"Cross Cultural" comics and manga recs list - PART 2
List 1
List 3
THE KEY
* there's some sort of media offshoot, whether it's a novel, anime or movie
# I've never read it, though I have seen pages/issues.
teal is for comics
greenish is for manga
orange is for media/novel
MAGICAL/MYSTICAL/FANTASICAL
Violent
Dracula vs King Arthur (Adam & Christian Beranek, and Chris Moreno) Medieval
Hellblazer* (Garth Ennis, and various others) modern day (The movie Constantine was based off this series)
Berserk* (Kento Miura) rape, gore, demons and mature/brutal topics -- a very good, solidly written story (even if it’s depressing as all hell) Medieval wartime setting
Full Metal Alchemist Anime The TV animation takes a markedly different turn from the manga and I would strongly recommend watching the anime to see what happens that’s different. Both are good in their own way, though I do find the anime a bit more intense. (if only because the music and cinema makes it so. The feeling carries over when reading the manga afterwards). And as an intro, an anime as good as FMA is a good gateway rec to the print media.
Midlevel violence depending on volume
Sandman (Neil Gaiman) modern day…sometimes
Lucifer# (Mike Carey and Others) I saw a few issues, though not in depth. If you’re looking for nice art, this series is uneven in its selection of artists. Towards the end, however, there’s a guy with AMAZING watercolor skills that hops on board. If someone could give me more info on him?
Ruse (Mark Waid)
Full Metal Alchemist* (Hiromu Arakawa) post industrial revolution, somewhere between the first and second world war
Petshop of Horrors* (Matsuri Akino) Modern day, Chinatown, California
The Devil Ororon/Akuma No Ororon (Mizuki Hakase) You get dismemberment and eye gouging. Modern day
Record of Lodoss War * (Ryo Mizuno and Yoshihiko Ochi) D&D style fantasy setting
Low or no violence
The Comical Tragedy or Tragical Comedy of Mr. Punch (Neil Gaiman, Dave McKean) Modern Day
The Amazing Screw On Head* (Mike Mignolia) Abraham Lincoln era USA
Castle Waiting (Linda Medley) Medieval setting
Thieves & Kings (Mark Oakley) Medieval Setting
Death Note* (Tsugumi Ohba) Modern day
xxxHolic* (CLAMP) Modern day
Basara (Yumi Tamura) sort of hybridized ancient days/fantasy
Utena*(Chiho Saito) a fantastical boarding school
Ghost Hunt* (Shiho Inada and Fuyumi Ono) modern day ghost hunting/mystery solving with spiritualists and espers
Mushishi* (Yuki Urushibara) uncertain of the time period (it doesn’t really matter)
Escaflowne fantasy with steam punk elements
XxxHolic movie and TV (the tv anime takes up the stories from vol 1-6)
Juuni Kokki (Twelve Kingdoms) the anime is good for the first third and last third, while it drags a bit in the middle. The problem is that the anime was supposed to be about 50 episodes and touch on many other kingdoms in the world it features, but it got chopped to half that number in the middle of broadcasting. It also differs somewhat from the original novels that are now being translated by Tokyopop.
Mushishi Well, you can read the manga, but I also wouldn’t miss the anime. The music, pacing and tone is wonderful and bizarrely relaxing.
‘Spirited Away’ and ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ by Miyazaki/Studio Ghibli I think that I actually prefer the English dubs over the Japanese
SCI-FI/CYBERPUNK/STEAMPUNK (that don’t involve superheroes)
The Men in Black *# (Lowell Cunningham) aliens on earth and the US government
Matrix # (Andy Wachowski, Larry Wachowski, Geof Darrow, and Bill Sienkiewicz) cyberpunk
Just about anything by Enki Bilal european artist that specializes in cyberpunk + dystopia, heavy character pieces
Agents of Atlas # (Jeff Parker)
Hellboy# (Mike Mignolia) general genetics and high tech
Airshell (Lia Fiengo) cyberpunk
BLAME!* (Tsutomu Nihei) cyberpunk
Noise (Tsutomu Nihei) cyberpunk
No.5 (Taiyo Matsumoto) future, or perhaps just events in a parallel Earth
Clover (CLAMP) genetics, VR and tech
Eureka 7* (Katoaka Jinsei, Kondou Kazuma) Manga adapted from the anime: A future in a planet somewhere where humanity meets another lifeform, giant mech suits and wind surfing
Mushishi* (Yuki Urushibara) natural “strange” lifeforms from Earth, possibly mystical, but also possibly not. It depends on how you look at it.
