Manga Mavericks

Boo! That’s the sound a vuvuzela makes, at least according to the series we’re talking about today. That’s right, Naoki Urasawa superfan and lettering enthusiast Aidan joins us to discuss the first Urasawa manga we’re covering on the show - Mujirushi: The Sign of Dreams! We discuss how the series reflects Urasawa’s storytelling principles while differing stylistically in interesting ways, and gush over his art and color pages! We also discuss the lettering found in Urasawa’s books, translation differences across different editions, and the layout of the book itself! Oh, and of course, we analyze Urasawa’s reinterpretation of everyone’s favorite buck-toothed francophile from the Osomatsu-kun franchise, and the surprising depth Urasawa brings out in such a silly character! So head the vuvuzela’s call and listen closely to our discussion of this bande dessinee! Sheeh! Visit this podcast's webpage for a complete list of links and shout-outs mentioned in this episode! - http://all-comic.com/2020/manga-mave

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, Colton & Lum spend most of the show catching up on and discussing their thoughts on the latest round of Jump Starts from Shonen Jump (Phantom Seer, High School Family & Our Blood Oath), as well as some other simulpub debuts from Mangamo (Deathdeus: Hero of the Dead & My Evil Stepbrother) and Manga Plus (World's End Harem ~Britannia Lumiére~, Hokkaido Gals are Super Adorable, Excuse Me Dentist, Its Touching Me! & Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective). Afterwards, they discuss their thoughts on the latest bonus chapters of The Promised Neverland & Demon Slayer, and then round off the show by talking about Sawanabe Zombie by Kakio Tsurukawa from Star Fruit Books! We also have our usual news roundup discussing topics such as Demon Slayer catching up to My Hero Academia on the newest Bookscan list, the baffling ending of Iori Asaga's Dear Sa-chan, and the new licenses we have to look forward from publishers like Yen Press and Star Fruit Books! Enjoy! For a co

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, we have yet another review of a new series whose first volume is now on sale from Viz Media known as Moriarty the Patriot from Ryosuke Takeuchi and Hikaru Miyoshi! A series that runs in Shueisha's monthly Jump Square magazine starring the infamous nemesis of Sherlock Holmes himself, as he and his comrades take on the task of murdering the worst of England's elite noble society to make the world a better place for the common folk. Lum & Colton are joined by letterer of the series, Ace Christman, to discuss their thoughts on this first volume and even some material coming up! They're also sent in some thoughts from editor, Rae First, who couldn't make it to the show, but still had some insights to contribute as well! The game is afoot, as our titular mavericks are ready to eat the rich right alongside Moriarty band of rouges! Enjoy! For a complete list of links and shout-outs included in this episode, visit this podcast's webpage at: http://all-comic.com/2020/manga-maver

“Fly Me to the Moon Let me podcast among the stars Let me see what marriage is like From a, Sunday and Hata In other words, listen to me In other words, baby, read this series!” That’s right, we’re over the moon because we’re taking a trip into one of the latest hit Shonen Sunday manga, Kenjiro Hata’s Fly Me to the Moon! As always when we cover anything Sunday, we’re joined once again by Sakaki, founder of the Weekly Shogakukan Edition Talkback Twitter & Blog, as well as Marion from the Good Friends Anime Club and a gamut of other podcasts! Oh, and Mavericks teammate VLord, host of the Demon Slayer Podcast and Dumb Weebs is here too, I guess. Listen to this dream team discuss this dreamy manga about married life! We chat about the couple, the cuteness, the name, the pop culture references, and the allusions to The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter and the implications it may have on the story. We discuss everything that makes Fly Me an engaging manga, one you’ll want to commit to! We’re not asking for the mo

Anime and manga are beloved worldwide and enjoyed by passionate fans of all walks of life. However, marginalized voices are often not represented or visible in community events, conversations, or the media we enjoy itself. But POC fans and creatives have done so much great and essential work for this fandom, Black fans in particular. Recently there’s been a long-overdue movement in creative and professional circles to amplify and spotlight the voices of Black creatives in fandoms and industries, and I want to use Manga Mavericks to amplify more Black voices in the community and have a critical conversation about representation and inclusivity. In this spirit, we invited on a group of Black creatives who’ve long advocated for these critical conversations and championed spaces to highlight diverse perspectives to discuss their experiences as Black anime fans. Our guests are the Black Manga Critic, an anime/manga Youtuber who does live-stream read-throughs of series he loves while also doing vlogs discussing br

