Yeah, that series was my immediate first thought on seeing Other Sean’s post. 
Sorry for the delay, general update on schedule and such and whats coming next! Jump to the next post if you are interested in reading a manga magazine or just reading more!
We have already knocked out five manga and one issue of the magazine! Thats great! I’ve been really enjoying doing these write-ups, and its motivated me to read more and faster! The first issue of next year comes out a week from today, so thats very very very exciting!! (For reference, typically manga magazines release their ‘January’ issues in December. This hold true for the following months as well. This makes no real difference on publication, so I honestly have no idea why they do it. If anyone knows please enlighten me!)
In addition to keeping up with the bimonthly releases, which I hope to be able to go more in depth to, I want to lay out the plan for the rest of the manga series in Grand Jump!
First, there are the manga I’m interested in catching up to!
- Shrink〜精神科医ヨワイ〜
- #DRCL midnight children
- ザシス/ Zashisu
- レッドムーダン/ Red Mudan
- カモのネギには毒がある-加茂教授の人間経済学講義-/ Kamo’s Onion is Poisoned!
- ラジエーションハウス/Radiation House
- 瞬きのソーニャ/Blinking Sonya
Those are all the manga in the magazine that I actively want to read in this magazine having done my preliminary research on them. Lets call them my Highly Anticipated Manga (HAM) In order to not force me self to catch up on very long series that I might not like, here is my general strategy going forward.
-
Finish each HAM series in their entirety, that means every volume!
-
Then, slowly go through at least one volume of each remaining series, doing at write up of each manga based on my impressions from the first volume.
-
Start a new magazine!
Here is my ideal schedule for how that will work out (this is mostly just to hold me accountable to myself lol):
| Due Date | Goal | Requirements |
|---|---|---|
| November 30th | 2 HAM series | Red Mudan and Zashisu Write-Ups posted! |
| December 8th | 2024 Issue 1 | Finished First 2024 Issue and post it! |
| December 28th | All HAM Series Posted! | DRCL, Radiation House, Shrink, KamoNegi, Blinking Sonya |
| January 30th | ??? | The next project should be decided! |
After that, my goal is to do a write up of one of each of the remaining series on the weeks an issue doesn’t come out! That way I will eventually finish but won’t burn myself out and can try some new things! Obviously if a new series comes out in the magazine I will post about it on the issue that it comes out on. I hope this is an acceptable schedule for my write ups, and will keep my posting schedule more consistent! This does mean a lot of extra posts in December as I finish the HAM.
This schedule also makes it so I am caught up on the manga that were the reason I got into this magazine, at that point I will have a dozen series in the magazine that I’m actively reading, which I would consider a success for being an active manga magazine reader! Finishing that this year would be a major milestone, as its a dream I’ve always had to be at this level. Wish me luck! Also, check the below post if you want to get in on the action!
4 Likes
Getting Into a Manga Magazine!
So, some people mentioned wanting to join in on this project, and I just wanted to check on the general interest of reading a manga magazine (and or its backlog to catch up to the current series) together!
Would you want to read a manga magazine in a group?
- Yes. Fullstop. Put me in coach!
- Yes, depending on the magazine
- Yes, only if the magazine is a specific one I already want to do
- Maybe, depending on if its free-form or scheduled
- Maybe, it depends on the rigor of the reading schedule
- Maybe, if I have time
- Maybe I’ll catch up later
- No, but I’ll lurk and follow along on the updates!
- NAH BRAH
- NAH BRAH (but more politely)
0
voters
Some other things I want to gauge some interest on (These are non-comittal, just want to see if anyone would have any interest in joining on one of these projects in the new year!):
Other Projects!
- The Real Robot: Reading Gundam the Origin in Full Color
- A Club for the (Manga) Classics (older manga club)
0
voters
Please respond, and let me know any details about what you would want to do, and I’ll answer any questions I can!
Also just in case, if you want a book club thats already underway…
3 Likes
Zashisu by Morita Masanori
Genres: Thriller, Psychological, Horror, Mystery
Triggers: Intense Bullying, Violence, Horror, Some Nudity, and a rough series of seven pages where (don’t click this if you are squeamish a man has his stomach eaten by starving rats…)
Background on the artist:
Masanori Morita is an absolute manga Demi-god.
Most people in the west won’t know about him, but he is a truly legendary mangaka, He was known for his two long running series in Shonen Jump during its heyday, Rokudenashi Blues (link) and Rookies, which were made into an anime and a drama respectively.
(Despite how this looks, this is very much a comedy)
(This is also a comedy, but much more dramatic IMO)
Since then he has been published in Weekly Young Jump for another series, Beshari-Gurashi, which is the only one of his series I haven’t read. Disclaimer, I was a BIG rookies fan, and so was my wife (though she doesn’t read manga but she loved the drama!)
Morita-sensei has never really taken off in the west, probably because his work, especially for the time, was not prime import material. As an importer, are you going to bring over the action-packed fantasy of Dragon Ball or a story about a guy who maybe someday will box with someone? The choice is clear.
