Yes, I am aware that society usually doesn't expect us to be ninjas who fight evil or teenagers who save the world through card game tournaments.

Shounen Jump is a fairly famous publication within both Japan and the otaku fan circles abroad. Basically, if you ask an anime fan to name three Shounen Jump titles, they can easily rattle them off. Its a highly visible publication.

Likewise, if you ask an anime fan to tell you some typical characteristics of a Shounen Jump title, you'll easily get at least a short list of SJ archetypes; young male protagonist, fighting evil, saving the world, massive power-ups, you know the drill. Certainly a few deviate from this formula, but the Video Girl Ai's and To-LoveRU's are vastly outpaced by the Saint Seiya's and D.Grayman's of the bunch. For the most part, these are teenaged males, be they pirates or shinigami, gaining awesome powers and kicking bad-guy ass - over and over and over again.

So, how exactly does this say anything about societal expectations?

While no one could claim that Japanese society wants to have a generation of samurai-pirate-ninja guys running around defeating evil via psychic powers, a closer look at character's and their behavior, along with the reactions of others to their behavior, reveals a lot about societal roles and expectations. One of the clearest examples of this pertains to friendship - in the flagship titles of Shounen Jump, friendship and it's importance is repeatedly stressed. In Bleach, Ichigo has friends and they all band together to save the day, while Aizen only has cronies he can destroy on a whim and who feel loyalty to him from the end of a sword. And although the Bleach manga is far from complete, I believe it goes without saying who will win the day in the end. All of which reinforces the idea that to be independent within and of Japanese society is a negative - thus, subtly teaching the young male audience about what their culture demands of them.

The friendship aspect is also, perhaps, the most interesting aspect, in that while it translates well into American culture in the sense of 'friendship is important', the secondary aspect, that being independent is bad, does not translate into American culture at all.

Another concept that Shounen Jump reinforces for its young Japanese readers is the idea of a strong sense of duty to one's family. In some of the Shounen Jump series this is quite obvious - Cat's Eye, for instance, features three sisters who work together, and Dragon Ball Z features members of the younger generation as fighting alongside their elders. But we can even see the notion of duty to one's family in a series like One Piece, although there is no blood-family here - the Straw Hat Pirates operate as a family in many ways, and one could never argue that they don't display a significant sense of duty towards one another through loyalty. Even weaker characters here have their day to stand up for the sake of their comrades, which actually brings us to another point - that of the notion of "gambare", probably best conveyed as "never give up!" in English with the idea of unspeakable odds.

It is very clear that Japanese society does not tolerate failure. Although it isn't nearly as common as it used to be, it isn't unheard of for entire families to commit suicide in Japan because of the father's failure in the business world, and surely everyone has heard of train conductors leaping on the rails because their train was a minute late. So it is extremely important to instill into young citizens a sense of being unwiling to yield to grave odds, for the consequences of being unmotivated are, while perhaps not as dramatic as death, certainly dire. That the consequences in Shounen Jump series of the hero giving up are often world-scale cataclysmic is no coincidence - to walk away is to doom others, and to walk away from societal roles is to do the same, even if it is to a lesser degree; the hyperbole once again serves as a reinforcement in the minds of the young, albeit not consciously.

Because that's it exactly - none of this is consciously absorbed by the reader or viewer. Instead, it is much like the learning process for babies when they're beginning to talk. A baby does not sit in it's highchair and think, "Well, I just saw that when that lady wants that man's attention, she says 'Paul, could you come here for a moment?', so that's what I have to say to get attention." No, it giggles and repeats, slowly absorbing the grammar of the language, but beginning with short fragments of language that would be unacceptable in an older child. Likewise, a Shounen Jump reader isn't thinking, "Hmm, everyone likes Yugi here because he's willing to help others, even if those people were bullying him, but no one likes Kaiba because he's cruel and cold to everyone but his brother, so I should be like Yugi and not Kaiba." It is just a process of subconscious osmosis of what others react positively to, and what actions bring pain.

But don't get me wrong here, I'm not making the claim that Shounen Jump's manga-ka and editors do this intentionally; rather, it is inevitable. A person within a particular culture is going to write from that viewpoint, is going to write what they know. That author isn't going to make it's protagonist completely counter to what that culture finds to be acceptable (in general, of course - but even if you come up with examples of characters who do appear to run completely counter to the home culture, you can probably pick out culturally acceptable traits within the character, even if they are few) - this is simply because it is hard for a reader to sympathize at all with a character who is fully beyond the pale, and therefore difficult to keep the reader engaged as such; would you read a book or watch a TV show if the main character is someone you can't stand? Hardly.

So, the manga-ka makes a likable protagonist, especially because the intended Shounen Jump audience is not one which looks for multi-layered protagonist (or, at the least, not multi-layered beyond 'tough guy who's actually caring on the inside'). So the protagonist is a good guy overall, and although he'll face some setbacks (because in 99% of these titles the protagonist is male), in the end he'll overcome it all, because the intended audience isn't looking for their hero to suffer endlessly and only come to grief when the story closes - do you know any nine-year old boys who like it when the story ends and the hero is crying over the dead bodies of his family and friends?

So, we come back to the original point, that is that Shounen Jump displays and reinforces societal roles and expectations (the same argument could be made for Shoujo Beat, but obviously with different examples). It's also important to realize that it does it in ways that manga intended for older audiences simply does not - by the time someone is reading a title like Terra e..., they already know how to behave within their society, and they're reading to see something a little deeper than a monster-of-the-week storyline - they won't see the behavior of the antagonists, which is rewarded far more often than not, as being an acceptable alternative to how they already behave, because they've already learned that it isn't.

A good example of this is of a child hitting another child. Within American society, this is deemed to not be right, but it is something that we must tell the child is not right. When we tell the child, they do not immediately absorb the lesson, but as they grow and come to know their culture, they see that it is the incorrect thing to do. So then, at an older age, when they see a child hitting a child, their immediate reaction is negative - that kid is being mean, he is being a bully, it is wrong to hurt others. However, another kid seeing this scene doesn't see it that way - if they see it as particularly wrong, it is because mommy or daddy has told them it is, it is because they'll get in trouble for doing it. It has yet to become a question of morals for them. And if the hitter benefits by their action, the observing kid will see it as advantageous to hit another child. But if it is continually made clear to the child that using violence as a means of gain is wrong, then the child will not suddenly view it as morally acceptable years down the road when they are an adolescent or adult.

Anyway, I've always been bad at conclusions, but I think you get my overarching point. Shounen Jump - it serves a purpose beyond entertainment! Shocking, huh?

