The catch copy on the sleeve of the latest Billy Bat (ビリーバット) release says, "Will the scroll that controls time finally shed like on the true identity of Billy Bat?!" And since Naoki Urasawa's (浦沢直樹) manga are known for their multi-layered twists and turns I was a bit skeptical of the claim. And here I should also point out the excellent work of Takashi Nagasaki (長崎尚志) who writes a lot of the stories with Urasawa including the past series of Monster, 21st Century Boys, Master Keaton, and Pluto to just name a few.
I won't give anything away about the latest story line, but I finally feel like the puzzle is starting to be solved. After I was a bit frustrated with the previous volume, volume #11 steps up an delivers some answers. Einstein and Saint Frances Xavier pop in for some more flashback cameos and shed light onto the origins of the scroll that everyone is in a mad scramble trying to track down, and Billy Bat.
But as the story takes a small step toward it's conclusion, a new 1981 story line is introduced which references the space shuttle Columbia, and new Kevin. Could this be Kevin Yamagata's son? I guess we'll have to tune in same bat time, same bat channel. Until next time.
Best Picture: Kirishima Quit Club Activites (桐嶋、部活やめるってよ)
Best Director: Daihachi Yoshida (吉田大八)
Based on the best selling teen fiction by Ryo Asai (朝井リョウ), and directed by Daihachi Yoshida who also won best director. It features Ryunosuke Kamiki (神木隆之介) who I know from the Otsuichi short film So-far, Ai Hashimoto (橋本愛) who was in Confession (告白) . Both up and coming actors that you should keep an eye on.
Best Animation: Wolf Children Ame and Yuki (おおかみこどもの雨と雪)
Directed by Mamoru Hosoda (細田守), and co-produced by Madhouse. Hosoda has found recent acclaim for Summer Wars, an adaptation of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, as well as working one many well known series such as One Piece, Dragonball Z, Digimon, and Slam Dunk.
Best Actor: Hiroshi Abe (安部寛)
for Thermae Romae (テルマエ・ロマエ)
Based on the popular manga by Mari Yamazaki (ヤマザキ マリ). Starring Hiroshi Abe who is an extremely prolific Japanese actor who has started in countless movies and TV dramas.
Best Actress: Kirin Kiki (樹木希林)
for Wagaha no Ki (わが母の記)
Based on the autobiographical novel by highly acclaimed author Yasushi Inoue (井上靖). This is Kirin Kiki's 5th Academy Award. Her second for Best Actress, and she has won Best Supporting Actress 3 times including 2011's Villain (悪人). After a long and distinguished career, Kirin shocked everyone during her acceptance speech by announcing her cancer diagnosis. In good humor she joked that she may not make it to next year's awards ceremony. Let's hope we can see her in several more features during the next year.
Best Supporting Actor: Hideji Otaki (大滝秀治)
Best Supporting Actress: Kimiko Yo (余貴美子)
for To You (あなたへ)
To You is based on the novel by Akio Morisawa (森沢明夫). The best supporting actor award was posthumously awarded to Hideji Otaki who died in October last year. An extremely prolific actor of both stage, TV and screen. This is first academy award. Kimiko Yo is also extremely prolific, also appearing in Hoshi Mamoru Inu and Akunin in a supporting role. The film features a large ensemble cast including Ken Takakura (高倉健), Yuko Tanaka (田中裕子), Koichi Sato (佐藤浩市), Tsuyoshi Kusanagi (草彅剛), and Beat Takeshi (ビートたけし).
Following up after being awarded the 58th Shogakkan Manga Prize (小学館漫画賞) in the general public section (一般向け部門) comes volume 11 of Kengo Hanazawa's I Am A Hero. Previous winners of the prize include Space Brothers (宇宙兄弟), Gaku (岳), 20th Century Boys (20世紀少年) and Monster (モンスター).
This volume continues the second story line of Takashi Ezaki after he is rescued and taken to the hideout of Kurusu (来栖) and his group in Saitama. Kurusu is mentally unstable, and revels in the lawless anarchy of the zombie apocalypse, with little regard for the life of his fellow survivors. Although in the uncertainty of their situation, his penchant for violence is regarded as a necessary skill by the others in the group. Kowashi is the most realistic and level headed of the group, and acts as a default leader. Tomabechi acts as the scientist of the group, he runs the wireless radio, in which we find out that other groups of survivors are Japan are aware that the group at the shopping mall have have been overrun by ZQN (The name given to the zombies based on DQN which is Japanese netspeak for delinquent.).
One of the problems faced by mangaka is that the real world also changes during the time the story is told. The first time I noticed this was while reading Space Brothers, the story relies on the continuation of NASA's manned spaced flight which has seen a dramatic decline in funding since the series started. As for I Am A Hero which started in 2009, the 2011 Eastern Japanese Earthquake didn't occur, and as such, the nuclear power stations are still operational in the world of I Am A Hero.
I'm a resident of Fukushima, and after the initial explosions at the Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, there were several weeks where it seemed like we were living in a zombie infested society. A sense of panic ran under the surface, and everyone was forced to stay inside with dwindling supplies of food. Electricity, water, and internet were still available in the area I was in, but a lack of petrol meant that use of the car was for life threatening situations only. Thankfully after several weeks, services returned to normal.