Oh btw, that silly boxing comedy itself had over 60 million copies in circulation by 2013. It was hugely popular in Japan, but again, that isn’t the kind of story that you want to bring over to highlight the insane creativity of the manga and anime industry.
Instead of using Rookies (though you should definitely read Rookies), I’ll later use some pages in Zashisu to highlight his strengths. But the big three are:
- His mastery of shading
- His character’s expressive faces
- His ability to write realistic characters
Morita-sensei is an extremely talented vert who clearly has the respect of his peers in the industry. He has been on the Tezuka Award committee for ages now, along with his peers Toriyama, Oda, and Inoue. Calling this guy a master of his craft is an understatement.
Manga Summary:
I think that I’m one of the first people in the west to read this, or at least talk about it, so let me give you the basic idea without going too much into spoilers. (because I think you should definitely read it!)
Zashisu is a psychological thriller, much different from his earlier high school sports manga. It involves a teacher who hears about a former classmate of his who had fallen from an apartment building with his hands tied behind his back. At the same time, his girlfriend who works at a publishing agency is reading a submission that seems to describe the exact situation of the murder, submitted before it happened. The game to solve this mystery is on!
That is all I feel comfortable sharing, because HOLY COW Y’ALL SHOULD READ THIS IT IS QUITE GOOD.
Sean’s Thoughts/Should You Read This?: (That’s right, already skipping to here!)
This series is short so far, with a slower release schedule since Morita-sensei is old, but it is dense and thrilling, and a feast for the eyes to read. If you like manga, and aren’t squeamish, then you need to read this manga. It shows you how a simple thriller can be elevated with expert shading and sheer mastery of the medium of ink. You have to see his work to understand that
This
Man
Can
Draw
But amazingly, his art never distracts from the story, it just enhances it. It isn’t just there to show off, but is executed perfectly in sync with the story. This is non-digital, but that perfect kind of non-digital that shows the artist’s hard work and gifts and experience and goddamn mastery. Even his character’s silly faces capture the motion of talking and emotion better than almost any other mangaka I’ve read. They sometimes look ridiculous, but their overall consistency allows every dialogue scene to feel so much more realistic and emotional than most manga.
Also his writing and dialogue matches perfectly with his art, but he lets the faces and the drawings do the emotion and add the flair and flavor, while keeping his character’s dialogue consistent and engaging, with jokes and little moments that give the characters their dimensions. An example is a very cute moment in the first chapter that does more to establish a relationship on one page than most manga do in a full chapter, and it felt so real because my wife does the exact same thing.
Overall, I don’t want to go into too much detail, because I don’t want to spoil anything. I’m not going to pretend the story is revolutionary or anything, but this should be read just to see how a non-fantasy story can be enhanced by the sheer skill of the mangaka’s analog ink drawing skills, and its a super solid thriller even without the art. It feels very cinematic, almost like this manga is designed to be adapted to a movie.
Since it’s only 9 chapters, I read the whole thing in an hour and a half, and it was one of the best experiences I’ve had with this project so far. I employ you to check this manga out, if only to study from a master!
TLDR:
You should read this if:
- You are an artist
- You like thrills and mystery and a little horror
- You want something short but high-level
- You are interested in manga as a medium
- You like ink drawings
- You like media that has an older style to it (this feels pretty 90s in the best way!)
- You like anything that Naoki Urasawa has made (Monster, Pluto, Master Keaton, etc)
You shouldn’t read this if:
- You need furigana, or are having trouble with slice of life manga. This is dense.
- While the dialogue is snappy which is good, he can really cram a lot of information in each piece of dialogue.
- You are squeamish.
- No seriously, the first chapter is something to stay away from if you can’t handle horror/thriller. It gets more calm after that but damn.
- No I’m really really serious, It’s wild. That goddamn rat scene is the worst of it by far, but its fucking rough.
I hope a lot of people check this manga out! I put a lot of work into the write-up for this one so hopefully it convinces someone to give it a try!
9 Likes
レッドムーダン (Red Mudan) by 園沙那絵
Genres: Drama, Historical, Horror
Triggers: Graphic Violence, Horror, Nudity, Attempted Sexual Assault,
Background on the artist:
Honestly, I got nothing! I know he lived in Shanghai for ten years before moving to Tokyo and getting his manga published in Grand Jump Mucha before it was transferred to the main magazine. Lets support a new artist!
Manga Summary:
I say this a lot, but I really think that I’m one of the first people from the west to read this, cause there is NOTHING online about it. Like amazon doesn’t even want to show me the books it does have! This manga is practically hidden online, which is a damn shame cause its very… unique? (And good, but it’s complicated)
Red Mudan is the story of China’s famous woman empress, 武則天, who I think I remember from when I played CIV 5. This is her tale from poor peasant girl to the empress of China, a real rags to riches story.
However, this is not a feel-good story. This story is DARK. And DEPRESSING and VIOLENT. I thought Zashisu was rough, but damn this is really hard to read. There is whipping, humiliation, and… lets just say period-accurate portrayals of how women were treated. This is not a fun read. This is not a light read. This manga is essentially the dark, evil, tragic version of 薬屋の独り言.