Ugh...its done but I'm feeling down(got raped by my chemistry test) so chapter 11 will be delayed to next week...or the week after that.

I'm also looking for another editor/cleaner to become the "co-leader" (sounds nicer that way..)

Experienced or not,I don't really care.

Mediafire:HERE

Sendspace:HERE

Tell me ASAP if the links are broken

Media fire:HERE (Third time today I'm reuploading this..and something is still wrong) 

Sendspace:HERE(This one works best..)

As for wheter I'll continue doing the later chapters..I thought about it and I'd definitely want to scanlate more provided the Niphredil can keep churning out translations.However,not this month because I need to sort out some business with my school,exams etc.

And I'm also searching for a french translator to do a few joint releases with a french scanlating group(if they agree).

Okay.. its time to sleep ZZZ

De unos meses para acá empecé a leer Mx0 y ver esta noticia me desaslentó un poco. Canned Dogs reporta que según un "espia" en Jump que postea en 2ch Mx0 Terminará en los próximos 3 ó 4 capitulos.

¿Qué es Mx0? Bueno, es un Manga Shonen comedia-romantica de acción, escrito por Yasuhiro Kanō que trata sobre una escuela donde enseñan a los estudiantes a hacer y utilizar magia, y las aventuras y problemas que pasa un estudiante común (sin habilidades mágicas), Kuzumi Taiga, quien fue admitido bajo circunstancias especiales....

La cara de Aika lo dice todo...

Me sorprendio ver que terminará tan abruptamente (supongo que por bajas ventas/popularidad) debido a que es de esos mangas que tienen de donde agarrarse para seguir un buen rato, y que dejaron varios hilos sueltos que dificilmente se pueden resolver satisfactoriamente en 3 ó 4 capitulos de 17 hojas.

El arte es agradable a la vista, tiene una cantidad de ecchi justa que no cae en la exageración y los personajes e historia son graciosos cuando deben, en fin, tampoco es el mejor manga jamás escrito, pero es regular, entretenido y ps me agrada :(

Ps nada, ahora solo falta esperar a ver como termina :(

-------------------

Facts:

Author: Tite Kubo

Status: Ongoing

Release rate: Weekly

Anime: Yes

-----------------------

Ratings:

Raisume's: A very good manga, contains lots of the stuff that is required for a shounen manga. Mainly outrageous fightscenes where they power up in ungodly levels as the fight progresses. This is the second manga I've ever read and it keeps me looking forward 'till the next issue comes out. The artwork of this manga isn't the best I've ever seen, but like I always say, it's better than I could ever do. An always present theme in most shonen mangas, the bad guys have utterly ridiculous powers. Most of the antagonists aren't very fun to look at either. The plot, like most other mangas, is what keeps me coming back. The humor can also be sometimes very strained, like Tite Kubo put it there at the last minute, which can make the reader feel very awkward. So far, the manga has over 300 chapters, and with long mangas comes repetitiveness. As the story arcs progress, it feels as if the same things happen again and again, only with different characters.

Artwork: 7/10

Character Designs: 9/10

Plot: 8/10

Comedy: 5/10

--------------------------

Gosuto's: I like Bleach because it has a good storyline and it's an exciting read. All of the blood and gore is very satisfying as well. Reading this manga keeps me occupied, that is, until I have to wait for the next chapter! Bleach gets a 10/10

-------------------------------

Tsuukushi's:

Bleach is definitely a well done manga, I found the plot very well done, and the fight scenes were irresistible. The manga always keeps you wanting more and even wondering sometime,s "what’s going to happen next?".  I didn't mind the artwork, though I must admit I have seen better. I found the humor well done, but sometime's Tite Kubo added it in when it was a very serious moment, making me and maybe other readers confused. I must agree with Raisume that Bleach can be repetitive just taking a little creativeness out of the picture. Nontheless, I must say Bleach is a fantastic manga over all, but just like others, has the smallest of let downs.

Artwork: 7/10

Character Designs: 9/10

Plot: 8/10

Comedy: 6/10

-----------------------------

As my first post here, I should catch up with everything I've missed lately. I'm going to attempt to keep this blog up-to-date, update it much more, and write some posts that have some actual content besides just quick news posts. xD

(my g key's broken, and while I'm copy-pasting the lowercase g it's too much trouble to keep copy-pasting the uppercase and then having to go back to the lowercase...so that's why I might have random fail moments in terms of capitalization)

First up:
Mano Erina graduating Ongaku Gatas and H!P Eggs to become a soloist
Wow, this totally surprised me. Ongaku was formed just recently, with only one album, and someone's already graduating? And even more surprising, it's an Egg. At least it's one of the ones I actually know though. XD I only know a few of the Eggs, even within Ongaku.
Manoeri is my favorite Egg, but I still think it's too soon for her to graduate- especially to become a soloist! She's young, and she just debuted as part of Ongaku...but I'm really looking forward to how this turns out, hopefully she'll debut soon.

Resonant Blue
So the radio rip of Resonant Blue surfaced recently. Usually I don't listen to the radio rips and just wait until the PV, but I couldn't help myself this time. I've seen pretty extreme views of this, ranging from absolute love to total hate and disappointment. Personally, I think it's nothing -too- special or impressive, but it's definitely a good song. I don't know if I really want Morning Musume to continue with songs in this style, but I know that I'll probably love all of their singles no matter what. xD I'm always so biased, I find it hard to really judge Momusu singles because even if they released a horrible song, I'll still love it because it's Momusu. I still haven't decided which of the limited editions to buy, it's tough because both contain DVDs. I suppose I'll wait until I know what exactly is on the DVD...if they're both alternate versions of the PV, it'll probably depend on what the PV is like...
I really hope their next album comes out soon, it should be released in the next couple of months.

Milky Way
When I first heard about this on Some Boys!, I was like "YAY NEW UNIT!" But then it turned out to be ANOTHER Kirarin Revolution unit. Anime units don't bother me too much usually (I mean, Buono's probably my #2 favorite unit in all of H!P) but I'm kinda getting tired of these Kirarin releases. It's not that I don't like the anime (I'm going to watch it soon), it's not that I don't like Koharu (even though her solo releases aren't the best, they always manage to get stuck in my head), it's just that for once I'd like something NOT Kirarin-related. And as if that wasn't enough, it's Koharu (well duh, everything Kirarin has to have her in it) and two Eggs. Which, unlike Manoeri, I don't know whatsoever. So I think all my interest in this unit might have just disappeared. And I bet it's going to be another one-shot unit like Kira*Pika.
Maybe it'll have a better single than Kira*Pika though. Hopefully one that's not stupid like Hana wo Pu~n.