On this Manga Mavericks, its once again time for another news roundup, but this time we try something different! Instead of bogging down the episode with a huge slew of licenses that have been announced since the last time news was covered, Colton & Lum decide to each make their own short list of licenses that they're personally looking forward to seeing! Its a slight change in format compared to how the Mavericks normally report on news, but it gives them the time and energy to report on and discuss other more pressing matters like the recent statement from Amimaru regarding their questionable translation wages, the noticeable increase in other countries' need of legal streaming anime after the shut down of pirate site KissAnime and more!! Enjoy. For the complete list of links and Shout-Outs featured in this podcast, please visit this episode's webpage at: http://all-comic.com/2020/manga-mavericks-ep-132-september-2020-news-roundup/ PODCAST BREAKDOWN: 00:00 - Intro 04:39 - Updates on Act-Age & a

On this monster-sized episode of Manga Mavericks, Colton & Lum talk about Naoya Matsumoto's Kaiju No. 8, a new series from Shonen Jump that takes in a world where humanity battles against giant monsters, starring a protagonist who's job it is to clean up after those battles, but ends up deciding to pursue his dream of being a soldier to engage in actual combat...but not before he himself gains the ability to turn into a monster! Our Mavericks go the extra mile with not just discussing their thoughts on this new hit series, but also invite on the entire localization team responsible for bringing new chapters to English readers every week, including editor Karla Clark,  translator David Evelyn, and past guest, letterer Brandon Bovia (who may or may not be an industry legend)! The Mavericks discuss with this lovely trio about the process of simulpubbing a series and the thought that goes into every single decision made in process, whether it be choosing the right type and size of font for the dialogue or tra

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, Colton & Lum once again tackle more news from the world of manga! We also discuss a lot of new manga from various publishers, including three new doujinshi from Irodori Comics' LGBTQ-focused imprint Irodori Sakura, as well as three new simulpubs! We start off with the manga adaptation of Japan Sinks 2020 exclusively on Mangamo, followed by Ghost Reaper Girl from Shonen Jump, and last but not least, Lockdown Zone: Level X from Denpa! It's a cool collection of new series that we were very excited to talk about and we hope you all check them out!  Unfortunately, we also had to address the arrest of Tatsuya Matsuki, the writer of Act-Age, and the subsequent fallout, such as the cancellation of the series in Shonen Jump and everything else related to it. Our hearts go out to the victims of Matsuki's crimes, as well as Shiro Usazaki, whose artistic talent was responsible for bringing the world and characters of Act-Age to life, and we hope she is able to find more work and s

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, Colton & Lum finally get around to (at least some of) the news that has been building up over the past couple of months, including all of the licensing news from all the various publishers that were still announced despite the ongoing pandemic! Some of the biggest acquisitions including the return of series like Shaman King from Kodansha USA, as well as Slayers from J-Novel Club, both of which we were so excited about that we just HAD to pull in Vlord into to room for a bit to talk about! We also take a deep dive into the latest thoroughly researched analysis from Comics Beat, as well as report on some other unfortunate events happening in the general comics industry, including but not limited to the exposure of Warren Ellis. Truthfully, this episode became much more bloated then we initially planned for, which is why we will saving the rest of our news for next week, along with some thoughts on the latest simulpubs and even some titles from the newest line of Irodori

Blue Flag is a wonderful coming-of-age story in which characters navigate the difficult mores of identity, relationships, love, sexuality, and the choices we make. In the second part of our retrospective on KAITO’s manga, special guests Maxy Barnard, Ace Christman, and SimplyGee! join us to discuss the broader themes of the story and the way in which it articulates them in uniquely impactful, relatable ways. First we share our history with the series and KAITO, and give a spoiler-free review of the first volume to describe what sets this story apart from other romantic dramas through its characters, themes, and art! Then we discuss the series as a whole, honing in on specific characters like Masumi and Mami and exploring their roles in the story, empathizing with the feelings of self-loathing and defeatism in our main trio of protagonists. We also answer some listener questions addressing some of the more complicated, and controversial, parts of the story - including how it handles its LGBTQ representati

