Cropped Covers

I was browsing through 1001 Comics You Must Read Before You Die, a brick of recommended essential reading material of comic paperbacks, hoping to chance upon a GN I came across in the mid-90s.  It had something to do with a sorcerer wanting to force his way into a paradise / utopia that was zealously guarded by women.  No matter what defenses they drew up, he effortlessly managed to shoot them all down with unerring accuracy and logic.  Then, once having reasoned his prowess, was just about to step through into Paradise when the leader made a last-ditch effort and relocated Paradise to somewhere at random that even she wouldn't know.  From that point on, people all over the world started to feel the effects of the removal of Paradise, and feeling uneasy without knowing why.  This led to various long-winded conversations between people everywhere and the creation of a log cabin.  Although it was drawn in a fairly realistic style, it was still somewhat amusing.  The general weirdness of the premise and lack of any central main character might have something to do with its obscurity.  If there's anybody out there who has any idea of what I'm describing, please let me know.

Anyways, getting back on topic, I was going through the collection of comic titles, when I came across an item that was familiar to me.  It was something I'd borrowed from the library - Bosnian Flat Dog, which despite its horrific sketchy drawings,, is actually a loose autobiography of a group of cartoonists in a land of Kafkaesque proportions.  A major plot point consists of following trails of ripped out diary pages about having the mummyfied body of Marshal Tito stuffed in a refrigerator and an underground ice cream network.  (It's weirder than it sounds)

At the time, I didn't think much of the cover, figuring it was typical of the nightmarish world they were living in.  But when I looked up the title, the reference page gave the larger image, which showed what I'd been missing:

It got me thinking about other covers that were cropped for the sake of convenience.  The most infamous example I can think of is CMX's conservative editing of Tenjho Tenge, a fairly fanservicy Manga, dealing with violence and breasts, This was somewhat surprising, considering how the company would later try to aim for fanservice with more risique S-hero titles.  (I suppose if the creators and commercially licensed characters are American, you can get away with pandering to your fetishistic fanbase, rather than branch out to potential new audiences)  In addition to releasing their early volumes in stiff uneasy-to-turn papers, it pretty much poisoned the well for the company's reputation.  But apparently, it's not the only instance of slightly modifying the cover to make it more mainstream.

Back when Frank Miller wasn't as crazy as he is now, and wasn't pining for the world of 1940's gangsters, he was expressing admiration for the world of manly Manga, where muscle-bound men would prevail against formidable opponents while weeping openly.  He showed this by drawing the covers for the first twelve issues of First Comics edition of Lone Wolf & Cub, which were later reprinted out of order for the Dark Horse collections.

What was left out of the cover for "The Gateless Barrier" where the assassin-for-hire manages to train himself mentally to be able to slay a living Buddha is the shocked expression of the lone man in the crowd.  That little extra detail made the dramatic moment more amusing than it should've, which is probably why he was cut out.

This extends to reprintings of children's books as well.  One of my favorite examples, The Church Mice series has been through various reprintings with various publishers, and different covers.

This reviewer may be more lenient with the reprint, being happy just to have the recent classic available, but I'm far harsher, particularly with the removal of some images from the first printing, and the treatment of dumbing down the original text.

For anyone curious about the missing images, as well as how the front and back covers looked, a comprehensive display can be found here:

In some cases, it may be a cultural thing, depending on what is considered more important.  The English version of Annie Sullivan and the Trials of Helen Keller had the girl and her teacher in a tree, putting the characters foremost onto the cover up front.

But the French edition of the same comic gave a much wider scope of their surroundings.

Before we get all high and mighty about such things, the French market doesn't always get the right end of the shiny stick.

Casterman's reprinting of English titles has them changed to conform to a consistent line of comic covers that have the characters cast against a blank background.  It makes them thematically similar, but also somewhat dulls the overall exterior appearance.

Some Mangas even go the similar route as well.  Kaoru Mori's Otoyomegatari (A Bride's Stories) was faithfully reprinted (in hardcover with cover flaps) by Yen Press to the delightment of her fans.

Whereas, the French edition went by completely whitewashing the lushly drawn background details, as well as the accompanying back cover art.

Considering the amount of outcry Manga fans over here get when details of their favorite titles get mangled or slightly manipulated with, you'd think there'd be similar outcry on the other side of the ocean.  Either there isn't that much publicity or overanalysis compared to over here, or there hasn't been much publicity involved, or maybe they have slightly different priorities, being happy just to have a title available.  Does anybody have any idea what constitutes a scandalous change over there?

Tokyopop Revival?

There's been some rumblings in various sections of the blogosphere about the possible return of TokyoPop, even though it seems mostly limited to digital delivery, OEL Mangas and their last major hit, Hetalia.

