enough for me.

I think the main reason why I keep up with manga is to see the development. Yes, the plots might just be redone multiple times, but it's amazing to get to see an artist's style develop over time. They might start off with weak drawings, but after continuing the story over years and years of chapters, their art can get amazing. Minekura is an example of that. Her style was rough and inaccurate when I first started reading Saiyuki. But now in her most recent chapters, it's a style that has become amazing and purposeful. Clamp has a style that I enjoy revisiting as well. Although their art hasn't really changed that much for me over the time of me reading their work, I find their stories to be the development I want to catch up on. I find them one of the few manga creators that can keep my interest by story alone. I don't see it very repetitive. And with all the work that Clamp has done, I like getting to see what they'll come up with next.

Manga is something I may be slowly growing out of, but it's made a big impact on my life. I would never have started drawing so much if I hadn't discovered it.

Webcomics

Webcomics are a form I regularly keep up with. To be sadly honest, I usually pick a webcomic because I like the art of their banner. And also, I find my webcomics through Smackjeeves. It's a good website for uploading your comics for free, and still getting a wide spread amount of people to read it. I am in the works on producing a comic of my own that someday I will put up on Smackjeeves. Although self owned domains and websites probably are more recognizable and well known, I think that Smackjeeves is a great place to start. It's very easy to navigate and you can add your favorites, which sort by newest update. It also recommends other comics for you to read based off of the selections that you have. One comic I recommend from there is called "Toilet Genie". There haven't been too many comics so far on Toilet Genie, but I find it interesting.

As for reading, I picked to read Farley's "Electronic Sheep". Initially I notice the setup of the website was eye catching, starting with a page with a sheep on it. The page was set up like the old computers that were black and green. Although after that page, I started to dislike the choices made for the rest of the pages. It was rather boring and the art and toning techniques I find lacking... Afterall, you can tell that the line work was done and the rest was just paint bucketed in. There are spots where it wasn't fully colored... This page is an example of the inconsistencies. It bothers me artistically. But what I did find to bring my interest back was the fact that each page was only a panel usually, and there was narration text besides the comics. I've never seen that before in a webcomic. So it did keep me wanting to read on. Looking through the different stories in electric sheep, the art does take a turn in each. It goes from being black and white, to color, and even to 3-dimensional. I have my own personal dislike of 3-dimensional comics... They just creep me out. But moving on and focusing more on the literature of the comic, even though it's interesting, I'm not sure I like the narration on the side. If all you had were just the panels, you could still understand everything. However, with the narration, you know exactly what the author wants you to know. And yes, that is a good thing at times. However, I think I like getting to make up things a little more than Farley allows for you to do.

Alan Moore and Watchmen

I'm excited to get to listen to Alan Moore talk. I think he's a little bit crazy, but very intellectual. He has very strong opinions, but they're very interesting to listen to. I've never really gotten to listen to him before, but I have read Watchmen and I feel that his personality is reflected in the comic. I feel that if he were a character on Watchmen, he would be a mix between the main characters. I can see him as Rorschach, Dr. Manhattan, Nite Owl, the Comedian... More so between Rorschach and the Comedian. They just have such views on the world that I can see Alan Moore believing himself. But the views are just very interesting. I loved getting to read the views of Rorschach especially. It was so negative, but I enjoyed it none the less.

I find it very interesting that Alan Moore has never really looked at any of the films based off his comics. I understand why he wouldn't want to see it, but none the less... I actually didn't expect that. I feel if I were in that position, I would be interesting to see how they reflected the book that I wrote. But at the same time, you might just be setting yourself up for disappointment. After all, films based off of comics can't quite ever be as great. You can capture the feel, but there's a certain depth that I feel can't ever be reached. It's the same way with films based off of books. I love Jurassic Park as a movie, but Michael Crichton's book was so much more amazing. But that could just be my love of Michael Crichton's writing speaking... Not to get off topic or anything.

