#From the cover of the original Japanese edition of volume 16

[mercyll]

[brickme]

💕💗❤️🥰❤️💗💕

The print quality is beautiful and it includes WAY more than the 300 pieces of art they promised! I'm very very happy to own it and so grateful the exhibition made Shueisha get off their lazy butt to put this together.

As expected, the selection of art focuses largely on title pages. It includes almost all Narumi and Aira title pages, which is lovely, but there are a LOT of Ranze title pages missing, which I have to ascribe to the original manuscripts having been lost (like Ikeno has told her fans in private multiple times).

16 of the missing Ranze title pages were reprinted in the 1987 furoku "Memorial scene collection", so my theory is they were all lost in the process of printing this furoku, and the ch. 4 title page might have been lost when it was reprinted for the "Anime special issue" magazine. This would also explain why the Italian edition uses different cover art than the Japanese tankobon edition for volumes 2 and 9! I've been wondering about that for a while. If this is true, a ton of beautiful, wonderful art has been lost. :(

Other titles pages which were not included: Ranze ch. 1 (included in the Tokimeki manga-michi tankobon), ch. 21, ch. 22, and side story Christmas no okurimono (included in the Romantic Album fanbook); Narumi side story Ginga romance no yoru ch. 1; Aira ch. 20, Aira side story Poteto no Merry Christmas. Ribon covers which were not included: Aira cover of Ribon bikkuri zokan early spring 1993.

Of these I'm missing Ranze ch. 22 and Ginga romance no yoru ch. 1 in my collection, so I'll make it a priority to pick up the relevant magazines in the near future.

Other than that, there are six pages reprinting a more or less random selection of furoku art, a smattering of black and white manuscript pages, and three pages (one for each arc) reprinting preview illustrations, magazine spine illustrations, novelty phone card illustrations, and other rare and beautiful art, which might be some of my favorite pages of the whole book <3 I absolutely adore Ikeno's preview illustrations, so much cuteness and beauty crammed into such small spaces! These pages are a must see and must own for fans. The interview with Maki Yoko and Mochida Aki is fine, not particularly insightful but you can tell they're both genuine fans of Tokimeki and of Ikeno's art.

One glaring omission from this book (aside from the Ranze title pages) is the numerous rough sketches that were displayed at the Tokyo venue of the exhibition -- only five of them are reprinted here. Just more reason for people to go to the venues though, because holy molly those were absolutely amazing!!! I really hope they'll be displayed at the Kyoto venue too, so I can take pictures of every single one of them.

But all in all, this is a wonderful book. If you visit the exhibition, or if/when it goes on sale online, you should definitely pick it up -- it's a masterpiece of 80s and 90s shojo art!

[savebatsfromscratch]

Hockey Watching - Palletshipping Week 1 (Roommates)

Summary:

Gary and Ash watch a hockey game together. (Au notes in final note in ao3 version, I put them at the top in this one.)

Notes:

Prompt: Roommates Note: The first thing I went to was watching a Hockey game together. …for some reason. I kinda made up my own Pokemon world teams, but feel free to imagine your favorite team I guess. (Though if it’s not the Sabers I don’t want you here. /light hearted) Also, for the record, they’re kind of American coded in this one. Whoops. I apologize for this look into my mind. Cws: Surprise kiss, sort of nonsensical writing Words: 1,791

End Notes:

…dude this is such a mess. (<- did not even try to edit it.)   Here’s a fun secret, I headcannon Blake (from Pokemon Adventures) as a Hockey player, and I made his number his dexholder number! :D I also headcannon Jun (from Pokemon Diamond and Pearl Adventure) as a Hockey player, and I made his number “3” because he has three total pokemon lol. I also put Hareta (from the same series) on his team and made him number “1” because that’s the number of my favorite Sabers goalie. :3 I also Headcannon Barry and Jun as triplets (the third being Pearl from Pokemon Adventures.) I also had to make up a last name for both Jun and Blake. For Jun I gave him “Aemilius,” because I went the roman route and it “was originally derived from the Latin word aemulus, which referred to equal or rival.” (iGENEA) And I gave Blake Rasmussen because it starts with an “r” sound and so does his Japanese name AND Rasmussen would look SICK on a Hockey jersey.

Ao3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/54803911

Prompts from here: @/shigerussato

Fic under the cut!

Gary plopped down on the couch in front of the already flickering TV, one hand clutched around a large can of some gross thing that Delia had bought them, and the other clinging desperately to an overfilled bowl of chicken wings. Already on the couch, Ash laughed and turned up the volume on the TV with the remote that he had apparently located. (Last time Gary had checked in, the two of them had been pretty sure that that thing was gone for good.)

“Is the game on yet?” He asked, setting the huge cup down on the coffee table (and releasing a short prayer that it wouldn’t spill) as he looked up at the current rush of ads across the television screen, “Who’s winning?”

Ash giggled and got halfway through a, “Not yet Oak,” before stopping and realizing that something was still missing from their Hockey watching spree. “Um, you did get us napkins, right?”

Gary looked around himself, and though he saw Ash’s fingerless glove clad hand already covered in Buffalo sauce, hovering unsurely about the rest of the chicken wings, he saw no napkins. “Oh dang it,” He let out an exasperated cry and smacked a hand to his forehead, “I forgot them in the other room, here, I’ll get them-,”

He went to stand, but all of a sudden the announcer sprang to life before them.

“Welcome to today’s game of Hockey,” he was saying, voice strong and accented like an old radio star, and speaking just as fast, “We’ve got a very interesting match up today,”

The second announcer interrupted, sounding just as excited as the first, “Thankfully for the Snowpoint Legends, it seems that number 3, Jun Aemilius, is back on the ice, after his injury on Wednesday we were getting worried that he might not be able to make it to the next game, but it seems the medics came through!”

“And based on today’s lineup for the Icirrus Truths, the Legends may have really needed the return. I mean, ever since number 16, Blake Rasmussen, was traded into the team from the Castelia Ideals, the Truths have been rising in power across the league,”

“However, the new goalie for the Legends, number 1, Hareta Rowan, might be able to match Rasmussen’s intensity,”

“Do you know who they’re talking about?” Gary whispered to Ash, who seemed to have given up on napkins and was instead licking his fingers clean. (Seeing this, he quickly flushed red and looked back to the screen, pretending to be looking for clues there, though he hoped Ash would not guess the true reason for his newfound focus. …though it wouldn’t have been a problem if he had known.)

“Number three for the Legends is triplets with one of my rivals from when I was in Sinnoh,” Ash commented, watching as the camera tracked after a very attractive blond offensive player as if it was a totally normal comment to make to his current rival.

Gary suddenly reached for a can on the table, suddenly realizing that his throat felt dry. 

“None of that,” Ash waved his hands back and forth, flinging a speck or two of leftover sauce into Gary’s face, “I still love you the most,” he looked down at the cans, “Plus, those are non-alcoholic,”

Gary put his head in his hands, laughing. Had Ash assumed he had been trying to get drunk? “I’m just thirsty Ash,” he said, “and you reminded me of what your mom bought us,”

Ash made a face, studying the cans critically, “I wouldn’t suggest trying those, they’re probably flavored, like, pumpkin pie or crayons or something,”

Gary studied the can in the brightness of the ice from the screen. “The first one,” he told Ash, making a face, “Pumpkin pie seltzer, are you kidding me? Where does she even get them?”

“The Viridian Pokemart I think,” Ash said, snuggling a bit closer to Gary under the guise of checking out the ingredients of the strange drink.

“Why would she go all the way to Viridian to get-,” Gary cut himself off as the game suddenly kicked into action on the screen in front of them. Ash too sat up, suddenly on the edge of his seat as the puck rushed from player to player, currently held by the Truths. Gary glanced over at Ash’s face, noticing that he didn’t look super happy about that fact. 

“Soo…” Gary tried, now his turn to scoot closer, “Are we rooting for the Legends?”

“Would you want to root for a team from Unova?”

“Fair point,”

The two sat together, watching as the action moved from player to player, occasional crashes and shrieks coming up from the players as they crashed together and into various metal walls. Gary found himself leaning forward and hissing in anticipation as the puck shot towards the goal on their side, but joined Ash in whooping when the (apparently not-so-rookie) goalie expertly blocked the shot, catching it under his glove and sending up cheers among the crowd on his side of the stadium.

Ash grabbed Gary’s arm and shook him, as if Gary had watched more than a couple of games before to understand quite what that meant for his team. “Did you see that?!” He asked, sounding almost as excited as he always had before their battles, “That was so cool!”

The fact that Gary didn’t quite understand the game did not stop him from sharing Ash’s excitement. (Though he suspected that was more due to the fact that his rival was all but climbing into his lap in nervous joy about the game.)

“Yeah,” Gary said, watching somewhat in awe as the players sped from side to side in the advertisement lined rink.

They continued to watch like that, whooping as number three on their team managed a goal and hissing as 16, Blake, on the other side finally managed one of his own. At one point, their hands met in the chicken wing bowl, and of course Ash couldn’t help but joke that it was the most affectionate they’d been since getting back to Pallet together. (Gary shoved him off his shoulder and laughed it off, but the entire next period passed before he was done blushing about it.)

Advertisements passed as Gary left to refill the snacks, and he found himself grinning with the draw to watch the game as he saw it starting up again.

“You have to admit that this is just as interesting as watching a Pokemon battle,” Ash said, between bites of chicken wing, looking expectantly up at Gary.

“And nowhere near as irritating,” Gary added, breaking off in the middle of his sentence to take a large sip of pumpkin pie seltzer. (Which was honestly even more interesting than Delia had advertised it as being.) “I’m not there picking through every mistake they make,”

They both cringed as, number three, the forward on the team they had decided to root for just barely missed an easy shot.

“For the most part anyway,” Gary corrected

“For the most part anyway,” Ash laughed, agreeing with him.

They looked forward, and the game went back into that comfortable blur as the announcers led the cheers (or boos) as players entered and left the ice. (Though Gary found himself realizing that the two rivals were getting oddly close again as the final period began to wrap up. Even if the “close together” in question was more like, “just about falling off the couch with how focused they were on the flashing screen,”)

They cheered as their goalie blocked yet another would-have-been goal, and then cheered even louder as their team managed to actually complete a goal of their own. They were back in the lead by one, and with only a couple of seconds remaining on the clock, and a major player of the Truths out for misconduct earlier in the match, it was looking good.

“Comeon comeon,” Ash muttered, his fingers digging into Gary’s shoulders as he leaned even further forward, “Just hold the goal for one more-,”

“No!” They both shrieked, watching as their goalie, the one named like his region’s professor, was knocked to the ground by an opposing player, allowing the puck to sail cleanly into the net behind him.

Making the game tied, and sending it into overtime as Ash jolted to his feet, taking two large steps forward and echoing the announcer as he yelped. “How was that not an illegal move!”

Gary stood and walked to meet him, but found his eyes similarly glued to the screen as the teams reset for the tie breaking move. In his still lacking understanding of the game, he couldn’t quite tell what was happening, but the energy in the crowd (and in Ash), was enough to tell him that, whatever it was, it was seriously interesting.

He squinted at the glowing ice, and then found himself jumping up and down as he spotted number three dragging the puck forward and towards the opposing goal. He was moving like lightning, skirting around nearly every other player as he raced for the win.

Ash and Gary watched in slow motion as 16, Blake, from the other team fought to catch up with Jun, and cheered as he crashed into a defenseman from his own team, clearly still at least a little shaken up from his apparent injury on Wednesday as the two skidded across the ice together, their balance lost.

