japan Archives

Contrary to popular opinion, not everyone in Japan thinks that porn comics are just one of life's things. This week an unemployed 44 year old man from Kobe, was charged with taking pages of his hand drawn erotic manga, and sticking them under the windscreen wipers of parked cars It's alleged he'd been doing this kind[...]

The fools. The Avengers Tagline Stirs Up Controversy in Japan The Avengers isn't out in Japan yet, but will be later this week However, the flick's Japanese tagline is making a few people at least very, very upset. In Japanese, the film's tagline is 日本よ、これが映画だ or "Hey Japan, this is a movie" While some might think that seems[...]

I received some excited e-mails last night about a surprise, never heard of, upcoming Bryan O'Malley comic called Bluenose Type-O, seen at Comiket in Japan this weekend. However, I'm told it is just one illustration, for a book of fake giant robot anime concept work And this is O'Malley's contribution. I received some excited e-mails last[...]

    Matthew Funk writes for Bleeding Cool; The third and final book in the Fables for Japan digital anthology series has just been released Along with the first two books in the series, theyare definitely worth your attention for several reasons. The first reason is the talent The talented roster of contributors to the books includes[...]

A small aisle next to ours was largely dedicated to companies producing homegrown Arabic manga, and there was even a Japanese culture booth (that almost seemed to be sponsored by the Japanese government) set up where attendees could try out kimonos Quite a number of young female Arab artists were set up in Artists Alley,[...]

Now, I am no student of Japanese cartoons I don't know my Japanimation from my Anime I am only just about smart enough not to click on a link that says 'Hentai' at work. But I know good stuff when I see it And this is good stuff. Our pals over at Live For Films have just[...]

Fans can catch 'The Avengers' in action exclusively at the convention at the special 'Marvel' zone with comics, merchandise and many other surprises. GiantWatch: The hardcover collection of Joe Kelly and JM Ken Niimura's I Kill Giants has won the fifth International Manga Award organised by the Japanese government. TransformaWatch: The HuffPo dreams of Simon Furman. The best[...]

Of course, the Japanese, who took to Cyberpunk in a big way in the 80s and 90s, have paved the way and turned the subgenre into a whole market The .HACK franchise has been going strong since 2002 with games on Sony Playstation 2 and over a dozen spinoff titles in manga, novels[...]

I've written a short one page piece with artist Mike Collins for the upcoming Spirit Of Hope anthology from Comic Book Alliance, to raise money for victims of the earthquakes in Japan and New Zealand. Edited by Alan Cowsill, Spirit of Hope has two covers, one by Jimmy Broxton, the other by Mike Allred Creators involved[...]

Mike Choi is auctioning the entire original artwork for X-Force #26, the issue in which Nightcrawler karked it, for sale on eBay to benefit the Red Cross.

I was talking to animator Jesse Norton after he showed me his comic about his friend Koga surviving the earthquake in Japan, and as we went over the latest news about the reactors in Fukushima Dai-Ichi, there wasn't a lot of good news there. Bad news: Really bad news: Godzilla pix: As the entire Northeastern sector of Japan faces[...]

Jesse Norton, working in animation, writes; When the March 11 earthquake hit Japan, I was sound asleep enjoying my first vacation in years My friend Joe's call at 3am was not welcome for many reasons, and there was no way I was returning to slumber that night Tons of calls started pouring in[...]

This is just one of the pieces being auctioned off by Dark Horse comics in a fundraise for the Red Cross' activities in the post tsunami/earthquake Japan Other items include; Comics and graphic novels signed by Duncan Fegredo: Two sets of the comics miniseries Hellboy: Darkness Calls, Hellboy: The Wild Hunt, and Hellboy: The Storm Free Comic Book Day comic: "Hellboy:[...]

Hentai and Fnarr Fnarr. Their definition is not yet available but Wikipedia defines the first as "a Japanese word that, in the West, is used when referring to sexually explicit or pornographic comics and animation, particularly those of Japanese origin such as anime, manga and computer games (see Japanese pornography) In Japan it can be used[...]

This is a James Jean silk scarf being sold to benefit Red Cross efforts in Japan There's a lot of it about Meg Hunt writes; Japan has given those of us of a nerdly sort a lot over the years: sushi, angry dogs with curly tails, unsettling pornography, feminine dudes with huge swords, painstakingly[...]

At the beginning of the week Tokyo-based manga artist Sensha Yoshida, was cooking stir-fry rice noodles and tweeted that he didn't notice the first earthquake. Things changed quickly as tsunami and more tremors hit Japan leading to massive loss of life and damage and continuing disruption. In a form of prayer, Takehiko Inoue,[...]

FascistWatch: Green Hornet director Michael Gondry calls fanboys... welll... His eyes light up when he mentions Rogen, but the reaction of the fanboys and

JapanWatch1: The Tokyo Comics Code, restricting certain sexual material in comics to under-18s, has passed into  legislation, and will come into effect in April for self regulation, and July for state restrictions. JapanWatch2: A number of Japanese digital publishers, including the Digital Comic Association, are condeming Apple for continuing to approve Apps from China that pirate[...]

The ebook market in Japan is currently valued at 700 million dollars year, with 90% of that from your standard phones In comparison Kindle and iBook take only 1%. And over 80% of those phone sales were for manga – making a yearly market for phone manga at five hundred million dollars a year Which is[...]