Read This Comic, Or Else... ;-)
Despite having very little time overall in the last few weeks I discovered a new obsession. Yay! (This is actually a totally un-ironical 'yay' - I *love* new obsessions. New obsessions are like new loves.)
I'm leaving for Worldcon tomorrow and I still have some packing and preparations to do, so I can't write a long entry about my new obsession now, but I've posted quite a few enthused ravings to various message boards, so I can copy some of those and give you a few links.
First, a rec for the series in German:
http://www.sf-community.de/forum/showthread.php?t=5110
Another one in German, but not from yours truly:
http://filmtagebuch.blogger.de/stories/247699/
Now, a slightly rambling rec in English:
http://hellblazer.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=1928
And another one in English, from a board I cannot link to, so I'm copying it here (it's written by me, anyway):
Technically I don't have the time to rec anything at length now, and reccing 20th Century Boys is awkward as well because it's not yet officially released in the English-speaking world. There are scanlations, though, (i.e. fan translations inserted into scans of the Japanese comic), which you can find here:
http://www.directmanga.com
Those aren't frowned upon so much, legally speaking, as long as the comic isn't in print where you live. Also, there exists a French edition already, and we do have a few people who know French here, don't we? (There's a German edition as well, but two of the volumes are a bit hard to get, and there's only 11 volumes out so far whereas in France there's 16.)
The series is still unfinished and volume 19 was recently released in Japan - apparently even including, on a cd, a song by one of the comics' protagonists who's a hobby musician who at one point was close to going pro. The song, which features significantly in the comic, is titled 'Bob Lennon' ("... because it's stolen a bit from Bob Dylan, and a bit from John Lennon." *g*)
The series won the renowned Prix Angoulème recently in France; that's probably the most important French comic award. I'm told not many foreign comics manage to nick one of those. It's also won a couple of big awards in Japan and is very popular there. Alas, it's not so popular in Germany, where people still don't understand that comics aren't 'just for children'.
So, yeah, to start with the basics, this is a manga. Wait, don't click away now - it's probably not what you expect. No absurdly big eyes and tiny mouths. No 'cuteness'. No magical girls. No pretty boys. No giant robots. Well, almost no giant robots. There's kind of a pretend robot at one point, but that doesn't count, right?
To dispel any misgivings about the artwork right away, here's a link to some samples. Click on the covers to see them:
http://www.s-book.com/plsql/com2_search?sha=all&pat=b2&text=20%90%A2%8BI%8F%AD%94N&page=1
Or look here:
http://sbookg.s-book.com/sol/sky_gif/tanko_sample3/185532.gif
So, as you can see, it's drawn in a fairly 'naturalistic' style. (The guy in the monk's robe, btw, is possibly my favourite character in the series, though he's not exactly a monk when he appears again later and at greater length. Rather, he's just been identified as 'Hulk Hogan' by a couple of kids in the part I've just read. *g*)
The author and artist's name is Naoki Urasawa. Urasawa's previous series, titled Monster, was recently bought by New Line Cinema for production as a motion picture. I've read Monster, too, and although it may have impressed New Line enough to want to make a movie of it I haven't been as impressed by it as all that.
20th Century Boys, however, is excellent. In fact, it is probably one of the best comics I have ever read. And it really feels like a movie, somehow.
So what's it about? Well, summed up in one sentence, it's about fondly remembered children's games that come back to haunt you as an apocalyptic nightmare. And since probably nobody has any idea now what that's supposed to mean: 20th Century Boys is the story of a group of childhood friends who were in fifth or six grade or so around the end of the sixties/beginning of the seventies. In the summer of 1969 they built a 'secret base' in a field and imagined themselves great heroes who fought an evil organisation that was trying to destroy the world. Their elaborate games, fueled by a steady diet of 1960s science fiction manga, they immortalised in a notebook, called 'The Book of Prophecy'.