R20: Route 20 - The Town With Gears (Yoshiyuki Sadamoto) cyberpunk/future dystopia
Patlabor* (Masami Yuki) mechsuit, police and politics in a future earth
Ghost in the Shell* (Masamune Shirow) cyberpunk
Dominion: Tank Police (Masamune Shirow) same universe as Ghost in the Shell, except from the regular police side of things. Less cyberpunk and more about tech and weaponry
PLUTO (Naoki Urasawa) future earth, androids and humanity. Based on Atom Boy.
Atom Boy* # (Osamu Tezuka) Old school story of androids, atomic energy and humanity.
PlanetES* (Makoto Yukimura) slice of life, hard sci-fi, the life of debris collectors/space garbagemen around Earth's orbit
Noein Hard sci-fi. Quantum physics on Earth
Phantom Memory Kurau Hard sci-fi. Aliens, high tech. Beautifully done character story.
Galaxy Railways Space opera. Old school story about manhood with lots of heart (and very questionable science, but it doesn’t matter)
Cowboy Bebop Space opera, of sorts. Bears no resemblance to the original manga, though there is a new manga series derived off the anime that I hear is decent
Captain Harlock: Arcadia of my Youth Space opera. Another old school story about manhood with lots of heart and questionable science
Last Exile politics on a planet far from Earth. Gorgeous tech based on art deco designs
Blue Submarine 6 future Earth
Metropolis cyberpunk (oldschool)
Memories hard sci-fi, 3 short stories
FLCL (?) bizarre sci-fi elements without much explanation of the tech. Aliens.
Ghost in the Shell Innocence - after the last goodbye (Masaki Yamada) (novel) cyberpunk
Legend of the Galactic Heroes old school space opera, warring planets and colonies.
GRITTY/HARD STORIES (violent - sex and death)
From Hell (Alan Moore)
Sin City (Frank Miller)
City of Glass (Paul Auster)
Supreme Power# (J. Michael Straczynski and Gary Frank)
Transmetropolitan# (Warren Ellis)
Preacher# (Garth Ennis)
Helter Skelter (Hiatari Ryoukou) This seems like a typical shoujo story at first, especially with the art and presentation, but it gets mind bendy and screwed up pretty quickly. And then your head explodes.
Basilisk* (Masaki Segawa and Futaro Yamada)
Berserk* (Kento Miura)
Blade of the Immortal (Hiroaki Samura)
MPD Psycho (Eiji Otsuka and Sho-u Tajima)
Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Clinic# (Eiji Ohtsuka and Housui Yamazaki)
Dogs/Bullets and Carnage (Shirow Miwa)
Sanctuary (Sho Fumimura and Ryoichi Ikegami)
Dragon Head (Minetaro Mochizuki)
Banana Fish # (Akimi Yoshida)
Basilisk novel/anime I personally find the anime better than the manga in terms of art, and some of the things GONZO decided to add to otherwise faithful retelling of the story. The reviews regarding the translation for the classic novel is mixed. Manga fans or those well read in genre stories say its an excellent translation, while other reviewers say it’s incoherent. Still, I think it’s worth it to check it out-It’s written by the guy responsible for the ninja renaissance in modern Japanese entertainment. Sort of the way the Spaghetti Western was for the American Cowboy.
HUMOR
Cable & Deadpool (Fabian Nicieza)
Nextwave (Warren Ellis)
Justice League, Justice League International/Europe (Giffen and DeMattias)
The Amazing Screw On Head* (Mike Mignolia)
Truer Than True Romance: Classic Love Stories Retold! (Jeanne Martinet) Someone takes old romance comics and replaces all the words to be…. Something else entirely. Still are romance stories, though. Just cracked.
Codename: Knockout# (Robert Rodi, Mark A. Robinson, and Andrew Pepoy)
Johnny the Homicidal Maniac (Jhonen Vasquez) (violent, dark humor)
Yakitate Japan* (Takashi Hashiguchi)
Eyeshield 21 (Riichiro Inagaki)
Honey + Clover* (Chika Umino)
Café Kisshouji (Negishi Kyouko)
Gokusen (Kozueko Morimoto)
GTO (Tohru Fujisawa)
Cromartie Highschool I highly reccomend the dub version. Idiot delinquent parody anime
Ouron Host Club parody-ish of the reverse harem from shoujo manga
THRILLER
Human Target# (Peter Milligan)
Sleeper# (Ed Brubaker)
Scene of the Crime# (Ed Brubaker)
The Losers (Andy Diggle/Jock)
Monster (Naoki Urasawa)
20th Century Boys (Naoki Urasawa)
ALIVE* (Takahashi Tsutomu)
Interestingly, so far, most of the thriller type stories I’ve read in manga are largely bloodless and are more mysteries than their US contemporaries.