As much fond memories as Tokyopop has for making the attractive $10 package possible, let's not forget that their founder, Stuart Levy, has a history of Attention Deficit Disorder when it comes to promoting Manga.  At first, he seemed all up for wanting to deliver what was accurately described as "Film comics", but his constant reliance and kissing up towards the Movie industry (such as his hyping up the currently unfinished Priest Manhwa) began to grate on the nerves of faithful fans.  Before long, their once-powerful company collapsed under its weight of acquiring dozens of B-level Mangas while running out of surefire hit titles and being reduced to Fruits Basket, whose release date between volumes kept being spaced further out to boost sales of their other sagging titles which were all competing with each other as well as the competition.

Rather than hype up the return of Tokyopop, I'd much more appreciate a return to the underappreciated Mangas of the CMX line.  CMX had its fair share of problems, such as a reliance on Mangas that had no Anime tie-ins, and C-level Mangas that felt subpar compared to the competition, which offered much more exciting titles.  Of the wide variety of titles present, only Tenjou Tenge and Gon have been saved from license hell.  One thing I meant to mention a long time ago was that in addition to displaying their early volumes in stiff binding, CMX Mangas seemed to have dozens of little scraps of paper sprinkled throughout the pages, which looked like cigarette confetti.  That was one niggling detail that seemed to escape everybody's collective memories.

Not to scale.

As long as we're giving some lip service to the CMX line, I might as well devote some attention to some minor mistakes in the cult favorite, From Eroica with Love.  In The Laughing Cardinals arc, where Klaus boards a plane that happens to be hijacked by terrorists, the following monologue ensues:

"They're far too" what???  Sophisicated?  Professional??  Prepared???  Classy????  Smarmy?????  Cool??????  Not knowing how the sentence ends gnaws on my brain like a woodland tick in the throes of a termite field.  It doesn't let go that easily.  Another barely noticeable example is in a short story where Lawrence is rattling off a list of the hotel's quality benefits.  If you look closely, there's an extra line nearby the 2nd "It's" there.

Lastly, there's this opening to the 13th volume of the multi-arc of The Seventh Seal that continues from where the 12th volume left off.  At first glance, there doesn't seem to be anything unusual about this page.  The only problem?  The previous volume was the 1st part, and it's erroneously labeled as the 3rd part, when it should clearly be the second.

These kinds of detail might get ignored by the majority of people who want to get to the next balloon, but it still bothers me.  Part of why I like having comic images on my computer is so I can do some creative editing to correct the little details that were missed the first time around, or clean up some bubbles or images where there's specks of white or black dots creating visual eyesores that distract me from appreciating the whole page.  I'm funny that way.

CMX Resuscitation?

I wasn't originally that interested in an interview with Lee and Didio about the future of their company, since I've considered Marvel & DC to be in a downward spiral catering to their hardcore fans. That was until I took a closer look and noticed they were going to address a certain issue that just recently came to my attention:

...DC recently closed its CMX imprint. I wonder if you’d maybe reflect (...) over the last five - ten years of growth in manga and now the shrinkage, and on why DC decided to pull out now.

Lee: We had put in a number of good years trying to make a real concerted effort to be in that business. It’s difficult because the licenses, the key licenses, are not easy to obtain. It’s a very long negotiating process where you have to work with lesser-known titles and work your way up to the key licenses. That hurt us from the get-go. We had great staff, and Asako Suzuki was instrumental in spearheading the CMX line. I think we had some relative success given the licenses we had. But if you look at what’s shaking out in the market right now, from what I can tell, it’s just a very few, very dominant licenses that account for the bulk of the business and everything else has fallen to the wayside.

We looked at a number of different alternatives. We talked to a number of key publishers there about alternatives and then we couldn’t make the numbers work. The numbers on CMX were, comparatively, super low compared to the rest of our offerings and just reached a point where it made more sense for us to be out of the business than to continue struggling with it.

Typical reasonable boilerplate corporate logic. However, this next bit, which was all I was interested in jumped out at me;

Do you know what’s going to happen to those licenses?

Lee: We’ve actually had interest from a couple of other creative studios that were interested in taking over the role on a couple of books. We’re talking to them. Right now I assume they’re going to revert back to the publishers and they’ll figure it out. I think Dark Horse had expressed interest…

There are some incomplete runs.

Lee: Exactly.

If true, this could be a boon for many bloggers who've lamented the loss of certain properties and unfinished Mangas, such as Apothecarius Argentum, From Eroica with Love and Swan. Not to mention that other recently translated properties could find a second life if transferred to another company with better brand name than CMX.

