Tuesday, December 1, 2015

IIIIIIIT'S CHRISTMAS TIME!



Well, more accurately it's December, which means that it's time for another month full of reviews of some of the latest, greatest (and not-so-greatest) manga titles of 2015.  That also means that it's time for yet Holiday Giveaway!  Once again, the prize is a $25 gift certificate to RightStuf, enough to buy yourself a volume or two of some of the better manga I'll be talking about this month.  As always, to enter all you have to do is leave a comment talking about the best manga you read this year.  Long or short, new or old, it doesn't matter so long as it was new to you.   The giveaway ends at midnight on Christmas Day, so don't delay too long in leaving a comment!

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to playing Fallout 4...er, I mean, writing more reviews!

6 comments:

  1. I've been rereading Vinland Saga....
    ok ok, thats cheating. The new an ddamn good manga for this year has been A Silent Voice. It's punching me straight in the feels.. of... "jfc, this is like my middleschool experiences 'cept replace deft girl with foreigner girl" kind

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  2. Best manga I've read this year was the conclusion to Summit of the Gods by Jiro Taniguchi. It was a great series overall based on the discovery of George Mallory's camera from his final climb up My. Everest. The conclusion was quiet but deep and reflective. And the art throughout the series was amazing! Will definitely be looking for more of Taniguchi's work.

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  3. Best ongoing manga I've read new volumes of: A Bride's Story. You know why. Beautiful, lovingly detailed art, immersive portrayals of cultures and locales you don't see too often in either Western or Far Eastern fiction, lovable characters, its commitment to showing all the ways in which life in these places is different, and all the ways in which it's the same, strong themes of love and family, and just generally an all-around well-crafted experience.

    Best manga I've been revisiting this year: Monster. It's a goddamn masterpiece, and I will hear nothing to the contrary. Even got my mom to read it with me and she never reads manga but she got totally immersed in it, which is a great sign. Again, exceptional art from a proven veteran doesn't hurt.

    The best new manga I experienced for the first time this year was A Silent Voice, which is probably one of the most viscerally immersive, "this is too real" manga I've ever read. It can portray cruelty and disturbing truths with sharp honesty, without itself coming across as needlessly cruel, and it fucking rips my heart out on a regular basis.

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  4. Best manga I've read this year? Oh god that's hard, on the scanlation side it would be Akatsuki no Yona since the scans got to some really good parts of the story (so glad it's licensed now!) and on the legal side I'm really enjoying a lot of the series over on Crunchyroll. I started Orange this year and liked it so much I still haven't read the last chapter yet, Spirit Circle is still quite excellent and I read Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer as well, and The Morose Mononokean is exactly the kind of supernatural story I liked. Overall it was a really good year for manga for me!

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  5. This is hard... I'd have to say the best manga I read is Yukarism. I'm a big Chika Shiomi fan, and this series doesn't disappoint. The time-traveling aspect is interesting, and I love the relationships between the three main characters. I haven't read the final volume yet, but I'm really looking forward to it.

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  6. The best manga I read this year was the first volume of A Silent Voice. That was a great print pickup by Kodansha, and it's one I've lent out to folks and gotten them hooked as well.

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