I mean, if we’re doing an anime worth watching each month, it only makes sense we do a manga worth reading as well right?
So this is ultimately the feature of dreams. Manga is vast, and there’s certainly a lot of it to consume, whether it’s published in your country, or someone’s fan translating that one title no one will know about until it gets an anime, or you happen to find an out of print title that deserves some recognition somehow. So that’s what this is for: to share some of that with us! It better be good though! And be respectful of links. Or something like that.
So, what manga was worth reading in July? Well…
Justin: Pretty much without a doubt, Osamu Tezuka’s Message to Adolf is the title I read that blew me away this month. (Advance apologies to My Love Story!!, which I’ll give it’s own spotlight with a review hopefully next week). My history with this title is weird. I had Part I last year, but aside from reading a few chapters, I kept stopping and starting. Then I picked up Part 2 early this year, and planned on reading everything again. That didn’t happen. So I seemed set on just not actually reading Message To Adolf at any point until, oddly enough, I was encouraged to bring stuff to read to work on Sunday because Sunday work is boring! And not a lot of people show up on Sunday at my job.
So I brought it. And I was so mesmerized that I read Part I and Part II in the course of three days.
The story, while it introduces a cast of characters, revolves around three: Adolf Kamil, a Jew living in Japan, Adolf Kaufmann, a Japanese/German who happens to be friends with Kamil in Japan, and Adolf Hitler, who needs little introduction, and how their lives are ultimately connected because of a document that showed Hitler had Jewish blood in him. At the start of the manga, you know these 3 characters are dead, as they are told from the eyes of Japanese reporter Sohei Toge. From then on it’s stepping into a political minefield, outdated and not surprising cultural views, and lots of violence, which isn’t a shock since this spans from the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, to post WWII.
As I finished the manga, the first thing I could only go is, “Yes, Tezuka’s works are old and crap, but damn his works are STILL better than a lot of the current manga going on right now.” There’s so many moving parts in this manga — from learning about the documents, to various political factions angling to get the documents, to going from country to country, etc — and it manages to tie together in a wonderful, almost you have to keep going to find out what the hell’s gonna happen to Miss Ogi (wait, who? Exactly!), or anyone else in this work. Hell, you even wonder just what happens to Hitler and his inglorious, worthless end. Many characters appear and are developed with clarity and conviction that even if they didn’t have a grand scheme overall you felt for them. The story and plot points themselves — from elaborating on each country’s war tactics and seminal moments from start to finish, the Reds and the inability to not trust a single person, group, or faction to leak the document and cripple Hitler’s ambitions, etc, were engrossing and hard to put down.
I’d say any flaw with this series is that with its breakneck pacing, it can lead to rushed moments — an example being a super spy who was built up to be one of the best getting caught and then eventually giving up — but honestly, it’s mere nitpicking. This is a work that requires a lot of your time, your devotion, and your attention. This is definitely one of the best manga still on the market that you have to go buy. Like, go buy now, and don’t make the same mistake I made and leave it on your shelf for years.
Reading Silver Spoon is always a great pleasure. Reading Silver Spoon always provides the right amount of fun and drama all in a single volume.
Volume 7 is still part of the volumes that have been adapted into anime so you probably know what’s going on already. Volume 7 is the mandatory cultural festival (though it’s more a food festival, we’re talking about these guys you know). It’s also the volume in which Hachiken collapses and it starts on the Ichiro problem.
All in all, it feels heavier than in the anime. I still couldn’t stop smiling at some moments of cuteness and stupidness but it’s heavy. I don’t think it’s too heavy though. I mean. Yes it’s sometimes hard to watch but it also feels incredibly real. Hiromu Arakawa really does everything well.
As usual, I cannot stop waiting for the release of next volume, even though I already know the story because I watched the anime. The next one is released in France in November. I’m not sure I can wait.
The bare bones story is that former delinquent, Mafuyu Kurosaki, transfers to Midori Ga Oka, and, despite starting out with dreams of being the exact opposite of a delinquent, becomes fast friends with the delinquent she sits next to, Hayasaka. The two are then drafted into the Disciplinary Club by Mafuyu’s homeroom teacher and childhood friend, Takaomi Saeki.
The best thing about the story is that it doesn’t get bogged down by silly drama. There’s none of the typical shoujo nonsense here. Though Oresama has more sentimental moments, it’s largely light-hearted and comedic, with the comedy being a bit similar to what you see in Nozaki-kun, meaning that a good portion of it often leaves me laughing, or, at the very, least smiling.
That said, the biggest draw when it comes to Oresama Teacher is, hands down, the characters. As with most things I love, it’s hard to put my finger on what exactly makes them so endearing. Their silliness? The way they play off each other? Their relatively simplistic natures?
Take Mafuyu, for instance, who has quickly climbed her way onto my list of favorite characters, and is absolutely precious. She’s far from your typical shoujo heroine with her tendency to get into fights, but she genuinely cares for the people around her and does her best to help them to the best of her ability. She doesn’t really get caught up in stupid drama but has a number of sentimental moments that furthers her as a character. In addition to Mafuyu, you also have her best friend Hayasaka. He’s a bit dim and has to have his ass saved off and on by one of Mafuyu’s alternate identities, but he’s endearing in the care he shows for his friends. Together, he and Mafuyu make up one my favorite BFF duos. Though the rest of the cast is pretty golden themselves, I’ll spare you some blabbing and leave it at this is one of those rare manga where genuinely hating or being permanently annoyed with a character is pretty hard to do which is really nice.
Truth be told, I, personally, think I’m pretty crap at giving persuading people to try things out since most of the time, my reasoning tends to boil down to “I really liked this, this, and this. The whole thing’s great. I really like it.” Hopefully, I’ve been able to do a semi-adequate job of making anyone even vaguely want to check out Oresama Teacher because it’s genuinely good. The story and characters are simple, but they don’t fall into any of the usual shoujo stereotypes and end up being really likeable. Did I already mention it’s by the same person who is doing Nozaki-kun and is just as, if not more, enjoyable?
If anything, give it a shot for the sake of seeing Usa-chan Man.
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Justin
Justin is the founder of Organization Anti-Social Geniuses. Anime & manga fan that likes to blog about anime and manga, is addicted to sports, and weak to crossovers. You can follow Justin on Twitter @Kami_nomi.
Latest posts by Justin (see all)
- Manga Worth Reading July 2014 - July 31, 2014
- Anime Worth Watching July 2014 - July 31, 2014
- Takeshi Obata’s Gonna Be At New York Comic Con - July 29, 2014
- Viewster Steps Into The Anime Streaming Service Game - July 29, 2014
- This Is How You Can Watch Anime Legally in 2014 - July 28, 2014