Buono! releasing a third single
Now for a good anime release! =D As I mentioned, Buono's my #2 unit in H!P (behind Momusu of course) so I was really happy when they announced this. My copies of Renai Rider and Cafe Buono (both limited editions) should arrive in the mail this week, or maybe they already arrived, I'm currently in the Dominican Republic so I have no idea what's going on back home. (I'm getting back late Saturday night, hopefully the package (the Buono releases and a couple of Prince of Tennis rereleased singles) will be waiting when I get home) I really hope their third single is going to be just as good as Renai Rider and all the tracks on Cafe Buono. It'll have the new opening/ending themes to Shugo Chara, so we'll get to sample both the title track and the b-side once Shugo Chara enters a new season- I'm guessing episode 26.

Fujimoto Miki's new single
I don't have too much to say about this, I haven't watched the video preview yet and I can't right now cause the internet isn't that good here (though I have to say, I thought there wouldn't be any internet at all here so I guess I'm lucky), but I'm really glad Miki's back. It's great to see her go back to her solo career after a couple of years. Now I just want to see her go back to GAM...

Prince of Tennis finale
All good things must come to an end at some point. Of course I've seen bands break up like ZONE and Do As Infinity, but I've never had a manga end like this before, all of the completed manga I've read so far had already ended when I started the series. With PoT, it was the first series that I followed weekly that ended. I started reading Prince of Tennis weekly back last summer, when the Nationals Finals started, and I guess it hasn't been that long but it really feels like ages. I still remember angsting over an uber late chapter like a week into my fandom, for some reason it wasn't uploaded until like the next Thursday or something. (And you'd think that would mean two chapters within a couple of days of each other, but no, Prince of Tennis was on a break that week.)
So yeah, Prince of Tennis ended about a week and a half ago. February 29th was the day it came out online, my friend says that it just shows how evil Fuji is (his birthday is February 29th) but since it technically didn't come out until the next Monday, that theory was disproved. xD
I'm pretty disappointed with the last chapter. At first I was like "that was ok, not too good, but..." but as the day went on (the scanlation wasn't out until Saturday morning) my opinion of it just got worse and worse. xD He abandoned Seigaku! D: The idiot ochibi went and moved back to America. So much for being Seigaku's pillar of support. And Kaidou was buchou, what the hell? I don't think I've ever seen anyone that thought Kaidou should be buchou, everyone always said Momo would be. Personally I think Kaidou would suck as buchou, maybe he has the intimidation but he just doesn't seem -right- for the position. Especially when you realize that inwardly he's just an uber shy 13-year-old boy who loves cute kittens and other small animals and such. Oh Kaidou.
And we didn't see anything about the future of the third-years. Are we just left to speculate what happened? Tezuka went to germany, Taka became a sushi chef, but the others...?
I really want an epilogue chapter showing them at some point in the future. Please make Ooishi and Eiji get married. <3333

Sayonara...Megane's cover out

Er, yeah, nothing much to say here, other than this reinforces my idea that this is their last single.

New PoT CDs
Not sure why I didn't post this earlier, but the soundtrack for the latest musical was announced like two weeks ago. I think the DVD's being released like a week after the CD, can't remember but it was in the Jump issue I got from Kinokuniya a while ago. Not like it really matters to the English-speaking world, for some reason the musical DVDs aren't sold at any online stores so the only way to get them is places like eBay and LJ where they're UBER UBER expensive. I think I'll hold off until I go to Japan this summer. (Definitely buying Dream Live 1st while I'm there btw.)
But anyway. Info:

タイトル：ミュージカル『テニスの王子様』The Progressive Match 比嘉 feat．立海（仮）
発売日：2008年4月23日（水）
品番：NECA－30224
価格：2，800円（税込）

Title: Musical "Tennis no Oujisama" The Progressive Match Higa feat. Rikkai
Release date: 2008.04.23 (Wednesday)
Code: NECA-30224
Price: 2800 yen

I wonder if Eiji got a cool solo song in this musical due to his uber angsty single match vs Kai from Higa. And it's the new cast which I know nothing about...

Along with the Higamyu soundtrack, two singles were announced today.

タイトル：ＩＣＨＩＧＡＮ ＮＥＷ ＶＥＲＳＩＯＮ（初回生産完全限定盤）（仮）
アーティスト：越前リョーマ
発売日：２００８年４月３０日（水）
品番：ＮＥＣＭ－１０１０５
価格：￥６３０（税込）

Title: ICHIGAN NEW VERSION (limited release)
Artist: Echizen Ryouma
Release date: 2008.04.30 (Wednesday)
Code: NECM-10105
Price: 630 yen

タイトル：恋風 ＮＥＷ ＶＥＲＳＩＯＮ（初回生産完全限定盤）（仮）
アーティスト：大石秀一郎
発売日：２００８年４月３０日（水）
品番：ＮＥＣＭ－１０１０６
価格：￥６３０（税込）

Title: Koikaze NEW VERSION (limited release)
Artist: Ooishi Shuuichirou
Release date: 2008.04.30 (Wednesday)
Code: NECM-10106
Price: 630 yen

Both are apparently new versions of songs from old albums. Ichigan is apparently from Ryouma's album SR, and it's a self cover. Koikaze is from Ooishi's album Tsuki no Kidou, and this is a new arrangement or something. I've never heard either song (still working on getting through all the PoT music), but I'll probably check them out later once I have good enough internet to download the albums...
I'm not sure why they're releasing random self-covers, but I hope all Seigaku regulars get one.

I know I missed some H!P news, but I just can't think of anything else right now. XDD I really hope I can keep up this blog better than the old one and regularly update...
これからもよろしくお願いします。

At first I was debating what to ask her to buy, I heard somewhere that they have Hello! Project photobooks but she isn't a Hello! Project fan (she knows what Morning Musume is due to my random ranting, but that's it) and I didn't want her to have to ask about those since that would without a doubt be awkward for her. xD I also wanted something Prince of Tennis, but the only specific thing I could think of off the top of my head was the 30.5 illustration book and I didn't know how expensive that would be...which would be necessary because I had to give her the cash beforehand.
So this is what I ended up with:

SKET DANCE 2 - My second-favorite current Weekly Jump manga! =D Soon to be my favorite, as Prince of Tennis is ending at some unspecified time within the next month or so. (Somehow there's never been anything stated about the upcoming end, but everyone knows it's coming and the non-fans over at the Weekly Jump LJ community are uber quick to write it off every time there's a rumor. >_<)
I bought volume 1 a couple of months ago, I remember that that was the volume holding my Mikan copies back for a few weeks! I decided then never to buy manga from Yesasia again if there's an alternative. =) Volume 2 came out January 9th, and it features uber cute chibis on the cover!! 8D Kind of fitting, because this volume has the chapters with the chibi puppets and also the chapter where Bossun turns into a little kid.
Sket Dance is doing really well in the weekly rankings in Jump, and I seriously think that this could be the next big hit. I mean, sooner or later the main series will end and something needs to carry the magazine afterwards. (lol for some reason while typing that I thought of the Prince of Tennis English manga's line "You can carry Seigaku!" I love how I can relate everything to PoT in some way.)