Of course, some CMX Mangas are easier to find in the bargain bin than the shelves, some properties may be less likely to be saved, especially if they're still in circulation. My guess is they're going to wait until the majority of a title is no longer available when they'll rush in to fill the void.

First there’s the titles that were announced, but never released:

51 Ways to Save Her
Carved
Nyankoi!
Shisso Holiday
Deka Kyoshi
Nadeshiko Club
Phantom Guesthouse
Polyphonica Cardinal: Crimson
Rampage
Tableau Gate

Then there’s the titles that were aborted as soon as they hit the ground:

Diamond Girl
My Darling! Miss Bancho
Stolen Hearts

In fact, it’d be easier to list the titles that haven’t been completed, so companies can take notice of what’s missing, and which novices have likely avoided. (The knowledgeable customer’s not going to pick up a series that’s missing the last few volumes)

From Eroica With Love - 15 out of 19 (36+)
Swan - 15 out of 21

Apothecarius Argentum - 8 out of 11??
Broken Blade - 4 out of 9
Fire Investigator Nanase - 5 out of 7
Go Go Heaven - 9 out of 16
I Hate You More Than Anyone - 9 out of 13
Musashi #9 - 17 out of 20
Orfina - 7 out of 12
Seimaden - 10 out of 11
Teru Teru x Shonen - 7 out of 11
Two Flowers for the Dragon - 6 out of 7
Venus in Love - 8 out of 12
The Young Magician - 14 out of 15??

So far, the one license that Dark Horse seems most likely to pick up that would fit their overall Manga line would be Musashi #9 or 51 Ways to Save Her.

Order Out Of

Everybody knows about this little exercise, right?

Did you konw you’re a guiens? Jsut the fcat taht you can atllacuy raed tihs psot porves taht fcat. The huamn mnid is so pufowerl it can dcodee tihs txet eevn tguohh eervy sglnie wrod is slepled iocenrtclry. The one cavaet is taht the frist and lsat lertets are pervresed in erevy wrod. Cidrgbame Uitesirnvy cetoudncd a sduty and fnuod taht the biarn deos not raed eevry snlige lteetr, but wodrs as a wohle.

Olny srmat poelpe can raed tihs.
I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs psas it on!!

There’s a similar experience in comics - sometimes it can be unclear as to which direction you’re supposed to read a sentence. It might be because of lousy page design, it might be because of character placement, it might be because of a lack of arrows, but whatever the cause, you can wind up reading an intended sequence out of order. In some cases, this can be rather jarring, especially if you’ve been reading at a brisk pace, and all of a sudden, you realize you were supposed to read the balloon to the side (or below) and are forced to reread the entire page again. (This is an obvious reading hinderance in the otherwise excelent Girl Genius comic)











Usually, when reading American comics, the general rule is to go from top to bottom. However, it’s not always clear as to which direction you’re supposed to read next. From the middle balloon, are you supposed to go to the balloon below, or go across the upper right part of the page?

It’s only after reading this panel multiple times that I realize that going down, then up is the right route. However, later on the same page, that rule is broken.























Here, it looks like the conversation is:

Itto! you were told not to come! Oh no, he’ll come.
I could take him back -

But the correct way to read it is:

Itto! you were told not to come!
I could take him back -
Oh no, he’ll come.

Without Agatha’s balloon intruding on the other girl’s balloon, it looks like her conversation is a one-sided affair. It’s a constant balancing act, and it takes awhile before Foglio figures it out.

The most glaring example in misreading a comic would be in Kochalka’s Monkey Vs. Robot and the Crystal of Power. I read the whole book the normal way, from right to left, even though it started with the words “the end”. It wasn’t until I finished that I realized the entire book was the result of a printing error, and the story would’ve made more sense if I read it backwards.























Apart from this glaring instance, I’ve found a few actual funny mistakes.

An easy example is in Fox Trot, where Peter was dressing up as various Rock guitarists in order to get the right “feel” for his music style. His first foray was dressing up as Bruce Springsteen, which led to Jason responding off screen. Because I hardly saw the tiny arrow pointing in that direction, I read the last panel as:









“Jason, tell our brother Paige who, unfortunately I am.”

This puts Paige’s question of how tight Peter’s bandana was in a whole new light.

Another example is from an Archie comic, where Betty was telling a fairy tale about a sadistic King with Fletcher Hanks overtones. He was constantly doing more and more elaborate forms of intimidation over his subjects. Below is one of his tamer tortures.























Because of the horns, I read the panel as:
But the bulls
Half as vicious
Were not
As the king.

When the correct way to read the panel should’ve been:

“But the bulls were not
Half as vicious as the king.”