List 3
THE KEY
* there's some sort of media offshoot, whether it's a novel, anime or movie
# I've never read it, though I have seen pages/issues.
teal is for comics
greenish is for manga
orange is for media/novel
MAGICAL/MYSTICAL/FANTASICAL
Violent
Dracula vs King Arthur (Adam & Christian Beranek, and Chris Moreno) Medieval
Hellblazer* (Garth Ennis, and various others) modern day (The movie Constantine was based off this series)
Berserk* (Kento Miura) rape, gore, demons and mature/brutal topics -- a very good, solidly written story (even if it’s depressing as all hell) Medieval wartime setting
Full Metal Alchemist Anime The TV animation takes a markedly different turn from the manga and I would strongly recommend watching the anime to see what happens that’s different. Both are good in their own way, though I do find the anime a bit more intense. (if only because the music and cinema makes it so. The feeling carries over when reading the manga afterwards). And as an intro, an anime as good as FMA is a good gateway rec to the print media.
Midlevel violence depending on volume
Sandman (Neil Gaiman) modern day…sometimes
Lucifer# (Mike Carey and Others) I saw a few issues, though not in depth. If you’re looking for nice art, this series is uneven in its selection of artists. Towards the end, however, there’s a guy with AMAZING watercolor skills that hops on board. If someone could give me more info on him?
Ruse (Mark Waid)
Full Metal Alchemist* (Hiromu Arakawa) post industrial revolution, somewhere between the first and second world war
Petshop of Horrors* (Matsuri Akino) Modern day, Chinatown, California
The Devil Ororon/Akuma No Ororon (Mizuki Hakase) You get dismemberment and eye gouging. Modern day
Record of Lodoss War * (Ryo Mizuno and Yoshihiko Ochi) D&D style fantasy setting
Low or no violence
The Comical Tragedy or Tragical Comedy of Mr. Punch (Neil Gaiman, Dave McKean) Modern Day
The Amazing Screw On Head* (Mike Mignolia) Abraham Lincoln era USA
Castle Waiting (Linda Medley) Medieval setting
Thieves & Kings (Mark Oakley) Medieval Setting
Death Note* (Tsugumi Ohba) Modern day
xxxHolic* (CLAMP) Modern day
Basara (Yumi Tamura) sort of hybridized ancient days/fantasy
Utena*(Chiho Saito) a fantastical boarding school
Ghost Hunt* (Shiho Inada and Fuyumi Ono) modern day ghost hunting/mystery solving with spiritualists and espers
Mushishi* (Yuki Urushibara) uncertain of the time period (it doesn’t really matter)
Escaflowne fantasy with steam punk elements
XxxHolic movie and TV (the tv anime takes up the stories from vol 1-6)
Juuni Kokki (Twelve Kingdoms) the anime is good for the first third and last third, while it drags a bit in the middle. The problem is that the anime was supposed to be about 50 episodes and touch on many other kingdoms in the world it features, but it got chopped to half that number in the middle of broadcasting. It also differs somewhat from the original novels that are now being translated by Tokyopop.
Mushishi Well, you can read the manga, but I also wouldn’t miss the anime. The music, pacing and tone is wonderful and bizarrely relaxing.
‘Spirited Away’ and ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ by Miyazaki/Studio Ghibli I think that I actually prefer the English dubs over the Japanese
SCI-FI/CYBERPUNK/STEAMPUNK (that don’t involve superheroes)
The Men in Black *# (Lowell Cunningham) aliens on earth and the US government
Matrix # (Andy Wachowski, Larry Wachowski, Geof Darrow, and Bill Sienkiewicz) cyberpunk
Just about anything by Enki Bilal european artist that specializes in cyberpunk + dystopia, heavy character pieces
Agents of Atlas # (Jeff Parker)
Hellboy# (Mike Mignolia) general genetics and high tech
Airshell (Lia Fiengo) cyberpunk
BLAME!* (Tsutomu Nihei) cyberpunk
Noise (Tsutomu Nihei) cyberpunk
No.5 (Taiyo Matsumoto) future, or perhaps just events in a parallel Earth
Clover (CLAMP) genetics, VR and tech
Eureka 7* (Katoaka Jinsei, Kondou Kazuma) Manga adapted from the anime: A future in a planet somewhere where humanity meets another lifeform, giant mech suits and wind surfing
Mushishi* (Yuki Urushibara) natural “strange” lifeforms from Earth, possibly mystical, but also possibly not. It depends on how you look at it.
