Hypocrisy posted:

Huh. So that's how Shamo ended.

coathat posted:

This is loving dope http://bato.to/comic/_/comics/jacarand%c3%a1-r15582

Sick destruction

Izumi Konata posted:

why am i so pissed about the outcome of Shamo? it felt rapaciously forced.

Phobophilia posted:

In spite of the beautiful imagery, this is one of the most misanthropic things I've ever seen.

LORD OF BUTT posted:

This actually sounds hilariously awesome, is it like actually bad or did it just get way sillier after the initial arcs

Turin Turambar posted:

Imperial Guards is pretty loving manly.

Imagine, if you may a XIX century-style war between fantasy Japan and fantasy Russia, in a world where there are dragons and sabre-toothed tigers, without our protagonist fighting in a desperate defensive war.

Sharkopath posted:

lol the whole point is about not letting the past dictate how you aim for the future, its a super positive and heartwarming comic thats supposed to impart the reader with a desire to change their living today

Chas McGill posted:

These look cool. Adding them to my to-reads.

I've been reading a couple chapters of Bartender every night lately and although it's not earth shatteringly good, it's relaxing and satisfying, like a glass of 10yr old Aberlour. I bounced off the anime, despite being a lover of mundane stories, but I'm somehow 40 chapters into this. As Yang Wenli said, alcohol is humanity's friend.

Turin Turambar posted:

Have anyone read 'The World is Mine'? Opinions?

Chas McGill posted:

Any recs for manga (or anime) where the protagonist solves problems with cool knowledge or non-fighting related skills? Stuff like Master Keaton, Bartender, Jin, Sakamoto desu etc.

Chas McGill posted:

This is extremely cool. I'm really interested in comparative theology and folklore

Turin Turambar posted:

Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou (end)



This famous sci-fi slice of life seinen is about the calm, relaxed life of Alpha, an humanoid robot that own a little cafe place. It promised comfiness, relaxedness, a easy-going style and mono no aware attitude and it delivered as hell in that regard.

The protagonist is incredibly charming in her relaxed, happy-going but innocent personality, and it will touch your heart easily. The other characters are also good, as here everyone is nice and the calm atmosphere of the entire setting permeates every person here.

One of the main pillars of the manga is the drawing, I don't think the author would have got the atmosphere and feelings he stirs up within it without this drawing. It's a mix of a simple style for characters, which underlines their gentleness, and a more detailed work that it may seem at first for the landscape. He is so good with the lush vegetation, with the lone roads, and playing with shadows, light and darkness, using great skill with the ink.

Of course, you better not think one minute of time in the logic of the setting, as it doesn't hold up any kind of scrutiny. It's the story of the end of times, about human extinction, but it isn't very clear why there are so few humans and why they aren't reproducing more (it seems they are less and less are years go by), and even with all that they still get electricity, fuel, etc. Just... /handwaves oh look at this poignant scene done with the sunset on the background! ohh!
Don't misunderstand me, this isn't a true flaw of the story, and it's pretty clear it never intended to build a realistic or deep setting, the author uses it as a pure mood setter.

As good as it is, it actually goes a bit longer than it should. All the poignant scenes and themes and happy moments and moments of solitude could have done in say, 10 or 11 volumes, but it goes up to 14, and in the last volumes it shows a bit, as at that point you can notice a bit of repetition.

It's also a not very ambitious story. It's clearly a episodic SoL story from the beginning, but around the middle of it there are opportunities in the characters and in the plot that could have used to have a more intense character growth or expand the setting or spice up a bit more the story, but the author shows a headstrong intention into just doing his mono no aware thing where nothing happens, despite it's that very same author who does the teasing about what could have been. In fact at times I supposed it was all going in a certain direction that would reveal itself near the end of the series, but nope.
Drama? Nope. For example it could have underlined more the theme of passage of time and Yuri's unique position in it (and the theme of humanity final fate) with the death of one of the two elders, in addition of adding a bit of drama in there for a pair of chapters, but even if a dozen of years pass in the manga it never happens. It could have finished with Alpha all alone in a abandoned place or having to leave the café forever or something like that, but it doesn't dares to go for the gut punch.
Romance? Nope, not for the protagonist, not for the other robots, not for the other humans. Well at the end Takahiro and Makki are together and have a child but it happens totally offscreen. Oh, and I didn't liked Takahiro never visits her since he left, not even at the end, even if they tease about it several times, with Alpha asking for him repeated times and gramps saying he was going to.
Origin story? Nope. The manga teases you about the backstory of the robot's creation and their function (like the disc they found about the first series, or how the doc was involved in their creation), and the meaning of the giant plane that also have a Alpha series robot in it and their mission, and how Alpha is strangely tuned for flying which I suspected it was related, but nothing.
And obviously nothing about the setting itself, the owner or whatever.