Weekly Shounen Jump 2008 issue 12 - This was the major thing I asked her to get! See, this is in some ways my dream Jump issue- Prince of Tennis is on the cover and has color pages, and Sket Dance has color pages in the center! My favorite issue of Jump in a really long time. As soon as this ToC was announced on the Jump LJ community, I immediately said "I have to get this issue!" And while searching around the web for some way to get this issue, I realized that it was the issue for the week Sarah was going to NYC! SO LUCKY! 8D
It's pretty significant because it's basically Prince of Tennis' final Jump cover, not the final color pages because it's possibly going to get more of those next week, but it's probably the last cover it's going to get. I think it should definitely get the cover on it's final issue - all series that I've seen end in Jump haven't, but those have been canceled rather than really ended, and PoT has been running for 8.5 years - but it's probably not going to in favor of another cover for One Piece/Naruto/Bleach. >_<
I love the cover, with Tenimuhou!Ryouma and everything. I was really worried that somehow it'd look bad, with either something else taking over a huge part of it, or just a bad drawing- I mean, in the back-to-back double issues for Christmas and New Year's, the art wasn't really that good. However, this cover turned out to be really good. And the color pages inside...I love the two-page spread! With Tenimuhou!Ryouma on the left side with the green spiky-ish hair and green eyes (...last week when I read this chapter I immediately thought 'Super Saiyan!') and that cool look, and the text on the right side over the stands. Some of the volume covers are taken from chapter covers, there haven't actually been that many chapter covers lately so I hope the cover for volume 42 could maybe be the picture of Ryouma here. (On that note, I've been checking the Shueisha website for news of volume 41, and while they started listing it last week they didn't put a release date. However, the color pages in this issue of Jump say that it's coming out March 4th. That's only like a week and a half away! Definitely buying that when I get the chance.) I should set the two-page spread as my laptop background, when I get tired of the Sket Dance wallpaper taken from the color page in the same issue.
Speaking of which, the Sket Dance color page is nothing too special, but I think I'm just unconsciously comparing it to the last two color pages- one of which had the Sket Dan exchanging outfits (Switch was crossdressing as Himeko, thankfully with sweatpants under the skirt...xD) and the other had them dressed up in ninja outfits. xD
Also, the color page for Sket Dance says that volume 3 is going to be released April 4th.

I really wish there was a Kinokuniya in Boston. Apparently the one in NYC was huge, and I want to go so badly~ @_@ My parents say that maybe we could go to NYC over a long weekend and merge that with a trip to visit my stepsister and her husband and baby daughter (they live pretty close to NYC). I'm so excited~~
(Though, you know, I should be even more excited for my one-month trip to Japan this summer. xD While I'm there I'm definitely going to go for a ton of H!P merchandise...do they have an official store anywhere near Sapporo? xD That's where I'm going for the three-week homestay...and the last week is sight-seeing with the other kids from my school.)

The series ended about a couple of years ago after barely 10 volumes (the 10th volume had the final chapter, an unrelated but similar one shot manga and a final bonus story) is by the creator of the popular Rurouni Kenshin series Watsuki Nobuhiro (family name first from here on in). For the most part the series is about the male protagonist Mutou Kazuki and the female protagonist Tsumura Tokiko using the "alchemical armaments" (busou renkin) which manifest from the alchemically created alloy known as "kakugane" to fight against the "alchemical creatures" known as "homunculus". In other words it's a whole lot of nonsense. To me the emphasis on hidden alchemy in a world otherwise contemporary to ours (as opposed to open usage of alchemy in an alternate world like Full Metal Alchemist) and the way the story plays out is ridiculously similar to Le Cirque de Karakuri/karakuri circus (からくりサーカス) and Kazuki looks too much like Sagara Sousuke from Full Metal Panic while Tokiko with a big scar across her face from a blade is reminiscent of the titular character from Rurouni Kenshin. Well supposedly the sources for all such things (aside from Tokiko) are different and it is of course true that I am familiar with many incidental works. But those are just some of the many things that stuck out to me (probably because I like full metal panic and Karakuri Circus).

That said, even though I have a pile of criticisms for the series I actually rather like it. The main reason for this is Tokiko. The only times you see such idealized strong and capable female characters is in works by males. I suppose this is a similar reason as to why I liked Shakugan no Shana (the first anime series of it that is) even though it had a pathetic male lead. And as it turned out for the first time in a long time I was satisfied by the ending. There is a moderately long final bonus(I'm assuming it wasn't serialized) chapter in the 10th volume of the manga (there's also a "one-shot" work that's a bit amusing which has apparently now been turned into a new series) which I found highly amusing and was a good note to end the series on after it had frankly otherwise ended mostly by sweeping all kinds of things under the rug. So just take my recommendation for the series if you can stomach a shounen fighting manga. As to why I read shounen fighting manga even though I always lambast such things it's because that's about all I can read properly with my level of japanese and at my age I'd rather read a vaguely occult fighting series than a school girl's romance story (which is possibly even something I could translate if I tried hard) even though both are tedious.

That said, I get the impression that rather than being planned for the length that the series ended out at it was a little bit closer to it being canceled. Certainly I did not anticipate the series ending when it did. But at about the halfway point of the series the final objective was introduced and then things were kind of pushed along from there. Arguably with the extremely vague premise from my summary which is the hallmark of shounen manga so that it can be serialized for as long as it's popular it could have gone on forever like One Piece is poised to do (the author of One Piece, Oda Eiichiro is a former assistant of Watsuki). And perhaps it would have done so if things went differently, but there was definitely some reason for it ending other than trying to keep the story a respectable length rather than having it constantly repeating itself (One Piece repeats the exact same pattern(s) over and over again). My guess was that it ultimately wasn't that popular in comparison to the likes of the big 4 of Jump (prince of tennis (did that ever end?), bleach (may or may not be winding down... in a year or three), one piece (I doubt it will end), and naruto (probably will not end for a while due to popularity but is poised to end at any time) since it wasn't particularly original. I could say the same thing about Anzai Nobuyuki's work  MAR which other than the setting was almost exactly the same as his previous work "flame of Rekka" (烈火の炎 rekka no honoo that's all the different kanji used for "fire" right there). hmm well honestly the whole world is in kind of a slump right now so that's inevitable right?