Getting back on the topic of comics, I think that Alan Moore's position on superheroes is just something that no one else has quite depicted. His take on humanity is a view that I find very realistic. If superheroes were real, I could definitely see the Watchmen world to be what happens. That really could be the way that humanity reacts. People usually react negatively to things that they don't understand. Or others that have more power than they do. I appreciate that Alan Moore made his characters, with the exception of Dr. Manhattan, real people who want to protect justice for one reason or another. It just extends how realistic Watchmen could be. Watchmen and Batman are relative for me. They both show a super hero who is just a person in a suit fighting for what they believe in. No matter how flawed that belief is.

((P.S. Nite Owl is my favorite. Screw Rorschach.)

Arabian Nights

As for women's comics, I read "The Arabian Nights" by Lillian Chestney. The first thing I noticed was actually that the lettering was contributed to someone else. I'm entertained by this, because you never see anyone attribute the text to someone else on the main page like that. But then again, they had control of writing, so maybe they put it there themselves. But moving on, I chose this comic because I've always loved the 1,001 nights story. In my senior year in high school, we read several sections of "A Thousand and One Nights". I love Scheherezade is an amazing woman. She's clever and outwits the king to save her life. It's just so great that the king was going to kill her, but she got away by telling stories. Although it's pretty clear to me that after the first few days, he didn't really intend to kill her anymore. The king probably just kept telling her that he would cut off her head just so she would tell him more stories.

I can see why a woman would choose this story to illustrate. Women in art tend to want to prove that women are better than men. That they are smarter. So choosing this story to illustrate is a good choice. It's all about the power of women. Even in the stories that Schehereade tells are about the power of women. I know that Lillian Chestney must have had a fun time illustrating this. It makes me wonder who really wrote "A Thousand and One Nights". No author has ever been attributed. And it's most likely that there were multiple authors, as it's believed that some stories were added on later, such as Aladdin. Without a time machine, I doubt that anyone will ever know who wrote the stories.

After reading parts of "A Thousand and One Nights", I think that Chestney did a good job of taking that story into her own hands. She kept true to the story and made the right characters stand out. "A Thousand and One Nights" is hard to read. You need to pay complete attention to it and take a lot of time with it. It's clear that Chestney fully understood it and developed it into a successful comic.

Eightball

I had to catch up on reading after missing class last week. I read "Eightball" by Daniel Clowes. I chose this because it was recommended to me. I read through "Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron". Now that I've gone through and read it, I don't exactly know what I can say about it. It's just so strange. Although I wish that it had been continued from the 'to be continued' point because I was curious to see what was going to happen from there. But basically that is a very strange comic. Although I didn't get to read much into it, I'm assuming the man in the bathroom stall is the reference to eightball with all the questions people ask him. I had been wondering why the line in the men's bathroom was so long, so I'm glad that it was explained.

I didn't get much of an understanding by reading the short 14 page exerpt of "Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron", so I looked it up on wikipedia. I had absolutely no idea that the woman in the movie was his wife. I was wondering why he would possibly be that obsessed with her. But I sort of just thought that he was somewhat dominatrix obsessed or just thought she was pretty. But no. It was his wife. At least it makes sense as to why he was so obsessed with her. I like having explanations for the things that I read. Although I don't understand a majority of the comic. Why would his friend be treated for an infection in his eye socket by taking out his eyes and putting two crustaceans in instead? What would make the crustaceans stay there? And wouldn't they die in there? But they were still moving. I don't know, it was confusing. And then there's the strange woman that the police pick up, thinking she's a prostitute. But she's got three eyes. I just don't know. It makes no sense to me. But it was none the less interesting.

Eurocomics

So I've read some of TinTin before, but other than that, I've never really paid attention to European comics. But I wish I would have before now. Because now that I've read "The Nikopol Trilogy", I want to read more. For anyone who hasn't read that, I think they should. It's a great graphic novel made up in three parts. In total, it's about 175 pages of science fiction that I'm very glad to have read. Something about it just really grabbed me from the beginning. Maybe it was my fascination with Egyptian Gods. Or science fiction in general. They're two things that always draw me in. So it probably sparked my fascination with it from the start.