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, Colton & Lum are joined by special guests, Maxy Barnard of Friendship Effort Victory, Marion from the Good Friends Anime Club, as well as Aisha from the MommaLuvsManga Youtube Channel, to talk about Cross Manage from Kaito! Cross Manage is a sports series about teenager Sakurai, an ex-soccer player who is roped into serving as the problem solving manager of his high school's lacrosse team. This is also another series unfortunately cut short by Weekly Shonen Jump, but also had a full simulpubbed run in English back when Viz's Shonen Jump was in its Alpha phase, as such, this is another "cancelled Shonen Jump manga" podcast, which we will from now on be referring to as "Jump Stop" podcasts! Get it, cause its the opposite of "Jump Starts"? D'aaah, you get it, you get it... Cross Manage in particular may be the most beloved of these "pre-Jump Start" series licensed and simulpubbed by Viz Media, so of course we spend a lot of time discussing it from a ton of different angle

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, its already time for a new batch of series from Weekly Shonen Jump, as Lum and Colton tackle the first few chapters of four all new titles! Including two from veteran authors Kentaro Yabuki (Black Cat, To Love Ru) and Ryuhei Tamura (Beelzebub)!! As per usual, the Mavericks discuss their feelings on the debut of each series, whether they're slightly bored or even uncomfortable with Ayakashi Triangle and Hard-Boiled Cop & Dolphin, or they get a genuine laugh or two from both Magu-chan and Roboco! Afterwards, they check emails and list off some more cool things for listeners to check out in the Community Shout-Outs near the end! Enjoy! Visit this episode's webpage for a complete list of Links & Shout-Outs included in this episode: http://all-comic.com/2020/manga-mavericks-ep-126-june-2020-jump-starts/ PODCAST BREAKDOWN: 0:00:00 - Intro Jump Starts!! 0:02:34 - Ayakashi Triangle by Kentaro Yabuki 0:17:31 - Magu-chan: God of Destruction by Kei Kamiki 0:25:59 - Hard

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, Lum and Colton sit down with Emma Hanashiro, editor-in-chief of Boys Love manga subscription service futekiya, to discuss her role in running the service, as well as other topics such as Emma's academic background, how her crew tackles piracy, and even some recommendations as to what people should read on the site! Visit this episode's webpage for a complete list of Links & Shout-Outs included in this episode: http://all-comic.com/2020/manga-mavericks-ep-125-our-intreview-w-emma-hanashiro/ PODCAST BREAKDOWN: 0:00:00 - Intro 0:02:40 - Our Interview /w Emma Hanashiro of futekiya 1:42:45 - Community Shout-Outs!  1:52:42 - Future Plans & Wrap-Up Enjoy the show, and follow us on twitter at @manga_mavericks, on tumblr at mangamavericks.tumblr.com, and on Youtube! You can also follow the hosts on Twitter at @sniperking323 and @lumranmayasha. If you’d like to help support the show financially you can pledge to our Patreon and receive some awesome rewards like our Pat

If Love Me For Who I Am’s non-binary maid is reporting for duty, then our non-binary host is recording a podcast about it! That’s right, we’re reviewing the first volume of a newly released series on the show this time! We haven’t spotlighted a lot of new releases recently, but we had to make an exception for this exceptional manga exploring gender and the LGBTQ community in Japan in a way we’ve rarely seen. Joining us to discuss the series is someone who’s basically become its ambassador on MangaTwitter, Ashley Hakker from Anime Herald! Ashley helps us dig into each of the series’ fantastic cast of characters, core themes, and beautiful artwork, exploring what makes it such a sweet, one-of-a-kind story! We also spend some time discussing a topic close to LumRanmaYasha - the recent #FUCKSVA initiative - and why the School of Visual Arts needs to make long overdue changes to make its campus a safe learning environment for students. It’s a more serious topic sandwiched in the middle of two relatively more l

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, Lum and Colton once again go over some more of the latest manga news as even a global pandemic can't stop all the new series, licenses or even live action adaptations being announced! Some of the biggest news stories this episode include Demon Slayer's complete take over of all of Oricon's sales lists only half way into the year, the end of The Promised Neverland, plus some updates on the state of the North American manga industry via Deb Aoki's article from Publisher's Weekly! Join us over the coming weeks as we have podcast episodes dedicated to discussions of some series such as Cross Manage, Blue Flag, Love Me For Who I Am, and much, much more!! Some of which may or may not end up being uploaded early on our Patreon! PODCAST BREAKDOWN: 0:00:00 - Intro 0:01:28 - Oricon's Top Selling Manga and Light Novel Series Mid 2020 0:19:10 - May Bookscan List and June NYT Graphic Books List 0:30:12 - Eisner 2020 Nominees 0:34:48 - Souboutei Enters Final Arc 0:36:15 - Domestic