It happened so fast that Gary almost missed it, but the puck banged against the net and the stadium exploded. Even with the TV on low volume, Gary truly felt like he was among the screaming fans as Ash jumped up and down beside him. Clapping his hands together and shivering in excitement. To Gary, the sight was almost funny, but as he opened his mouth to say something about it, he found himself the one taken aback as Ash jumped up and kissed him.

They hung that way for a moment, Gary feeling like he was floating in sudden joy as Ash’s arms wrapped briefly around his shoulders, only to be dragged back away again as his friend suddenly pulled back, face bright red.

“Oh I-,” he tried to explain himself, “I didn’t mean to-,”

Gary’s face was definitely bright red, but he didn’t care. “Well,” he said, grabbing Ash’s hands and leaning forward, “Do it again and I might think about coming back for the next game,” 

He smirked as Ash stuttered out a sudden, “I love you,” right before Gary pulled them back into a kiss as the cheers of the crowd echoed through the dark room. 

(Even if their mouths tasted like buffalo chicken wings and pumpkin pie seltzer.)

[harvardfineartslib]

We’re back from a long break! Sorry for the long silence but we’re happy to be back again.

This summer, we launched a new website for Early Photography of Japan. It is a virtual collection of more than 40 souvenir photograph albums and illustrated publications from Japan with over 2,000 images from Widener Library, the Fine Arts Library, and Harvard-Yenching Library. In celebrating this new website, we’re posting several images from the Fine Arts Library’s collection. 

Japan: Described and Illustrated by the Japanese – Part 1

In 1896, Tamamura Kozaburo, a highly successful commercial photographer in Yokohama, received an order from a Boston publisher that would eventually lead to the production of more than one million hand-colored albumen prints. At a time when most publishers were using illustrations produced via cheaper and faster photomechanical processes such as collotype or halftone, J. B. Millet Company used original photographs to illustrate no less than 16 different folio editions of the multi-volume Japan: Described and Illustrated by the Japanese published between 1897 and 1898. The publisher limited the most exclusive editions to 25 sets available by subscription only, along with larger editions numbering 750 to 1000 sets. 

The key figures in this undertaking included a Boston publisher, an expatriate Irishman, and a Japanese photographer. Harvard graduate Josiah Byram Millet (1853-1938) founded his publishing company in 1890, and like many in the Boston area, he became interested in Japan, learning to speak the language and developing close connections to many Japanese statesmen, scholars, and businessmen. He conceived the idea for Japan: Described and Illustrated by the Japanese and used his connections to secure financial backing for the project from the Japanese government.

Stay tuned for our future posts!

From Japan: Described and Illustrated by the Japanese

Image 1: Front cover Image 2: Title cover Image 3: Page XI, showing Mt. Fuji

Description Brinkley, F. Japan :described and illustrated by the Japanese. Boston : J. B. Millet Company, 1897-1898. Imperial edition. Fine Arts Library, Harvard University. Repository Fine Arts Library Institution Harvard University

[skkpaws]

manga collection progress :3

wanted to keep record of my manga collecting progress since i’ve decided i actually want to try to collect ! rn mainly focusing on bsd but also jjk or others when i get the chance :D

Notes: bought JJK , HxH, SxF, & Soul Eater Vol. 1 soooo long ago back when I just wanted to collect the first volume of series I like so idk the date. also i tend to buy volumes out of order based on price, the cover, or the contents in the volume just fyi. dates are based on when i have the physical version, not when i order them.

Masterlist:

Total Mangas: 40

Total Light Novels: 7

Bungo Stray Dogs:

Main Manga: 1-6, 20-23

WAN!: 2, 4, 6-7

BEAST: 1-4 (COMPLETE)

Dazai, Chuuya, Age Fifteen: 1 (ENG & JP), 2 (JP)

Gaiden Manga: 1-2 (COMPLETE)

Dead Apple Manga: 2-3

Light Novels: 1-4, 6-8

Jujutsu Kaisen: 0-4, 7-9, 11, 19

Soul Eater: 1

Soul Eater The Perfect Edition: 1

Spy x Family: 1

Hunter x Hunter: 1

Chainsaw Man: 6

Banana Fish: 1-2

The Girl from the Other Side: 1-2

The Girl from the Other Side Deluxe Edition: 1

Sakamoto Days: 5-6, 8

The Case Study of Vanitas: 1

Gokurakugai: 1

Timeline:

10/14

BSD Light Novel 1 (Dazai’s Entrance Exam) yes i did buy it thinking it was manga volume 1

12/12

BSD Vol. 21 & 23

JJK Vol. 4 & 7

12/13

BSD Dazai, Chuuya, Age 15 Manga Vol. 1

12/16

BSD Vol. 1

BSD Wan Vol. 6

JJK Vol. 0

12/25 (Christmas Gifts)

BSD Beast Vol. 1-4

BSD Light Novel 2 (The Dark Era)

BSD Dazai, Chuuya, Age 15 Manga Vol. 1 & 2 (Japanese Version)

1/7

JJK Vol. 3

BSD Vol. 22

1/13

BSD WAN! Vol. 4

1/27

BSD Light Novel 8 (Stormbringer)

1/29

BSD Vol. 2-6

2/2

BSD Light Novel 7 (Dazai, Chuuya, Age Fifteen)

2/26

BSD Light Novel 3 (The Untold Origins of the Detective Agency)

BSD Light Novel 4 (55 Minutes)

BSD Gaiden: Ayatsuji Yukito VS. Kyōgoku Natsuhiko

3/2

JJK Vol. 9

BSD Dead Apple Manga Vol. 3

BSD WAN! Vol. 2

Banana Fish Vol. 2

Chainsaw Man Vol. 6

The Girl from the Other Side Vol. 1

3/18

BSD Vol. 20

BSD Gaiden: Ayatsuji Yukito VS. Kyōgoku Natsuhiko

JJK Vol. 2

Sakamoto Days Vol. 5-6

The Girl from the Other Side Vol. 2

3/28

JJK Vol. 19

The Caae Study of Vanitas Vol. 1

4/12

BSD Light Novel 6 (Beast)

4/16

Gokurakugai Vol. 1

4/18

Banana Fish Vol. 1

BSD WAN! Vol. 7

BSD Dead Apple Manga Vol. 2

JJK Vol. 8 & 11

Sakamoto Days Vol. 8

Soul Eater The Perfect Edition Vol. 1

The Girl from the Other Side Deluxe Edition Vol. 1

[satoshi-mochida]

irem Collection Volume 2 announced for PS5, Xbox Series, PS4, Xbox One, and Switch

Gematsu Source

ININ Games, Tozai Games, and irem have announced irem Collection Volume 2 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Switch. It will launch digitally on February 20, 2024. Physical edition pre-orders will open on July 16 via exclusively via Strictly Limited Games.

irem Collection Volume 2 will include shoot ’em up games GunForce, GunForce II, and Air Duel.

Here is an overview of the collection, via ININ Games:

About

Welcome to the irem Collection Volume 2, an extraordinary compilation of timeless arcade gems. Whether you’re a retro gaming enthusiast or new to the scene, this collection guarantees excitement!

GunForce (SNES, M-92 Arcade)

This Run and Gun gem will include both the Super Nintendo Entertainment System and arcade versions. Whether you played the original on your childhood Super Nintendo Entertainment System or prefer the much-improved Arcade version, we’ve got you covered!

Often considered to be one of the first run’ n’ gun games, GunForce: Battle Fire Engulfed Terror Island can be seen as the initial baby steps that paved the way for the later-released Metal Slug series and its sequel, GunForce II (GeoStorm), both of which were highly acclaimed. GunForce is where it all began, after all!

Originally released on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in the west and in arcades in Japan, you must run and gun your way through hordes of aliens to stop a rogue CPU and restore freedom to the world. The game shows no mercy and throws you into the enemy frontlines right from the start as you parachute into action. And if that’s not enough ’90s action for you, how about doing a wheelie on a motorbike while shooting helicopters?! GunForce has got you covered. As it is now a tradition, GunForce introduced different vehicles f0r the player to control – tanks, helicopters, or motorbikes. Make your choice!

GunForce II (M-92 Arcade)

The official sequel to GunForce never made it out of the arcades, making this release its first official worldwide launch on consoles!

GunForce II, known as GeoStorm in Japan, is the sequel to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System and arcade game GunForce. It improves upon GunForce in every way and is considered to be one of the last arcade games from Irem. GunForce II was never released outside of arcades, making its inclusion in the irem Collection Volume 2 its first-ever worldwide console release.

Featuring enhanced animations, improved gameplay, and a killer soundtrack, GunForce II was created by the same staff that later developed the iconic Metal Slug series. It is considered the spiritual predecessor to the Metal Slug series, with many of its sound effects and designs being reused in the series. It is a must-play for all fans! Set in a futuristic post-apocalyptic environment, the game allows you to take control of Max or Lei. Your goal is simple: dual blast your way through five different stages and rack up those high scores! Vehicles make a return, as is tradition, including motorbikes, mechs, and tanks, to name a few.

Air Duel (M-72 Arcade)

Rounding out Volume 2 is another arcade-exclusive game. Air Duel was only ever released in Japanese arcades, and this marks its first official worldwide release on consoles. In this classic shoot ’em up, you can switch your aircraft before every new stage, a feature that was groundbreaking back in the day!

The year is 2004. Earth has been devastated by an unprecedented nuclear war, and a secret organization called D.A.S. is rising to ensure chaos in the world. It is now your job to thwart their mischievous plans and save what remains of the world! Air Duel is a 2D vertical scrolling shoot ’em up that was exclusively available in Japanese arcades and never made it to the West. Its inclusion in the irem Collection Volume 2 marks its first-ever worldwide console release.

Developed by the same legendary team at Irem that brought you GunForce and later the Metal Slug series, Air Duel offers seven challenging stages that need to be mastered either alone or with a friend in co-op. Choose your aircraft! Whether you prefer shooting forward only with the Jet Fighter FG-40 or firing crosswise with the Helicopter E-709, your playstyle is key to victory. Together with GunForce and GunForce II, Air Duel completes the irem Collection Volume 2.

And that’s not all! For all the games, we have included Online Leaderboards & Global Rankings. If you seek a real challenge, this is your call!

View the first screenshots at the gallery. Visit the official website here.

[astroboyart]

Source: Fukkan

Japanese website Fukkan announced that they will be reprinting the original versions of the Ambassador Atom manga and Astro Boy manga in 16 volumes in 3 phases.

It is the first reprint to include the original versions of Ambassador Atom and Astro Boy since 2009 and 2010 when a similar release, called Tetsuwan Atom << Original Edition >> Reprint Daizenshu [1951-1968] --- (  鉄腕アトム《オリジナル版》復刻大全集［1951-1968］), was released; the 2009-2010 release has since ran out of stock and is a collector’s item for Japanese Astro Boy fans.

Extras will be included for buyers who buy all of the volumes together or in each separate phase. The manuscripts shown below appear to be the same ones included for each Phase.

Phase I will last from October 2021 through March 2022 and will consist of Volumes 1 through 6. Extras include manuscripts as well as a new 12 page booklet tentatively called Kappa Comix Cover Picture Collection, which includes 34 cover artworks included on Kobunsha’s Kappa Comix versions of the Astro Boy manga.

Phase II will last from April 2022 through September 2022 and will consist of Volumes 7 through 12. Extras include manuscripts as well as 3 large chiyogami papers originally released in the 1960s.