American comics aren't the only ones guilty of this - Manga tends to be one of the biggest offenders.

Manga is known for having very choppy sentences, usually used to pad out a scene, and oftentimes, they can be very immaterial. This is especially true when they’re talking in philosophical tones. The process is to make the reading experience as smooth as possible, even if you can't retain any of what's being said.

Here’s a general example from an early volume of Swan. Here, Aoi is talking about the frustrations about being unsuited for a role. The interesting thing is, even if you read it the wrong way, (from left to right) you can still get the general message:























“I want to retain my unique personality!
Instead of being a blank slate, a generic soloist...
...Ballet has been about individuals.
Because since the very beginning...
We have to make our OWN opportunities.
No!
At the next opportunity...
Enough is enough!
Always being offered second place.
From now on, I’m creating my own destiny!
I can’t wait any longer!
He really knows what he wants!
Aoi-San...
You and I...
...We both are good... just not right for these roles.
So don’t be disappointed.”

You could rearrange the balloons in the last panel in any order, and it’d still make some kind of sense.

From now on, I’m creating my own destiny!
Enough is enough!
I can’t wait any longer!
Always being offered second place.

I can’t wait any longer!
From now on, I’m creating my own destiny!
Always being offered second place.
Enough is enough!

Enough is enough!
I can’t wait any longer!
Always being offered second place.
From now on, I’m creating my own destiny!























Go ahead and mix up the balloons in your favorite Manga collection. See if you notice any difference.

CMX Take 2

I decided to post my latest thoughts on the CMX line in a new post since the last one was getting long enough already. Since the announcement, I've been doing a lot of looking around, both online & offline, trying to find which CMX titles were worth reading. I've already ordered the rest of Cipher, Moon Child & Astral Project. No easy feat, since DC's gone to the trouble to erase all proof of their existence upon proclamation of dissolution.

The moderator of MangaBlog even coined my point of irony: It would be ironic if their sales went up now that DC has shut them down.











While looking up various titles, I found a 2008 link that worried that the CMX line might go the way of the Dodo since the Minx line was just canceled. It's particularly noticeable for its title, "Please Save My CMX!", and the list of various favorite Manga titles. One particular quote stuck out for me:

"The one thing I learned at the CMX panel at San Diego Comic Con is that CMX titles are largely at the whim of their buyer. She solicits the manga she enjoys. I think that explains a lot of their catalog of older shojo/josei title. It’s all the work of one woman’s taste. I think she is the core audience."

The fact that the majority of the CMX line was at the mercy of one lone woman is rather astonishing, I think. It's just too bad her tastes weren't posted on a gossip mill - other women might've wanted to compare & give their feedback on which titles they liked & disliked. As Christopher Butcher said, there was a lot of wasted potential.

Part of the problem with the CMX line was similar to what plagued the Raijin line - it was never quite clear as to what audience - if any - they were aimed at. There were titles aimed at the younger age set, the teenage set, and the adult set. But they were all painted with the same CMX brush. Giving an age-apropriate rating wasn't enough - it would be more useful if they were categorized in such a way that made sense. Even Viz & TokyoPop's titles are easy enough to figure out by looking at the covers alone. But CMX's titles didn't have that luxury - the buying public had to do their homework themselves, and who wants to go to that trouble?

Another element was that many of their releases were spread out. Looking at a spreadsheet on the AnimeOnDvd forums, it wasn't unusual for a Manga to be released 4 months in between. When other companies were releasing volumes every two or three months, 4 months is an infinity. I just checked the releases of the last two Swan volumes, and they were 10 months apart! (5/19/2009 and 3/9/2010) Hell, Eroica was producing new volumes yearly by now. (7/9/2008 and 7/21/2009 for vols. 13 & 14 respectively) They could've eluded the Goldfish Memory symptom by releasing an anthology book/magazine of various worthwhile comics to an unsuspecting public on - oh say, Free Comic Book Day. That is, if they'd even remembered the Manga line existed.

Thanks to doing some personal browsing myself (I can deduce by looking at the rhythm of the interior pages whether it's worth picking up) I was able to narrow my choices to several titles. There's still a few that I'm still on the fence about buying, but that might change once I find out more information.

