mangacocktail

[mangacocktail]

Manga & Anime : Magi, The Labyrinth of Magic

Sup’ !

The former post was about Fairy Tail and I promised I’d get back to you about similar works that are at least as good in my opinion. And I am going to talk about Magi today, who I think is far superior and an ongoing work.

♥   THE STORY   ♥

The story of Magi is set in an alternate recreation of the ancient world with several regions and nations having some resemblances with real-life counterparts from that time (Mid-orient, asian empire, Roman empire, medieval trading cities, Egyptian nation, old tribes, magician scholar nation…). In this world, all living beings possess an essence known as Rukh and when they die, this essence returns to the “great flow” of Rukh that gives life to all subsequent beings in an eternal cycle of rebirth called “Fate”.

Years ago, several magic castles / towers or various shapes, full of treasures and traps known as “Dungeons” appeared across the world. Power, fame, wealth: many are those who entered a dungeon in quest of glory but never came back.

Magi tells the story of Alibaba Saluja, a young lad working for an asshole of a merchant who hopes someday of conquering a dungeon, acquire more power and reclaim the throne of his home kingdom of Balbadd, as its former prince. On the marketplace, he meets a curious boy called Aladdin who has been travelling the world for a little while. It appears Aladdin is friend with a djinn named Ugo that dwells within the flute he carries around his neck, and can summon some of his huge muscular bodyparts to escape the predicaments the young boy encounters.

It’s a tough world out of there: countries are at war, monsters roam around outside the urban area, and the slave trade is flourishing. A thing leading to another, the two lads escape death by entering the local dungeon and have to face the traps and challenges of the Djinn that rules it if they want to survive and be allowed to leave !

This is only but the beginning of their adventures in this beautiful world, shaped by many conflicting ideologies and the magic of the rukh. Meanwhile, a dark organization known as Al-Thamen seem to control some leaders as puppets, corrupt people’s Rukh and make them fall intro “depravity” …

♠    MY OPINION   ♠

This exotic and refreshing melting-pot of cultures and civilization makes up for very interesting and diverse world. It is very enjoyable to see more things inspired from the mid-orient and its myths !

Even though this is definitely a neat shonen, this piece of work focuses on the conflicting ideologies and cultural differences of all these civilization fighting through war or trade. Everyone is trying to lead their people to glory and bend destiny their way, may they be benevolent or greedy. But behind the scenes there is something much bigger at stake, with the God at the source of the rukh and magoi (magic power) ruling this world …

But yeah its a shonen! Dungeons, creatures, marital arts, swordsmanship and magic! Magi is a perfect example of what a well-balanced and well-executed shonen is like: the story of young and older human beings taking on the world and its complexity. It focuses on the differences between people and also what unites them. Its character design and rhetoric makes sense, it feels real. These characters are whole, and not defined by one or two traits. They questions their own ways, win and lose. They question what is right or wrong and their place in this world.

But again, it’s a shonen ! Just sit back and enjoy. It’s not fucking european geopolitics or elaborate trumponomics (yes, this is an oxymoron).

♦   THE DRAWING    ♦

The drawing is good and the visual effects of magic and djinn equips looks great: you won’t be disappointed. I really like how most spells have arabic names, and the style of the djinns.

The style improves as the story progresses, but honestly it’s of solid quality right from the start. The color pages are radiant and beautiful ! Magi is a very colorful anime.

♣    TO WRAP-IT UP   ♣

Magi is 350+ chapters strong and even had its own spinoff “The Adventures of Sinbad” (who is an important character in Magi) running in parallel. It tells the journey of young Sinbad, a man who can see destiny and believe in his vision like no one else, as he conquers dungeons and tries to build his own country !

Several seasons of Magi are available in the anime. As for the manga, its slowly coming to an end (I’d say before the end of the year). The Adventures of Sinbad will get their own anime as well (100 + chapters at the moment).

If you liked Fairy Tail, you will absolutely love Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic (and the spinoff “The Adventures of Sinbad”), who is in my humble opinion really better.

[mangacocktail]

Manga / Anime : FAIRY TAIL & RAVE

Hello everyone ! I’m sure you know about Fairy Tail. The adventures of Lucy, Natsu and their friends from the Fairy Tail guild have been going for over a decade now. I still remember translating the first chapters of the manga from English to French, back when I was in a scantrad team: I was 18 (shit, I’m old). It was fun and exciting, like a lot of mangas / anime when we discover the world the author created, before we are committed to a serious storyline. But I also remember how I kinda lost interest years ago, tired of the rinse and repeat “power of friendship” trick with each wave of foes. To be honest I haven’t been excited reading Fairy Tail for a long time: I just wanted to see the story to the end. It is very average. It leaves me flaccid. This week, the Fairy Tail manga will be brought to a conclusion. Those of you who watch the anime got time ahead of you, still !