This may or may not be the time and place to muse on the subject since I probably could have gotten another post out of it, but I think that it's a lot tougher to stay fresh as a deadline restricted established artist than it is to come up with something that stands out when you yourself stand out. There's a lot of pressure for a successful artist (writer, creator, director, illustrator, sculptor, painter, whatever) to have the same or greater  success with subsequent works. So even when the artist in question does actually improve, it might not be enough to meet expectations. For example, almost all aspects of Busou Renkin are superior to Rurouni Kenshin, starting with art. Originality is actually an issue with both series but having alchemy as a theme in manga is by and far less common than having "samurai and ninjas" as a theme in manga so there is that. But the timing was better for Kenshin, a lot better, and so, in my opinion, the weakness of Watsuki as a story teller was more exposed in busou renkin since the timing for it was frankly terrible (the same could be said of watsuki's other failed work "gun blaze west" but honestly that one just kind of sucked anyway).

Hmm that timing thing is something else I could probably turn into its own entry but I can't remember things that well from the last millennium (ah what a great feeling it is to say "last millennium") and as it's not like I was in japan and it was harder to get ahold of anime and manga then than now I may not have been really that aware of the situation. But let's see, as far as anime anyway in the 80s I think of mecha series, in the 90s I think of crappy love comedy series, in the 00s I think of works that are just repeating everything that came before them with recently an emphasis being placed on somewhat "aimed at otaku" series.  Hmm yeah even now I don't really have a good sense of what's that popular in manga although it seems like action series are still pretty popular for shounen manga and in shoujo manga the most popular series include one female character surrounded by lots of male characters. Which is amusingly the inverse of the succesful 90s "harem anime" formula (Tenchi Muyo always being cited in the west as an originator of this) where you had one guy surrounded by a lot of girls who liked him for some reason. Typically there are slightly better reasons in these shoujo series I'm thinking of, and also there are usually only 2 or 3 characters actively pursuing the lead rather than 6 or 10, and the emphasis is generally social drama rather than action, observational comedy rather than slapstick, and so on but really...

By the way you might notice that I'm saying that the types of series that are popular now are like busou renkin, hell some of them are even by people with a relation to the guy responsible for it, but the more popular a type of story is the harder it is to gain distinction for that type of story. And so the ones with the most exposure typically are the ones to flourish. Ah now we might be moving into business models rather than creative trends so I'll drop off here.

Exactly what "business acumen" a parasite rambling blogger has I'll leave to your imagination.

Do you love to draw? What about people getting stabbed? Thoughts? Yes? No? What about time…do you seem to be short on it? Would you venture to say that the attempts that you’ve made at creating your own blood splatter(s) look(s) less than genuine? Would you readily admit that you’re just some lazy self-proclaimed “artist” that’s seen Evil Dead and/or Dead Alive a horribly unnecessary number of times?

If you nodded in excited agreement when you read any of the above questions, then you might want to get your figuratively blood soaked hands on these. You can go to the Maxon site to order them, or you should be able to go any decent (read: not lame) art supply store to get similar screens. Stores might not be so keen on helping you feed your blood lust, so you might have to settle for something like glittery rainbows or misty circles.

I don’t draw at all, but I got these just because I found them to be such a strange, though useful and pretty creative concept. Plus now after having taped these up, I can tell people that I have blood on my walls and not feel weird about it.*

Just to give you a point of reference, I held up an oversized magazine to show you just how big these sheets are. I figured that the magazine I chose would be the most appropriate thing since I had it at the ready and it’s got Ken from the infamously violent Fist of the North Star on the cover. I haven’t had a chance to sit down and really look at this month’s issue of Studio Voice yet (not like I can read much of it anyway), but I’ve gotta give stacks of credit to anyone who can put Yayoi Kusama, Lego Star Wars and GG Allin all in the same magazine. A Jump retrospective, a great layout…and GG Allin. Insane.

*Editor’s Note: I do not actually have blood on my walls.

I've noticed that a lot of people confuse manga categories all the time. They can't tell the difference between shoujo, shounen, seinen, and josei. I admit its rather difficult at times because there are crossover mangas and etc., but there are differences. Genre such as fighting, sci-fi, school drama etc. is not what determines which category a manga fits in. Although admitedly there are more school drama shoujo mangas than shounen and more "hero" type shounen than shoujo. There is a difference in drawing style. Also Seinen and Josei are not commonly published in the United States, because they target older audiences.

For starters shounen manga is target towards boys (although from what I hear more girls than boys read shounen jump). Manga like Dragonball Z, Naruto, and Claymore are shounen. Shounen is more restrained than shoujo in the flow of movement. The flow is easier to read and the characters are more likely to stay in the boxes. Also, the background is either drawn out or is full of sound effects and/or speedlines.

Naruto

Shoujo manga is targeted toward girls and is most often about romance. The backgrounds are more flowery (not all the time of course) and the people are more beautiful. Examples of shoujo manga include Fruits Basket, Ayashi no Ceres, and Ouran High School Host Club.

Ouran Host Club

Seinen is basically men's manga. Examples include such various titles as Elfen Lied, xxxHolic, and Monster. This is the hardest category to determine. Clamp has drawn beautifully in xxxholic which is seinen. Seinen also includes manga with a lot of nudity and panty shots, but that is not in all seinen. In general seinen is more mature than Shounen.

Monster

Josei is essentially women's manga. Emma, Paradise Kiss, and Nodame Cantabile. The romance is not as as "romantic" as shoujo and tends to be more realistic. Also Yoai mostly falls under this category.

Nodame Cantabile

Remember you are not restricted by you sex from reading manga from different categories. These are just who they are targeted to. In general Seinen and Josei are about more mature themes that usually wouldn't interest younger people. Shoujo is more about things that girls think about and Shounen is more about what boys think about or at least are thought to think and dream about.

Kagehime

Intro

Captain Tsubasa

Remember that Ogiue is very much a Shounen Jump fujoshi with her preference for titles such as Saint Seiya and Scram Dunk.

http://community.livejournal.com/weeklyjump/52738.html

And if you're too lazy to click the link...

