Sollosi has been going comics-crazy
It's true. The past two and a half to three years, I've been devouring manga, manhwa, and Western comics like Pringles. This is in large part to the discovery of sites like stoptazmo and onemanga, but I can probably pinpoint it down to the comics case study that I did in my Media Studies 201 class three years ago, in which Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud and Watchmen by Alan Moore were both reading assignments. Really, before then the only comics I owned were Calvin and Hobbes anthologies (still the best daily strip of all time, bar none). So I'll do something a little crazy now: I'll jot down some info on five manga and one manhwa that I've read over the past three years as some quick recommendations. These aren't necessarily my favorites (note the lack of One Piece and Death Note), but they're all great reads. I'm avoiding Western comics, because they aren't available on the internet for free as readily as these are. Also, I did a little summary similar to this about a year ago, in September 2007; I'm not repeating anything from that list.
Great Teacher Onizuka - 200 chapters, completed
GTO just delivers on every level. There's comedy, drama, compelling characters, good art, and a clear arc that satisfies the reader at story's end. The setup is something like a completely ridiculous manga version of Welcome Back Kotter, in which a former delinquent that recently graduated from a fifth-rate university decides to become a teacher. At first his goal is to make it with some hot schoolgirls, but after awhile he realizes that he really wants to become a teacher so he can make school fun again for kids that have grown to hate school and teachers.
Most of his students and several teachers and school officials are hell-bent on running him out (his class is a legendary group of teacher slayers that had already driven at least two other teachers to insanity), but Onizuka's determination, strength, and surprising wisdom always carry him through and his list of allies grows and grows as the series wears on. This is one series that always satisfies and never stops being exciting or at least interesting. Definitely in my top five of all time.
Liar Game - ~30-40 chapters in English, ongoing
I know that this one has only barely started, but it has some great moments and I get more intrigued with each passing chapter. Liar Game is about a girl that's painfully honest. Really, it's almost sad. So of course she ends up taking part in a special game that rewards dishonesty. Basically, a mysterious corporation is targeting people in debt to play a game that allows them either to win large sums of money or increase their debt by even more. Our heroine starts losing badly early on, so she begs a legendary ex-con to help her out so she can continue supporting her hospitalized father.
The games themselves are what keeps the series interesting. Each round of the game is a match of wits between at least two players, sort of like The Prisoner's Dilemma or Deck Head. The strategies and twists of each round are an about-equal mix of obvious and completely insane. Definitely recommended if you're interested in a drama with something different.
Shin Angyo Onshi - 75 large-sized chapters, complete
I'll say it right now - the art in Shin Angyo Onshi is the best art in any comic I have ever read or seen. It's gorgeous. It takes me longer to read than other manga since I have to look at every detail. But enough of that. Shin Angyo Onshi is unusual - a manhwa written by a team of Koreans, then translated into Japanese and published in a manga magazine. That's right - a Korean manga that isn't published in Korea. Weird
But enough trivia - Shin Angyo Onshi tells the story of an Angyo Onshi (a kind of "special agent" in feudal Korea that went around solving problems on the ruling powers' authority) that travels with his shy foxy lady bodyguard and his annoying little kid manservant, searching for the man that brought his home kingdom to ruins. The story borrows liberally from various Korean folk tales, using them both to give exposition to major characters and also to provide side stories largely unrelated to the series' main plot; it's all very well-implemented, and I felt that much more cultured after following up by researching some of the folk tales that the story borrows from. The biggest draw, however, is the story's protagonist, Munsu. Munsu is a bit of anti-hero that is incredibly rough around the edges and has a past so mysterious that you will want to read it to the end just to figure out what was up with _____ and ______ and naturally _______. It's good. And it has really, really pretty pictures.
Slam Dunk - 276 chapters, complete
Slam Dunk is a classic, and it's the only manga here that's over fifteen years old. Right behind Dragonball, it's the second-highest selling completed manga in Shounen Jump history. Basically it's about the Shohoku high school basketball team making a run at the national championship, but it's much more than that. The main character only joins the team to impress a girl, but ends up becoming a force on the court and learning to love a game that he hadn't heard of until high school. The main character's rival is a basketball prodigy that feels shackled by playing in Japan when the best basketball in the world is played in America. The team captain is a great center that has never made the inter-high playoffs and tries to unite the other four starters (all of whom are delinquents / incredibly poor students) into a team that gets the most out of every player. There's a lot of drama here.
Now, basketball was never very popular in Japan, and most kids there in the early 90s weren't basketball fans at all until Slam Dunk. This manga was good enough to build interest in the NBA over there, and part of the reason it succeeded was because the characters seem so genuine. None of them would be out of place in a really, really good spots movie. My favorites are the old former coach of one of the enemy teams that was fired because his run 'n gun philosophy could never make it to the inter-high semifinals and the ace of Shohoku's rival team, whose incredibly laid-back attitude makes him one of the series most entertaining "villains". But trust me, if you have any passing interest in basketball, Slam Dunk is worth a read. My only caveat is the Bleach-style drawn-out length of it. There are only six complete 5v5 games shown in the series, and it's 30+ volumes and 276 chapters. That's long.