Geez, between all the series starting and ending in Shonen Jump recently, it sure feels like the brand is entering a new era. Heck, by the end of 2020 over half of the lineup will consist of series that only started this year! There are so many new series starting up that we’re getting up our episode on the last batch just as the new batch has started. Actually, there’s been a new series every month so far this year - it’s hard to keep up! Well, before we can talk about Ayakashi Triangle and the other new blood starting up, we still have to take care of some leftovers. Is Moriking a supremely funny gag comedy or did we want to squash it like a bug? Was Bone Collection bad to the bone? Did we have the time of our lives reading Time Paradox Ghost Writer? Does the Food Wars duo’s new one-shot Yugen’s All-Ghouls Classroom have a ghost of a chance at becoming a regular series in Jump? Is there anything substantial to say about any of these beyond quips and puns? Eh, honestly I wish we’d read more chapters before

Black Lives Matter.  Manga Mavericks stands in support of Black Americans and against the systemic racism and violence perpetrated by the police and the U.S. government.  There are many ways to help the Black Lives Matter movement, be it engaging in the protests yourselves or by donating to those fighting on the front lines. We’ve included links in the description of this podcast for people to learn more about petitions to sign and places to donate. We’ve donated all of our Patreon earnings from this year and hundreds of our own dollars to Bail Funds and Charities supporting progressive movements for change across the country, and if you can give, we strongly encourage you to do so. Otherwise, you can even watch videos donating all their ad money to charities too. Again, there are many ways to help, and every bit counts. To quote a great moment from The Boondocks: "What do you do when you can't do nothing, but there's nothing you can do?" "You do what you can."  In that spirit, we’re also supporting and am

Hello, darlings! Welcome to the return of our Urusei Yatsura podcast, Lum Squad! Well, technically we already returned in last month's episode, but there was actually a year-long break in between recording that and this episode! Think of it as like how there was a break between Viz's original publication of "Lum" that prompted their continuation being re-titled "The Return of Lum." Except we're not re-titling this podcast; it didn't work in the 90's and it ain't happening now. Anyways, because it'd been so long since AC and I recorded the show, we decided to spend this episode going through all the UY volumes Viz has released in the past year and share our thoughts on them! We discuss our favorite chapters, characters, the translation, lettering, and pretty much everything! Oh, and you KNOW we ranted about the whole "Hot Springs Emblem" situation. I really hope Viz reconsiders that name... Afterward, we dive into the Urusei Yatsura fan community, exploring its history and current state now! Look forward to

On this episode of Manga Mavericks, we're joined by new guest Kory from the Taiiku Podcast, as well as our old friends, Bomber (Sakaki) and Jecka from the WSS Talkbalk blog and Twitter, to talk about Yuki Suetsugu's Chihayafuru manga! Chihayafuru is a high school, sports series centering on Chihaya Ayase, who is inspired by her new friends to play the Japanese card game known as karuta, and from then on becomes obsessed with it to the point of forming a team in high school to seriously compete in tournaments all across nation to become the best in Japan! Our Mavericks both recently read all of whatever was available of the manga from Kodansha USA and instantly became filled with passion while experiencing players from all walks of life competing in matches against each other in a game that requires more then just knowing a few Japanese poems! We discuss how amazing the series is from the first volume alone, as well as why readers will become enamored with the matches that take place despite any language barri

The Manga Mavericks are talking television! Welcome to the first episode of a new irregular podcast series in the vein of @ Movies, except the titular focus this time is the wonderful world of television and streaming shows (except for Anime, which is already covered by & Anime). We’ll be chatting about tv shows we’ve seen and have a lot to say about, and giving reviews of new and upcoming series! We have a very special show to talk about on this inaugural installment! We got the opportunity to check out Apple TV’s new show Central Park, a musical comedy by the creators of Bob’s Burgers. The show drops on Apple TV on May 29th, but we were able to watch the first four episodes a few weeks early! So we’re giving our first impressions on the show, what makes its characters and music special, and how these early episodes stack up against the first seasons of this creative team’s previous shows. By the time you’re done listening, I’m sure Central Park will be central in your heart! PODCAST BREAKDOWN: 00