According to Ritual scan and Heiji-sama from Mangaverse, Jump will be putting an end to:
- Prince of Tennis
- Belmonde
- Hero Studies
starting from issue #48. (on sale 26th of November)

AND new series are expected by more established authors such as:
- Shinya Suzuki (Mr. Fullswing)
- Mizuki Kawashita (Ichigo 100%)
- Takeshi Obata (artist for Death Note, Hikaru no Go)
and a series by Shiibashi Hiroshi, who recently had a most superb one shot called Nurarihyon no Mago.

Last year we had these kind of rumours too, when Obata and Takei were about to start Blue Dragon and Jumbor respectively; so I'm inclined to consider this true. Also because a LOT of new artists just aren't sticking; and that likely has Jump reaching back to past glories.

I really don't care about most of that, but...

According to Ritual scan and Heiji-sama from Mangaverse, Jump will be putting an end to:
- Prince of Tennis
starting from issue #48. (on sale 26th of November)

Well...
It's no secret Prince of Tennis is almost over. However...they're rushing it...which isn't good...
I guess instead of letting it end naturally, Jump's cutting it...you'd think for a long-running series like PoT they'd at least let it end naturally...but there's no way it's ending naturally with only ~3 months left before it's over...there's too much left to finish up...even if it ended right after the Nationals (well, not that it'd go into another plot arc anyway, but I figured it'd have a couple of chapters after the Nationals), it'd still be rushing the Nationals matches...we still have three matches to go plus finishing up doubles 2...I really don't want to see a rushed ending for this...
well...this is the first time anything I've been following weekly has ended...well, Hitomi no Catoblepas is ending, but that's new and even though I was interested in it I wasn't really too into it...
I'm pretty sad I only managed to get into Prince of Tennis so recently, when it's about to end and everything...I've done that so many times it's not even funny...for once I'd like to be able to say "I read this manga weekly before it was even popular!"...for Prince of Tennis I guess it was the other way around, I caught it after it hit it's peak and when it wasn't as popular anymore...so that's why I've been trying to read new manga lately, but that's failed...Hitomi no Catoblepas was cut, Belmonde's getting cut...
I always figured for a manga/anime, once it ended in Japan, I'd still have the English version to follow...but honestly, I don't think I want to follow the English version of Prince of Tennis that much...the dubbed anime sucks, and the English manga is full of so much crap...I keep noticing stupid mistakes, like on the back of one of the volumes they called Jirou "Jin", and then "Takashi 'Taka' Momoshiro"...

so, yeah, this ruined my uber good mood this morning (hey, it's Saturday, that's enough to have me in a good mood, not to mention the PoT box set #2 came and everything) when I first saw it on the community, then after a day of reading fanfiction and listening to music and pushing this to the back of my mind, someone posted it on MangaHelpers and it ruined my mood again...

I'm seriously cursed with the bad luck of getting into series after they're either past their prime or already over...usually the second option, actually, considering most of my manga is just the English version so it's usually already over in Japan...so I think I'm gonna start some shounen series soon that aren't quite new, but aren't really uber uber huge hits...

recommendations, maybe?
then again, I think the only people who read this blog are the j-pop fans, and probably won't be able to help that much...

On the bright side, the raw for Prince of Tennis 356 is finally out...not that that's much of a bright side compared to the bad news here, but...

Flaming Hot DVD
Comin' at you next month is Vol. 3 of The Prince of Tennis Box Set! Ryoma and his teammates at Seigaku Academy are now competing at the Metropolitan Tournament, and their "golden pair" in doubles is forced to resort to an unusual formation. Contains episodes 27-38. Special features include: original Japanese trailers and original Japanese opening and ending credits!

So I'm gonna break this down a bit, I guess...
"Flaming Hot DVD!-" (you mean they actually care about Prince of Tennis?) "Comin' at you next month-" (ok, I squee-d for a second before realizing that they meant October; it's still August so I thought they meant September) "-is Vol. 3 of The Prince of Tennis Box Set!-" (already? didn't the second one just come out? speaking of which, it STILL HASN'T ARRIVED. D:) "-Ryoma and his teammates at Seigaku Academy-" (ok, this line is fail. Seigaku is short for Seishun Gakuen, which basically is Seishun Academy or w/e. Seigaku is a team nickname. Seigaku Academy makes no sense. It's like...my school is Noble & Greenough School; the nickname is Nobles, but we don't call it "Nobles School", that makes no sense) "-are now competing at the Metropolitan Tournament-" (to be honest, I stopped there to take a minute to figure out what the hell they were referring to, cause there's no "Metropolitan Tournament". The Prefecturals?) "-and their "golden pair"-" (no, no quotation marks. Golden Pair.) "-in doubles-" (no duh. what, do they think that people think a pair could be in singles?) "-is forced to resort to an unusual formation.-" (the Australian Formation? It's unusual, but I wouldn't really say they were "forced to resort" to it...) "-Contains episodes 27-38.-" (St. Rudolph arc, right?) "-Special features include: original Japanese trailers and original Japanese opening and ending credits!" (NO. NO. NO. The original OP/ED shouldn't be "special features". If they're going to brag on the cover about the episodes being "uncut", the OP/ED should be fully intact! WTF~ Especially because they use the original opening and ending for Naruto boxed sets...I wouldn't mind as much (well I'd still hate it, cause the American PoT OP/ED are crap, but...) if they didn't say on the box "UNCUT". They say it's "uncut", but it's not- it's the exact same thing you see on Toonami/Toonami Jetstream- the American OP/ED, and the American title screen. Seriously, wtf? I was really hoping they'd use the original OP/ED...I wanna see Driving Myself and KEEP YOUR STYLE. DDDDD:)
Lolz, I needed something to rant over, and this was perfect. =D The English version of the anime is crap, and the manga's not too good either.

BUT ANYWAY
YAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYY
I totally freaked out on one of the Bleach pages. For two reasons. The first being...
YAAAAAYYYY THE BLEACH WII GAME IS COMING OUT IN AMERICA
and a DS game that I've never heard of before.
I've actually really wanted to play the Wii game for a while, but I don't think there's a Freeloader for the Wii. This is great~ I'm really surprised though, it's way farther than the American anime is. Not that I'm complaining or anything.
The second thing is that they had a thing at the bottom of the page going all "SOUL REAPER ALL POINTS BULLETIN". It was a fake "warning note" or something. Pretty lame, but then...
THERE WERE PICTURES OF GRIMMJOW AND ULQUIORRA
@_____@
Wowwwww, the English manga is pretty close to where the Japanese manga is~

And then way later on in the magazine, they decided to make an announcement...
BLEACH IS BEING SERIALIZED IN SHOUNEN JUMP STARTING NEXT MONTH
YAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
YAYYYYYYYYYY
I think it's a good decision. Bleach is one of the top 3 Jump manga in Japan, and I'm so glad they're putting it in the magazine. I think they're starting from the Arrancar arc, so...