Go West! by Yu Yagami (4 Vols)
Oyayubi-hime Infinity by Toru Fujieda (6 Vols)
Presents (3 Vols)
Steel Fist Riku by Jyutaroh Nishino (3 Vols)

What would be immensely helpful would be to read more short reviews of the most noteworthy CMX Mangas, including the underapprecated ones. I was only able to find out about Steel Fist Riku, thanks to this link. This post at the Newsarama Blog was particularly helpful, though I pointed out one series I found:

In addition to the short titles you’ve mentioned, I’d like to add Go West! by Yu Yagami to the list as well. It’s a Western in the same vein that Et Cetera was, only with less fantasy elements in it. A girl travels to the Wild Wild West, and confronts a horse that’s basically a stubborn (Seussian) Zak – it only races towards ONE particular direction – towards the West. Eventually, she manages to tame it enough for it to let her ride his saddle.
Of course, “tame” is too strong a word – more likely the horse is just letting her enjoy the ride while he continues his obsessive destination West. That’s the gist I got from the first chapter alone, and looks kinda fun.

It’s a quick read – only 4 volumes.
You can find more CMX titles here, which is more comprehensive than the Wiki, which for some reason doesn’t have entries for all the Manga titles. (There’s even a few missing)

There's another aspect of the CMX line that's only been touched on briefly - that it can take some time before a title starts to get really good. If the first few volumes don't hit that sweet spot, there's not that much incentive to try again. That was the problem I had with a certain Manga - there were quite a lot of characters introduced at once, and it was hard trying to keep track of who I should keep my eye on. As a result, I ended up wasting more energy trying to keep track of the cast rather than the story.

In the middle of the night, while dealing with a sudden bout of insomnia, I decided to read the 3rd volume of Swan. I only meant to read a few pages, sure that I would eventually grow bored, but I wound up reading the whole book. The first two volumes had previously put me to sleep, but it was this volume that I found had an intensity similar to The Glass Mask, that reminded me what I liked about Old-School Shojo. After that, I grew increasingly nervous & excited about the prospect of having to shell out more money to read the rest of what was available. I'd already ordered $150 worth of books, and now faced the prospect of ordering even more reading material.

Eventually, I was able to calm down enough once I'd figured out the final costs & deductions out of my paycheck. Still, this meant that I wouldn't be able to purchase my personal Wii for another three months or so. (Especially if I wanted to order other CMX Mangas)

The sad thing was, originally, I'd planned to purchase the rest of Swan, once I was sure that CMX had published the entirety of the series with no room for cancelation. I'd gotten vols. 1-3 for sale second-hand ages ago, and only thought to read the third volume recently. It's really a shame - the 3rd book was just languishing on my bathroom shelf for months just waiting to be read. At this rate, I might even have to reconsider my position of From Eroica with Love as well.

Just to rub salt in the wound, Mike Sterling had this to say:
“This new CMX book sounds pretty good. Can’t wait for future installments!”

AAUGH!! You just had to drive that stake in the wedge didn’t you? On the plus (minus?) side, I’m picking up PLENTY of CMX titles I would’ve otherwise ignored. Hopefully, there’ll be enough lifeblood of demand for more volumes if the outcry is loud enough.

That's what we should do - create enough noise that Fantagraphics might want to think about completing the series where CMX left off. Hell, they can even hire the same people who were just left off, if there's an opening, and they've got nowhere else to go.

In the meantime, I'm going to be doing some serious Manga binging for the next several weeks. The difference being that instead of purging, I'm going to be wallowing in bliss of what I've just read. (Unless what I've read wasn't that good, then I'm going to spend some time over the toilet, bemoaning my lost of time & money)

CMX commentary

EDIT - a commentor pointed out that I'd been misspelling Eroica with Love as Erotica with Love. It's an understandable mistake on my part, and has been corrected here. (The mistakes are still there on the forum entries though.) Still, you have to admit, it sounds more interesting that way...

The big news in the Manga world this week was that CMX, DC's Manga line was going to cease publishing on July 1st. I'd never really paid much attention to their line, since the Tenjho Tenge fiasco. It was one of those Manga companies that was just there, and since it'd remained stagnant for years, I'd just grown used to taking it for granted that I could buy any series I wanted once the runs were complete. One fault I dislike is when Manga companies license a series, and then decide to cancel it due to poor sales. But that didn't happen with CMX - they kept publishing Swan, From Eroica with Love, and multiple other obscure titles that didn't garner much attention.

Given that CMX was initially the WildStorm of the comics world (another DC comics imprint about "mature" S-heroes that's never quite as popular as their Vertigo output) it started out as the bashing child of the Manga world, and many never quite looked back.

But a funny thing happened when the CMX line was finally canceled - many fans bemoaned the loss of a line of Old-School Shojo Mangas, rather than keep kicking a dying horse, they instead heaped piles of praise over the once-marginalized line. In fact, the only ones actually celebrating their upcoming demise were S-hero comics fans who seemed glad to see that Manga was falling in popularity. I'm reminded of a phrase I read somewhere: "S-hero fans live under the assumption that once people stop reading Manga and start reading 'real' comics, the industry will be saved. But what they don't realize is that when people stop being interested in Manga, the comics industry is over, because that's what the loss of the Manga audience Means."