Do you know of Hiro Mashima’s previous work called Rave (or Rave Master or The Groove Adventure Rave depending where you live) ? It shares a lot of similarities with Fairy Tail. Actually, some characters are either directly copied from it or just really an upgrade / v2.0. The hero is called Haru (means Spring in Japanese, while Natsu is summer), his buddy Musica is basically Gray v1.0 and their amnesiac new girl acquaintance Elie (who will of course be not really useful for a while, until she figures out her powers and learns she’s special and shit etc. Typical) is the equivalent of Lucy in Fairy Tail.

The shape-shifting gear of Erza is strongly inspired from Haru’s shapeshifting sword. The Oracion Seis, Sieg Hart (aka Jellal) and even Plue were sometimes pretty much copy-pasted from Rave! Julia, Aquarius, many traits or roles of secondary characters … everything was already there ! All of the characters / pictures in this post are from Rave, only one image is from Fairy Tail ! 

Little game : can you guess what characters of Fairy Tail were modeled after the characters of Rave in the color picture ? Or in the double black &white page ? 

♦   RAVE : THE STORY   ♦

Now for a little synopsis of Rave (from https://myanimelist.net/anime/246/Groove_Adventure_Rave):

Long ago, a war was waged between the forces of darkness and light as Dark Brings—stones containing dark power beyond human ability—put the world at risk with their destructive force. In order to stem the tide of darkness, a lone swordsman used holy power known as the Rave to destroy the source of every Dark Brings. The resulting explosion, which came to be known as the Overdrive, destroyed a tenth of the world; fragments of the Rave were scattered throughout.

Groove Adventure Rave takes place fifty years after the Overdrive. A group known as Demon Card has collected the remaining Dark Brings, using them to lay siege to a number of towns. Meanwhile, a young swordsman by the name of Haru Glory has inherited both the Rave and its guardian, Plue, making him the next Rave Master. With the aid of an amnesiac drifter by the name of Elie and a silver-manipulating blacksmith by the name of Musica, Haru must scour the world in search of the scattered Rave Stones and put an end to the Dark Brings and Demon Card for once and for all. During his travels and battles, he will learn about the truth behind these stones and the Overdrive…

♥    THE NOSTALGIA    ♥

I had a good time reading Rave back then. Of course I am being a somewhat biased nostalgic little shit, here. I was also 16 or something.

I don’t remember it to be as dumb as Fairy Tail, which features an idiot of a main protagonist punching his way through the story with the power of fire or friends. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t. God I hope it wasn’t.

Sword, magic, dragons (dragon-warriors even !) … Rave was a decent ride. A generic shot at fantasy-adventure manga. It got it right. Of course, the style of Fairy Tale is more polished. But it’s like these guys who want to re-write their PhD thesis 7 years after they submitted their manuscript and graduated: It looks and sounds a bit better but that’s still the same stuff, except its not state-of-the-art anymore.

You probably understand now why I’m a bit annoyed when I hear people say “Fairy Tail is so good !”. It’s not that great at all, especially when you realize how much was copy-pasted into it from other (older) works or done better before it. There are loads of better (yet similar) shonen than it (Have you heard about Magi ?). But I enjoyed part of it and I’m glad you’re having a great time with it !

♣    TO WRAP IT UP    ♣

The Rave anime can be found on some torrent tracker sites and… there’s a surprising amount of seeders for something that has been over for 10 years !

As for the manga scans, you can find them bundled in volumes and such since we IRC scantrad teams used to have them on bots for DDL back then !

I hope you found this little post interesting, and that maybe you’ll have a quick look at Rave, out of curiosity. 

If you like Fairy Tail and want similar (or better) then the next short post will make you happy, as I will suggest you ongoing works that are at least as good !

[mangacocktail]

♠  Castlevania mini-series  ♠

Hi ! Just a quick post about the Castlevania series released on Netflix a few days ago. Just to be clear, this is not a manga/manwha/anime but an (American) cartoon. That’s why I will make it short. Inspired from the Castlevania video games, this first season only contains 4 episodes of 25 minutes each. It tells you about the origin of Dracula’s army of monsters ravaging the lands of Wallachia in the 15th century, as well as how Trevor Belmont (from the Belmont family of hunters that appear in many Castlevania games) enters this story. The target audience is definitely adults, with a fair amount of blood and pain thrown around. It’s done seriously, and the animation can be particularly good, as you will see in the stylish sword fight in episode 4 ! No bullshit here: straight action and good atmosphere. Good characters who mean business, while retaining some personality ! A second season of 8 episodes is already planned. Go watch it, it’s really not a big commitment ! For those of you who don’t have Netflix or view streaming as an acceptable alternative I just watched all the episodes here:  http://www14.soul-anime.us/watch/castlevania-episode-1/

[mangacocktail]

Manhwa : Magician

Hello everyone !

