In a move that highlights its continuing efforts to aggressively publish a broad variety of graphic novels for the bookstore and comics shop market, DC Comics is launching CMX, an imprint that will publish Japanese manga in English translation for the U.S. market. DC Comics plans to release 10 to 15 manga titles a month, beginning in October of this year, in the categories of horror, fantasy, science fiction and adventure.
Jake Tarbox, formerly vice-editor-in-chief of Raijin Comics, a subsidiary of Japanese publisher Gutsoon!, has been named group editor of the CMX imprint. Tarbox has lived in Japan for 14 years. He will be based in the U.S. and will oversee editorial, translation and printing of CMX manga.
The launch of CMX follows DC deals announced earlier this year with French graphic novel publisher Humanoids (36 books a year) and U.K. publisher Rebellion (36 books) to import foreign graphic novels for the U.S. market. Paul Levitz, president and publisher of DC Comics, connected the new imprint to the previous deals: "If there's good stuff that people want to read, we'd like to be publishing it."
The first CMX titles will include Madara by Tajima Sho-u and Otsuku Eiji, the story of a blacksmith's apprentice who fights demons; and Mekakushi no Juni by Tsukuba, the story of a high school girl who sees visions of the future. Levitz told PW that the number of manga released each month by CMX could increase. "I didn't expect manga to reach the sales level that it has," said Levitz. "The experts believe that sales will keep going up, and if they do, we'll do a lot more."
