About Heroes

E’s Volumes 3 & 4Story & Art: Satol YuigaTranslation: Satsuki YamashitaPublisher: Broccoli Books Boy do I feel like an idiot. And it really doesn’t take much, but that’s beside the point. Last week I reviewed E’s volumes 1 and 2, well on my review I referred to Satol Yuiga as him. After a little research I owe Ms. Satol Yuiga an apology. I was a little lost when I read volumes 3 and 4 and I just read the previous volumes just last week. The art is still impressive if not better that the introductory chapters. She still manages to capture amazing fight scenes and gorgeous character designs. I really…

BoBoBo-Bo Bo-BoBo Volume 1Story & Art: Yoshio SawaiEnglish Adaptation: Drew WilliamsPublisher: Viz How do I explain this book without using the word insane? I probably couldn’t. With a title like that what else would you expect from this book? For some reason Viz decided to only publish one of the 20+ volumes of Bobobo in America. What’s really strange is that it’s not even volume 1 of the series, but volume eight or nine. So we jump right into the story with a paragraphs worth of catching up. Does that work? Hell yes! You really don’t have to know much about the background of this series to appreciate the level…

Asian BeatStory & Art: Hakase MizukiTranslation: Yoohae YangAdaptation: Nathaniel BowdwenPublisher: Tokyopop When I read the title I immediately thought of some J-pop group that got their own manga. I have to be in the mood for J-pop and I really have little very interest in reading anything based on J-pop. Thank God that I was wrong. This book has nothing to do with music at all. It is a compilation of four stand alone stories: The Town Where Snow Falls, Asian Beat, The Grey Town, and Scars. Although the book is described as fantasy I really don’t consider AB to be in the same league of same stories as Mizuki’s…

Clamp No Kiseki Volume 8Creators: CLAMPPublisher: Tokyopop If you’ve ever read manga or even heard about manga, I’m sure some time or other you have come across the work of CLAMP. CLAMP is an all female manga creator group from Japan. There are four members of this group: Mokona, Satsuki Igarashi, Tsubaki Nekoi, and Ageha Ohkawa. These ladies are responsible for such creations as Magic Knight Rayearth, Chobits, Angel Layer, Tsubasa, X/1999, xxxHolic, and Tokyo Babylon. They celebrated 15 years together in 2004 and these wonderful books with chess pieces were released in Japan for fans. Thanks to the great folks at Tokyopop these wonderful books are now available again…

Eden: It’s An Endless World Volume 1Story & Art: Hiroki EndoTranslations: Kumar SivasubramanianPublisher: Dark Horse I’ll be honest and say that what initially peeked my interest about this book was that gorgeous cover. It’s reminiscent of something Katsuhiro Otomo would have drawn back in his Memories book. The Wonderful character designs and technology all blended into one, hell at first glance I thought this was nothing more than a rip-off Otomo book. But it’s so much more than that, so much more. Enoah and Hannah are two kids around the age of fifteen, living in and around a Biosphere facility along with their mentor Layne. Layne is a man suffering…

Manga Reviews: Aqua, Murder Princess V. 1 & 2, Nabi, and Manga: The Complete Guide Aqua Volume 1Story & Art: Kozue AmanoTranslation: Alethea & Athena NibleyEnglish Adaptation: Barbara Randall KeselPublisher: Tokyopop After reading the entire book I found out it was a prequel to another manga entitled Aria. I have never read Aria, but I completely understood this manga, so it is safe to say that it is a stand-alone story. This particular story takes place on Mars, which is now called Aqua, because 90% of the planet’s surface is now water. It seems that in a city called Neo-Venezia, gondoliers are now known as Undines. Our main character Akari…

Story & Art: Oh! GreatTranslation & Adaptation: Makoto YukonLettered: NMSGPublisher: Del Rey From the creator of Tenjho Tenge, Oh! Great (Ito Ogure) comes Air Gear. When I heard about this manga, I thought to myself: “Great another manga trying to cash in on extreme sports!” I really do love it when I put my foot in my own mouth (actually, I am not that talented). This manga is everything taken from Rollerboys, Solarbabies, The Warriors, and mixed in with some fantastic new elements. The story is pretty basic; Airtrecking is an x-treme sport where skaters wear high-tech skates and then battle in teams for territory and fame. Each skate has…