So now the only thing left that would make me uber happy would be if they put PoT in the magazine. 100% never gonna happen though. I always thought it was really popular in Japan, but it seems like it's been near the bottom of the Jump ToC lately. And it's not popular in America at all, so I'm not gonna get my hopes up.

By the way, I noticed something slightly amusing when I was putting away some of my manga the other day.
On the inside cover for Bleach volume 1, there was an ad for other Shounen Jump manga. The main one they were advertising...was Prince of Tennis volume 13.
So...well, both series have 20 volumes at the moment in America. Does that mean that in the time it took for Bleach to release 20 volumes, Prince of Tennis only released 7?
O___o
*goes off to ponder this thought*

After I get Kakaeta Kiseki and Flower, the only seiyuu OP/ED songs left to get are Fujori (by Hyoutei Eternity; the second OVA ending) and Thank You!! (by Cap to Bin; the third OVA ending)...
ONE is by Eiji, which means I HAVE to get it, which means that all that's left for my Eiji solo collection is his album Hello! and his Best of Seigaku single, Tsubasa ni Natte. But neither of those are limited releases, so I think I'm gonna put those off for now while I go through and get some limited stuff.
As for why I bought Gather...well, it's the JUNIOR SENBATSU TEAM of course. xD Fuck the fact that that was all filler, it has EIJI in it (which made me UBER UBER HAPPY when they added Eiji to the team because I didn't think Eiji would make it on the team in a million years) and it has KIRIHARA in it (well, it's not Kirihara I care about, it's his seiyuu Morikubo Shoutaro who is AMAZING) and having both of them in the SAME SONG is uber uber amazing. WHICH IS WHY I NEED TO FIND DOWNLOADS OF EVERYTHING RELEASED BY THE DUO HEART-BEAT BECAUSE IT'S BOTH OF THEIR SEIYUU. *dies* (even though Eiji's seiyuu sounds nothing like Eiji when he's not actually trying to sing as Eiji.) I really like the song anyway. xD
And last but not least, Valentine Kiss. Hmm, I wonder if anyone out there in the j-pop blogosphere knows about the '80's song Valentine Kiss by some member of Onyanko Club? I hadn't heard of it until recently, when I was looking at the Lucky Star Wikipedia page to see the list of endings and on the talk page someone mentioned something about Valentine Kiss (one of the endings) being used as a Prince of Tennis song. That immediately got me interested, so I looked it up. Turns out, the song has been covered by 5 different Prince of Tennis seiyuu on 7 different releases. On Valentine's Day 2004, Atobe released a single containing a cover of Valentine Kiss. In 2005, it was Oshitari who released the Valentine Kiss single. In 2006, they both released Valentine Kiss singles...I haven't listened to them all yet, I don't know if they were re-releases or actually sung differently or whatever. In 2007, it was Sanada from Rikkaidai who released a Valentine Kiss single. Also, Shishido sung a cover of it as a bonus track on his album, and Ooishi did the same for his album.
The version on Amazon is Oshitari's 2006 version...the only other version I found was Sanada's, which I can still get on Yesasia so I'll grab it later.
Oh, and then I guess there's the 2nd PoT box set. I need to watch the dub. I haven't watched it since they took it off the air back in June...I wanna start from the beginning and I don't think you can do that on Toonami Jetstream. To be honest, from what I remember of the dub, it absolutely sucked, but whatever. Really, if I can handle Dub Piece I can handle this. I think.

I noticed the lack of non-PoT stuff in this, and I swear I'll make it up next order, which at the moment I think will consist of...Arashi's latest album Time, Morning Musume's SEXY 8 BEAT (limited edition of course), and Morning Musume's 7.5 Fuyu Fuyu Morning Musume Mini or w/e it's called (limited edition for that too). Probably Manatsu no Megane's, by Megane's (I don't even know how to make "Megane's" possessive, I seriously doubt it'd be "Megane's's") and Cap to Bin's Thank You!! too (I would actually get those in this order, but there aren't any "buy used & new" options for either single and I don't quite trust Amazon with import CDs anymore), and if I have the money maybe the Ongaku Gatas single. The limited edition probably, because I like the cover a lot better. xD
But that'll have to wait until later.
(or I might buy the 3rd PoT OVA DVD. I just got waaaaayyy too tempted to get it when I found it on CD Japan while looking for the Tenimyu DVDs...I mean, it's Eiji, and Golden Pair angst, not to mention it's the OVA series so the animation quality is great and everything...)

Anyway, I'm heading off to Cape Cod tomorrow morning (against my will) for a week with no TV and no internet, but I'm bringing the PS2 down along with a couple of *coughcoughillegallydownloadedcoughcough* Tenipuri games (I have Doki Doki Survival Secret, Doki Doki Survival Mystic, Gakuensai no Oujisama, and Smash Hit! 2- the first three being dating sims and the last being just a tennis game) and Narutimate Accel to hopefully keep me busy. (lolz, for the record I just recently found out you can download PS2 games and burn them onto DVDs, and I've kinda been abusing that power I guess...) That in addition to summer reading and a couple of episodes of Shippuuden plus about 8 episodes of Bleach plus all of Gintama plus all of Lucky Star...well, I don't think I'll be too bored while hanging out in the cottage. xD

I really was expecting to scan and upload the CDs from my most recent order, but my mom's computer wasn't hooked up to the scanner and every time I remember to ask her, she's not in the house. >____< And now I don't have enough time...sorry, I'll get those up as soon as I get back~

On a total side note, there's no Jump this week. Which makes me UBER UBER SAD because I wanted to at the very least find out who's playing doubles 2 before I get sent off to Cape Cod and cut off from the world for a week. T________T

