Entries from April 2008 ↓

My review of Bus Gamer is up at Manga Life. An excerpt:

For fans of Minekura’s other series, Saiyuki and Wild Adapter, Bus Gamer offers familiar pleasures. Although the art is not quite as polished as that seen in Wild Adapter and later volumes of Saiyuki, it is still very easy on the eyes. Minekura pays close attention to anatomy in her drawings; as a result, the characters’ body language is always realistic and expressive.

I’ve also added a link to the comments RSS feed on the sidebar, for anyone who might be interested in that.

For me, learning to interpret a whole new set of cultural references and symbols is one of the pleasures of reading manga and watching anime. And one of the most widely used symbols in manga and anime, especially at this time of year, is sakura, or cherry blossoms.

Sakura is known for its short-lived beauty. As a result, it’s a symbol of transience and mortality (or, in the words of my friend Oyce, “DOOM”). In art and literature, it’s also linked with Japanese nationalism and samurai. Since sakura blooms in April, it’s associated with spring and the beginning of the new school year. In Japan, there’s also a tradition of flower viewing in the spring known as hanami.

(For more information on the cultural significance of sakura, see Wikipedia.)

So in honor of spring (which has finally arrived where I am living), here are some of my favorite uses of sakura imagery and symbolism in anime and manga.

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My review of vol. 1 of Honey and Clover is up at Manga Life. An excerpt:

Chica Umino’s Honey and Clover follows the lives of five students at a Tokyo art college. Though it is published in the U.S. by Viz under the Shojo Beat imprint and serialized in Shojo Beat magazine, Honey and Clover is actually very much a josei series; though there are hints of shojo-ish romantic drama, the characters’ concerns are definitely those of adults rather than teens, such as paying the rent and finding a post-graduation job. This first entry in the ten-volume series displays a lot of promise, but there’s also some significant room for improvement.

My review of vol. 15 of Fullmetal Alchemist is now up at Manga Life. A teaser:

The fifteenth volume of Hiromu Arakawa’s Fullmetal Alchemist takes readers several years into the past, as Lieutenant Hawkeye tells Ed about the Ishbal campaign. For anyone unfamiliar with the series, Fullmetal Alchemist is the story of two brothers, Edward and Alphonse Elric, who attempt to resurrect their dead mother using alchemy. The ritual goes wrong; Ed loses his arm and leg, while Al loses his entire body and now exists as a soul bonded to an empty suit of armor.