Manga Fascination

I received some Manga as a Christmas gift, specifically Blade of the Immortal written and illustrated by Hiroaki Samura and Vagabond written and illustrated by Takehiko Inoue, both samurai epics. It appears that people either love or dislike Japanese comics. In Japan everyone reads them. When I was visiting Tokyo in the mid 90’s I even witnessed homeless people reading the large volumes filled with many different stories.

Every type of concept you can imagine exists in the manga world from the most innocent to the hard core. What amazes me is the talent that crops up in some of these books. The visual development of characters, environments, pacing, composition, page design, are very well done and pulls the reader through the tale. It is film on paper. The drawing and pen and ink skills some of the artists showcase is quite beautiful and stunning. I am sharing a few highlights of  Blade of the Immortal, Vagabond, and Tegami Bachi written and illustrated by Hiroyuki Asada. Notice that the artist in these cases is also the writer! Talk about multi-talented.

It is interesting that many manga stories become animated features (anime) for TV especially in Asia. I have yet seen a manga translated into film that truly captures the life and spirit of the original artwork in these books. You can experience hundreds upon hundreds of different Manga, cover to cover, for free (including the ones I just mentioned) on mangareader.net. How they are able to offer all these books which have high rez scans of every page of the book is a mystery. I have written them to ask if the site is sanctioned by all the publishers. Pretty amazing what they have accomplished.

Do you have a favorite manga that you feel transcends the medium? Let me know.

Peace

Greg