It does very well the episodic mono no aware thing, but I think it could have done that and in addition something even more meaningful and poignant, but it chooses not to.

Laputanmachine posted:

Teppu is (or was) pretty extraordinary in that it was about girls/young women MMA and it wasn't beachballboob bimbos making out with each other.

It's a drat shame it ended way too soon.

Mikl posted:

There's a new Shiori Experience chapter out and you guys best go read it right the gently caress now

Puukko naamassa posted:

Cephas posted:

Any recommendations for stuff similar to All-Rounder Meguru and Teppuu? I really like the more down-to-earth stories about daily training and competitions and stuff. Doesn't have to be about MMA though. Martial arts, yoga, running--any sort of manga about people just doing their thing like that really appeals to me.

Yawara and Stretch totally count.

Chas McGill posted:

I had a feeling you're meant to, maybe. He looked sort of similar to how she remembered her bro, I think.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with the documentary. I didn't expect it to actually feature her performance, since that's being saved as a prop in a redemptive set piece.

Serious Frolicking posted:

Well, why remake an old rape porn manga if you don't really enjoy drawing rape scenes? And boy howdy, does that dude ever enjoy drawing rape scenes.

Bad Seafood posted:

I've never read anything by this guy, but none of these pages really make me want to.

TheFallenEvincar posted:

Yeah, he does that with Suicide Island too, I like that little eccentricity. I can't remember if he does it for Destroy and Revolution though? It's all too blurry now. It'd be weird if he did, "Many people think overthrowing the imperialistic forces of the United States may be difficult. However, based on my experiences !"

Bro Dad posted:

Yeah, the latest chapters have leaned pretty hard on him turning into a Griffith/Femto-like character. Although in my opinion he comes off more as the creepy kid from Chronicle with a messianic complex.

Ytlaya posted:

Yeah but I imagine it's the sort of thing where "This guy is correct but I disagree with his methods," so the dumb Baby's First Political Theory stuff previously mentioned is still true.

The key issue with that sort of politics is that it's really obvious people with those views are starting from an initial opinion (in this case "I dislike the US and like (my rose-tinted view of) past Japan") and then look up facts to support that. So you end up with a bunch of accurate criticisms of the US, but, because these facts are actively sought out to support a particular world-view, they don't understand the big picture (that these issues are more a result of a complex combination of economic system, history, culture, etc and certainly not unique to the US).

It's actually kind of interesting from an American/Western perspective. Because of the US's position as a superpower, this particular brand of right-wing doesn't really exist here. In the US you see something along the lines of "the US is great and other countries are dumb and/or evil", but in other countries like Japan you instead see "Japan used to be great but the Evil Empire ruined them!" It's predicated on the existence of a more powerful Other, while in the US there obviously aren't any other countries that are more powerful and exert a ton of control and pressure so you don't have this sort of world-view.

Yeah I Like Girls posted:

even all the people translating it hate it & no one was upset when it went on indefinite hiatus again

his other series are way better. he's incapable of writing new personalities for protagonists, they all act exactly the same and when it approaches morality or politics you can tell the writer thinks he's way smarter than he is

L-O-N posted:

Yes it has. You just don't remember the first few chapters.

psyer posted:

The Town Where Only I Am Missing got nominated for the 9th Manga Taisho award along with a couple of other seinen manga.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2016-01-18/9th-manga-taisho-awards-nominate-11-titles/.97690

Serious Frolicking posted:

See, the real problem with Wolf Guy is that a bunch of people here really liked Akumetsu. "Oh cool", we thought, "a new series by the akumetsu guys!" So we had quite an active thread for it. It even had a promising start, with the wolf dude smugging all over the place. Then it started with the raping and most of us dropped the manga. From the people that somehow did not drop it, we learned that it never actually stopped with the rape and that was really what the manga was about all along. What's more, that artist/writer duo has other works as well. Wolf Guy wasn't the fluke; Akumetsu was. These dudes really, really like making mangas featuring sexual assault!

tldr, a bunch of adtrw folks fooled themselves and each other into thinking that it was a good manga before being proven completely wrong. The funniest part is, Wolf Guy is actually a remake of an older bsdm porn manga and we still didn't catch on.

