Happy new year, VIZ fans! New year, new manga, new pubwatch from me! This month we’re covering all first volumes from new and established creators, including the new Taiyo Matsumoto series, Tokyo These Days. But first, the news!
Kazuo Umezz Reacts to VIZ Editions of his manga
Having covered several Umezz works in pubwatches past, I enjoyed getting a glimpse of the man behind the manga in this video made for the VIZ social media team. He seems like a fun guy! I like that he’s still dressing in his distinctive stripes. The comments are also very polite and encouraging.
Shonen Jump 2023 Year in Review
Like every other app on the planet, Shonen Jump (and its partner the VIZ app) decided to release a Year in Review thing. I honestly found this one a little lacking in comparison to, say, the Webtoon Wrapped, which told me how many episodes I read and in which genres, while the Shonen Jump and VIZ apps each merely reported my top 5 series read per app and the most popular series globally. Although I guess the VIZ top 8 was pretty interesting, as it’s a wider range of genres and includes classic series like InuYasha and Magi.
But it also doesn’t really make sense in terms of things to measure, because of course I’ll read more of a series with lots of short, frequently updating chapters like Komi Can’t Communicate than a monthly comic. Of course the top series across the Shonen Jump app would be the currently updating Weekly Shonen Jump serials (or BLEACH, which has a currently airing anime) and not completed comics. And then after the unranked top… 8 series, it showcases some series with recent anime adaptations, some new comics that have already gotten axed (or are on their way towards that), and miscellaneous action-adventure comics. It’s basically the homepage of the app in a slightly different shape.
Where are the stats, the big numbers? How many people have clicked on the first chapter of One Punch Man this year? How many people are reading Zom 100? How many chapters have I read total? What’s my favorite genre? What’s my readerly vibe or whatever? That’s what’s enjoyable about these year-end wrapped things, and it’s totally missing from the VIZ edition.
Also, I read a lot of shojo manga this year, apparently!
Zom 100 anime is almost over, finally, and you can buy it
So, in case you missed it, the much-hyped, much-marketed, basically fine Zom 100 anime’s last few episodes were… extremely delayed. Normally, a 12-episode anime airs once a week at the same time and day each week until it is complete. Zom 100’s episodes got pushed back weeks, then the final 3 episodes aired months after they were originally supposed to air, getting delayed from early October to late December. But, as VIZ hurries to reassure us, everything’s fine now! And when the dub of the finale airs on the 29th, you can own the full season starting January 30th on the Apple TV App, Microsoft Store, VUDU, Amazon, and Google Play. Great!
Anyway, enough of the news, it’s time for…
What I’m Reading
Marriage Toxin, Vol. 1
Story by Joumyaku, Art by Mizuki Yoda
January 2, 2024
Diversity win: the premise of this shonen manga hinges on being a lesbian ally and respecting women! I was surprised how much I actually loved this goofy action comic. Gero is the heir to the poison clan of assassins, and his grandmother wants him to continue to family line— or his lesbian sister will have to break up with her girlfriend to do it instead. Thus, Gero enlists the help of professional marriage con artist Mei Kinosaki to help him find true love. They quickly determine that Gero’s charm point is his competence with his assassin skills, and thus, search for jobs on the dark web that will allow him to rescue eligible bachelorettes from near-death and make them fall for him. Kinosaki’s teachings focus on helping Gero learn to treat women as people and become friends with his potential future wives first, turning this wacky action series into something like Komi Can’t Communicate with the main character trying to make as many friends as they can. It’s funny, sweet, and cute, and the action sequences are pretty fun too. The love interests are interesting, capable characters in their own right, which is rare to see in shonen. This series is definitely underrated.
Tokyo These Days, Vol 1
Taiyo Matsumoto
January 16, 2024
Tokyo These Days is about manga editor Shiozawa who retires from the industry but just can’t quite seem to leave it, before deciding to try and assemble a team to make one last manga on his own terms. Like all Matsumoto comics, it’s beautiful and idiosyncratic, if more restrained than No. 5 and fairly easy to follow. The subject matter hits close to home for me. Even though I’m at the opposite side of my comics career, I’m constantly wondering whether it’s time to throw in the towel on trying to make this thing work. It’s fascinating to see the different viewpoints and ideas of the manga industry and manga as an art and storytelling form Matsumoto depicts here, ideas that seem to be pulled from close observation. I also like the talking bird. I look forward to seeing what these characters do next.
Steel of the Celestial Shadows, Vol 1
Daruma Matsuura
January 16, 2024
As soon as I saw this cover, I knew I had to read this. Look at that, it’s gorgeous. And the interiors are just as gorgeous! Matsuura has an incredible knack for all things character: expressive emotions, dynamic action sequences and beautiful faces. The environments are fine, but I think this comic would work even without backgrounds, the character art is just that good. And the story is fun, simple and fairytale-like in its basic premise: Konosuke’s cursed to warp any metal that comes near him, which is a problem when his only goal in life is to be a sword-wielding samurai. He can’t get a job and he’s the laughingstock of town, when a beautiful woman appears out of nowhere and pays him a huge dowry to be his devoted wife! What? Who is she, and what’s her deal? As of the end of this volume, those questions remain to be answered, but the larger mysteries of this world are starting to be unveiled. The story is compulsively readable. Konosuke’s instantly sympathetic and relatable, and his mysterious new love is likewise understandable in her motivations and actions. I had fun reading this comic and I hope you have fun as well.
Honestly, great month for reviews. I don’t usually like all 3 books I review this much, but this time I just loved all of them! Let’s hope next month brings more great books for me to tell you about.
