2009 was not a good year. In fact, many people are calling it the worst year ever. But in 2009, manga finished out one of its best years yet. More sophisticated content founds its way to American readers—and by way of the Internet, no less.
Ever widening their lead on their competitors, Viz Media launched the website, SigIkki.com, an online, American version of Japan’s alternative manga anthology magazine, IKKI. Fans of art house comics had their day when Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s self referential tome about the beginnings of gekiga comics in Japan, A Drifting Life, was applauded in Japan and abroad in the U.S.
Even closer to home, Yen Press has been cultivating a taste for hybrid, manga inspired graphic novel adaptations of American properties—Maximum Ride, Cirque de Freak, and forthcoming Twilight and Gossip Girl manga may just launch the publisher into one of the top slots next to Viz.
2009, the worst year ever? It’s debatable, but in the spirit of the god Janus, we look forward as we look back. 2009 is a strong indication of manga’s continued growth from “It Girl” status to becoming a solid competitor that’s laid down its roots and is determined to push in all directions this country allows. So here's to a new year, a new decade, and 10 of the best manga properties of 2009 that none of us could have hoped would make it to western shores.
10. Moyasimon: Tales of Agriculture by Masayuki Ishikawa
Ishikawa’s bacteria manga won the Kodansha Award in 2007. And we asked ourselves, “Will we ever see that property here?” Thanks to Del Rey, everyone can join in the fermented fun as Tadayasu “I-see-bacteria” Sawaki, who really can see bacteria, embarks on his first year as a student at an agricultural university. Darling bacteria acidophilous bifidous plays a supporting role while E.coli acts as a sinister foe. The series functions somewhere between a science cookbook on fermentation and a humorous lesson on hygiene, all rolled into one.
9. Ooku by Fumi Yoshinaga
Yoshinaga is clearly pushing herself beyond her boys love/Antique Bakery roots, with Ooku, set in feudal Japan in a Y, the Last Men scenario where men are scarce and women are Shogunates. The storyline is far more ambitious than her other works and Yoshinaga at times seems uncertain of this new world. However, the plotline is powerful and there is a sense that the reader has of discovering the world as Yoshinaga builds it.
8. Ikigami: The Ultimate Limit by Motoro Mase
Something of an uplifting derivative of Battle Royale, Ikigami is a science fiction about the morbid way government intervention teaches the value of life in futuristic Japan. At age 6, 1 out of 1000 children are implanted with a capsule which will explode in their hearts between the ages of 18 and 24. The series unravels as slice-of-life vignettes of individuals who have been appointed to die and how they negotiate their last hours on earth. Thrilling, frightening, and at times romantic, Ikigami is seinen at its heartbreaking best.
7. Summitof the Gods by Yumemakura Baku and Jiro Taniguchi
Adapted from Baku’s novel about a mountaineer obsessed with dangerous climbs, and a photographer who unravels his story, Summit of the Gods is a narrative of manhood and the challenge of making one’s mark on the world. Baku’s story is a perfect match for Taniguchi’s style and expertise - his manga, Quest for the Missing Girl, also involved climbing. Visually detailed in the technicalities of equipment, and the scale of peaks such as Everest, Matterhorn, and Eiger, Taniguchi captures the feelings of risk and danger involved in the flights of man vs. nature.
6. PLUTO by Naoki Urasawa and Osamu Tezuka, co-author Takashi Nagasaki, supervised by Macoto Tezuka
In Pluto, Urasawa takes Tezuka’s Pinocchio-inspired Astroboy and re-imagines it as a futuristic thriller. The series touches on many of the themes in Tezuka’s Astroboy, the overlap of man and machine, as well as characteristics of humans and what differentiates humans from robots. Detective Gesicht is an android who lives as a human and is investigating the “murder” of various AI like himself. But is it possible to murder a machine? Pluto offers adult graphic novel readers (and fans of Monster) classic, all-ages Tezuka in a mature package. Required reading for 2009.
5. DetroitMetal City by Kiminori Wakasugi
Quite possibly the funniest, raunchiest, and laughably inappropriate manga of this year, DMC is lewd entertainment at its best. No one suspects that Krauser II, frontman for the death metal band Detroit Metal City, who screams rabidly about rape and patricide, is actually Soichi Negishi, a mild-mannered college graduate who aspires to a career in Swedish pop. A parody of death metal and its fans, DMC pokes fun at just about everything and makes everything funny.
4. A Distant Neighborhood by Jiro Taniguchi
Salary man Hiroshi Nakahara finds himself back in his junior high school body and travels back to his old neighborhood in 1960’s Japan. A thoughtful and self-aware narrative about second chances and self-discovery that Taniguchi handles with affection and a quiet sorrow.
3. Children of the Sea by Daisuke Igarashi
A magical exploration of the ocean its underwater inhabitants, Children of the Sea evokes feelings of long summer days and quiet beach outings. The series is set around three kids (two of whom were raised by dugongs and can breathe under water, one of whom simply wants to belong) assisting in ocean research and searching for the Ghost of the Sea. Igarashi mimics the silence of the sea in both pacing and illustrations. Reader warning: Children of the Sea may prompt further interest in marine biology and a deep desire to keep the oceans clean.
2. Go Go Monster by Taiyo Matsumoto
Go Go Monster is far more cerebral and less overt than the popular, Tekkon Kinkrete, but Matsumoto’s narratives of love, support, and outsider friendships endure. Yuki Tachibana is a third grader who sees monsters in school and is mocked by his piers. He is befriended by newcomer Makoto Suzuki, but grapples with the decision between maintaining his outsider status or cultivating a deep friendship. Because Go Go Monster is less fantastical, it feels more severe, the imagery more haunting. Likely to receive less attention than its popular sibling, Tekkon Kinkrete, Go Go Monster is a testament to Matsumoto’s understanding of youth and the perils of friendship.
1. A Drifting Life by Yoshihiro Tatsumi
This may not be fair, entirely. I spent more time with Tatsumi’s A Drifting Life than I did any other book this year. And it was well worth it. Tatsumi’s illustrated text, (historic, autobiographic, economic) of the Japan that he grew up in and the growth of the industry there that we currently know as manga, is an even handed, revealing work of graphic prose that evokes the youth and imagination - as well as the industrious nature - of a young artist. Soon after publication, A Drifting Life was awarded the Osamu Tezuka prize in Japan. Well worth an Eisner in this country, and well worth owning.