Phase III will last from October 2022 through January 2023 and will consist of Volumes 13 through 16. Extras include manuscripts as well as a new 16 page booklet tentatively called Astro Boy Club Chronicle ( 鉄腕アトムクラブ クロニクル ) and will feature all 22 covers of the Astro Boy Club magazines printed from 1964 through 1966.

These special reprints are being done for the 3 year Atom Debut 70th Anniversary celebration from 2021 through 2023.

[the-bejeesus]

To Those Who Say “I’m not gonna catch up on One Piece until it’s finished. Why would I watch/read 1000+ episodes/chapters when I don’t even get to know how the story ends?”

      Now for the past few years, when I came across somebody who said this, my rebute would be something like “Well the series is great already. It doesn’t really matter if I don’t know how it ends, because the journey itself is enjoyable.” or “Man if that’s your excuse, who you gonna explain why you read/watch stuff like Berserk, Hunter X Hunter, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, and My Hero Academia? Newsflash, they aren’t done yet.” But it came across my mind that I can now apply a completely different approach:

“If you start watching/reading at this pace right now, it will be over by the time you catch up.”

      If you’re a fan of the series, you’ll know that for awhile now Oda has been saying that he plans to end the series in just 5-4 years. Now he’s made lots of claims in the past that turned out to be ridiculous. However, many One Piece researchers have compiled his claims and found out that they only get more accurate as time goes on, with the most ridiculous claims being found to be myths. And with the most recent claims of ending the series in less than 5 years, even his editors who are usually skeptical have started to trust that he can do this. After all, he has officially set there to be only one more saga (which isn’t necessarily one arc, but it’s either going to be 1-2 major arcs or an anthology of 5-6 shorter arcs). And now that we can trust this claim, we can essentially extrapolate how many chapters/episodes are left and what pace we have to binge to catch up at just the right time.

If you plan to read the manga (black and white):

The manga in black in white is a perfectly fine way to enjoy One Piece. It’s what Oda draws, it’s how he intends it to be viewed, and best of all, it will be the first version of publication to finish.

     Out of the 1223 weeks since the first chapter published in July 19, 1997, 1000 chapters have published, meaning on average he publishes 42 chapters per year, or in other words, there are only 10 hiatuses per year (including holidays where WSJ does not publish). Now if I wanted to be more accurate, I’d only look at the chapters published this year, to exclude outliers like how he had no hiatuses for the first 200 chapters, or how he had a 4-week hiatus during the timeskip, but 2020 has been a bit crazy, so we’re not doing that for this or any of the others.

     Going off of this, the final chapter would be chapter 1212 in December 28, 2025 (yes, the 28th would be a Sunday again.) So here’s how you’d calculate the pace in which you need to read One Piece, and really this is how we’ll calculate it for every version)

     Now I know math is boring, but the reason I’m showing this to you is because the amount of weeks until One Piece ends will vary based on when you start this binge. Chances are you aren’t going to start the day you see this post, and there’s an even greater chance you won’t see this post the day it’s posted. For every example I’m going to assume you started binging on December 28, 2020. Now let’s try to use it for this example.

     And there’s your answer, just read 4-5 chapters per week. By the end, One Piece should be nearly over or have very recently ended. To put that into a different perspective, you could purchase and read just two volumes per month and you’ll be at prime pace. Or you could read one chapter every day, but only on weekdays.  If you want to, you can see this calculation in action in graph form.

     While this is a very rudimentary graph, it’s a basic visualization of what we’re calculating here. We’re calculating what speed we need to binge to catch up at exactly the right moment. I say exact, but ultimately no one can predict how many chapters there will be exactly, nor how many hiatuses Oda will go on during it. It will be important, as you’re nearing the end, to find a spoiler-free way to keep up on how close One Piece is to ending. To know whether you ought to speed up or slow down.

If you plan to watch the anime (subtitled):

For years now people have hated on the anime “terrible animation!” “terrible pacing” but at the end of the day, it’s the more popular version. Or the more viewed version I should say. And personally, I think that once you acknowledge its problems and learn how to deal with them, it’s a perfectly fine experience. There’s enough good voice acting and enough good storytelling that you’re easily able to ignore the problems. Plus, the animation has substantially improved since Wano.

      Now for this we’re going to have to change a lot of variables to get this right. We’re going to have to adjust when publication started, and recalculate when One Piece will end by looking at how slowly the anime adapts the manga, and how behind it is. The anime aired on October 20, 1999, and has aired 956 episodes since then. This means on average they air 44.9 episodes per year, meaning there is pretty much only 7 breaks the entire year. With these 956 episodes, they have adapted 955 chapters, making the pace almost exactly one chapter per episode. However this is really inaccurate, considering all the better-paced arcs earlier on in the story. Looking solely at episodes 2012 and onwards, the anime adapts at a pace of 0.65 chapters/episode.

     Knowing that there are roughly 212 chapters left, and Toei adapts at 0.65 chapters per episode, we can assume that there are going to be roughly 324 episodes left. That sounds like too many, but keep in mind that there will be several, several instances where the manga will be on hiatus whereas the anime will keep on airing. Knowing there are approximately 324 episodes left, and that the anime only takes about 7 breaks a year, we can assume that it will take 7 years, or 374.49 weeks before the anime will end. So now we have the information we need to do the math again.

x = 1280/374.49

x = 3.417 episodes/week.

     It may seem like a more relaxed binge, since you get a whole 2 extra years to binge, and you only have to do 3-4 episodes per week, compared to the 4-5 chapters. But keep in mind that these episodes are 24 minutes each. Still not at all bad, but you will be spending more time on it overall.

If you plan to watch One Pace:

One Pace is a fan project that edits the anime so that filler and padding is cut, other edits will be made to make the anime more manga-accurate, such as reorganizing scenes, or adding title cards where absent. Originally only used by a niche number of One Piece fans, One Pace has grown in popularity, and has tried to improve its quality to accommodate more fans, such as making their episodes Dual Audio (meaning you can switch between the dub and original Japanese audio tracks), and including Spanish subtitles.

      You’d think we’d have to adjust for when One Pace began, how slowly One Pace catches up, and the works, but there’s not much to calculate. Fortunately for us, no matter how far behind One Pace is on editing the current arc, they always like to wrap things up just a few weeks within when an arc ended, if not the very same week. So really all we have to calculate is how many One Pace episodes there will be by the end of all this, so that we know how many you’ll need to watch per week.

      Looking solely at what they’ve covered so far, One Pace has taken 573 episodes and condensed it down to 259 episodes. That’s a pace of 2.21 anime episodes/ paced episode. Earlier we calculated that there would be 324 episodes of the anime left, making for 1280 episodes total. This would mean that there would be around 578 One Pace episodes by the end. And One Pace would probably wrap up in, let’s say 376 weeks, because as I said, they’ll probably finish editing the final arc a week or two after the last episode airs.

x = 578/376

x = 1.53 episodes per week

      Now that’s a relaxed pace. 1-2 episodes per week? That’s so slow, I’m not even sure if I’ll remember what I watched last week next time I watch some episodes. The only problem is some of the pre-timeskip still haven’t been edited. They’ll probably be done by the time they finish the final arc, but that’s not gonna work out fast enough. You’ll hit your first roadblock about 7 weeks in when you need to watch the Baratie arc and it’s not done. And don’t even get me started on how many arcs aren’t done in dub or Spanish sub yet. Hopefully you could just switch to the anime or manga when you hit these arcs, readjusting how many episodes/chapters you need to watch/read when you do. But that’s a bit of an excessive amount of math for something that’s supposed to be fun. So yeah, if you’re still convinced you shouldn’t get into One Piece until it’s ended, maybe this is the option for you.

If you plan to read the manga (Colored):

Since 2012, Shueisha has made a colorization of One Piece. It’s not a fan coloring, it’s as official as it gets. Many consider the color schemes portrayed in this version as the most canon, as the majority are pulled straight from whatever colored illustrations of Oda’s they can find. And quite frankly it makes the manga at least 10 times more beautiful. It’s especially great if you have trouble interpreting dense, small black and white panels.

      This one is a doozy. You’d think all I gotta do is calculate how far behind the colored manga usually and just adjust from there, right? Wrong. Because how far behind the colored manga is, or how frequently they release volumes in full color, is one of the most inconsistent things I have ever seen. You wanna see what I’m talking about? This is how they’ve chosen to release each volume since 2012:

Volume 1-12: July 15, 2012

Volume 13-23: September 28, 2012

Volume 24-63: December 4, 2012

Volume 64-65: April 4, 2013

Volume 66-68: December 20, 2013

Volume 69-70: August 25, 2014

Volume 71-72: September 16, 2015

Volume 73-75: October 4, 2016

Volume 76: December 2, 2016

Volume 77: March 3, 2017

Volume 78: July 2, 2017

Volume 79: September 4, 2017

Volume 80: December 4, 2017

Volume 81-82: March 3, 2018

Volume 83: October 4, 2018

Volume 84-86: August 2, 2019

Volume 87-92: September 16, 2020

     How I am supposed to find out how long it will take for Shueisha to colorize the final volume of One Piece is beyond me. I guess the first step would be to look at how far behind the manga each release was on average, but I’m going to ignore all the ones before 2013, because those were clearly just Shueisha catching up really fast cause they just started and didn’t want to be dozens of volumes behind forever. So of the 14 publications between 2013 and now, on average the last chapter of the last volume they colored was 97.78 weeks after that chapter had published in Weekly Shonen Jump. This means that if the final chapter of One Piece is chapter 1212 on December 28, 2025, then you can expect the final colored volume to publish November 14, 2027.

x = 1212/359

x = 3.37 chapters/week

     So if you prefer the manga but don’t want to read 5 chapters every week for 5 years, this might be a better option for ya. But yea, I have no doubt my prediction is at least a little off for this one.

If you plan to watch the anime (dubbed):

Unlike the 4KidsTV and Odex dubs of One Piece, the FUNimation dub is a perfect way to enjoy One Piece. The DVDs come with enjoyable commentary and a marathon mode, great for binging.

       FUNimation’s releases of the dub are inconsistent, although not nearly as erratic as the colored manga release. However, there was recently a 2-year hiatus we only just got out of. Since Episode 1′s dub in May 27, 2008, the dub has gotten as far as Episode 614. But that’s only looking at the DVD releases. If you’re willing to stream on FUNimationnow, the dub is as far as 641, and if you’re willing to digitally purchase it from an e-shop such as the Microsoft store, it goes all the way to Episode 654. With that being said, that would mean that on average, FUNimation dubs 1.004 episodes per week. Although if we go back to before the two-year hiatus so as to exclude it from the average, it’s actually 1.10 episodes per week. Not a huge difference, actually. And then if we look solely after the two-year hiatus, it’s actually 2.25 episodes per week, which is insanely faster. It’s hard to tell what the future of the dub will be. I can’t assume they’ll go this fast forever, so I’m just going to take the average of all 3 and say it’s 1.45 episodes per week. Don’t know if that’s the best mathematical approach, but the number seems about right.

     So knowing that the dub is at Episode 654 and looking at our previous guesstimation that the anime will be 1280 episodes long, we can predict that it will take 431 weeks before the dub catches up and ends. That would be in 2029! Sounds quick at first until you notice it’s 4 years behind!

x = 1280/431

x = 2.96 episodes per week

      Looks like it’s almost exactly 3 episodes per week. Not as much less of a workload as I expected, compared to catching up to the sub. You know, I figured those 4 extra years would make you binge a lot slower.