(oh so close to being caught up with PoT...)
...but not quite there yet, cause you see the issue is that I can only find the first two episodes of the Nationals Semifinals subbed in Chinese, and I watched the first episode but it's boring without subs so I think I'll leave the other episode until later when I actually get motivated to care about Fuji vs Shiraishi
maybe it's just cause I'm still hung up over Tezuka vs Sanada where TEZUKA LOST ZOOOOMMMG which is NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN unless it's to RYOMA but he LOST to SANADA OF ALL PEOPLE and they decided to put RYOMA against YUKIMURA which is like BAD IDEA considering it comes down to a fucking FRESHMAN (I mean, even if he is their super freshman, there's seriously a limit on how overpowered he can be) vs the fucking CAPTAIN (and best player like EVER) OF RIKKAIDAI but we all know that after doubles 2, singles 2, and doubles 1, two of them will win and one will lose so it'll come down to Ryoma vs Yukimura for the deciding match to see which team wins the Nationals and we ALL KNOW that Ryoma will win so Seigaku will win the Nationals and the series will end *TEARTEAR*
cause it'd make SO MUCH MORE SENSE to put FUJI against Yukimura (actually the best would have been TEZUKA but for some reason he ended up in SINGLES 3 even though he's the BEST PLAYER ON THE TEAM) instead of RYOMA but Fuji isn't the main character now, is he
we have yet to see Yukimura play since he's been in the HOSPITAL the whole time (being raped by a plant according to a fanfic I read =D) but we know he can do the MUGA NO KYOUCHI and he's the CAPTAIN OF RIKKAIDAI and he's BETTER THAN SANADA AND YANAGI AND EVERYONE ELSE FROM RIKKAIDAI so we know he's UBER POWERFUL so Ryoma's gonna have to pull some new moves out to beat him and add to his uber move collection
that is if he even comes in time for the match, that'd actually be really funny if he totally missed his match due to being wherever the hell he is right now while Momo and Atobe and Oshitari are looking for him
I figure since Ryuuzaki let Momo run off and look for Ryoma that means he's one of the two subs this round because I don't think she'd take the chance of losing another player and missing another match, and the other sub is obviously Taka because of his uber injuries from his last match which was really unrealistic, and when you figure that out it's pretty easy to figure the rest of the matches out, Inui and Kaidou have to be in doubles 2 because there aren't really any other good combinations with the others except the Golden Pair of course but obviously they're in doubles 1, and they should win somehow because of their goal to become "Nationals #1!", and if Inui and Kaidou are in doubles 2 and Ooishi and Eiji are in doubles 1 and of course Ryoma's in singles 1 that leaves Fuji for singles 2
I can't figure out who Rikkai's playing in their lineup though because of all the plot crap, like I really doubt Fuji's gonna play Kirihara again and stuff like that, cause that wouldn't really be as interesting, and since Sanada was in singles 3 and Yukimura's obviously in singles 1 I figure singles 2 will be Yanagi cause he's the last of the "3 demons of Rikkai" or w/e the hell they're called, but then we have the two doubles pairs and if we leave them the same then we're gonna end up with Yagyuu/Niou vs Ooishi/Eiji and that'll be boring, unless the anime of it includes the concussion that was SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN the first time but they cut it out for some odd reason along with like all of the good stuff from all the Rikkai matches in the manga like Fuji going blind and stuff like that
so maybe they'll switch the pairs around and we'll get Yagyuu/Niou vs Inui/Kaidou and Jackal/Marui vs Ooishi/Eiji, or maybe Konomi will come up with a totally new doubles pair like Yanagi/Kirihara and totally surprise us, that'd actually be pretty fun
well I bet we'll see Jirou as long as Marui plays, and that's always good cause JIROU = <333333333333333333333333

so I was thinking about Shounen Jump today and I was thinking that I wished PoT would be on the cover of an American Shounen Jump issue because sometimes non-serialized manga get on the cover like Bleach, but in order for PoT to get on the cover something important would have to happen like the movie coming out or the anime starting up again or something and then I realized that no one cares about PoT in America
it's really sad cause it's a great anime/manga and I think it could have done really well if they did it right, but they didn't and that's the problem
the manga's good, though there are some crappy changes like everyone calling everyone by their first names (no one should call Tezuka "Kunimitsu" except his family, seriously it's just weird to see the regulars call him that) it was fine, but manga isn't really as popular in the US and it wouldn't become popular with just the manga
but then the anime came over and Viz killed it, first of all they had the crappy dub with the uber uber uber crappy voices and everything else was good but the voices can ruin an anime, and they definitely did this time, I mean Eiji's supposed to sound hyper and Fuji's supposed to sound like a girl and everything else, so they totally killed the voices, and then they put it on Toonami Jetstream at first and that wasn't that good of an idea because I really don't think it's that popular, but then they put it on TV which was a good move but then they killed it by SKIPPING LIKE HALF THE EPISODES FOR NO REAL REASON, and I'm sure that confused dub-only watchers who probably had no idea what was going on, and I can understand why they'd want to get farther along in the series faster because the series starts out kinda ehhh and gets waay better later on, but skipping episodes is not the way to go, and so then they finally restarted it from the very beginning but then they took it off the air for good before they got to the good episodes!
so now people have to buy the DVDs to watch it and I don't think it's really attracting any new fans by doing that because if I was someone who only watched dub anime I certainly wouldn't want to spend like $40 on a DVD that I'm not even sure I'm gonna like and it's especially not good because they don't even release separate DVDs, only box sets, and I think that's a turn-off for people because whyyy would they want to buy a box set for an anime they're not even sure that they're going to like
or they could watch it on Toonami Jetstream, but that sucks and I don't think they keep the earlier episodes on so if you didn't see the beginning you're screwed and you'll have no idea what's going on especially because I hear they're about to hit the Yamabuki arc and by this point you don't randomly start watching in the middle, you just don't
and btw I really wanna know what Dan's gonna be like in the dub because it's DAN for god's sake and they can't keep "desu" so how else are they gonna keep his weird speech habit, which reminds me I need to see the rest of the dub in general, cause I'm interested in how they're gonna keep "daa~ne~" and the whole "duck" reference cause that doesn't work unless they dub him to say like "quack" or w/e and if they do that I'll shoot the people who came up with that crappy idea
not to mention I don't know/remember any of the voices besides the Seigaku regulars, so I gotta see how crappy the other voices are
oh dear lord I CANNOT wait until we get to Davide from Rokkaku, how the hell are they gonna work in all his puns in English
actually the manga's already that far but I'm not, I'm only up to volume 8 in the English version but I've been buying a few everytime I get the chance so I'll catch up soon, they're already at Eiji's seal step! yaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyy
I forget if that's when Eiji plays Rokkaku or Rikkaidai so I don't exactly know how far the English manga is but whatever, not like it really makes any difference, Eiji's amazing and uber great yayyyyyyy
ok I think I'm finally out of things to say

[/rant]

Oh, and completely random, but virtual cookies to anyone who spots what's wrong in this manga page. xD I didn't notice it until someone told me...