[Need Cute Alliterative Title Using Letter M]
Saw this article over on Folio thanks to
Dirk
Deppey's link: It's a piece titled
"Mighty
Manga Mags" and it looks at how manga magazines are doing here in
the U.S. The main focus is on Viz's
Shonen Jump, but it
also mentions Gutsoon's
Raijin Comics and the possibility that
Del Ray may be looking at launching a manga mag. A couple things
that raised questions in my mind:
- I didn't understand how these figures for Shonen Jump
jibe: "Its publisher, VIZ, is guaranteeing a circulation of
150,000 by 2004" and "VIZ plans to print 1 million issues a month by
2005....double the 500,000 for Shonen Jump in September." Why is
Viz's estimate for circulation in 2004 350,000 lower than the print run
for September? Was the 2004 circulation goal misprinted? (I
seem to remember that Shonen Jump
launched with numbers near 300,000, so "circulation of 150,000 by
2004" would be quite a disappointment in my mind.)
- I wonder how Gutsoon's collected editions are selling. I
had no idea the numbers for Raijin Comics were so low (assuming
the
article's circulation estimate of 15,000 is correct). I thought
Gutsoon had signed some distribution deals to get the magazine (and
books) into different markets, but I'm not sure how successful those
arrangements have been. I haven't seen Gutsoon graphic novels in
any of the local bookstores when I've looked, but I always find plenty
of
collections from Viz (and Tokyopop, of course). I hope Gutsoon is
doing OK, if only for the selfish reason that I want to continue
reading Slam Dunk in collected form.
- I was disappointed to see no mention of Dark Horse's Super
Manga
Blast! in the article. I have a personal fondness for the
anthology, since it was what turned me on to manga in a major
way. I've since dropped it (and other manga anthologies) in favor
of the collected editions of the series I really enjoy (Club 9
and What's Michael? from SMB; Slam Dunk and
maybe City Hunter from Raijin), but I still think SMB
deserves some props, since it's been around a couple years
longer than the more recent upstarts. Maybe the "flipped" format
keeps SMB from being hip enough to rate a mention.
Shawn
Fumo also shares his thoughts on the short piece. Shawn is
particularly impressed with news that Viz has signed a distribution
deal
with Scholastic's book club (the article isn't clear on whether the
deal is just for
Shonen Jump, the
Shonen Jump
collections of select series, or Viz books in general). And even
though it really has
nothing to do with the topic, here are some old reviews I wrote for
early issues of
Shonen Jump and
Raijin Comics over at
Anime
News Network.
