Mangaloid

Stupid Girl

Well no; she's not actually...

While many Manga series rely on the comical characters to break tension, or the amazingly gorgeous ones to captivate their otaku fan base- there is a point where a character gets one trait exaggerated and blown out of proportion. Poor Rangiku is one such victim. The buxom vice captain of division 10. Her pretty face, and big...er...heart has won over many fans. The issue comes by the fact that as the series Bleach expanded beyond Shonen and onto TV and film Ran...well...she became an idiot. Read more about Stupid Girl

Ouran High School Host Club

One of my favorite manga series of all time would have to be Ouran High School Host Club. The series follows the story of Haruhi Fujioka, a young girl whose life becomes intertwined with a host club after breaking a vase. While searching for a peaceful place to study, Haruhi discovers the music room where the host club performs their services to their female clients. However, in a clumsy moment, she accidently breaks an antique vase and ends up owing money to club. Since she doesn't have enough money to pay for the vase itself, she has to lend her skills and work for the club to help pay off her debt. As time progresses, her interactions with the host club also turns into several lifelong friendships with the other characters.

Princess Mononoke is an Incredible Film

If you are a fan of Miyazaki films and you haven’t seen Princess Mononoke yet, you must rent it immediately. It’s definitely not for children; think Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind—but even more brutal—rather than Ponyo or My Neighbor Totoro. That said, if you can stomach said violence, it’s an amazing movie—so amazing, in fact, that we just named our daughter’s new kitten Princess Mononoke (Noke for short)!

Princess Mononoke is another one of Miyazaki’s tales about how the humans corrupt the world through industrialization and waste. In this case, we are presented with a young man who lives in a very rural village with its own traditions and customs who is sent off on a quest to break a curse he gets stuck with just by saving his village. During his quest, he encounters Princess Mononoke, a girl raised by wolves who attempts to stop the world from industrializing—and who does some pretty earthy, and even primal, activities in her crusade. Read more about Princess Mononoke is an Incredible Film

Replica Jacket Released for Akira's 30th Anniversary

Holy poo. You don't see a whole lot of Akira cosplay around your most widely-attended nerd conventions, probably because the franchise had its heyday before cosplay really took off, but you might be seeing that much more now that this jacket exists. It's the iconic red leather bomber worn by Kaneda in the manga and anime, complete with capsule insignia. And it's a damn sexy piece of work.

Y U No?

Rage meme actually a manga panel

I love it when memes crawl out of the strangest places. Did you know that the "Y U No" guy, a staple in Rage Guy comics, emerged from manga? Gantz, Chapter 55: Naked King (裸の王様) by Hiroya Oku, to be precise. I wonder if the author even knows he's famous. To be fair, his original image has been stretched so far out of context that it's not really his anymore. Sometimes all you need to do to acquire (semi-) internet notoriety is to draw a silly face once. Oku's work has been seen and spread by millions of people and he probably doesn't even know about it.

The original panel:

Read more about Y U No?

Why the Akira Remake Should Die

American exceptionalism has no place in my favorite manga

In case you hadn't heard, there's an Akira live-action remake somewhere in the works in the Hollywood machine. That alone isn't necessarily enough to boil your bubble; the visuals in the manga and the anime film might translate well to a photorealistic style, what with all the technology filmmakers have at their fingertips these days. It might actually be kind of epic as a 2013 live film. So no hate there, at least not from me.

The hate starts seething when I read about the changes screenwriters and producers are making to the Akira story. They're deep, fundamental changes, kids, so buckle up and start raging.

Manga Eyes

I don't know what it is about giant, creepy, Manga eyes that makes me think of that epic song Hungry Eyes by Eric Carmen but I figured if I changed the lyrics everyone could enjoy my own personal hell when they, too, hear the song and associate it with Manga. Let's get this party started, shall we? First lets get the song stuck in your head with this YouTube video:

Now that we have that settled, repeat after me: Read more about Manga Eyes

Nick Simmons Copies from Famous Manga?

Photo Source: Gene Simmons' Son Plagiarizing Bleach? (Livejournal)

With the Nick Simmons case doing the rounds, there's no use talking about anything else, is there? Well, here goes.

First of all, let's talk about the Nick Simmons case. Simmons is an artist for a comic book series called Incarnate. Recently, it came to light that he might have been 'borrowing' heavily from his idols. To this effect, fans of various manga series found that the characters depicted in his comics bore a startling resemblance to characters from Bleach, Death Note and a number of others. Folks are looking into the matter and from what I last read, they are not going ahead with his comic until this issue has been sorted out, one way or another. Read more about Nick Simmons Copies from Famous Manga?

A Hairy Issue

It was one of those weird conversations that lead to a blog post. A friend and I were discussing manga and anime characters that don mustaches or beards and found ourselves struggling to name many. Alright, so we could name quite a few but a lot of them were bad guys. Could it be that tons of facial hair was synonymous with an evil temperament in such series? Yea, I am feeling bad for Hagrid if he ever ends up in anime format.

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To dub or not to dub

Oooh, that age old debate – subbing versus dubbing. I'm not about to argue both sides with pros and cons. This is more because I lean towards the subtitles school of thought (all voice actors must be cursing me right about now). But if you are interested in the arguments against subs (along with pros for dubbing), do check out the link here and here. Nah, for this article I wanted to point out the most common reasons why fans cringe and gag whenever they come across a dubbed version of their favorite anime show.

Subs, dubs, what's it all about? Read more about To dub or not to dub