Final Thoughts:

      There’s a lot of my math that was estimation, approximations, extrapolations. Feel free to correct me or fact check me, especially if you plan on using this. I figured this would be a fun thought excercise. There’s also a lot of smaller variables I simply didn’t want to take into account because of how long this is already. For example, reading the black and white manga. The calculation can vary slightly depending on if you read it the day it’s published (which I assume would have to be a fanscan unless you can read Japanese), reading the weekly publication legally on Viz.com, waiting for the physical volume release. The dub can also vary depending on whether you buy from Microsoft, wait for the FUNimationnow release, wait for the DVDs, or wait for the Collection sets. So feel free to take this into account.

[fantranslatorbychoice]

Kakuriyo no Yadomeshi Volume 6 Intermission 3 - Kasuga and O-ryo

T/N: Yep, it’s a double premiere guys, I hope you all enjoy. =)

As always, if you like this translation, you can heart it, share the link, reblog, I just respectfully ask that DO NOT REPOST ELSEWHERE. This is my contribution to the scant English content of this fandom, and I worked really hard to finish this thing, it’s not like I just copy-pasted everything. I even had to build the kanji in Jisho one by one. Try it and you’ll see what I mean.You can rave about this, rant about this, reply, etc. but if possible please link back to this page. If you’re unsure how to do that, just copy the web address of this page. If you’re on a blogsite just insert the web address as a hyperlink as a link back to here. Honestly if this light novel was officially-published in English, I wouldn’t even be doing this right now... And if it did, I’d take this offline to support the publishers and Yuuma-sensei. Creators support creators, is what I believe in. I’ll prolly do 1-5 once 6-10 has been done, or however long I can manage to translate the raw texts, it can take a toll at times.  As previously-mentioned in earlier chapters, if you stumbled upon this one, the two seasons of the anime covered volumes 1-5, so other than the extra details, you didn’t miss much stuff.

No spoilers lol

P261 "Hmph. You're the newly-hired kid? Really, you're named Kasuga? Aren't you a stumpy little tanuki-girl? I am O-ryo, the future Wakaokami. I'll train you under me, and I'll be sure to drill the job of being a waitress into your head."

I remember well, the day that I first met O-ryo sama. I am Kasuga, a Bunmon Tanuki, while still a child was chased off from my home by my Hachiyo Baba-sama to experience the outside world, and along with my uncle Chiaki who also has nowhere else to go, we inquired in, and started working in Tenjin-ya. It was that first day. That person who called me stumpy, has hair and skin as white as snow, it was the conspicuously beautiful snow lady. Her personality is of someone who hates losing. She was a selfish Sempai, but has an indomitable and strong willpower to rise to the top, and I thought that surprisingly, I have come to like this person. As such, in order to gain her dream position of Wakaokami, she exerted herself no matter what it took. P262 A woman who fights her battles to win. I came to her side and I recorded her heroic battles, and I wrote about it in my diary.

"Hey.... Hey, why are you asking something while falling asleep, Kasuga-kun, HEY!" "Whaaaa~" In the middle of talking about something regarding a Hachiyo's marriage at great length, sitting on my heels I was nodding off to sleep. Since early morning I have been with Aoi-chan, and I have been going about here and there. I was feeling confident. I was dozing off in front of Byakuya-sama. Is Byakuya-sama angry or is he surprised? "Good grief. You're a reliable and shrewd girl girl, and I think that it's beyond expectations that you're going to get married to a Hachiyo... yet I am worried that they'll find faults on you. That is a position that has many enemies, do you understand? "Yeah, I get it. I have watched Aoi-chan for a long time. But Aoi-chan is awesome... Even though she's in a disadvantage, she was aware of her own strengths. Furthermore, in Tenjin-ya, when Aoi-chan gets married to Odanna-sama, isn't there anyone who grumbles about it?" "Hmmm. in that case, isn't that a problem? Because nobody's complaining, probably there's a group that's P263 thinking about rubbing her out of existence." "That point, I am fine with that. I plan to not make enemies with my demeanor, an incomptetent person making a blunder. Well, at any rate, from the very start I have been incompetent." "..." Byakuya-sama narrowed his eyes, and with a snap hit the corner of his mouth with his fan. I thought that he was going to say something but, he just scolded me and released me after saying "You can go now" . Wahh, after standing up from sitting on my feet, they fell asleep and started tingling painfully... Holding the Maneki-neko** coin bank, I planned to go back to Yugao. Along the way, the waitresses looked over here, and started gossiping and whispering to each other. Up until now the friends that were calling me in carefree voices, and the sempai that used to fiddle with and pushed me around, now they pass sideways, and bow their heads subserviently, and flees anywhere. Oh well, I could understand why they became like that but... I come in contact with the management staff that were like Shizuna-chan and they are normally composed, but I'm a normal girl, aren't I? I feel like I'm a sore thumb sicking out. "Kasuga, Kasuga" "...Chiaki" From the other side of the hallway, peeping over here looking worried, it was my uncle, the tanuki. T/N: Maneki-neko, the beckoning cat, famously known for bringing in luck. It's said that it was originally named after a cat that waved to a monk to go inside a shrine and the monk almost got struck by lightning or something, so it was a lucky omen. P264 He approached while calling for me. "What is it, from now onwards I'm helping out at Yugao." "It's not that, you were called for by Byakuya-sama, and I got worried somewhat." "It's nothing. It's just that I'm developing a souvenir product with Aoi-chan." "Why you, aren't you scowling at me?" "Why, my relative shouldn't speak about me flippantly." He isn't necessarily overprotective and he wasn't saying anything like that, but ever since the old days Chiaki has been worrying about me. He's just a nice and charming person who took care of me, and he always looks after those that are just like me. Though I'm already fine, even at this age he still worries about me... "Chiaki aren't you staying behind here in Tenjin-ya?" "Yep. I'll continue working here. Even though I was thinking of coming along with you." "It's fine, it's nothing. I've always been taken care of by uncle, I cannot function properly being a Hachiyo's wife." "...Kasuga" His eyes gloomily welling up, holding down the corner of his eyes, Chiaki went "That tiny Kasuga has grown to be praise-worthy" "Ahhh stop it already, don't be gloomy.. Get over it." Shh... Uncle you're annoying. P265 While being paid extra care, I could feel myself fading away. Our relationship, even though we are family, here we cannot become too overly-familiar. The love that tanuki give to each other are the strongest among Ayakashi, as such they aren't entrusted to to other people, which makes tanuki unaware about so many things such as getting close to and connecting with strangers. Those people, now matter how much we studied them, we couldn't find them... With regards to those, I thought I learned those in Tenjin-ya.

"Oh.." In front of the passageway that connects the door to Yugao, there is someone who is sneakily peeping in. Isn't that... "O-ryo sama, what are you doing over that place?" "Kyaaa!" O-ryo sama jumped up suprised. With a sluggish expression, she slowly looked back. Opening her mouth as if about to talk, hesitatingly, she made a weird face by sticking her lower lip out. "H-hmph." In the end, O-ryo sama took her leave without saying anything. P266 I slightly tugged on O-ryo sama's sleeves. "What now?" O-ryo sama icily stared down at me with that severe gaze. Oh well, I've been used to that gaze. "Uhm, I believe so, that O-ryo sama will likely aim to be Wakaokami again." ".... what?" "Within Tenjin-ya, there's something that only O-ryo sama can surely do." Pulling my hands immediately from the hem, I madly dashed towards the inner garden where Yugao was. The O-ryo sama who was aiming to be Wakaokami. And the one who made her dream come true, the O-ryo sama that became Wakaokami. To me, O-ryo sama is dazzling, despite the many enemies she makes, being hated by her colleagues, being gutsy and only wants to rise up into the world. The one I adored. After doing so many different things, O-ryo sama eventually became demoted from Wakaokami, and yet... When O-ryo sama becomes Wakaokami once again. Truly, I support that from the sidelines..

End of Intermission 3, Volume 6. Previous - Chapter 8 Next - Chapter 9

References:

Wonderful site for the youkai references

Other stuff I used to do this: Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Dictionary (you can buy here, I’m not sponsored btw). I was about to buy the older edition but then the newer one came out 2013 so I bought that instead. Worth buying since I was able to find nearly all of the words I needed just by stroke pattern alone.

Merriam-Webster's Japanese-English Dictionary (the red-covered 1996 version is apparently out of print right now). This is what I have been using for a very long time, I bought it when I was still a fetus (yes I am old so what lol), and after so many years, when compared to newer editions, I still prefer this one since its entirety is Japanese-English, the English to Japanese gloss are just 16 pages tops, so you get more Japanese words for your buck. But that’s just my opinion, maybe other people prefer the Jap-En x En-Jap IDEK.

Basic online dictionary, Jisho. Knowledge of verb conjugations  and other words are necessary since not all have entries.

If you can read Japanese, you can buy the whole set in Amazon Japan, they’re shipping worldwide now, I think.

[blastoisemonster]

Marmalade Boy

Before talking about today's spinoff, I'd like to take a step back for better context and briefly describe the interesting relationship Italy has with japanese culture: the two countries, despite being so distant and having developed from very different histories, have been called similar in their habits and in many aspects of the daily life, to the point of showing mutual affection for eachother’s society and products; in our case, we’re especially talking about entertainment.

Which takes us to the slice-of-life anime genre: true animated soap operas originally maybe only targeted at an audience of female teenagers but that, once in italian territory, end up catching interest of the whole family with its intrigues and linked episodes. 1980/1990s Italy clicked perfectly with them; not only a great amount has been brought in Europe thanks to our translations, but a selected few have been taken as inspiration for completely original work based on that universe. Basically, yes, our television companies have produced anime fanfiction dramas. One striking example is Love Me Knight - Kiss Me Licia, which became something like a pre-Pokèmon nationwide phenomenon: not even Japan (which produced only one season and then called it quits) understood how or even why the average italian loved this saccarine shit so much, and still today the girl who originally sang our Kiss Me Licia opening basically owes her whole career and popularity lasting more than three decades (she's still singing anime openings and even doing concert tours) thanks to the leading acting role she played in four live action Kiss Me Licia sequel series. You've read it right, four. All met with huge success from 1986 to 1989 for a grand total of 144 episodes. Original mangaka Kaoru Tada knew nothing about this and the studio responsible for the animated adaptation of the manga, Toei Animation, had not even been contacted for the rights: truly, our entertaining industry was making fanart just as the average kid on DeviantArt likes to post his not-so-traced Goku drawings for everyone to see.

The second most remarkable big shojo love Italy had is the subject of this post, Marmalade Boy, known in Italy as "Piccoli Problemi di Cuore" (literally translated: Small Heartaches). The Mediaset adaptation team wanted to create another big Licia phenomenon but, this time, instead of producing live action spinoffs, they went and actually contacted the original author, Wataru Yoshizumi, for permission on modifying the anime's plot. Piccoli Problemi di Cuore has been one of the biggest and most coherent works of animation "cut-and-paste" the team has done during that late 90s, resulting in a completely new italian anime series of 70 episodes (out of the 76 original ones) inspired by Marmalade Boy's plot. And as expected, this became a huge hit: it started airing at the beginning of 1997 and it captivated the audience so much that after a while they had to move it to another channel and time block because people were watching it more than the news. This also allowed Italy to export their own Marmalade Boy inspired creation as a whole different anime with the international name "A Little Love Story". Piccoli Problemi di Cuore was the anime all the big sisters and more romantic girls of the class followed almost religiously at the time of its original broadcast. Of course I wasn't part of that audience at the time, but after having researched the very interesting backstory of our adaptation, I'd be more than curious to at least take a look at it. And the manga? The original 8 tankobon got translated in my country by Planet Manga several times: the first publication was split in 16 volumes, the second one had 8 issues, and then there's the "Gold" edition of 8 volumes with alternative covers. Oh, and just to be sure everyone had bought it, a fourth edition has been published as recently as 2015. Be it manga or anime, Piccoli Problemi di Cuore was always absolutely famous and great.

