20th Century Boys, Vols. 1-6
Do you remember those first, glorious seasons of Heroes and Lost? Both shows promised to reinvigorate the sci-fi thriller with complex, flawed characters and plots…
Manga Critic
Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms
In The Idea of History, author R. G. Collingwood argues that nineteenth-century historians viewed their task in a different spirit than their predecessors. While previous…
The 2009 Manga Hall of Shame Inductees
I’m pleased to report that 2009 yielded fewer jaw-droppingly bad manga in the vein of Eiken, J-Pop Idol, or Shiki Tsukai — surely the most…
The Best Manga of 2009: The Manga Critic’s Picks
I pity the poor critic who panned Up — it’s not fun to buck the tide of critical approbation, especially when it seems like everyone…
Oishinbo A la Carte: Vegetables
I mean no disrespect to Tetsu Kariya or Akira Hanasaki when I say that the Vegetables volume of Oishinbo A la Carte irresistibly reminded me…