Books: BM Manga
By Jonathan Clements.
From the exacting way that curator Nicole Coolidge Rousmaniere’s introduction refers to her British Museum exhibition as “Manga マンガ”, it seems that almost everybody who attended has failed to realise that the word is supposed to be said twice. This is not the BM “manga” exhibition, it is the BM “manga manga” exhibition, a doubling in two writing systems that recalls Frederik L. Schodt’s seminal 1983 book on the subject, Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics.
As the exhibition winds down, its catalogue is going to form much of its historical footprint. On shelves and coffee tables in years to come, this hefty 350-page book is going to transform into a resource and an aide-memoire, a place for people to remember and revisit what they saw. Undoubtedly, it will form the germ of some new fans’ first appreciation of what manga is. Continue Reading
Of Flesh and Blood
By Jeremy Clarke.
In the West, Hirokazu Koreeda remains Japan’s highest-profile, living, live-action film director. Shoplifters (2018) picked up over eighty awards nominations this year including the Best Foreign-Language Picture Golden Globe and Oscar. A Blu-ray box set of four key films, each with a new commentary, plus some excellent extras and a useful book of critical essays, follows London’s recent BFI Southbank retrospective. Continue Reading
Gun Gale Online 2
By Andrew Osmond.
If you haven’t seen the first volume of Gun Gale Online, we introduce it here; it’s spun off from the Sword Art Online franchise, but it’s quite possible to start with Gun Gale if you want. The end of the first volume set up the plucky Karen, known online as the pink pint-sized fighter Llen, preparing to enter her second “Squad Jam” tournament. Unlike the previous battle royale, when Llen was fighting beside the taciturn M, her teammate in this game is her best friend Miyu, who summons up her own cute-girl guise.
This time, though, there’s more than just a game victory at stake. Karen has learned that one of her online girl friends, the cheerfully lethal Pitohui, is obsessed with the Sword Art Online incident from a few years ago, when players who “died” in the game died for real. Now it seems that Pitohui may be planning to kill herself if she “dies” in the tournament, unless Llen can be the player who kills her… Continue Reading
Zeta Gundam Part 2
By Andrew Osmond.
Zeta Gundam is sometimes described as one of the darker Gundam series. That’s largely because of things that happen in the last couple of episodes on this set – this really is a series where no-one, and we mean no-one, is safe. Continue Reading
Oldboy Restored
By Jonathan Clements.
After a drunken night on the town in Seoul, Oh Dae-su (Choi Min-sik) just wants to get home and give his daughter her birthday present. But on the way … he simply disappears. In the ensuing 15 years, he is drugged, hypnotised and locked in a single room. He fails in an attempt to kill himself. When he is finally, inexplicably released, his only desire is to locate his captor, Evergreen. Evergreen, however offers him a deal - he has until 5th July to discover why this has all happened. If he gets it right, Evergreen will commit suicide. If he gets it wrong, he will kill every woman he has ever loved. Continue Reading