And then there's the Game Boy spinoff, that instead is exclusive for Japan. How come? Released by Bandai in 1995, this title had been originally conceived for the Game Boy and only three months later a Super Famicom version showed up, making it a unique strange case of an handheld exclusive coming second for home console, and not the other way around. Also, it’s a dating simulator! Personally, this is the first of this genre I see on the small screen.

Adorned with cute checkers patterns all around and predictably nice-looking sprites and background scenes, this game has the player assume the role of female protagonist Miki Koishikawa and flirt with three suitors: Yuu Matsuura (technically Miki’s main love interest in the original anime), Ginta Suou (long time Miki’s classmate and secret -even corresponded- crush, but too proud to admit it), or Kei Tsuchiya (a talented yet troubled pianist, also Miki’s coworker at Bobson’s ice cream parlor). A lot of places from the anime, such as the protagonist’s school, workplace, and house, can be visited, and there’s many more characters to interact with; all in run-of-the-mill dating sim fashion, Marmalade Boy features tons and tons and tons of dialogue and, as rewards, special cutscenes featuring Miki and the boyo of her life. I really don’t like dating sims at all, so I’m not sure if I could judge it fairly, even if I understood japanese. >.> But as far as I researched online, the general public and fans of the original source do seem to enjoy it, meaning that at least it does justice to the anime. The game seems programmed with passion as well, as it can be used along with a Super Game Boy for an exclusive border and more colorful pixelwork; it also has a password system, in case one screws up an answer and ends up with an undesired ending.

Unfortunately, no one has yet provided a translation patch neither for the Game Boy nor the SuFami version, and it’s clear that back in the day of its release, which is two years prior to Piccoli Problemi Di Cuore’s television airing, there was absolutely no interest in seeing it marketed to a western audience. Though, just imagine if an italian developing house would have taken interest into this spinoff as much as the television companies did with the cartoon! We’d have an italian translated Marmalade Boy’s videogame re-adapted to follow our own version of the story. An exorbitant cost for surely meager earnings, yet unmatched peculiarity... and probably, pride!

[chiseler]

Echoes

One book from my childhood has always haunted me. Cursed Be the Treasure, by H. B. Drake, didn't just get under my skin, it crawled inside and gnawed. An "adventure" tale of smugglers and pirates, of guilt and vengeance, it was a cold soak in an alternately reality that I could believe with all my heart.

My mother presented it to me at I'd guess age 10 or 11. Probably it had been in our collection all along. I assumed it was from her own teen years, so in the 1910s. I never knew where my mother came by such things, she seemed to absorb offbeat, peculiar works through some etheric transfer.

Over the years, I remembered little of the plot – just two incidents so horrific that they hung on me like literary albatrosses.

Perhaps five years back, that haunting returned and I felt the need to find that book again – the original had disappeared into the mists of yesteryear. I bought a copy online – a mere $3.50 if I remember rightly – a ratty-spined hardback. I immediately determined not to read it. I couldn't face the possibility that it would be just another "young adult" monstrosity that had overwhelmed my feeble mind. That would be a gut stab.

But with Daniel Riccuito's strong-arm encouragement, looking for an "unusual" book from the '20s or ''30s – my pick – I immediately thought of Cursed Be the Treasure... but "uh-oh, wrong decade." Yet when I flipped back the creaky cover, I found the copyright was 1928. So I committed to reading it again, with dripping trepidation.

And...? It resonates with the "now" of me as solidly as with the "then" of me; it's left an unusual sense of wonder, a "how can the universe work this way?" that I pooh-pooh in daily life.

Before getting to that: Who was H. B. Drake?

I've found minimal online biographical info on Henry Burgess Drake, who had two (at least) parallel careers. Born of British missionary parents in China in 1894, the next to last of seven children, he served in WWI, then taught English in China, Korea (at a Japanese university) and England, sometimes alongside his younger brother, Eric – this bio snippet, an aside to a longer one of Eric, does not mention Henry's writing. During (or before?) WWII, Henry served in the British Intelligence Corps, "to recruit spies to penetrate Japanese held territory" in China.

Of his alternate existence, fantasy and SF sites note him mainly as author of The Shadowy Thing, which had a strong influence on H. P. Lovecraft. You can purchase a 1928 hardback edition online for $967; I don't plan to. Beyond that and Cursed, he penned a few sea and other adventure tales (sometimes as Burgess Drake), and a five-volume Approach to English Literature for Students Abroad during the '40s and '50s. He died in 1963.

I've had little truck with adventure stories. The Conan tales bore me silly – great gnarled nonsense. I recently downloaded a humongous boulder of public-domain fantasy/SF/adventure (many of them novel-length), looking for a simple, non-challenging read. The first four I staggered through were almost malignantly bad – cumbersome slagheaps of adjectives, mostly multi-page descriptions of otherworldly scenery, including, so help me, two travels through nothing – quite literally a void interrupted by different-colored lights. They showed less imagination than an addled exterminator.

It's turned out that what I was looking for in that muck, without knowing, was Cursed Be the Treasure, which harks back to lesser-known works such as R. L. Stevenson's The Wrecker, about a ship ("The Flying Scud") in which the adventure is as much inside the narrator as mired in convoluted events wavering beyond the written horizon. I think Drake also took inspiration from Dickens, especially Nell's wanderings through the countryside with her grandfather in The Old Curiosity Shop. (Though unlike Dickens with his often black and white characters, all of Drake's emanate shades of moral grey.)

The first-person narrator of Cursed is Tommy, recalling his youth from age 6 to roughly 17, consumed in continual flight with his father from the vengeance of what his father calls Shadow-of-Fear. During their flight, they are briefly "trapped" by a witch-like figure, Bite-in-the-Dark, whom Tommy kills by accident. Then the flight continues, because... who or what is Bite-in-the-Dark, and can the greater Shadow-of-Fear be killed?

Baldly stated, this can sound silly. But it's written with a riveting intensity of isolation and unfocused fear. His father will run forever to protect Tommy, but does not feel he can, himself, escape the inevitable. And there are also the magically bright summers at the Dolphin Inn, where Tommy investigates the caves and rock ledges of the coast, the supposed refuge of smugglers, uncovering secret passageways leading to... what?

Along the way, he and his father stop at a supposed haunted house. Tommy sees a ghost (does he?) and encounters a skeleton (he does).When his father must leave on for an extended period, Tommy goes to school for the first time – his father's extensive, intensive knowledge had been enough to meet his educational needs.

Tommy makes friends with Worthing, an older, rule-bound student (who faults Tommy's adventuresome ways). Tommy invites Worthing for a stay at the house, during which Tommy finds a hidden passage and loses it again. In a later stint at the house, he meets Captain Field and his daughter. She, like Tommy, is traveling alone with her father, and like his father, the Captain is haunted by an implacable enemy.

Why no mother for either of these near-bewitched children? The word "mother" never appears in this tale. For both, the single parent and the single child have always been thus.

From here on, I'll leave the plot alone, because it's the method of telling and the near-perfect pacing that make this book, in my mind, close to a masterpiece. Reliving it, retrieving the incidents I forgot through the years, was unlike any other literary experience I've had; 70 years between readings, and it holds the same searing chill. And those two remembered incidents that I did recall – I can't talk sanely about them. The second details perhaps the worst mistake any human being could make.

There's nothing overtly supernatural in the telling, but the possibility of it hangs like a torn curtain. As Tommy slowly uncovers clues, a more enmeshed tale emerges, tying together disparate elements –almost typing them together. Certain small details don't quite fit... but not because Drake is lax. It's because nothing here can be complete, wholly true or fully whole. A "definitive" through line would only cheapen the tale. The passageways by the Dolphin Inn lead to no found end; the lost treasure is truly cursed – through the intertwined vengeance of those who fought and killed for it, and the inescapable guilt with which each must live.

That's the book, as written. But its effect on me goes beyond the words. It reaches something in me as inescapable as Shadow-of-Fear, like a reflected study of my life. Not Tommy's flight – the entire tale. I have none of Tommy's robust, adventuresome spirit... at least not externally. But something of my mind works the way this story works, with the details incomplete, the compounded feeling of guilt, the need for everything to be different, released. It was somehow like I was reading myself.

But a few details....

The novel I've been working on for the past couple years (before I reread Cursed) encapsulates a woman in her early 30s:

raised by her father, from the ages of 4 to 16

haunted by the past and her eerie effects on the present

with no direct memory of her mother, though unlike Tommy, the not knowing torments her

her name is Jenny; Captain Field's daughter's name is Jenny

This litany of congruence rattles my innards.

Did those plot details from Cursed that I thought had been lost remain hidden in the far reaches of my mind?

I don't think so. On rereading, the early chapters seemed fully new to me.

Are there cosmic associations that exhibit when we least expect them, in the least likely ways?

I think that even less.

I see the world as a grand accumulation of circumstances, ruled by laws that we can never directly experience or untangle as they apply to the minute incidents of life. Sometimes these circumstances heap in symmetrical piles that can delight or terrify, as did the Dolphin Inn and Shadow-of-Fear for Tommy.

In my case, the dovetailing of this marvelous tale with driving events in my life is an overwhelming gift.

I refuse to question it.

by Derek Davis

[quantumlasange]

A more refined and accurate version of my top 50 Albums of all time in no real order. This time I’m gonna go into some more detail for my choices.  So if you wanna read that it’ll be after the line break.

1. Graceland - Paul Simon. This is the only album I have on CD, Cassette and Vinyl. It’s honestly a perfect album. I don’t really like ‘That Was Your Mother’ on it’s own but when hearing it as part of the album it’s great.

2. Abbey Road - The Beatles. My favorite Beatles album and I love how the B-side is knows as The Abbey Road Medley. It also has Ringo’s only Drum Solo in the entire Beatles catalog and we all know Ringo is the best Beatle. I have it on Vinyl.

3. In Step - Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble. Stevie Ray Vaughan is by far my favorite guitarist of all time. Every track on this album kicks ass and he put his heart and soul into every note he played. I have it on Vinyl.

4. Brothers In Arms - Dire Straits. Over all a great little rock album. I find a lot of the songs to be comforting in their own way,  like “So Far Away” and “Brothers In Arms” are very comforting to me. I have it on Vinyl.

5. Winelight - Grover Washington Jr. By God this album is fucking Sexy, like holy shit. This is a more recent listen but I was missing out just listening to “Just the Two of Us” (Featuring Vocals by Bill Withers).

6. Watching You Watching Me - Bill Withers. Nelson George said that this album was I quote "full of little pleasures" and he’s damned right. There is not a single song on this album I don’t like, by far my favorite R&B album of all time. I have it on Vinyl.

7. Future Development - Del the Funky Homosapien. My favorite Hip Hop/Rap album ever. Del’s flows and rhymes are on point throughout the whole album.

8. Spontaneous Inventions - Bobby McFerrin. A live album that you wouldn’t think was live since there’s little to no crowd noise. A great Vocal Jazz album showcasing how Bobby McFerrin can use his voice as an instrument all it’s own. I have it on Vinyl.

