Tag: manga

Let the Hate Roll On

Anybody else ever notice how Cardcaptor Sakura is always flipping us off? It’s almost as if Clamp is trying to tell us something …

Oh well. I guess it’s no worse than that guy in Sailor Moon who’s always flipping us off.

Anyway, today was to be our last entry in the Ten Things I Hate about Cardcaptor Sakura. However, real life caught up with me today and I didn’t get the post completed, so the hate will have to continue into overtime.

That means you get more hate for the same price.

The final post, the final hate, is still to come. Expect it when you least expect it.

Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, eight!)

The Ten Days of Hate: Day Seven!

FIRST | | NEXT | LAST

Let us continue with Ten Things I Hate about Cardcaptor Sakura. Today’s post again necessarily contains spoilers.

Number 3: The Creeptastic Mid-story Plot Twist

Continue reading “Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, eight!)”

Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, seven!)

The Ten Days of Hate: Day Six!

FIRST | PREVIOUS | NEXT | LAST

We continue yet again with Ten Things I Hate about Cardcaptor Sakura. Today’s post, like yesterday’s, contains some spoilers.

So, here we go.

Continue reading “Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, seven!)”

Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, six!)

The Ten Days of Hate: Day Five!

FIRST | | | LAST

We continue now with Ten Things I Hate about Cardcaptor Sakura.

Today’s entry in our ongoing series is a relatively short one, but it necessarily contains spoilers. Spoilers begin after the break.

Continue reading “Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, six!)”

Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, five!)

The Ten Days of Hate: Day Four!

FIRST | | | LAST

We now continue with the Days of Hate begun on Monday. I sent my old and decrepit computer in for maintenance, and it’s no longer overheating on me, so I think they managed to get my issues fixed … but now all my image files have been renamed for some reason, so I can’t find my screenshots …

Anyway, we’re back with more of Ten Things I Hate about Cardcaptor Sakura.

Continue reading “Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, five!)”

Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, four!)

The Ten Days of Hate: Day Three!

FIRST | | | LAST

Two days ago, we kicked off the Ten Days of Hate with a discussion of Cardcaptor Sakura, the hugely popular magical girl franchise. Then we followed that up with further hate.

Now we continue with more of Ten Things I Hate about Cardcaptor Sakura.

Continue reading “Why I Hate ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ (and you can, four!)”

‘Shugo Chara!’

Surprisingly sophisticated but unfortunately creepy.

Shugo Chara!, written and illustrated by Peach-Pit. Translated by Satsuki Yamashita. 12 vols. Kodansha Comics (New York): (). Rated T (ages 13+).

Shugo Chara!, Shugo Chara! Doki, and Shugo Chara! Party!, directed by Kinji Yasuta. Satelight and TV Tokyo, –. 127 episodes of 25 minutes (approx. 53 hours). Not rated. Available on Crunchyroll.

In Revolutionary Girl Utena, Kunihiko Ikuhara’s magnum opus, there are several screwball gag episodes dedicated to the side character Nanami, a spoiled rich girl who laughs inappropriately—a requisite character in shoujo anime. In the most fascinating of these gag episodes, Nanami awakens one morning to find an Easter egg in her bed. Convinced that she laid it, she at first tries to hide its existence but, on account of some misunderstood conversations, eventually concludes that egg-laying is normal for girls. In keeping with the coming-of-age theme of magical-girl shows in general and Utena in particular, the egg becomes a multivalent symbol by turns representing puberty, menstruation, childbirth, and child-rearing.

This one-off episode apparently inspired another whole magical-girl franchise, Shugo Chara!, by Banri Sendo and Shibuko Ebara, the two-woman manga-ka team known collectively as Peach-Pit. They got their start with works aimed primarily at a male audience: The little-known harem comedy Prism Palette, the raunchy magical-girlfriend series DearS (which is sort of like Chobits with more bondage), and an action series called Zombie-Loan. In the U.S., probably their most famous title is Rozen Maiden, an unusually classy harem series that’s like a cross between Pinocchio and Highlander with a veneer of Gothic horror. It’s spawned internet memes and a modest cult following.