We see the same thing in I Am A Hero. Some people are holding out hope that the situation will soon be brought under control, and government services will be resumed. But there is a group of individuals who didn't fit into regular society and are more suited to the uncertainties, and want to build a new society from the ground up.
The latest volume of Space Brothers (宇宙兄弟) was released on Friday. If you get in quick you can grab the limited edition version with a bonus DVD which includes a prelude to a new Space Brothers animated movie, Space Brothers ~One Point of Light~ (宇宙兄弟 ～一点のひかり～), which will be released this summer on July 21st. It's interesting to note that the anime will only be playing at various planetariums around the country. Seems like a good way to young kids out to planetariums and interested in science.
The latest volume of Space Brothers deals with lose, and Hibito's absence further heightens this sense of lose, and I hope we see him back soon. Focusing more on Mutta, we see more on the back story of two of his current mentors, Vince and Piko, and how they have used the lose of a dear friend to fuel their ambitions and to never let go of their dreams. We also see the return of one of Mutta's original mentors from his youth, Sharon, who finally achieves one of her dreams, but this is tainted by the sense of loss she feels as she succumbs to her illness.
I'm not sure what Chuya Koyama has in store for the two Space Brothers, Mutta and Hibito, and even though this is one of the most regularly released comics I read, I wish the central story would continue at a faster pace. I'm rather impatient to see how this series finishes.
A light comedy directed by Shinobu Yaguchi and features one of my favourite young Japanese actors Gaku Hamada, along side Yuriko Yoshitaka and Japanese rock icon Mickey Curtis.
I first noted the slightly built Gaku Hamada in the 2006 release Golden Slumber. He had the small supporting role of an anarchic teen who lived on the streets. And then I saw in him in a main role in Ahiru to Kamo no Coin Locker, which features what I consider to be one of the best feature film portrayals of what it is like to be a foreigner in Japan. Then a comedic role in 2012's Space Brothers. But Roboji features Gaku in a more subtle comedic role that reminds me of Australia comedies produced by Working Dog Productions such as The Dish.
The female lead is played by Yuriko Yoshitaka, who I first saw in her film debut in the collection of short films for Otsuichi's ZOO. She appeared in the short film, Seven Rooms, which is possibly my favourite Otsuichi short story. So I'm always aware of her, when she pops up in various film roles and TV dramas. In Roboji she appears as a robot obsessed university student looking to pursue a career in robotics.
But the man who steals the show is the man inside the robot, Mickey Curtis, veteran of over 70 films, race car driver, rock and roll icon. Anyone one is a fan of King Crimson style progressive rock should check out Mickey Curtis and the Samurais 1971 album Kappa.
Back to Roboji, there is one thing that annoys me about the translation of the title of the film into English as Robo-G. The Japanese title, which I've just translated phonetically, is the portmanteau of robot and jiji (japanese for old man or geezer). It's a clever and fitting title. I'm not sure there is a suitable replacement title in English, but resorting to Robo-G feels like giving up too much, so I've stuck with the transliteration Roboji.
The 148th winner of the Akutagawa Prize is ab Sango (abさんご) by Natsuko Kuroda (黒田夏子), and at 75 years and 9 months she is the oldest recipient of the award. So all of you that are harbouring dreams of literary glory, it's never to late to start writing.
I've just started reading it, and even though it is quite short, as a non-native reader of Japanese, I'm finding the style of the prose quite difficult. When I started reading Japanese, I found it much easier to comprehend books written in basic kanji rather than the text for younger readers written in hiragana. Natsuko Kuroda's stlye of large sections of hiragana are a slow painful process for me, I find myself having to reread the same line several times to catch the meaning, and I would much prefer a version with more kanji! Then when she does use kanji, it can be equally confusing, as I found myself diving for my dictionary to discover that 禽 is just bird(鳥).
Anyway, I'm enjoying the challenge and hope to get through it in the next day or two.
Planetes is a four volume manga written by Makoto Yukimura between 1999 and 2004. I've just finished up watching the Freedom anime, and now this series. I'm a big fan of hard science fiction, which tends to focus more on a realistic portrayal of space exploration and near future technologies. Planetes focuses on Hachirota "Hachimaki" Hoshino and the crew aboard the space debris collection ship, Toy Box.
With all the recent announcements from several companies looking to finance and develop the asteroid mining industries, Planetes may well be the first science fiction series to hit their specified time line. The series sees the crew going about their business in 2075, although in reality it will be more likely all the future space mining jobs will be left to the robots. NASA themselves noted that the scenario presented the manga is highly unlikely due to the high cost, and low value of salvageable materials. Japanese space agency JAXA must have a permanent division just for dealing with anime and manga consultations after they were asked to help in the development of this series, and even more recently with the Space Brothers franchise.
A 26 episode anime series was produced by Sunrise in 2003. They are also responsible for several series of Gundam, Freedom and Patlabor, so they definitely know how to handle their SF. Although my personal preference is to leave out the giant robots, so I strongly recommend Planetes.
