Kodansha
NYCC ’10 | Kodansha’s panel was not canceled, it was never scheduled
Dallas Middaugh at NYCC/NYAF
When the news broke last week that Kodansha would stop licensing its manga to Del Rey and publish them under its own imprint, some commenters reacted with dismay. Aside from being unimpressed with the first few releases from the Japanese publisher, American readers are not happy with Kodansha’s complete lack of accessibility to the public — no content on their website, no press releases and very few interviews.
So when the Kodansha panel abruptly disappeared from the schedule for New York Comic Con & New York Anime Festival, online reaction was sharp and rather resentful. Fortunately, the Kodansha honchos seem to realize that things were going off-kilter and authorized Dallas Middaugh, who will continue to edit the publisher’s books under the new arrangement, to address what exactly happened.
And what happened was not a sudden cancellation, but rather a miscommunication, Middaugh explained. Kodansha had originally planned to do a panel at NYAF but decided to cancel it at the end of August. “We realized that we were a little off schedule,” he told Robot 6. “We really weren’t going to have any titles to announce, and without any titles to announce, we didn’t see any point in having the panel. I contacted the [New York] Comic Con folks and told them ‘We got nothing, please cancel the panel.’ And in their defense, I did say ‘What’s the latest we can get back to you if we decide we do want a panel?’ That day came and went, we had canceled the panel, they unfortunately took it as a yes and ran the panel information, and we were surprised the panel was listed.”
So what looked like an abrupt cancellation was actually a correction.
- October 11, 2010 @ 10:30 AM by Brigid Alverson
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Marvel
Publishing | Retail news and analysis site ICv2 concludes its two-part interview with Marvel Publisher Dan Buckley, who addresses the struggle between “tightly interwoven continuity” and accessible comics: “… You run the constant battle of people saying ‘we need one-shots for people to jump on to,’ but the ordering trends don’t play to that a lot. The ordering trends play to ‘is this tied to an event.’ It was very evident with DC’s Brightest Day and Darkest Night orders. It was very evident during Civil War. So you hear that said a lot but most of the sales are very contradictory to those desires. Making books as easily entered into as possible is something we try to pay close attention to. I’m not going to deny that we don’t get lost in our own soup sometimes which is the nature of serialized story-telling. It’s hard to keep the revenue numbers without tying in books to leverage off the big books.” [ICv2.com]
- October 5, 2010 @ 08:09 AM by Kevin Melrose
Kodansha to take over Del Rey manga (Updated)
Last week, we noted that a number of Del Rey series had mysteriously disappeared from Previews and Amazon, and in the comments, we speculated that an announcement may be in the works.
We were right! On the eve of New York Comic-Con/New York Anime Fest, Kodansha and Random House (the parent company of Del Rey) have announced a major change: The Del Rey imprint will disappear as a separate entity, and Kodansha will publish its own books in the U.S., rather than licensing them. Random House stays in the picture, though, providing distribution and support through their Random House Publisher Services division. Longtime Del Rey editor Dallas Middaugh will transfer to that division.
UPDATE: PW has more, including the news that Random House will still be doing a lot of the editing and production work on the books. No word yet about the rest of the Del Rey staff, though. And it looks like Del Rey may survive as an imprint for non-manga graphic novels.
Full press release after the jump.
- October 4, 2010 @ 08:30 AM by Brigid Alverson
Kodansha announces contest winners
The Unreberating Echo, by Kim DaeJin
Editors from Kodansha’s Morning magazine announced the winners of their fourth annual Morning International Comic Competition this weekend, and they seem to be happier than they were last year. The judges in the 2009 competition complained that “many of the current entries have focused on bishojo, giant robots, ninja and the like, leaving a very narrow impression of ‘manga’ style.” They expressed overall dissatisfaction with the entries and asked prospective creators to think about some different types of stories, and to emphasize this, they changed the name of the contest from Morning International Manga Competition to Morning International Comic Competition.
- August 23, 2010 @ 11:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Kodansha to publish yakuza, samurai manga
Cover of the prose edition of Yakuza Moon
Talking to Publishers Weekly Comics Week, Sean Michael Wilson, the editor of the alt-manga anthology AX, reveals that the Japanese publisher Kodansha is bringing out a line of mature manga works. (It’s not clear whether Wilson is referring to Kodansha USA, Kodansha’s US manga publishing arm, or Kodansha International, which is a different division.)