My interest in Egyptian Gods and science fiction weren't the only things to draw me in. The style of the comic did the job as well. For instance, the color palette were strong. After studying color for a while, I understood what was going on. The author, Enki Bilal, chose to go with a muted palette. And it fits the futuristic vibe that he gets. I can imagine this is what 2023 is like. Although I don't know how all the aliens would get here about 13 years from now. But who knows! Maybe Bilal was right. And where were the Egyptian gods from 525 BC to 2023? Just hiding in their mechanical pyramid? Waiting until they ran out of fuel? That would set the comic up at least. Not that I'm getting off topic or anything.

Back to things that caught my attention. The way the text was formed. If someone was walking up a hill, their text would be slanted above them. In one scene, their are airplanes flying around and if one's upside down, the text is upside down as well. It goes wherever the speaker goes. Something about that is just great. Just the attention to details and different ways of twisting the standard form of a graphic novel. The characters that Bilal created were great as well. All the Egyptian Gods had a personality. There was a telepathic cat, Gogol. The governor and the people that surrounded him and of course Nikopol, his son and Bioskop the reporter. It gives them all an importance for the graphic novel. Nikopol might be the central character, but he's not the only important one. Everyone else that gets an importance has a connection to him in some way.

Bilal was very creative in not only connecting people, but in his future. I loved the fact that cats can now be telepathic. Or that you can now kill people in hockey games without getting in trouble. That now chess an boxing is mixed together. Bilal took what he knew and twisted it to make it much more interesting and fascinating. What else can I say about Nikopol? I don't really have anything to complain about. It bugged me slightly that the text changed to fit someone's accent so you had to work harder to figure out what was going on. However, other than that, there's nothing that I can say that's bad about this comic. I'm definitely going to have to look for the movie Immortal and watch it. Even if it's not as good as the comic, I still want to see it! Science fiction mixed with Egyptian Gods is something I definitely want to have more of!

Manga

I have read manga since I realized it existed. It started with Sailor Moon and Pokemon. That was how I first realized that manga was around. Little did I know how long it had been around and how many series there were out there. Once I found the manga section at Barnes and Nobles I started buying them and reading the series that I found interesting. Usually I read shounen or shojo mangas. I remember reading parts of the InuYasha series by Rumiko and I would pick up anything that Clamp had done. Piece by piece I gained over 200 volumes of manga. Now, with my family moving, they've got to figure out what to do with all the manga. And I still do read manga online. I wish I would have realized how many scanlation sites there were back when I bought all of that. It's much easier to read all of them online than to go out and spend all your money buying them.

So, though I don't read manga as much as I used to, I still do catch up on the ones that used to interest me. For instance, there is still one series that I buy in the store, which is Saiyuki by Minekura. I don't know what it is about that manga. I think it's just one that I will never get tired of. When you've stuck by a manga for 27 or so volumes, you want to stay caught up. Although the 27 volumes haven't been finished in the US, so that's why I keep up. For some reason, none of the scanlation sites really keep up with the newer volumes of Saiyuki. But I think one of the reasons that I stay dedicated to this manga is because you can see the development of Minekura's artistic style. Here's a scan of the first volume, and here's one of her newest updates. There is such a difference in style, and I love looking back at it and seeing the differences. Sure, it was the story that interested me at first, not the art. But I still love looking back and seeing the development.

There's another manga that I actually just read over the weekend. "Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle" by Clamp. I've been reading it for a while now, since it was first released in English in 2004. I owned the first few volumes, but the rest I read online because they've been keeping up with the scanlations as they're released in Japan. Over the past few days I had the chance to read up on the chapters I hadn't read before. Which also brought me to the end of the series. It was completed just recently. And I've got to say... I wasn't a big fan of Tsubasa. It was all very, very confusing. If I tried to explain what had happened, I couldn't. There was too much going on and it kept going in circles and circles. And as for the style of art, well.. I've always adored Clamp's art, but this one was different. It wasn't the art that bothered me, but the toning. They had very messy toning that made it hard to tell what was going on. Here is an example. Their line art would be fine, but they add in this gritty toning and swirly energy waves everywhere. It just makes things even more confusing. I stuck with the story in hopes that I would understand what was going on eventually. But even after it's ending, I don't.

When it comes down to it, I won't stop reading manga. Or things like manga. I've sort of moved on to webcomics, but they're like the scanlations of manga I've read anyway. So it's not going far from my roots in manga.