R20: Route 20 - The Town With Gears (Yoshiyuki Sadamoto) cyberpunk/future dystopia
Patlabor* (Masami Yuki) mechsuit, police and politics in a future earth
Ghost in the Shell* (Masamune Shirow) cyberpunk
Dominion: Tank Police (Masamune Shirow) same universe as Ghost in the Shell, except from the regular police side of things. Less cyberpunk and more about tech and weaponry
PLUTO (Naoki Urasawa) future earth, androids and humanity. Based on Atom Boy.
Atom Boy* # (Osamu Tezuka) Old school story of androids, atomic energy and humanity.
PlanetES* (Makoto Yukimura) slice of life, hard sci-fi, the life of debris collectors/space garbagemen around Earth's orbit
Noein Hard sci-fi. Quantum physics on Earth
Phantom Memory Kurau Hard sci-fi. Aliens, high tech. Beautifully done character story.
Galaxy Railways Space opera. Old school story about manhood with lots of heart (and very questionable science, but it doesn’t matter)
Cowboy Bebop Space opera, of sorts. Bears no resemblance to the original manga, though there is a new manga series derived off the anime that I hear is decent
Captain Harlock: Arcadia of my Youth Space opera. Another old school story about manhood with lots of heart and questionable science
Last Exile politics on a planet far from Earth. Gorgeous tech based on art deco designs
Blue Submarine 6 future Earth
Metropolis cyberpunk (oldschool)
Memories hard sci-fi, 3 short stories
FLCL (?) bizarre sci-fi elements without much explanation of the tech. Aliens.
Ghost in the Shell Innocence - after the last goodbye (Masaki Yamada) (novel) cyberpunk
Legend of the Galactic Heroes old school space opera, warring planets and colonies.
GRITTY/HARD STORIES (violent - sex and death)
From Hell (Alan Moore)
Sin City (Frank Miller)
City of Glass (Paul Auster)
Supreme Power# (J. Michael Straczynski and Gary Frank)
Transmetropolitan# (Warren Ellis)
Preacher# (Garth Ennis)
Helter Skelter (Hiatari Ryoukou) This seems like a typical shoujo story at first, especially with the art and presentation, but it gets mind bendy and screwed up pretty quickly. And then your head explodes.
Basilisk* (Masaki Segawa and Futaro Yamada)
Berserk* (Kento Miura)
Blade of the Immortal (Hiroaki Samura)
MPD Psycho (Eiji Otsuka and Sho-u Tajima)
Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Clinic# (Eiji Ohtsuka and Housui Yamazaki)
Dogs/Bullets and Carnage (Shirow Miwa)
Sanctuary (Sho Fumimura and Ryoichi Ikegami)
Dragon Head (Minetaro Mochizuki)
Banana Fish # (Akimi Yoshida)
Basilisk novel/anime I personally find the anime better than the manga in terms of art, and some of the things GONZO decided to add to otherwise faithful retelling of the story. The reviews regarding the translation for the classic novel is mixed. Manga fans or those well read in genre stories say its an excellent translation, while other reviewers say it’s incoherent. Still, I think it’s worth it to check it out-It’s written by the guy responsible for the ninja renaissance in modern Japanese entertainment. Sort of the way the Spaghetti Western was for the American Cowboy.
HUMOR
Cable & Deadpool (Fabian Nicieza)
Nextwave (Warren Ellis)
Justice League, Justice League International/Europe (Giffen and DeMattias)
The Amazing Screw On Head* (Mike Mignolia)
Truer Than True Romance: Classic Love Stories Retold! (Jeanne Martinet) Someone takes old romance comics and replaces all the words to be…. Something else entirely. Still are romance stories, though. Just cracked.
Codename: Knockout# (Robert Rodi, Mark A. Robinson, and Andrew Pepoy)
Johnny the Homicidal Maniac (Jhonen Vasquez) (violent, dark humor)
Yakitate Japan* (Takashi Hashiguchi)
Eyeshield 21 (Riichiro Inagaki)
Honey + Clover* (Chika Umino)
Café Kisshouji (Negishi Kyouko)
Gokusen (Kozueko Morimoto)
GTO (Tohru Fujisawa)
Cromartie Highschool I highly reccomend the dub version. Idiot delinquent parody anime
Ouron Host Club parody-ish of the reverse harem from shoujo manga
THRILLER
Human Target# (Peter Milligan)
Sleeper# (Ed Brubaker)
Scene of the Crime# (Ed Brubaker)
The Losers (Andy Diggle/Jock)
Monster (Naoki Urasawa)
20th Century Boys (Naoki Urasawa)
ALIVE* (Takahashi Tsutomu)
Interestingly, so far, most of the thriller type stories I’ve read in manga are largely bloodless and are more mysteries than their US contemporaries.