Ytlaya posted:

The problem with any justice fantasy that takes place in the real world is that they often have some really dumb ideas of what the cause of society's problems are, and the main character ends up look really stupid when he acts smug despite being kind of dumb himself. Because they take place in the real world, the reader can't help but think about the comic's politics. In many cases, like with Akumetsu, there seems to be this view that the problem stems solely from government corruption (and that if you eliminate a bunch of random corrupt people it'll somehow solve the problem). While it's true that corruption is part of the problem, acting like it's the whole problem in and of itself is really superficial and makes the comic as a whole look really dumb.

Akame ga Kill doesn't have this problem because 1. it doesn't take place in the real world and 2. they're trying to flat out overthrow the existing government, which is actually reasonable under those circumstances.


vvv I think so yeah, but the issue is that trying to address corruption wouldn't come close to actually fixing most of society's problems (and some degree of government corruption is sort of an inevitable result of our economic system). I guess it would help some, but it's basically treating the symptoms instead of the disease.

Nate RFB posted:

It's a very tidy and expected sort of ending for where the story was heading, but I'd definitely say it stuck the landing. A great series.

Ytlaya posted:

Didn't he also do Sidooh? The art looks the same.

ahiwattamplifier posted:

what happens in Gantz? I don't think I've read anything since '08 or '09
They were in Osaka or something and there was a girl with big boobs and everything was at its rapiest

TheFallenEvincar posted:

It became the most popular series ever beloved by killer alien robots



I'm actually enjoying Inu Yashiki a lot now that it's past the crappy translation chapters. It's absurd and silly, but entertaining. And hey, there doesn't seem to be a lot of weird fetishy Gantz stuff. Plus I don't think I'll ever get tired of people getting killed by their smartphones or kindly trembling old robo-man and his doggie though.

At some point it'll inevitably go garbage like Gantz did, I guess, but it's never had the highs that early Gantz had so maybe it won't have the lows and just stay amusing and mediocre.



in terms of letdowns nothing'll top Shamo's last half and ending though. Maybe matched by Veritas dying.

ahiwattamplifier posted:

There is no way I'm going to read 6 years worth of poo poo to figure out how it ended. Spoil all of Gantz to me please

TheFallenEvincar posted:

i guess there is a way too look at it wherein dying like a dog after a completely pointless battle where he just mercilessly wailed on a mentally disabled person is in fact a fitting end for Ryo

Ytlaya posted:

Oh, regarding Rin, did the plot ever address the fact that Norito is doomed to have his manga career (and life) cut short by the same disease his sister and mom had? His sister got it in her late 20's iirc, which is kinda bad if you want to make any sort of impact as a manga artist.

edit: Something else I noticed while re-reading Rin and looking at the comments is that a lot of people really loving hate Honda. I don't understand this. There is literally nothing wrong with Honda; she is just a normal person who wants to be friends with Fushimi because Fushimi is a talented manga artist and that's a cool thing. Her wanting to do social things with Fushimi is not "leading him on" because she doesn't even have any reason to believe he's interested in her (she can't read his mind).

Fortunately the author obviously agrees with this, and throughout the entire comic Honda continues to be a normal, friendly person instead of suddenly betraying Fushimi or something.

Ytlaya posted:

Oh I agree that him angst-ing a bunch over it would have been pointless, I was just curious if they had ever mentioned it again after him going "I'm virtually guaranteed to get it while I'm still young if my sister also got it in her mid-to-late twenties!" It's definitely kinda a bummer knowing that he might face such tragedy relatively soon after the story ends, though.

In retrospect the ending was actually pretty good. The only thing that's disappointing is that there wasn't really much romantic resolution. Like, yeah, it's not really necessary (since he says "I guess I always loved Rin" at the end), but it still would have been nice to at least have him express his feelings to her at some point.