Today I'm gonna talk about what is possibly my favorite manwha so far : Magician (by Kim Sarae).

♣   THE STORY    ♣

Magician starts as the story of young Iremy and her friend Enzo, both living in the peaceful village of Adatt on the island of Nevis.

Iremy is the tomboy grand-daughter of a local witch and is incredibly skilled with magic. She spends most of her time studying the runes and learning under the village elders who consider her to be a special child. Because of her intelligence and skills, the red-haired girl is however short-tempered and arrogant. Enzo is a novice yet strong swordsman her age, learning the sword from his father. The two have been living in the village for a few years. Although more respectful and easy-going than Iremy, he is still a brat at heart.

One day, one of the elders foresees an extremely powerful magician coming to the village: he is rumored to be the 300 year-old immortal and evil "Ethermask". Excited, Iremy drags Enzo to both challenge the man before he reaches the village. They are no match for the monstrous power of Ethermask, who recognizes the talent of the brats, especially Iremi.

The fight is interrupted as Enzo notices black smoke coming from the village, attacked by a fire mage and others seeking to kill Ethermask. A fire mage, coming from the country of Teodore insisted that the village took their side in the upcoming war and lent them the power of the forest. The master of the village declined resulting in an escalation of violence: Enzo's father died in the fight. Ethermask saves Enzo in extremis from the fire mage, who recognizes him. He prompty vanishes in the air after laughing "we finally found you."

After settling things down and taking care of his business, Ethermask reluctantly agrees to kids and him setting off together: Enzo in quest of revenge, Iremy just for the ride, and Ethermask himself searching for a mysterious manuscript. Their journey will plunge them in the middle of the war between the two powerful nations or Aruman and Teodore, and the darkness surrounding Iremy and Edermask ...

♦     THE STYLE    ♦

Magician is fully colored and its style is a bit rough at the beginning : I recommend you push forward ! The lines are pretty light, and the pastel coloring can seem a bit dirty. Art and story are the work of a single person, not a whole team like in serialized mangas (frequent situation in manwha).

Although the quality of the first chapters is not too high, the fight scenes (movements and special effects) and the backgrounds are clearly above average and have great potential; they just keep getting better.

The character design is really really good and the style consistently evolves as the story progresses: by the second ark it is already FUCKING FANTASTIC.

♥    TO WRAP IT UP     ♥

It is one of the best work I have read in the last decade and a unique take at serious fantasy. It's usually the first manwha I recommend to anime/manga afficionados who want to know the good stuff !

Magician is about 400 chapters deep and is going through its final and 3rd arch. Its mood is set between a shonen and a seinen: it is a serious story with adults fighting real battles and not bullshit about the power of friendship. Both passion and real warfare / strategy are involved. Characters are real, their growth, strength and weaknesses make sense. They are not omnipotent.

Our heroes become adults as they face the reality of the outside world and the assassins targeting Ethermask, as well as ancient beings that shaped the old and the present world.

[mangacocktail]

Cocktail : Chai whiskey sours

I actually happen to know 1-2 locals who really like their sours and...bam ! They were both pretty mindblown when I got them to try one I made. The Chai simple syrup (instead of regular simple syrup) really does it and is both easy to craft and store. Sour, slightly sweet and soft : so easy to drink ! - 2 ounces of a not-too-great whiskey (keep the good stuff for other things) - 1 ounce fresh lemon juice (I just squeeze 1 lemon) - 1 egg white - 3/4 ounce of chai simple syrup (google it: easy to make at home !)

Shake it dry, then with ice. Garnish here is cinnamon stick and star anise (if you’re in Canada, easy to get for literally nothing at Bulk Barn, for example !)

[mangacocktail]

Hello, world ! Coucou !

Quite frankly, I haven’t really thought this Tumblr thing through. I was like “I want a space that allows me to talk about mangas / manwhas, cocktails and maybe food, without the 140 character constraint from Twitter. But I kinda wanna post sexy pics too”.

I quickly realized that these two axes were targeting VERY different crowds and that I better had to make a choice. So, woo ! Here we are. Cocktails and mangas. I hope you’ll have a good time procrastinating around here. Don’t hesitate to drop me a line :)

Je suis Francais a la base, mais le contenu de ce blog sera en Anglais ! Deal with it.  B)