(Right now, the current Manga audience is addicted to two or three of the top chart burners, but that's another topic for a future post)

This outburst of mourning & praise also garnered the most varied commentary I'd ever bothered with on other comic sites. For years, I was content to be a simple lurker, staying in the shadows and copying people's opinions while never making one of my own. That's changed since I created my blog, and had a site I could reference from & to.

One of the first was MangaBlog, where I posted the faults quite simply:

I always thought that CMX really shot themselves in the foot in the starting gate with the whole Tengo Tenge censorship. When Del Rey got under fire for the same issues revolving Negima, they immediately resolved the problem, putting them in a better light with the fans. CMX never really seemed to care about the Manga audience, save for some selective obscure 70’s Shojo Mangas. They just assumed they’d snap up any license they’d acquire.

Not to mention most of the titles they brought over were substantial titles that couldn’t really stand up to their competitors at Viz & TokyoPop, the REAL Big Two. Heck. they’d be lucky to be considered a contendor versus Go.Comi, Broccoli, Bandai, or any of the small-time Manga publishers.

At least they stuck with this longer than they did for the Minx line. My guess is that they only just noticed it around now, and decided it wasn’t on par with the rest of their regular S-hero line. (i.e. Dark & Depressing)

I’d better snap up the rest of Moon Child while I still have the chance. (Even if it feels like a sub-par Please Save my Earth rip-off)

Even as one of the later commentors assured me that it was worth reading, I was still reluctant. Jumping into a new series is no easy task, even if there's postive buzz surrounding it. There's always the danger of the books not living up to their praise. Especially since I'd tried one of the early CMX releases, Swan, and despite being a fan of Old-School Shojo, I simply couldn't bring myself to enjoy it that much. Part of it might've been that the story wasn't as engaging as I'd have liked. Another might've been that it was unnerving seeing Manga characters with soulful eyes suddenly become blank whenever they were upset.

But I pointed out a major factor to me on the Manga Curmudgeon:

One of the major things that bothered me about the early CMX books (apart from the Tenjo Tenge fiasco) was that most of them were extremely difficult to open. You had to literally break the spine apart just to read them. They got better in the later volumes with softer pages, but they never bothered to reprint the early volumes with an easier format. If I’m going to read a Comic Paperback, I don’t want to struggle against the pages just to read the interior.

Even now, I don’t have strong feelings of rereading the 1st volume of Swan, despite its similarities to The Glass Mask. Of course, it might be that the old-school Shojo sensibilities don’t engage me as much as I’d like them to.

On the ComicBookResources blog, I then changed on of my previous statements about the “Big Two”, but only slightly:

The same could be said for their brief foray into Euro comics with their Metabarons licence. The most memorable of those titles was TechnoPriests, which was even more insane than anything Grant Morrison, Alan Moore, and Shintaro Kago combined could've imagined together. The fact this didn't sell in the Direct Market means that people are more attuned to S-hero comics, and completely ignore anything that doesn't fit their worldview, which has become increasingly negative, which is odd considering the nature of S-hero comics.

Also, MegaTokyo being the lone surviving title is no great relief. It's changed companies how many times now? And the series has suffered from the story in the later years to the point that I've completely lost interest in it. That it continues to gather up offers is impressive, considering their audience must've moved on to other stuff by now. It's the Watchmen fallacy all over again - it shouldn't be picking up new readers, but it's not doing bad in sales either. Where are all these new customers for this series coming from? As far as I can see, it's most admirable trait is that the character designs are of superior quality, on par from Oh My Goddess!, but that's all.

I've often made comments that the "Big Two" were increasingly ignorant of the REAL Big Two, Viz & Tokyopop. That might change, since Tokyopop hasn't had a breakout hit on par with Fruits Basket for a long time. They may now be replaced by Yen Press whose books have been on the best-seller lists as often as Viz has.

The ironic thing is, if any of CMX's titles became snatched up by another publisher, they could see potentially better sales in their new home than they ever would at DC's, which could be another proverbal nail in their coffin. Of course, they'd have to be willing to take the risk in the first place...

On the Newsarama Blog, I posted a rebuttal to a rubuttal:

“Jack F., Congratulations, you just placed your schadenfreude on THE WRONG PEOPLE. The ones responsible for the Tenjo Tenge fiasco were no longer running CMX by 2006. The ones affected by this were only guilty of bringing out off-beat, quality products that don’t get enough attention.”