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‘Made in Abyss’ Gets TV Anime

This escaped my attention back in January, but the web comic Made in Abyss by Akihito Tsukushi is slated to get a TV anime adaptation, directed by Masayuki Kojima and animated by Kinema Citrus.

I stumbled upon Made in Abyss back in December, when I raved about the artwork.

And though it escaped my attention at the time, it was only a few days later that Crunchyroll reported news of an impending anime adaptation. I take this as further proof that I really live in a solipsistic universe that bends to my will, and you are all figments of my imagination. Bwa ha ha.

I hope Crunchy’s report is indicative of their plans to fish for the rights to stream a sub. At present, Made in Abyss is not legally available in English, though it was originally produced as a web series and can be read online in Japanese. I for one am quite curious about the series because the story sounds charming and the art is gorgeous.

And Tsukushi-sensei’s characters all look so darn huggable.

Sequel to ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ Is Coming … Prepare Yourselves

Featured image: “Cardcaptor Sakura Fanart” by Daikazoku63

Cardcaptor Sakura is one of the biggest titles in the magical girl genre. It was the first foray into mahou shoujo manga by the unbelievably prolific four-woman team Clamp, which produced it from 1996 to 2000. Its anime adaptation, which began airing in 1998, is one of the few TV cartoons that can hold up in terms of technical quality more than a decade after its run. The anime adds a great deal to the story; some of it is padding, but a lot of it is real improvement. A sliced, diced, and dubbed version was released in English under the title of Cardcaptors.

For reasons I’ll explain in a post I was working on for today but didn’t get finished, I don’t care much for Cardcaptor Sakura. Nonetheless, I must announce that after all this time, Clamp is adding a third arc to the story, the “Clear Card Arc,” currently underway. The first collected volume appeared in Japan last month. I don’t believe any English translation has appeared as of yet.

An anime adaptation is slated to begin in January of 2018. Plan is to bring back director Morio Asaka and round up much of the original voice cast. The Cardcaptor Sakura anime had very good production values, so bringing back the old-timers rather than getting fresh blood seems to be a good move. As they say, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

The original story featured its heroine in fourth and fifth grade, gradually powering up as she collects the “Clow Cards,” each of which contains a magic spell. The sequel now has her in middle school.

While many fans are excited, I’m scared. What is Clamp going to do to that poor girl now? She barely escaped all those perverts last time. I’m especially worried about Tomoyo, her obsessive best friend who at first seems to be an innocent little ten-year-old girl until Clamp casually drops the bombshell that she’s a monomaniacal lesbian stalker with a costume fetish and a penchant for voyeurism. Is this going to be the story arc where she hides a camera in Sakura’s bathroom or something?

‘Sugar Sugar Rune,’ Volumes 1-3

The greatest fantasy comic of the last 5 years has just ended its publication run in America and nobody cares. Oh well, I’ll just give it an A- and cry sad tears over why there aren’t more fans of Sugar Sugar Rune. —Carlos Santos, Anime News Network

Sugar Sugar Rune, volumes 1-3. Story and art by Moyoco Anno. Translated by Yayoi Ihne. Del Rey Manga (New York), 2006. Rated Y (Ages 10+).

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Sugar Sugar Rune may be one of the magical girl genre’s best-kept secrets. From time to time, I see this title named as the best of the so-called “cute witch” magical girl stories. Anime News Network, as quoted above, in 2008 even went so far as to call it the best fantasy comic of the last five years, and also said it has “one of the most satisfying, most creative, most epic endings to a fantasy series ever.” There is evidence for this in how the series gets sold: take a look on Amazon, and you will see that the aftermarket prices are reasonable for the first seven volumes, but then shoot up to ridiculous numbers for the final volume, apparently because people are actually willing to pay upwards of forty-five dollars for Sugar Sugar Rune‘s allegedly mind-blowing finale. Continue reading “‘Sugar Sugar Rune,’ Volumes 1-3”