Monster - 143 chapters, complete
This one starts out as a medical drama, turns into a crime drama, and ends up as a character-driven suspense thriller that keeps you guessing until the very end. A successful Japanese brain surgeon living in Germany starts to question the hospital's politics and decides to save the life of a young German boy that had been shot in the head rather than the town's mayor, who had an aneurysm. The boy lives and the mayor dies as a result, killing the poor doctor's chances at career advancement and causing his materialistic girlfriend to break up with him. Even more unfortunately, that boy turns out to be a sadistic killer, murdering several of the doctor's hospital rivals in thanks, inadvertently framing the doctor as the killer.
Determined to right his wrong and bring the boy to justice, the doctor becomes a fugitive from the law, traveling across Germany to learn of the boy's origin, to find out why he became a monster and what his long-term plans might be. On the way, he meets several people from the boy's past and gets caught up in the boy's scheme, all while dodging an incredibly dedicated genius-intellect detective. Now, if this doesn't sound awesome to you, then you and I significantly differ in tastes. Monster is an intense drama that lacks supernatural or magical elements and instead keeps you reading thanks to a wonderfully-paced plot full of intrigue and suspense.
History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi - 310+ chapters, ongoing
If HSDK seems like one of those "endles shounen" series like Dragonball, Naruto, Bleach, or One Piece, then you'd be right. The end is in sight (I think I already have the "final boss" of sorts picked out), but there is still a lot of fighting to be done - it isn't slow-moving like Bleach, there's just a LOT of content. The skinny is that Kenichi is a loser without any talent, but a strong desire to improve himself. He makes friends with a cute girl (a mostly-unrequited crush) and accompanies her home one day to discover that she lives in a dojo with her martial arts master grandfather and five other world-class martial artists. All six masters decide to take Kenichi under their wing, and have him undergo completely absurd training methods in order to become the strongest disciple in history (they jokingly decide on this title because they say Kenichi is so talentless that he'll never become a master).
Really, a good shounen manga needs good action, and Kenichi has action. The martial arts depicted are a mix of real/practical (the first several techniques he learns in the series are good examples) and nuts/fictional (Kenichi's signature attack later on, the Seikuken, is a good example). The series also has some (ahem) exaggerated females and falls under DBZ and Bleach's "every villain becomes a hero" stereotype. But still, despite being occasionally generic or too weird, Kenichi has good action, great humor, and very entertaining characters. It's reaching a point where it's hard to keep track of the entire cast, but that's to be expected, I guess. Definitely recommended if you like that shounen type.
So that's it. Those are six of my favorite projects, most of them read in the last year or so. If any of that sounded interesting, be sure to check them out. End transmission.
Great Teacher Onizuka - 200 chapters, completed
GTO just delivers on every level. There's comedy, drama, compelling characters, good art, and a clear arc that satisfies the reader at story's end. The setup is something like a completely ridiculous manga version of Welcome Back Kotter, in which a former delinquent that recently graduated from a fifth-rate university decides to become a teacher. At first his goal is to make it with some hot schoolgirls, but after awhile he realizes that he really wants to become a teacher so he can make school fun again for kids that have grown to hate school and teachers.
Most of his students and several teachers and school officials are hell-bent on running him out (his class is a legendary group of teacher slayers that had already driven at least two other teachers to insanity), but Onizuka's determination, strength, and surprising wisdom always carry him through and his list of allies grows and grows as the series wears on. This is one series that always satisfies and never stops being exciting or at least interesting. Definitely in my top five of all time.
Liar Game - ~30-40 chapters in English, ongoing
I know that this one has only barely started, but it has some great moments and I get more intrigued with each passing chapter. Liar Game is about a girl that's painfully honest. Really, it's almost sad. So of course she ends up taking part in a special game that rewards dishonesty. Basically, a mysterious corporation is targeting people in debt to play a game that allows them either to win large sums of money or increase their debt by even more. Our heroine starts losing badly early on, so she begs a legendary ex-con to help her out so she can continue supporting her hospitalized father.
The games themselves are what keeps the series interesting. Each round of the game is a match of wits between at least two players, sort of like The Prisoner's Dilemma or Deck Head. The strategies and twists of each round are an about-equal mix of obvious and completely insane. Definitely recommended if you're interested in a drama with something different.