9. Squeeze Box: The Complete Works of "Weird Al" Yankovic. This is kinda cheating since it’s a Box Set of every album Weird Al made and an extra album with unreleased stuff. But I can’t choose just one Weird Al album so this will have to do.

10. The Wall - Pink Floyd. This whole Album really resonates with me and helped me understand my depression after I dropped out of college. It really has a place in my life. I have it on Vinyl.

11. Kilimanjaro - The Rippingtons. A fantastic Smooth Jazz / Jazz Fusion album. I really like Jazz Fusion and this is a great example of it.  I have it on Vinyl.

12. Dreamland - Black Box. An Italo house/Eurodance album that’s my favorite in the whole house genre. Some great dance tracks on this. I have it on Vinyl.

13. Tourist in Paradise - The Rippingtons. This album came out right after Kilimanjaro and is another great example of Smooth Jazz Fusion. I have it on Vinyl.

14. Teddy Pendergrass - Teddy Pendergrass. His debut solo album and a fantastic piece of R&B. It also has the  greatest break-up song ever “I Don’t Love You Anymore”. I have it on Vinyl.

15. S.O.S - The S.O.S Band. Their first album, a disco album that came out in 1980 after disco died in the USA. Was really big in Nighclubs and is a good album aside from "S.O.S. (Reprise)" which just sucks.  I have it on Vinyl.

16. Purple Rain - Prince. This album is great. The guitar solo on “Purple Rain” is so good it could bring peace to the world.  I have it on Vinyl.

17.  Feels So Good - Chuck Mangione. A fantastic Smooth Jazz / Easy Listning. album "Hide and Seek (Ready or Not Here I Come)", “Feels So Good” and "The XIth Commandment" are just outstanding. I have it on Vinyl.

18. Elementary - Wah Wah Watson. Melvin M. Ragin’s only solo album. This is pure Jazz Funk at it’s best. I’ve used this album cover as an Icon online for years, I love it. I have it on Vinyl.

19. Rumours - Feetwood Mac. There’s only one track on this album that I don’t like and it’s "Oh Daddy”. I feel like that song just brings the whole album down emotionally. Other wise this albums pretty damn good. I have it on Vinyl.

20. Deltron 3030 - Deltron 3030. Del the Funky Homosapien, producer Dan the Automator, and DJ Kid Koala made a fantastic Hip-Hop/Rap opera Concept album. The story of a city in the dystopian year of 3030. 

21. Kisses on The Bottom - Paul McCartney. I caught this at like 2am on PBS' Great Performances one night in like 2013 maybe 2014 and fell in love with it. It’s mainly songs Paul McCartney grew up listening to and he wrote 2 songs in that style and it’s great.

22. Listen to the Scatman - “Scatman” John Larkin. Did you know that Scatman John was a legit Jazz Piano player? This album is just full of fantastic jazz and one kinda out of place dance song.

23. Loop Daddy II -  Marc Rebillet. Sure this is more of an EP but I put a whole Box Set on the list so shut up. Every song is a pure sexy dance groove. I love it.

24. Places and Spaces - Donald Byrd. This is 100% Pure Trumpet Jazz-Funk. This album fucking slaps hardcore. The way Donald Byrd plays the trumpet and flugelhorn is magical.

25. Whenever You Need Somebody - Rick Astley. Not only does this album have the Meme hit "Never Gonna Give You Up" it has a very heartfelt version of "When I Fall in Love". Every song is a mad banger. I have it on Vinyl.

26. Mint Jams - Casiopea. Casiopea makes some great Japanese Jazz Funk Fusion and this is by far their best album. I love me some Jazz Funk Fusion and some of the best stuff came out of Japan in the 80′s.

27. Hi-Five Soup - The Aquabats.  A great New Wave album that kids will enjoy. The Aquabats got more child friendly since they got a kids TV show but this album does have my boy Strong Bad on it. I have it on CD

28. Myths, Legends and Other Amazing Adventures, Vol. 2 - The Aquabats. An earlier Aquabats album since it’s a bunch of unreleased stuff and B-sides. “Pizza Day” speaks to my soul. I have it on CD

29. The Dance - Dave Koz. One of the first Smooth Jazz albums I ever listened to, it really helped me get into Smooth Jazz which lead me to my love of the Smooth Jazz and Jazz-Fusion. I have it on CD

30. The Corner Grocery Store - Raffi. This is an album form my childhood. I still have my VHS bootleg of Raffi on Broadway from when I was a kid. This album has my favorite song sung by Raffi, “Anansi”. 

31. Led Zeppelin 2 - Led Zeppelin. My favorite Zepplin album. “Moby Dick” is my favorite song off the album even if it’s just a big ass drum solo.  I have it on Vinyl.

32. Darkside of The Moon -  Pink Floyd. This is what I consider to be Pink Floyd’s most Jazz-Rock-Fusion oriented album. The whole albums flows together into a great soundscape. I have is on Vinyl.

33. Random Access Memories - Daft Punk. I find this to be a concept album about how Daft Punk is a pair of Robots. Part of it seems like that with the album title being a close reference to Random Access Memory aka RAM and the song title "Motherboard". A lot of the lyrics in the album make me think it has some kind of concept but that’s just me. I have this on CD

34. Thriller 25 Super Deluxe Edition - Michael Jackson.  This was the first CD I remember buying with my own money I got it at FYE. I only really listened to the songs that originally came on Thriller and not the new 2008 versions of the songs.

35. Can’t Get Enough - Barry White. This album is sexy as fuck, god be damned if you listen to this and not get turned on even slightly.

36. Larry Carlton Plays the Sound of Philadelphia. This is a great full of classic Philadelphia R&B as preformed by legendary session guitarist Larry Carton. He plays all the songs in a very Jazz like style that I just love.

37. Pure Pure - Moe Shop. A fantastic little Dance/Electronic EP. I like to call it a Future Funk EP but it’s in that vain of Vaporwave and Future Funk which are both good genres.

38. The Soundtrack to Mulan. Mulan is my favorite Disney animated movie so of course the soundtrack is on my list. I have this on cassette and it’s one of the two tapes I always listen to on long walks.

39. Every Breath You Take: The Singles - The Police. This is my other go-to cassette to listen to on long walks. This is basically the greatest hits of The Police but it’s fantastic.

40. Head Hunters - Herbie Hancock. I told you I liked Jazz-Funk Fusion right? This is perfect example of the genre made by the fantastic Jazz pianist and composer Herbie Hancock.

41. Marcos Valle - Marcos Valle (1983) Marcos Valle released a self titled album in 1970 according to Wikipedia, but I’m talking about the one from 1983. A great Brazilian Disco/Dance Bossa Nova  Samba mix album with some great dance-able tunes.

42. Homestar Runner Original Soundtrack Volume 1 (Songs, Background Music, Jingles, and Worse).

43. Homestar Runner Original Soundtrack Volume 2 (Songs, Background Music, Jingles, and Worse) .

44. Homestar Runner Original Soundtrack Volume 3 (Songs, Background Music, Jingles, and Worse) . If I could have all 3 volumes in the "HSR OST Full-On!" playlist from they would all be one entry leaving me a bit more room to play with. Plus the fact that Volume 4, a Limozeen album, a Sloshy album and a Videlectrix album are all planed for release it would help to just bundle all the Homestar Runner music together.

45. Strong Bad Sings (and Other Type Hits). This is the more “Legit”  Homestar Runner Music. I love Homestar Runner and was even featured in the 2018 Fan Costumes video so technically in a way I’m part of the Homestar Runner Cannon.

46. Fallout: New Vegas OST. My favorite Fallout game and I’d be amiss if I didn’t add the soundtrack to my list. One of my favorite games of all time even if I rarely play it.

47. Dinosaur Dracula’s Halloween & Christmas Jukebox. This is another one of those kinda cheating options since it’s two mix-tape type things. If I want to get in the Halloween or Christmas Spirit I can turn one of these Jukebox’s on and not have to worry about searching for mood music. With 100+ songs on each Jukebox I’m guaranteed good music.

48. 3 Hours of Relaxing Super Nintendo Music 1 & 2 - SNES Drunk. This is the music I turn on if I need some chill background noise or need something to fall asleep to. With a total of 6 hours of relaxing music I’m sure to fall asleep or just relax.

49. Xerf's Jazz/Fusion Mixes. So far there are 5 volumes of Japanese Jazz Fusion and like I said I like Jazz Fusion, espicaly Japanese Jazz Fusion.

50. Xerf's Jpop/AOR Mixes. There are thechinly 8 Volumes but volume 3 is just not there probbably due to copywrite. These mixes are more City Pop and older Japanese Pop, Adult-oriented rock, Funk that kinda stuff.

[siandvisualdiary]

friday 16/10/2020

 the history of publishing with David

task 1

i chose this book for the pre 2000 

Info from the V&A Search the Collections website 

Book - The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, Newly Imprinted ...

Book - The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, Newly Imprinted ... Object: Book

Place of origin: Hammersmith (published) Date: 1896 (published)

Artist/Maker: Morris, William, born 1834 - died 1896 (printer) Riley, Dominic (binder) Burne-Jones, Edward Coley (Sir), born 1833 - died 1898 (illustrator) Kelmscott Press (published)

Materials and Techniques: 'The boards of the book were made of laminates of millboard, card and hand made paper, stuck together with rabbit skin glue. [. The book was covered in black Harmatan goatskin, with the same leather for the joints and doublure, black suede for the first flyleaf, and red and black Fab cut-away areas were painted with red acrylic paint. The gold tooling and board edges was done by Trevor Lloyd, and I tooled both the title panels and the lines on the front and back cover. The binding is sig The book is housed in a double-walled, reinforced clamshell box lined with double red-and-white suede pads, and with a title label on the spine.' Dominic R

Credit Line: Given/Loaned by the American Friends of the V&A through the generosity of: Paul Chrzanowski. Museum number: LOAN:AMERICANFRIENDS.716-2016 Gallery location: National Art Library

Public access description

The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer published by the Kelmscott Press was the last great work of William Morris, and the icon of the private press movement, the printing revival he inspired. The volume contains 87 wood-cut illustrations by Edward Burne-Jones, who was a close friend of Morris. The Gothic-inspired type was specially designed by William Morris and named 'Chaucer' after this book. The book brought together Morris's passion for the medieval period and his commitment to beautiful hand-crafted productions and was published shortly before he died. 425 copies were printed, sold at £20 each.

This Kelmscott Chaucer had an undistinguished binding when acquired by the present owner, so that he felt justified in altering its condition. He selected Dominic Riley, a distinguished British designer bookbinder for the commission. Riley studied at the London College of Printing. He has won several major bookbinding awards, and was elected a Fellow of the Designer Bookbinders in 2008. He now works and teaches in Britain and the US.

The binder conceived the work as an overt homage to Morris, basing the design upon the mirror forms of his initials: ‘W M’. Several techniques were used (including modern digital methods to produce the stamps). The final work is grand and dignified, its geometric exactness relieved with touches of naturalistic ornamentation based on the book’s border decoration, and its use of the colour red echoes the red used for the rubrics in the text (based on medieval and Renaissance practice of highlighting headings in red ink).

Descriptive line

The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, Newly Imprinted ... (Hammersmith: Kelmscott Press, 1896), newly bound by British designer bookbinder Dominic Riley.

Physical description

Hand-printed book on paper with goatskin binding.

Dimensions

Height: 44 cm

Museum number

LOAN:AMERICANFRIENDS.716-2016

Object history note

Given/Loaned by the American Friends of the V&A through the generosity of: Paul Chrzanowski, 2016.