30 years later, in the late 1990s, they've mostly forgotten their childhood games, have taken up normal jobs and are living, for the most part, unremarkable lives - until a series of bacteriological attacks around the world remind Kenji, formerly one of the leaders of the group, now owner of a small convenience store and substitute father to his sister's abandoned baby, of the 'Book of Prophecy'. As the attacks get bolder he begins to realise that someone is using his childhood fantasies as a template for a large scale plot to take over (or destroy?) the world. The surreal aspect of the situation is fully acknowledged by the comic, for example when Kenji confronts the mysterious leader of the organisation that is doing all this, a man only called 'Friend', with a fake laser gun - little more than a child's toy.
All of this is only the prologue to a story that spans decades and continents and encompasses the lives of more than a dozen protagonists. Urasawa tells his story at several spots or periods in time - so far the years 1969-1971, 1997, 2000, 2014 and the year 3 of a new era (probably around 2018) have featured prominently. In the process, the small group of friends who decide to fight 'Friend' are dispersed, decimated, reassemble, and continue to fight an increasingly desperate battle with little resources against what slowly but surely turns into a totalitarian regime with odd science fiction trappings. A new generation, led by Kenji's niece Kanna, takes up arms against this regime, as well, but things look bleaker and bleaker.
Apart from the relentless, masterfully sustained suspense of the plot and the constant threat of horrible happenings just around the corner the main strength of the series is its characters.
Even the villains are given a lot of depth, and are in some cases, to some degree, sympathetic characters, and the heroes, while undoubtedly heroic, are utterly human, fallible, and occasionally weak. Most of them are fairly normal people who used to live unspectacular, even vaguely pitiful lives before the world went to hell in a handbasket and they decided they had to do something against 'Friend'. When they see real guns for the first time they are visibly shocked. They're people you can sympathise with, root for, and sometimes pity.
Also, Urasawa manages to make new characters that are introduced much later in the story sympathetic and interesting as well. I tend to have problems with 'new' characters taking over large parts of a story after I've gotten used to a given set of main characters, but not so here. I really don't mind 'spending time' with any of them.
Throughout the whole story there's a sense of nostalgia that serves as an emotional touchstone, though it's tinged with something slightly disconcerting, or beginning to be tinged, as more and more of the children's games become true in the real world. An 'Earth Defence Force' that defends Earth against alien invaders isn't so cool anymore if the alien invaders it is fighting are actually rebels against a tyrannical regime, and perfectly human...
To sum it up, this is a long - deliciously long; in fact, not long enough! *g* - comic that sucks you in like a good, exciting novel would, with an interesting premise and very engaging characters. IMO it would be an ideal comic for a non-comic reader who wants to give comics a try, since it really reads much like a novel. It will be published by Viz sometime in the future (within the next few years), but for now, head over to directmanga.com or some place like it and get a taste of it via scanlations. (The scanlations of it are pretty good, too.) You can still buy it - and you should, if you like it enough! - later.
Damn, I really have to learn how to keep these recs short, don't I?! *g*
***
In other news I had a very nice day today, partly packing, and partly geeking out with Nager, Dune, my roommate and another visiting Scaper from the old farscaped mailing list and the sf-community boards. We watched some Doctor Who and then Dune had to leave and the rest of us later made spaghetti with tomato sauce and ate and talked (before I went back to packing again). Then my laptop broke, but at least that means I won't have to carry it to Britain and back. ;-))
As usual I'm afraid of flying... my plane leaves at 19:50 tomorrow, so think of me then and wish me luck.
I've had recurring nightmares about Worldcon recently, mostly about being unprepared for my panels, but yesterday when I finally read through the whole insanely long (99 pages! 99 pages!!!) programme I finally began to feel properly hyped. There's panels and talks on everything, and I do mean everything. Have a look:
http://www.interaction.worldcon.org.uk/sched05.htm
There are very few times when there's less than four simultaneous items I would like to see. Arrgh!