Either way, this sounds like an intriguing project, both in the way it is being done and the books they are working on. Wilson is actually writing the books, which are adaptation of Japanese prose works, and they are going to be published in English in Japan and then in North America and the UK. Wilson has four books scheduled; the first are Hagakure, an adaptation of In the Shadow of Leaves, a guide for samurai, and Yakuza Moon, the true story of a woman born into a Yakuza (Japanese organized crime) family.
Wilson is also working on Gekiga Freaks, the manga biography of Masahiko Matsumoto, whose Cigarette Girl is due out next year from Top Shelf, but the publisher for that project has not been determined yet.
- August 11, 2010 @ 07:30 AM by Brigid Alverson
SDCC ’10 | Kodansha to do portfolio reviews
Morning 2
If you aspire to become a real manga artist and draw for a Japanese magazine, like American Felipe Smith has done with Peepo Choo, here’s your big chance: Kaori Kitamoto, editor of Chi’s Sweet Home, will hold portfolio reviews for Morning magazine at the Vertical booth at Comic-Con International.
Published by Japan’s largest publisher, Kodansha, Morning and its sister publication Morning 2 are seinen magazines aimed at young men and are the source of such critically acclaimed series as Takehiko Inoue’s Vagabond, the cute cat manga Chi’s Sweet Home and Naoki Urasawa’s Billy Bat.
Vertical’s marketing director Ed Chavez says Kitamoto will be on the lookout for possible series to run in the magazine as well as entries for the Morning International Comics Competition, with the emphasis on the latter. She wants to see stories that are no more than 50 pages long, and she is open to “any style but with clear paneling, strong character development and thoughtful narrative,” Chavez says. Take a look at their site (in Japanese) to get an idea of the range of art styles — it’s not all big eyes and spiky hair by any means.
- July 20, 2010 @ 09:00 AM by Brigid Alverson
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Akira, Vol. 1
Publishing | When Japan’s largest publisher, Kodansha, set up shop in the United States last fall, many expected a major shake-up in the North American manga market. But so far, Kodansha USA Publishing and Kodansha Comics have been awfully quiet, re-releasing only the first volumes of Akira and Ghost in the Shell. So Gia Manry goes to the source, the general manager of Kodansha USA, and learns … not a whole lot, actually. Except that the manga giant plans to create a website. [Anime Vice]
Publishing | Comics publishers are generally tight-lipped when it comes to sales figures — unless, of course, those numbers are really, really impressive. That’s the case with the hardcover collection for Mark Millar and John Romita Jr.’s Kick-Ass, which Marvel reports has shipped nearly 100,000 copies since its release on Feb. 17. Almost 40 percent of those has gone to the direct market. [press release]
- April 14, 2010 @ 08:04 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
From Wikipedia's lolicon entry
Legal | In what some have already dubbed “the next Christopher Handley case,” Wikipedia co-founder Lawrence Sanger has reported Wikimedia Commons to the FBI for “knowingly distributing child pornography” in violation of Section 1466A of the U.S. PROTECT Act. Sanger, who left Wikipedia in 2002 and four years later launched the rival Citizendium, specifically points to entries on pedophilia and lolicon.
