Digital Manga (http://www.emanga.com/) has been involved in the past in co-publication of 2 huge manga localazation efforts for North America that are Nightow's Trigun and Miura's Berserk. Teaming with American comic industry giant, Darkhorse, for those releases, now, fans are about to be greeted with the first truly independant manga offerings from Digital Manga Publishing (http://dmpbooks.com/). I've been in correspondance with Digital Manga's President, Hikaru Sasahara, for 5 years running and over that period, become familiar with his focus in seeking out manga and other character properties for North American licensing. The theme I always seem to come away with is a deep deep devotion to the hardcore, street and urban youth culture of Tokyo. And that's exactly what happens to be present content-wise with the inagural independant manga offering from the company in Hiroshi Takahashi's Worst and Ira Ishida / Sena Aritou's IWGP (Ikebukuro West Gate Park). Both are presented in Japanese manga style right-left read format with softcover dust jackets.Of the 2 titles, Worst is the heavier hitter in terms of being laden throughout with themes of young Japanese city style. The manga sports an impressive track record, having sold sold 1.5 million+ copies in Japan, ranking #3 at on sales charts there. The story itself, follows Hana Tsukishima who is a naive young man who's background hails from rural Japan. Hana relocates to Suzuran High in the big city and his aquaintance with city things comes into the spotlight in the first chapter as his unfamiliarity with a cell phone is realized. Before even entering his new high school, Hana comes into contact with the underlings that are revealed to be part of 3 gangs preside over Suzuran. The fighting throughout Worst is intense and comprises much of the story as new challengers define their level of skill and toughness and fans of GTO, Grappler Baki and especially DBZ will be quite at home with the storyline.
All Stories, Graphics And Material © Anime News Service Unless Otherwise Cited
Questions,Comments,News Submissions