So, anyway, I'm looking forward to it immensely now, though I'm also afraid it will be an absolutely exhausting experience and I may need a holiday afterwards. ;-)
I'm leaving for Worldcon tomorrow and I still have some packing and preparations to do, so I can't write a long entry about my new obsession now, but I've posted quite a few enthused ravings to various message boards, so I can copy some of those and give you a few links.
First, a rec for the series in German:
http://www.sf-community.de/forum/showthread.php?t=5110
Another one in German, but not from yours truly:
http://filmtagebuch.blogger.de/stories/247699/
Now, a slightly rambling rec in English:
http://hellblazer.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=1928
And another one in English, from a board I cannot link to, so I'm copying it here (it's written by me, anyway):
Technically I don't have the time to rec anything at length now, and reccing 20th Century Boys is awkward as well because it's not yet officially released in the English-speaking world. There are scanlations, though, (i.e. fan translations inserted into scans of the Japanese comic), which you can find here:
http://www.directmanga.com
Those aren't frowned upon so much, legally speaking, as long as the comic isn't in print where you live. Also, there exists a French edition already, and we do have a few people who know French here, don't we? (There's a German edition as well, but two of the volumes are a bit hard to get, and there's only 11 volumes out so far whereas in France there's 16.)
The series is still unfinished and volume 19 was recently released in Japan - apparently even including, on a cd, a song by one of the comics' protagonists who's a hobby musician who at one point was close to going pro. The song, which features significantly in the comic, is titled 'Bob Lennon' ("... because it's stolen a bit from Bob Dylan, and a bit from John Lennon." *g*)
The series won the renowned Prix Angoulème recently in France; that's probably the most important French comic award. I'm told not many foreign comics manage to nick one of those. It's also won a couple of big awards in Japan and is very popular there. Alas, it's not so popular in Germany, where people still don't understand that comics aren't 'just for children'.
So, yeah, to start with the basics, this is a manga. Wait, don't click away now - it's probably not what you expect. No absurdly big eyes and tiny mouths. No 'cuteness'. No magical girls. No pretty boys. No giant robots. Well, almost no giant robots. There's kind of a pretend robot at one point, but that doesn't count, right?
To dispel any misgivings about the artwork right away, here's a link to some samples. Click on the covers to see them:
http://www.s-book.com/plsql/com2_search?sha=all&pat=b2&text=20%90%A2%8BI%8F%AD%94N&page=1
Or look here:
http://sbookg.s-book.com/sol/sky_gif/tanko_sample3/185532.gif
So, as you can see, it's drawn in a fairly 'naturalistic' style. (The guy in the monk's robe, btw, is possibly my favourite character in the series, though he's not exactly a monk when he appears again later and at greater length. Rather, he's just been identified as 'Hulk Hogan' by a couple of kids in the part I've just read. *g*)
The author and artist's name is Naoki Urasawa. Urasawa's previous series, titled Monster, was recently bought by New Line Cinema for production as a motion picture. I've read Monster, too, and although it may have impressed New Line enough to want to make a movie of it I haven't been as impressed by it as all that.
20th Century Boys, however, is excellent. In fact, it is probably one of the best comics I have ever read. And it really feels like a movie, somehow.
So what's it about? Well, summed up in one sentence, it's about fondly remembered children's games that come back to haunt you as an apocalyptic nightmare. And since probably nobody has any idea now what that's supposed to mean: 20th Century Boys is the story of a group of childhood friends who were in fifth or six grade or so around the end of the sixties/beginning of the seventies. In the summer of 1969 they built a 'secret base' in a field and imagined themselves great heroes who fought an evil organisation that was trying to destroy the world. Their elaborate games, fueled by a steady diet of 1960s science fiction manga, they immortalised in a notebook, called 'The Book of Prophecy'.
