Taiyo Matsumoto

Since my favourite manga Inio Asano's Oyasumi Pun Pun finished last month I was looking around for some new series to read.  One of the series I picked up was Taiyo Matsumoto's (松本大洋) Sunny. The fourth volume of the series was released in October 2013, and it's published on IKKI, an imprint of Shogakukan.

IKKI also publishes the work of Daisuke Igarashi (五十嵐大介) who I'm a big fan of too. Both Iragashi and Matsumoto have uniquely identifiable artistic styles, and great story lines.

People might be familiar with Taiyou Matsumoto's earlier work Tekkonkinkreet (鉄コン筋クリート). The manga was published in 1993-94 and reached a much wider audience with the 2006 animated adaptation. Directed by Michael Arias, and made by Studio 4°C. It was the first anime feature film directed by a non-Japanese director, and won the 2008 Japanese Academy Award for Animation.

There are a lot of similarities between Tekkonkinkreet and Sunny. Both focus on the relationship of imaginative young boys. Tekkonkinkreet has the street-wise Kuro/Black (クロ) and the simple-minded Shiro/White (シロ). Sunny features the smart beyond his years, aggressive, easily provoked, Haruo (晴男) and his simple sidekick Junsuke (純助). The manga's title Sunny refers to an old broken down Nissan Sunny that rest on their front lawn that the boys use to play and travel where ever their imagination takes them. As with most of Matsumoto's work, the characters speak with strong Kansai accents, which can be hard to follow if you've never read/heard much colloquial Japanese.

Website: http://www.ikki-para.com/comix/sunny.html

Berserk

My introduction to the Berserk series was in 2000 through the Sega Dreamcast game, Sword of the Berserk: Guts' Rage. The depth of the themes and plots suggested more than the usual hack and slash fantasy title. The internet giving me a glimpse of more, but it was still the age of 56k modems. It wasn't too long before I had track down VHS fansubs, and ordered a copy of Susumu Hirosawa's accompanying soundtrack.

When I first moved to Japan it was one of the first manga series that I chased down at my local Bookoff. Although with my then rudamentary Japanese, I struggled through the first 3 volumes before they were relegated to the book shelf, for future reference once I had learnt a bit more kanji, and I searched for something a bit easier. Although Naoki Urasawa's 20th Century Boys wasn't much of a step down in difficulty.

2012 saw the release of a new series of movies by Studio 4°C which also cover the Golden Age arc which was the story line covered in the original anime by OLM. The Golden Age arc covers manga volumes 4-13. I'm hoping Studio 4°C also continue on with the Conviction arc (volumes 14-21), Hawk of the Millennium Empire arc (volumes 22-35) and the current Fantasia arc (volumes 35-).

The 3rd film in the current Studio 4°C series is just about to hit cinemas in Japan in February 1st.

And for those that have always wondered Sword of the Berserk: Guts' Rage takes place between volumes 22 and 23 during the Hawk of the Millennium arc which also featured in an additional PS2 game.

The Berserk manga has just been made available in digital format in Japan, I've been reading it on my Sony Reader. So it's a good time to try and jump into this mammoth series if you have access to an epub reader or there's also an android app.

Also catch the author of Berserk, Kentaro Miura, on Twitter: https://twitter.com/kentaroumiura

Detroit Metal City

Detroit Metal City (デトロイト・メタル・シティ) by Kiminori Wakasugi is a few years old now. Originally released between 2005 and 2010 over 10 volumes. It was followed up with a concurrenlty released live action movie and anime adaptation in 2008.

It's not so much a dark comedy, more slapstick, coated with an absurd parody of death metal. The main character Soichi Negishi longs for success as an independant singer songwriter. But to pay the bills has found himself a member of the increasingly successful and KISS inspired death metal band, Detroit Metal City.Although I'm yet to see the anime, I'm a big fan of Kenichi Matsuyama as Negishi. And it's hilarious to see Gene Simmons with a little cameo.

The anime series was produced by Studio 4°C who are responsible for the recent Berserk remake, and have also worked on Batman, Halo, Street Fighter, Thundercats, and Transformers anime. The advantages of the anime series is that it can ramp up the more extreme elements with sequences that are just not possible with a live action version. And it doesn't disappoint.

The Detroit Metal City manga has just been made available digitally in Japan. So if you have a Sony Reader, or there is also the app for Android phones and tablets. Unfortunately it's not supported on my rather dated Galaxy S.

Check out the author of Detroit Metal City, Kiminori Wakasugi, on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wakasugi_k
And you can download the series from the Sony Reader Store here: http://ebookstore.sony.jp/index/comic/