That may have been true with the licensing of several titles that were deserving of wider recognization. But there was NO interaction between the publisher & the fans that let us know that. Not to mention that most of the titles they had were deemed subpar simply because they were from CMX. It got to be so that I could detect whether a random Manga volume on the shelf was a Viz, TokyoPop or CMX title just by looking at the cover alone. Most of the time, my guesses were right on.

However, this shakeup may turn out to be a silver lining. Chances are people may be wanting to snatch up several titles before they’re no longer available, leading to the first INCREASE in sales in years. Not to mention that if they decide to let their licenses lapse, other companies could snap up certain titles deserving of a wider audience. One that comes to mind is Chikyu Misaki. Just look at how Yotsuba burned up the charts once it switched from ADV to Yen Press.

Of course, that would require a Manga company willing to take the risk of publishing Old-School Shojo Mangas such as Swan & From Eroica with Love. Maybe Fantagraphics could take them? They’re going to publish some Moto Hagio Manga later this fall, & Dirk Deppey expressed some dismay at their discontinuance.

Not long after I posted this did David Welsh mention that he also hoped that Fantagraphics would take up the slack on several unfinished Mangas, some which were only a few volumes away from completion. (Another very big annoyance among other Manga publisher, particularly TokyoPop & Dark Horse) Apparently, similar minds think alike.

What a coincidence! I just recommended that Fantagraphics pick up the remainder of Eroica & Swan on another board for the exact same reasons you mentioned. I suspect it’s all about branding. Fantagraphics is more likely to have better ties to bookstores than CMX ever was. (I only saw one volume of Emma at Chapters) -EDIT - I also saw the first volume of From Eroica, which gave me a better understanding as to why it was so universally loved around various blogs, but decided the kind of humour wasn't really for me. Other than that, I don't really recall any other CMX titles that really gathered my attention on the shelves. If there were any, I think I was guilty of ignoring them.

Also, Yen Press could potentially make a killing if they ever got their hands on Chikyu Misaki. Just look at how Yotsuba did once they changed hands.

Another potential weakness of the CMX brand might've been their logo, which was remarkably similar to the Go! Comi's Logo - and Go! Comi just announced they were going out of business shortly before CMX announced their cessation. This led others to see this as a conspiracy to close shop while Viz laid off their workers. After all, if everyone else's doing it, who'll notice?

Apparently, more people than they thought.













Can you tell the difference?

Slightlybiasedmanga was the most vocal of all the complainers, and is the one I'm most thankful for, since she pointed out several titles that I would've been otherwise totally ignorant of. I actually took the time to go to several second-hand stores and comic discount bins to find some of the Mangas she recommended, while I ordered the missing volumes. My reasons for doing this was threefold:

1 - I didn't want to order any Manga volumes from a limited supply from a warehouse where there might've been others who were more interested in certain titles than I was.

2 - I didn't want to regret having paid full price for a title when a better offer was languishing on a lonely shelf in an unknown corner somewhere.

3 - I'm a cheap bastard. I just spent $50 on half-priced Mangas, & I'm still not halfway done. When you suddenly have to complete your runs, every cent counts.

It would be ironic if the cancelation of the CMX line actually INCREASED sales for the first time in years. My thoughts were that apart from the Tenjho Tenge controversy (which I never really cared about in the first place, but which set the tone for the line at a whole – if that was how they were going to treat their cash cow, how would more risique series fare?) – I felt they failed on other fronts as well.

One major issue was that most of the books they had when they were starting out were extremely stiff. Reading comic paperbacks should be easy, not a chore. I had to literally break the spine of some titles just to read them, and they were STILL too hard to open.

Also, every time I saw a subpar title on the comic shelf, my first thought was “It’s probably a CMX Manga”, and I wouldn’t be too far off the mark. Apart from a few worthy titles you’ve listed above, most of them were unfortunatly rather forgetable. If they’d made the effort to show WHY some stories were worth reading, they might’ve stood a chance. But they expected their audience to do all the work for them. Fanship is a two-way street. You need input and output to stay healthy, and the Otaku mentality might’ve been too foreign from the Fanboy mentality for them to comprehend.

The only title I’m reasonably interested in is Moon Child, and bought the first three volumes, but now, I’m wondering if I should take the plunge & purchase the rest of the series while I still can. Trouble is, I’m unsure if I’ll enjoy it as much as other people claim. There’s a page in the 2nd volume that’s EXACTLY like a page in Please Save my Earth that lets me have some conservatism. Of course, the 1st volume of Banana Fish “borrowed” the Warehouse from Akira & became something else entirely, so the rip-off analogy might not work here. Another problem is that what wows you might not be as equally impressive on me. I simply can’t get into Swan despite being a great fan of The Glass Mask.