URL

http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1407076/the-works-of-geoffrey-chaucer-book-morris-william/

2. info from https://collections.artsmia.org/art/80115/the-works-of-geoffrey-chaucer-now-newly-imprinted-william-morris

Details

Title The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, now Newly Imprinted

Dated1896

Artist William Morris; 

Author: Geoffrey Chaucer;

 Illustrator: Edward Coley Burne-Jones; 

Engraver: Wood engravings by William Harcourt Hooper; 

Editor: Frederick S. Ellis; 

Printer: William Morris at Kelmscott Press, Hammersmith, England; 

Publisher: Kelmscott Press, Hammersmith, England 

Nationality British

Artist Life 1834 - 1896 

Role Designer 

Gallery Not on View 

Department Prints and Drawings

Dimension 17 x 12 x 2 5/8 in. (43.18 x 30.48 x 6.67 cm) 

(closed)30.5 cm 43.2 cm 6.7 cm 

CreditThe Frank P. Leslie Collection, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Frank P. Leslie in memory of Mr. and Mrs. John Leslie Accession Number B.67.1dup Medium Wood engravings, letterpress in black and red ink; bound volume Country England Century 19th century 

Provenance (Sold to Leslie by unknown vendor, London, England, c. 1952); Frank P. Leslie, Wayzata, Minn., c. 1952-67; given to MIA, 1967.Rights 

Public Domain Classification

Prints; Books

Object Name Illustrated book Catalogue Raisonne Franklin, p.192; Sparling 40; Tomkinson 40; PMM 367; Huntington Library (Great Books in Great Editions) 24; Needham 101A; Peterson A40; Ransom (Private Presses) 40; Garvey 45; Ray 258; Walsdorf 40; V & A 9

2nd book I chose was the 2018 sketch book ( 2018 Sketch Collection) by South Korean Artist  Kim Jung Gi I discovered his work on instagram a couple days ago and I loved the variety simplicity and the different style of his work so when i thought of an artist for this task I selected him :)    https://www.kimjunggi.net/biography-v2/   https://www.kimjunggius.com/pages/about-artist

Korean artist Kim Jung Gi was born in 1975 in the town of Goyang-Si, located in the province of Kyongki-Do South Korea.  At 19, this budding artist enrolled at a Fine Arts School, majoring in Art and Design.  He attended Dong-Eui University in Busan for three years and did his two years in the South Korean army as a part of the Special Forces Unit.  Here, he was able to memorize the array of different weapons and vehicles.

Kim’s most notable creative asset is his memory, something he has developed over a number of years.  His ability to render extremely complicated scenes near-perfectly from memory, without the aid of references, has stretched the boundaries of what many artists believed was possible.

Kim Jung Gi’s first publication – Funny Funny – was published in Young Jump magazine. He wrote a number of short stories and held exhibitions for his work that led to his teaching manhwa (Korean comic book) to various private schools and universities.  Kim collaborated with Seung-Jin Park, the writer of Tiger the Long Tail, to draw six volumes for his comic.  Kim also worked alongside French author Bernard Werber, illustrating two novels he had written – “Paradise” in 2010 and “Third Humanity” in 2013.

In 2011, Kim Jung Gi partook in the Comic Festival held in Bucheon where, for the first time ever, he drew live. In most cases, artists showcase a framed drawing or painting, but KJG decided to do something different. He placed paper up on three walls around his table and began drawing.

Superani CEO Hyun Jin Kim videoed and posted the entire process on YouTube and, as some videos tend to do, went viral. This led to the invitation to different worldwide events.  In recent years, he has accepted invitations to perform in France, America, all around Asia and now in Japan for his first show simply titled “Drawing Exhibition”.

Kim has six sketchbooks in print, which equate to about 4,500 pages’ worth of drawings in a span of 12 years. He also collaborated with the legendary Japanese artist Katsuya Terada in 2017.  The pair put together an amazing sketchbook of various drawings, showing off their talents.

He’s worked in various industries – movies, music, and government. Kim put together a feature exhibition in Cheongwadae” the Republic of Korea’s president’s official workplace and residence.  He was also hired by Korean Hip-Hop artist Drunken Tiger to create the album cover.

He holds the record for “Longest drawing by an individual” in the Guinness World Records book.

https://www.kimjunggius.com/collections/frontpage/products/2018-sketch-collection

I like both works because to me they are quite similar william morris working on Chaucer is legendary in itself the level of attention to detail is extraordinary and the colour pallette is simple and the typography is grand and archaic in nature a level of excellence rarely seen nowadays.Kim’s work is highly skilled and varied a comic book style but still unique to him I love black and white simplicity as well as colour however I love the detail and excellence shown in both works.To me skill is important to do one’s best and show originality whilst doing so.Clarity,skill and originality are demonstrated here and that is why I was drawn to both artists.

[murasaki-murasame]

Thoughts on Fruits Basket 2019 Episode 25: “Summer Will Be Here Soon”

I was a little worried about how this episode would turn out, since it was obviously going to be a sort of set-up/transition episode for season 2 rather than being super dramatic and climactic like the last episode was, but I think they handled it pretty much perfectly, and this was probably the best place to end this first season.

Now we just have to wait for Some Point In 2020 [tm] for the second season :)

Anyway, thoughts under the cut, plus some of my overall thoughts on the season as a whole now that it’s done. [Plus spoilers for the whole manga]

There’s something hilarious to me about how right up to the last minute they kept surprising me with the different choices they’ve made with how they’re structured this adaptation and what parts they’ve included. After they revealed Rin’s VA and character design a few days ago, I figured that meant she’d be the only new character getting teased at here, but then literally right when the finale came out they were like ‘oh yeah and here’s Kakeru and Machi lmao’.

They REALLY leaned hard into making the whole second half of this episode a giant tease for season 2, but I can respect that. They handled it really well, at least.

Specifically, this episode adapted chapters 34, 35, and the final scenes of chapters 42 and 48. I was worried that it’d feel weird to tie scenes from multiple different chapters together like that, but they integrated it all together really smoothly. They had to change a lot of the context around the bits they included from chapters 42 and 48, but they did it really well. I was mostly worried about how they’d handle Kakeru and Machi’s teaser scene, but having Tohru and Yuki just walk past them down the stairs at school was a surprisingly simple way to do it. It’s interesting to note that because they included that scene without the overall context of chapter 42, we don’t know that they’re going to be new members of the student council. Which is kinda interesting.

I also liked what they did with tying the ending of chapter 48 into the small scene with Ayame at the end of chapter 35, by bringing basically all of the Somas together for the final scene. It all tied together really naturally. And I still think that that whole monologue the episode ends on was definitely the best place to end this season. It’s a really blatant end-point that teases what’s about to come in the next major arc. I also thought it was neat how they mentioned how Hiro was going to be late, which lead into the whole Rin scene.

And on that note, her whole intro scene was largely the same as it was in the manga, but it’s worth noting that they give her a little bit more dialogue where she actually mentions the curse, which is interesting because it takes a bit of a while for us to find out in the manga that she’s trying to break it. I think it’s a really good idea that they pretty much laid it out immediately. As much as I love Rin as a character, I’ve always felt that the way she was introduced into the story felt very awkward and kinda confusing, and part of it was because we don’t know anything about her motivations for a while, so this is a good change.

And like with with the Kakeru and Machi teaser scene, I think it’s interesting that, in terms of how the anime’s pacing things, we don’t know that Rin is Haru’s girlfriend yet. All we know is that she seems to be trying to break the curse. We’ll probably still get that whole reveal of their relationship early in season 2, but I just think it’s interesting that they made it so that the scene of her in the hospital is the first time we ever see her at all in the anime. I wondered if they might try and include Haru talking about her in this episode, but I’m glad they didn’t. They didn’t really have the time for it.

Also I’m in the middle of rereading the series now that I have the whole collection in Japanese, and I’m right in the middle of where we learn about Rin’s backstory and we start getting more development with Kakeru and Machi, so that’s pretty nice timing, lol. It’s really reminded me just how much we have store for us in season 2.

At some point soon, maybe when I’m a bit further into my reread, I’ll probably make a more detailed post about how I think season 2 will go, and how much of the story it’ll cover, but at the moment I’m kinda clueless about it, lmao. I wasn’t expecting them to adapt the content they adapted in this episode, so it’s kinda thrown off a lot of my predictions.

In general I still think that, if we get a third season after it, season 2 will probably end around the end of volume 16, or with the big Akito reveals, since that’s around the two-thirds mark of the story.

This is probably an unpopular opinion, but I also kinda hope that they only properly introduce Kakeru and Machi after the whole summer vacation arc ends. I just think it’s a bit awkward how in the manga they get introduced at the start of volume 9 and then basically vanish from the story until the start of volume 12. But we’ll see.

Before I get into my retrospective thoughts on the first season as a whole, I wanna mention that this episode had some really good animation and art in it. Especially in a lot of the scenes with Kyo and Kazuma. I just thought it was really nice, and slightly unexpected.

I also appreciate that we got a more thorough look at how the anime’s depicting the cat house, after last week’s shot of it. It looks like instead of being a basement of some kind, it’s an isolated shed or something that basically has a prison cell in it. Which is all kinds of disturbing.

Anyway, now that it’s all said and done, this first season was amazing and now I’m gonna have to try and impatiently wait for season 2 to start.

I dunno where to even begin, since I’m still not quite over how surreal and unexpected the existence of this series is. It’s not every day you see a classic shoujo manga get a multi-season anime reboot, especially one that’s so lovingly made. I know some people haven’t enjoyed it, but I think it’s been nearly perfect for what it is. You can really tell just how much love and thought has been put into this.

I don’t even hate the 2001 anime that much [ok there’s some parts where the anime-original comedy filler got extremely bad but still], but this is such a drastic improvement over it in nearly ever way. The 2001 anime still exists for those who enjoyed it, but I’m glad that this can serve as the definitive adaptation that people can get into. The manga’s really easy to get now because of the omnibus editions, but having a good, modern anime adaptation still goes a long way to bring new people in.

There’s some parts that haven’t quite aged well [*cough* Ritsu’s entire character *cough*] in a very 90′s kind of way, but as a whole this is the sort of story that has a sort of timeless emotional core to it, which is probably a big part of why it got a new adaptation.

You can also really tell that Funimation also has a lot of love for this series. With how they’ve been handling the simuldub, and how soon the BDs are gonna be coming out, I’m still convinced that they’ve been involved in the production of this new series from the start. In particular it’s been really neat seeing just how many of the 2001 dub cast they’ve managed to bring back for this. Including the reveal in this episode that they got Hiro’s old dub VA to voice Kakeru.

The more I think about it, the more fitting I think it is that this finale is very intentionally low-key and mostly serves to bring us back into the status quo while still hinting at future developments and mysteries. It’s just kinda nice to end the season off on a much more warm and happy note than how intense and bittersweet the last episode was.

Anyway, I’m probably gonna just spend the next however many months rewatching this while I wait for the second season, lol.

[recentanimenews]

My Favorite Art Books of 2019

This year I reviewed 62 art books, a dip again from the 74 I did last year, and 82 back in 2017. I attribute the reasons for the falling numbers to a combination of reduced readership for my blog ( less readers = less conversion, which unfortunately gives me less resources to procure books ) as well as the comparatively smaller number of interesting Japanese art books that I felt was worth picking up.

Despite the reduced quantity, there’s still plenty of great art books that were published in 2019, and these particular 10 are my favorites. I hope you’ll find something of interest in the list, and here’s to a happy 2020 ! –

1) Spider-Man : Into The Spiderverse – The Art Of The Movie

Published in late December 2018, this book narrowly missed my fav art books list of 2018, so I’m including it here for posterity.