Shin Angyo Onshi - 75 large-sized chapters, complete
I'll say it right now - the art in Shin Angyo Onshi is the best art in any comic I have ever read or seen. It's gorgeous. It takes me longer to read than other manga since I have to look at every detail. But enough of that. Shin Angyo Onshi is unusual - a manhwa written by a team of Koreans, then translated into Japanese and published in a manga magazine. That's right - a Korean manga that isn't published in Korea. Weird
But enough trivia - Shin Angyo Onshi tells the story of an Angyo Onshi (a kind of "special agent" in feudal Korea that went around solving problems on the ruling powers' authority) that travels with his shy foxy lady bodyguard and his annoying little kid manservant, searching for the man that brought his home kingdom to ruins. The story borrows liberally from various Korean folk tales, using them both to give exposition to major characters and also to provide side stories largely unrelated to the series' main plot; it's all very well-implemented, and I felt that much more cultured after following up by researching some of the folk tales that the story borrows from. The biggest draw, however, is the story's protagonist, Munsu. Munsu is a bit of anti-hero that is incredibly rough around the edges and has a past so mysterious that you will want to read it to the end just to figure out what was up with _____ and ______ and naturally _______. It's good. And it has really, really pretty pictures.
Slam Dunk - 276 chapters, complete
Slam Dunk is a classic, and it's the only manga here that's over fifteen years old. Right behind Dragonball, it's the second-highest selling completed manga in Shounen Jump history. Basically it's about the Shohoku high school basketball team making a run at the national championship, but it's much more than that. The main character only joins the team to impress a girl, but ends up becoming a force on the court and learning to love a game that he hadn't heard of until high school. The main character's rival is a basketball prodigy that feels shackled by playing in Japan when the best basketball in the world is played in America. The team captain is a great center that has never made the inter-high playoffs and tries to unite the other four starters (all of whom are delinquents / incredibly poor students) into a team that gets the most out of every player. There's a lot of drama here.
Now, basketball was never very popular in Japan, and most kids there in the early 90s weren't basketball fans at all until Slam Dunk. This manga was good enough to build interest in the NBA over there, and part of the reason it succeeded was because the characters seem so genuine. None of them would be out of place in a really, really good spots movie. My favorites are the old former coach of one of the enemy teams that was fired because his run 'n gun philosophy could never make it to the inter-high semifinals and the ace of Shohoku's rival team, whose incredibly laid-back attitude makes him one of the series most entertaining "villains". But trust me, if you have any passing interest in basketball, Slam Dunk is worth a read. My only caveat is the Bleach-style drawn-out length of it. There are only six complete 5v5 games shown in the series, and it's 30+ volumes and 276 chapters. That's long.
Monster - 143 chapters, complete
This one starts out as a medical drama, turns into a crime drama, and ends up as a character-driven suspense thriller that keeps you guessing until the very end. A successful Japanese brain surgeon living in Germany starts to question the hospital's politics and decides to save the life of a young German boy that had been shot in the head rather than the town's mayor, who had an aneurysm. The boy lives and the mayor dies as a result, killing the poor doctor's chances at career advancement and causing his materialistic girlfriend to break up with him. Even more unfortunately, that boy turns out to be a sadistic killer, murdering several of the doctor's hospital rivals in thanks, inadvertently framing the doctor as the killer.
Determined to right his wrong and bring the boy to justice, the doctor becomes a fugitive from the law, traveling across Germany to learn of the boy's origin, to find out why he became a monster and what his long-term plans might be. On the way, he meets several people from the boy's past and gets caught up in the boy's scheme, all while dodging an incredibly dedicated genius-intellect detective. Now, if this doesn't sound awesome to you, then you and I significantly differ in tastes. Monster is an intense drama that lacks supernatural or magical elements and instead keeps you reading thanks to a wonderfully-paced plot full of intrigue and suspense.
History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi - 310+ chapters, ongoing
If HSDK seems like one of those "endles shounen" series like Dragonball, Naruto, Bleach, or One Piece, then you'd be right. The end is in sight (I think I already have the "final boss" of sorts picked out), but there is still a lot of fighting to be done - it isn't slow-moving like Bleach, there's just a LOT of content. The skinny is that Kenichi is a loser without any talent, but a strong desire to improve himself. He makes friends with a cute girl (a mostly-unrequited crush) and accompanies her home one day to discover that she lives in a dojo with her martial arts master grandfather and five other world-class martial artists. All six masters decide to take Kenichi under their wing, and have him undergo completely absurd training methods in order to become the strongest disciple in history (they jokingly decide on this title because they say Kenichi is so talentless that he'll never become a master).
Really, a good shounen manga needs good action, and Kenichi has action. The martial arts depicted are a mix of real/practical (the first several techniques he learns in the series are good examples) and nuts/fictional (Kenichi's signature attack later on, the Seikuken, is a good example). The series also has some (ahem) exaggerated females and falls under DBZ and Bleach's "every villain becomes a hero" stereotype. But still, despite being occasionally generic or too weird, Kenichi has good action, great humor, and very entertaining characters. It's reaching a point where it's hard to keep track of the entire cast, but that's to be expected, I guess. Definitely recommended if you like that shounen type.
So that's it. Those are six of my favorite projects, most of them read in the last year or so. If any of that sounded interesting, be sure to check them out. End transmission.