Manga collector Christopher Handley was sentenced in February under the same federal statute for possessing “obscene visual representations of the sexual abuse of children and mailing obscene material.” [The Register, Icarus Publishing, Geekosystem]
Business | This profile of Walt Disney Company CEO Robert Iger suggests there’s already friction between Marvel’s Isaac Perlmutter and Disney’s consumer productions division: “Hollywood, familiar with Mr. Perlmutter’s penchant for ruling his roost, has started to whisper: Will he turn into Mr. Iger’s version of Harvey Weinstein, the hard-charging Miramax co-founder who caused Mr. Eisner so many headaches after Disney acquired the little studio?” [The New York Times]
- April 12, 2010 @ 07:58 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
Libraries | In the wake of the recent firings of two Kentucky library employees — circulation desk attendants, not librarians — who refused to allow an 11-year-old to check out a copy of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, the crew of Good Comics for Kids discusses who should decide what children may read. [Good Comics for Kids]
Publishing | Simon Jones questions why Japanese publisher launched its long-anticipated U.S. division with a reprint of the first volume of Ghost in the Shell that’s flipped and missing pages that Dark Horse had restored: “What’s your master plan, Kodansha? Why was it necessary to take this license away from Dark Horse, if you’re not doing a different treatment of the book? It couldn’t have been because you felt Dark Horse wasn’t promoting the property, because I haven’t seen any marketing efforts from you. I can’t even find your URL in this book.” [Icarus Publishing]
- October 28, 2009 @ 08:17 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Dragon Ball
Manga | Wicomico County schools in Maryland removed all copies of Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball from library shelves Wednesday after the mother of a fourth-grader complained about the nudity and sexual situations depicted in the first volume of the hit series. The manga, which sports an “All Ages” a T+ rating, is published in North America by Viz Media.
A committee of administrators and “people from outside the school system” will review books, but the schools superintendent will make the final decision on the fate of the series. At a Tuesday meeting of the County Council, one councilman distributed photocopies of scenes from Dragon Ball, describing some of the illustrations as “disgusting.” [The Daily Times, The Daily Times]
Legal | An amended agreement between Google and the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers is expected to be filed by Friday to address concerns raised by the Google Book Search settlement. DC Comics is among the parties that object to the terms of the original deal, designed to resolve a 2005 lawsuit accusing the Internet giant of infringing on copyrights by digitizing out-of-print books without permission. [Publishers Weekly]
- October 8, 2009 @ 07:52 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Akira, Vol. 1
Publishing | Kodansha confirms what virtually everyone has known for quite a while now: that the publisher — Japan’s largest — is setting up shop in the United States, establishing an office in New York City. Kodansha USA Publishing will launch Kodansha Comics with Katsuhiro Otomo’s Akira and Shirow Masamune’s Ghost in the Shell, two titles that had been licensed in North America by Dark Horse. The company will focus on translating its sizable backlist, but views original publishing as one of its “eventual ambitions.” David Welsh provides a little commentary. [Publishers Weekly]
Publishing | BOOM! Studios has signed a deal with Haven Distributors to distribute second printings of all of the publisher’s monthly titles to direct-market retailers. [BOOM! Studios]
- October 6, 2009 @ 07:16 AM by Kevin Melrose
Comics A.M. | The comics Internet in two minutes
Warlord of Io
Publishing | The discussion continues about Diamond’s decision not to carry James Turner’s Warlord of Io, with clarifications from SLG Publisher Dan Vado, an overview from Editor-in-Chief Jennifer de Guzman, and commentary from Heidi MacDonald (followed by debate in the comments section), Greg Burgas, Sean Collins and Dirk Deppey.
I haven’t fully read and absorbed all the articles, but I liked Tom Spurgeon’s contention that, “[S]ome things have value even if they only sell 4000 units, both in terms of one day potentially selling many more than that but also in and of themselves and, perhaps most importantly of all, by adding to a varied and rich and unique experience that involves stringing together multiple titles.”
Pedro Bouça follows sometime later with this observation: “Funny thing is, Asterix, the world’s best-selling comic series has sold some 350 MILLION books all over the world. But guess how much the first book sold originally? Some 6000 copies. Luckily it was sold in bookstores, not on the direct market.”
Archaia
Publishing | Archaia Studios Press resumes publishing in June under a slightly different name: Archaia. [press release, via Comics Worth Reading]
Publishing | The first titles from Japanese publisher Kodansha’s new North American division have appeared on Amazon.ca: Akira and Ghost in the Shell, both previously licensed to Dark Horse. [Anime Vice]
Publishing | The solicitation for Love and Capes #11 was omitted from the May issue of Previews. Johanna Draper Carlson talks with creator Thom Zahler about Diamond’s efforts to make up for the error. [Comics Worth Reading]
Publishing | Montreal-based publisher Drawn & Quarterly, which marks its 20th anniversary this year, is profiled. [The Globe and Mail]
- May 6, 2009 @ 08:14 AM by Kevin Melrose