30 years later, in the late 1990s, they've mostly forgotten their childhood games, have taken up normal jobs and are living, for the most part, unremarkable lives - until a series of bacteriological attacks around the world remind Kenji, formerly one of the leaders of the group, now owner of a small convenience store and substitute father to his sister's abandoned baby, of the 'Book of Prophecy'. As the attacks get bolder he begins to realise that someone is using his childhood fantasies as a template for a large scale plot to take over (or destroy?) the world. The surreal aspect of the situation is fully acknowledged by the comic, for example when Kenji confronts the mysterious leader of the organisation that is doing all this, a man only called 'Friend', with a fake laser gun - little more than a child's toy.
All of this is only the prologue to a story that spans decades and continents and encompasses the lives of more than a dozen protagonists. Urasawa tells his story at several spots or periods in time - so far the years 1969-1971, 1997, 2000, 2014 and the year 3 of a new era (probably around 2018) have featured prominently. In the process, the small group of friends who decide to fight 'Friend' are dispersed, decimated, reassemble, and continue to fight an increasingly desperate battle with little resources against what slowly but surely turns into a totalitarian regime with odd science fiction trappings. A new generation, led by Kenji's niece Kanna, takes up arms against this regime, as well, but things look bleaker and bleaker.
Apart from the relentless, masterfully sustained suspense of the plot and the constant threat of horrible happenings just around the corner the main strength of the series is its characters.
Even the villains are given a lot of depth, and are in some cases, to some degree, sympathetic characters, and the heroes, while undoubtedly heroic, are utterly human, fallible, and occasionally weak. Most of them are fairly normal people who used to live unspectacular, even vaguely pitiful lives before the world went to hell in a handbasket and they decided they had to do something against 'Friend'. When they see real guns for the first time they are visibly shocked. They're people you can sympathise with, root for, and sometimes pity.
Also, Urasawa manages to make new characters that are introduced much later in the story sympathetic and interesting as well. I tend to have problems with 'new' characters taking over large parts of a story after I've gotten used to a given set of main characters, but not so here. I really don't mind 'spending time' with any of them.
Throughout the whole story there's a sense of nostalgia that serves as an emotional touchstone, though it's tinged with something slightly disconcerting, or beginning to be tinged, as more and more of the children's games become true in the real world. An 'Earth Defence Force' that defends Earth against alien invaders isn't so cool anymore if the alien invaders it is fighting are actually rebels against a tyrannical regime, and perfectly human...
To sum it up, this is a long - deliciously long; in fact, not long enough! *g* - comic that sucks you in like a good, exciting novel would, with an interesting premise and very engaging characters. IMO it would be an ideal comic for a non-comic reader who wants to give comics a try, since it really reads much like a novel. It will be published by Viz sometime in the future (within the next few years), but for now, head over to directmanga.com or some place like it and get a taste of it via scanlations. (The scanlations of it are pretty good, too.) You can still buy it - and you should, if you like it enough! - later.
Damn, I really have to learn how to keep these recs short, don't I?! *g*
***
In other news I had a very nice day today, partly packing, and partly geeking out with Nager, Dune, my roommate and another visiting Scaper from the old farscaped mailing list and the sf-community boards. We watched some Doctor Who and then Dune had to leave and the rest of us later made spaghetti with tomato sauce and ate and talked (before I went back to packing again). Then my laptop broke, but at least that means I won't have to carry it to Britain and back. ;-))
As usual I'm afraid of flying... my plane leaves at 19:50 tomorrow, so think of me then and wish me luck.
I've had recurring nightmares about Worldcon recently, mostly about being unprepared for my panels, but yesterday when I finally read through the whole insanely long (99 pages! 99 pages!!!) programme I finally began to feel properly hyped. There's panels and talks on everything, and I do mean everything. Have a look:
http://www.interaction.worldcon.org.uk/sched05.htm
There are very few times when there's less than four simultaneous items I would like to see. Arrgh!
So, anyway, I'm looking forward to it immensely now, though I'm also afraid it will be an absolutely exhausting experience and I may need a holiday afterwards. ;-)