Winner of the 2018 Academy Award for Best Animated Film, and a movie I’m super proud to have worked on, this book explores the stunning concept art created for the film, with a surplus of sketches, storyboards, character/environment designs as well as color scripts. The beautiful images that you see in the film were greatly informed by the amazing visuals the concept artists created, so if you like the movie, you’ll the art work in this book too.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK | Buy From Amazon Japan

2) Tokyo At Night – The Artworks of Mateusz Urbanowicz II

Tokyo based Polish illustrator Mateusz Urbanowicz‘s first art book Tokyo Storefronts was one of my favorites in 2018, and he’s back again this year strong with Tokyo At Night, a collection of delightful watercolor illustrations that explores the the moody nocturnal sights of the sprawling, skyscraper topped metropolis saturated with neon lights, mysterious back alleys, wet cityscapes lit by reflections and more. It’s a stunning art book from start to end, and I love it.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon Japan | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK

3) Real Size – Katsuya Terada Art Book

Renowned Japanese illustrator Katsuya Terada’s Real Size is a superb collection of his black marker art works, many of which were created during his live drawing events. The title refers to the print size of the reproductions which are at 100% scale of the original art works, large mural pieces which are cropped and presented across several pages in the book. The complete drawings are also included, scaled down to 16% of the original size.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon Japan | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK

4) Making Solo: A Star Wars Story

Industrial Light & Magic Presents : Making Solo: A Star Wars Story is a handsomely photographed making of book by Rob Bredow, the SVP, executive creative director, and head of Industrial Light & Magic.

As a child, the production photographs of the AT-ATs from The Empire Strikes Back inspired Rob to become a filmmaker, and in meticulously documenting the progress of the production on Solo he hopes to do the same – to inspire the next generation of artists, engineers and storytellers.

The beautiful set photographs gives readers an intimate glimpse into the journey that Solo took from pre-production, production, and post-production, fully documenting how this film came to the big screen.

This book is a great companion for the equally fantastic Art Of Solo – A Star Wars Story, which focuses on the concept art behind the film ( and incidentally one of my fav art books of 2018 ).

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK | Buy From Amazon Japan

5) The Idol – Sushio

Sushio is a Japanese animator/illustrator who started his career as an animator at studio Gainax for the TV animation series Neon Genesis Evangelion. After working on many renowned anime series and movies such as One Piece, he took on the character design work for the anime hit series Kill La Kill, catapulting his status in the animation world.

This book is his long-awaited first commercial collection that looks back over his career to date. It features notable works from Kill La Kill, Gurren Lagann, Momoiro Clover Z, along with a panel illustration of Anime Matsuri 2015, his work overseas for an annual anime convention held in Texas, and much more. This book also features Sushio’s illustrations of AKIRA: two original illustrations depicting the imaginary post-AKIRA world, which was officially approved by Katsuhiro Otomo himself, and two illustrations taken from the Tribute to Otomo art book.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK | Buy From Amazon Japan

6) The Making Of Alien

The Making Of Alien is an in-depth and comprehensive book charting the complete story of how Alien was made, featuring new interviews with Ridley Scott and other production crew, and including many rarely-seen photos and illustrations from the Fox archives.

I already own several excellent books on the making of the Alien films, Alien The Archive and Aliens – The Set Photography just to name a few, but this huge hard cover volume explores plenty of material that I’m only seen for the first time, most notably the huge collection of “Ridleygrams”; detail storyboards draw by the director himself, as well as on set production photographs and a giant depository of concept art pieces by several artists like Eliot Scott, Chris Foss and Ron Cobb.

But the book isn’t simply your regular coffee-table book glossed over with just pictures and images. The small print text accompanying the visuals are cramped with detailed production stories and are more scholarly than just a casual read.

As a big fan of the franchise I’m absolutely delighted with this book, and I really look forward to the upcoming Making Of Aliens book, also by J.W. Rinzler.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK | Buy From Amazon Japan

7) Children Of The Sea Background Art Book

Children Of The Sea ( Kaiju No Kodomo ) is a Japanese animated film directed by Watanabe Ayumu and produced by Studio 4°C, based on the highly acclaimed manga by Daisuke Igarashi. The art direction and background art is supervised by Kimura Shinji, who previously bought us the amazing background art in Tekkon Kinkreet and Steamboy.

Published in the same format at the fantastic Shiro ( White ) background art book for Tekkon Kinkreet, this hardcover volume is bursting at the seams with stunning background art painted by Kimura Shinji, with some 250 pages of art work.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK | Buy From Amazon Japan

8) Hellboy – 25 Years Of Covers

I enjoy every page and panel of Mike Mignola’s Hellboy comics, but the art covers he has illustrated for the comic are something special; often drawn with just that extra, delicate detail. Over the years as the volumes of Hellboy and the shared universe BPRD grew it became harder and harder to keep track of all the covers that he has illustrated, and I started hoping for an art book that is dedicated to just the covers. Hellboy – 25 Years Of Covers is exactly that.

This hardcover volume features more than 150 full-page cover pieces from Mike Mignola, Richard Corben, Duncan Fegredo and more, all neatly collected for easy viewing and enjoyment.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon Japan | Buy From Amazon UK

9) Ikegami Ryoichi Art Works

An art book that is long overdue, Ikegami Ryoichi Art Works is a superb collection of illustrations from the famed manga artist of Crying Freeman, Sanctuary and Mai The Psychic Girl.

Running at a sumptuous 288 pages, the art book is split into 2 separate volumes, with one book dedicated to male characters, and the other female. While a good portion of both volumes feature illustrations from Crying Freeman, likely the artist’s most famous work; there’s still a good spread of content from Ikegami’s other mangas, and this is the biggest collection of his art work published yet.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK | Buy From Amazon Japan

10) Akira Art Of Wall Art Book

This book arrived just in time to be included in this year’s list, and also made for a very splendid Christmas present.

Four sets of giant Akira murals ( see the pictures I took here, here and here ) used to decorate the construction walls of the Parco Shibuya shopping mall in Tokyo from the period of 2017-2019 are fully reproduced in this stunning boxset. The panoramic art work looks spectacular when fully extended, and would immediately class up any wall lucky enough to be adorned with it. I think this might very well be my favorite art book of the year, among all my favorites.

Read the full book review | Buy From Amazon.com | Buy From Amazon UK | Buy From Amazon Japan

Besides the 10 books that I’ve listed above, some other noteworthy mentions include Marvel Monograph: The Art Of Esad Ribic, Perfect Blue Storyboard Book ( New Edition ), The Art Of Kazuchika Kise and Bram Stoker’s Dracula – Mike Mignola Graphic Novel ( B&W edition ).

You can take a look at the full list of 2019’s art book reviews here, and I also recommend my favorite art books of 2018/2017/2016/2015/2014/2013/2012.

If you need help with ordering on Amazon Japan, the FAQs below will guide you through, step by step.

One small request – Due to the falling readership of my blog, I’ve been finding it harder and harder to purchase more books for review. I kindly ask that you use any of the Amazon purchase links in this post or anywhere on my blog to buy books; it won’t cost you anything, but the affiliate fee I earn as a result will allow me to continue reviewing more books. Thank you !

And lastly, I’ll love you hear about your favorite art books this year too, if you have any to share. Happy New Year !

The post My Favorite Art Books of 2019 appeared first on Halcyon Realms - Art Book Reviews - Anime, Manga, Film, Photography.

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Related Posts:

My Favorite Art Books of 2018

My Favorite Art Books of 2015

My Favorite Art Books of 2017

My Favorite Art Books of 2016

My Favorite Art Books of 2014

By: yonghow

[scyllua]

Even though chap.182-183 provide us with background story and plot exposition, I couldn't help feel the next few chapters also featured a slower narrative (in spite of all the action!) than the norm for the usually fast-paced Golden Kamuy manga. It then occurred to me to check the numbering of the chapters, and realized chapters beginnning from 181 (the breaking from Akou Prison) up to the upcoming 190 should be compiled into vol.19 (there are currently 16 volumes released). It seems to me author Noda has been matching the pacing of the narrative to complete a 10-chapter arc with the current plot.

I'd say we're still far from seeing any kind of conclusion regarding Ogata in the manga, but the current arc has had me pondering about the fate of Kiroranke. It actually had me pondering a lot more why Tanigaki always seems to get the worst luck out of the whole main cast in any given situation, including being shot, pummeled, poisoned, framed for false charges, deceived into becoming this manga's male gravure idol... I was eagerly expecting this week's chapter for the focus of the plot to come back to the rest of Sugimoto's entourage, and while it does seem we'd still need to wait for at least the chapter that would complete the upcoming vol.19 (chap.190) to get the bigger picture on the scope of things, the teaser text for next chapter... has me wondering again.

Individual chapters published in the Shounen Young Jump magazine include a teaser text at the end which is removed in the compilation volumes. For instance, "Chap.666 END! And next chapter: will they eat the poor cute seal they came across in the shore?" (Sorry about the example, but I won't ever be able to get over the seals in this manga). Chap.189 has the following teaser text: 天から役目なしに降ろされた物はひとつもない.

This is an Ainu saying that has repeatedly appeared since the very beginning of the serialization of the manga, though I can't remember at the time whether it's been featured in the plot itself...

...as it appears instead in the inner sleeve of the covers (it's the phrase highlighted in red). I do apologize for the poor quality of my pics, by the way!

In Katakana-rendered Ainu, it reads, カント オロワ ヤクサクノ アランケプ シネプ カ イサム. One rendition I found in our Latin alphabet is, Kant Oroya Yakusakuno Alan Kep Synep Caisam. The line at the left is the translation of the phrase into Japanese. The image files from the digital edition and manga scans I've found in the net don't include the inner sleeve and thus, they're missing this phrase. In the case of the digital edition of the manga, I wouldn't know this is because the original uploaders didn't include the inner sleeve along with the other image files, or because said edition simply omits it. I wouldn't know whether the official English version features the phrase in the inner sleeve, as I haven't seen that edition.

Literally, the sentence in Japanese reads, "there isn't a single thing that was dropped without a role from the sky". I understand the phrase as saying, "Nothing in this world came into being without a given role from the heavens", though I'd need a person actually fluent in Japanese to properly translate it, of course (or an "official" or acknowledged translation in any case: apart from being an actual saying, it seems to appear prominently in works and texts about the Ainu, as many results in Japanese showed me after a quick search in internet). Probably a better rendition would instead be, "All in this world came into being with a given role from the heavens". I've seen Japanese fans pondering about this phrase and how its significance to the plot (and the characters) since the beginning of the manga. I interpret it as telling us everything has a reason to be in this life; given the lastest chapters, I'm thinking of the phrase used as a teaser for chap.190 as an indicator (a promise?) of pivotal events to unfold that will affect the rest of the story.

[Edit] Thanks to sunsetpanic for letting me know the official English version does include the proverb! ...I can't read so clearly because the text appears blurry, but I think the translation the English version of the manga gives us is, "Nothing comes from heaven without purpose". As I wrote, I wouldn't know whether the Japanese digital version of the GK manga omits the phrase or simply the uploaders of the files I've found online didn't include it (none of the manga image files I've seen online include the backcovers, either), but it makes me happy to know the English version does take into consideration a seemingly small detail. (A small detail, but that has had fans pondering about its significance to the story since the first compilation volume, and that might prove to be important 190 chapters into the plot.)