Later, I submitted another follow-up post to my previous entry:

I just remembered another title you forgot to mention – Chikyu Misaki by Yuji Iwahara. If the name sounds familiar, he(she?)’s the same author of King of Thorn.

If another company decides to rescue any titles from CMX, that’s the child-friendliest one I can think of capable of gathering a wider audience. Just look at Yotsuba burning up the charts once it got swithced over to Yen Press. Strange that the same author who produced such a heartwarming tale also produced an Action/Horror Movie type Manga in King of Thorn.

Anyways, I took the chance to look up several CMX titles you recommended, starting with the finished series, such as Oyayubihime Infinity, Cipher & Astral Project.

So far, the first chapter of Oyayubihime looked interesting, though I wasn’t sure if I wanted to plop $30 for the first three books alone. I only managed to find the last volume of Astral Project in a shrinkwrapped cover, though the cover looked interesting. But Cipher looked to be the most intruiging of the lot.

I have a cardinal rule when purchasing Manga or any kind of comic. “Do I want to read this more than once?” After I read the first 50 or so pages, I instantly snatched it up. It didn’t hurt that it was in the discount pile with several Mangas (half of which were CMX titles) along with the 4th volume of Moon Child. (They also had another Manga by Reiko Shimizu, but for some reason, I couldn’t find it on either her or the CMX wikipedia) - EDIT - I went back to the store the next day, and couldn't find the title. This leads me to suspect that I might've accidently compared it with another volume of Moon Child.

Having had the chance to read it at a more leisurly pace at home, I was reminded of two more pitfalls against CMX.

1. – They had a tendency to be TOO faithful to the Otaku audience by not translating some titles to make them more interesting. TokyoPop may have caught some heat by translating some titles to make them sound more ‘Americanized’, but at least you understood what it was about. Oyayubihime Infinity may SOUND interesting, but what does it MEAN?? Until you take the time to read it, (and it could take awhile) the Japanese meaning can be totally lost on you.

2. – While reading the first page of Cipher, I was annoyed by how the text was portrayed vertically. It took me a good minute to figure out it was a retelling of the biblical quote of Cain being his Brother’s Keeper, and if any smote him, they would be returned sevenfold. If I wasn’t familiar with Sandman, it could’ve taken me much longer. And the vertical text kept switching around both ways in the book! It would be read from right to left, then left to right. Make up your mind!

BTW, Viz REALLY needs to rerelease PSME as an ombibus collection. Seven fat volumes worth of Reincarnated Psychic Aliens.

I hope I can find the rest of Cipher before it becomes unavailable!


So why was there so much outpouring of grief over a Manga publishing line that was widly inconsistent and varied at most? Every month, only a sporadic number of Mangas were released, and it could take up to three to four months to see a continuation of a previous book. If you're only following one or two titles at a time, waiting for the next instalment can be torture. But they filled these months with other Mangas which could've passed under the radar while they were waiting for the next volume. Even if only 3 Manga volumes were released one month a year, that still adds up to an impressive amount. And they survived for SIX years.
Another reason was that, unlike other failed Manga publishers such as ADV, Go! Comi, Broccoli, and the recently revamped Kodansha line, CMX actually delivered multiple quality Mangas to read. ADV was more of an Anime company than a Manga one, and tended to stall any series they released. We were lucky if a multi-volume series was actually completed by them. In comparison, CMX had more than one series that didn't rely on an Anime tie-in. That lack of Anime might have hurt its chances at success too. (The only exception being GALS!)
Of all the blog comments, this one from Kuriousity is probably closest to my personal feelings:

CMX is one of the companies that I always remember being there. Even though I’ve been reading and collecting manga for over ten years, it feels odd recalling a time when CMX wasn’t around. They never had a huge presence but I always knew they were there.

(...) I indulged in a number of their earlier series, (...) but CMX quickly become synonymous with unpleasant production values in my mind. The paper quality was nice but the stiffness of the books was horrible and the cover designs suffered from too much consistency, the art lost in a blank canvas of white space and awkward layouts. (...) While I was happy CMX was changing to a more eye-catching and pleasing format, their presence in the shops quickly began to dwindle and no titles I caught wind of via the internet sounded interesting enough to seek out via the process of special order.

If I'd had heard better things about some series other than Moon Child once they'd completed their run, I probably wouldn't be as hesitant to purchase them in the first place. On the other hand, if I hadn't known that CMX would be closing their doors so soon, I wouldn't be compelled to purchase these Mangas in the first place.

I normally despise cliches, but one in particular rings true here: We truly don't know what we're missing until it's gone.