Shinbun Saturday: TOKYOPOP Hits Hollywood…Again

Happy Saturday, readers! Vernieda and Angel here to bring you up to speed on the week in manga.

Planning a trip to Japan this year? You might want to check out the 88-stop anime pilgrimage tour that Kadokawa will be offering for foreign tourists! The tour was announced at a meeting of interest for the Hong Kong Book Fair, and several Japanese local governments will be participating. Designated stops won’t be limited to Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka, with Kadokawa hoping to bring tourists all over Japan.

While dates and locations haven’t been set yet, I expect that interest will grow as Kadokawa continues to work with city officials to prepare, and you can check back here for more details as they’re announced!

Making a quick jump over to Hollywood, it sounds like light novel Juror 13 might be settling into Hollywood as a movie. Pop Media Group’s Stu Levy has signed on to produce the film, with Mike Ferris (Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines) set to write the screenplay. The novel by D.J. Milky is a science fiction thriller, centered around a young man who questions his sanity after having his brain scanned with new technology without his consent. For people wondering why the names sound vaguely familiar, Pop Media is the parent company of the now-defunct TOKYOPOP and D.J. Milky is the pseudonym Stu Levy used to publish works under the TOKYOPOP brand. Funny how TOKYOPOP has a knack for appearing when you least expect it, huh?

Speaking of creators: Kazuo Koike, famous for such manga as Lady Snowblood and Crying Freeman, recently hosted an AMA on Reddit. He revealed that he was working on a new manga and has plans to adapt it into a motion comic. I’m not sure how much demand there is for motion comic adaptations of manga, though. A Kickstarter to fund a motion comic of what is arguably Koike’s most famous work, Lone Wolf and Cub, is currently running and they have a long way to go before hitting goal. On a side note, I’m completely tickled by the fact that Koike is a fan of 24.

As fans of Bleach will already know, the manga took a break this week due to Tite Kubo’s sudden illness. Weekly Shonen Jump is notorious for its harsh schedules, but it’s hard to say if that contributed to this. Hopefully, it’s nothing serious. Bleach is expected to resume in next week’s issue.

It looks like another Japanese publisher is joining the digital wave. Akita Shoten announced that their manga magazine, Weekly Shonen Champion, will be releasing a digital edition five days after the print version. And this is only the beginning, too. The publisher plans to digitize all of its manga magazines by the end of 2016. (For those who don’t know, Weekly Shonen Champion is the home of cycling series, Yowamushi Pedal!)

And that’s it for this week. See you next time!

Advertisements
Vernieda Vergara

Vernieda Vergara

Writer. Manga and webtoon aficionado. I hail from Washington D.C. where I consume too much media and cause only a little trouble. Tweet me @incitata.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Close
Menu
WP Twitter Auto Publish Powered By : XYZScripts.com