Ironically, I’ve been binging this show with my wife and loving it, so I was in the mood for Red Mudan. It even takes place in the same woman-only palace at roughly the same time! But damn, the tones could almost not be different!
Me not wanting to go into details is less because of spoilers and more of the fact that its… pretty aggressive, and I don’t exactly want to type out all of the details. Basically, a woman goes to the all-women palace to join the emperor’s harem for her family and courtesan-fighting ensues. Its very fascinating, but it is so much more violent than you would think after watching 薬屋.
Sean’s Thoughts/Should You Read This?:
At only 37 chapters at time of writing, it was longer than some of the other manga, but not unmanageable. The real difficulty is the language. OHHHHH BOYYYY I HOPE YOU LIKE KEIGO AND ALSO KNOW JAPANESE WORDS FOR CHINESE THINGS!
This is a rough read, because of the content and the context. The intricacies of the sentences aren’t limiting, you just need a good vocab base and be very comfortable understanding the gist of keigo before getting into this.
But, when it isn’t being horrendously violent, the art is really good! And the mangaka does a solid job of making the girls look different while all still be accurately Chinese (black hair, black eyes for the most part, the picture below shows some of the few exceptions)
Honestly, I’m really into this story, but I was also literally looking for another manga to scratch my 薬屋 itch. I definitely… sort of recommend it? Its a hard sell, but its certainly not bad! It’s actually really really good! I’m definitely going to keep up with it! Its just something I find hard to recommend because in order to enjoy it you have to get over a LOT of roadblocks. I think the first volume might still be free on amazon, so maybe give it a check? No worries if not though!
TLDR:
You shouldn’t read this if:
You are not confident in your Japanese. Full stop. Not saying you can’t do it, my Japanese isn’t that good and I can do it, but you will hit a lot of different roadblocks that could be demotivating. Definitely start with 薬屋！
You can’t look at graphic violence
As mentioned in the triggers… yeah things aren’t great for women in this time period… and they don’t shy away from EVERY aspect of that.
You should read this if:
You like Chinese history/aesthetics
You like tragic stories
You like slow rises to power
You want a unique art style
You like the drama of women competing in social activities
You wish 薬屋 was SOOOOOOOO much darker and tragic
Yeah, those are the two manga I’ve read this week, both much darker and more violent than I had anticipated!! Any thoughts/questions?? (And is there something like kusuriya that isn’t as violent??)
9 Likes
I really enjoy reading your overviews and getting a peak into so many new series!! Even if it’s not my genre for diving into, it’s fascinating stuff.
Thanks!!
7 Likes
I wholeheartedly agree with @mitrac. Your write ups are enjoyable to read and it is really neat to get an impression of each series covered in the current magazine issue even though I most likely won’t end up reading the vast majority of them. The disclaimers at the end of each write up are also very useful, so thank you for that as well.
Looking at your list of overviews in the making, there is actually a manga I came across a few years ago and have wanted to check out once I reach a higher level at reading comprehension; it’s Shrink〜精神科医ヨワイ〜. I purposely haven’t read much about it but I know that it deals with various mental illnesses and I’m looking forward to getting a sneak peak through your thoughts.
Again, thanks for all of your overviews so far!
9 Likes
For some reason it only just twigged that you are the same Seanbone I see on the natively feed all the time lol
6 Likes
Thanks y’all!! It really means a lot~
I will continue this project even if no one was reading my write ups just because I find it fun/good Japanese practice, but the fact that people are reading these and liking them makes it doubly worth it! Always makes my day!
Yeah I used Natively a little bit starting this year but recently I’ve been using it to keep track of my vast reading list! It’s so helpful, even if almost all of the manga for this project I’ve had to add myself haha. I’m still new to forum posting in general, so I haven’t been as active on Natively as here. Sorry for spamming the feed (especially with my owned books list!!)
5 Likes
I don’t want to distract from the great stuff you’re doing, but since I mentioned it earlier in the thread, I did finally make that English language rundown of every series running in Harta magazine I’d been meaning to!
Feel free to take a look and let me know if there’s anything I should tweak about the format!
11 Likes
Not at all!!! This topic is open to all manga magazine related posts!!! And I’ve been looking forward to this post since you mentioned it!!
Reads intensively
Holy cow you this did not disappoint! This write up is phenomenal!!! I’ve been looking at a few magazines (and I even found the copy of the most recent Harta at my local store, I forgot to post it though haha), and these write ups are an excellent primer.
Series that caught my eye:
- oh god I realize while writing this that its like, all of them, I need to narrow it down
- 生き残った6人によると, your pitch of Dawn of the Dead meets Terrace House alone sold it to me!
- 峠鬼, oh man the art is amazing!! And the sci-fi esque magic seems interesting!
- 瑠璃の宝石, I also love special interest/hobby manga, I think its one of the most unique and wonderful things about manga! And this looks gorgeous!
- スパイゲーム A.D.1600, This premise seems hilarious ngl
- 司書正, scratches that Chinese history itch left by Kusuriya
and Red Mudan! - 黒巫鏡談 Okay this looks cool as hell
- 本なら売るほど -古本屋十月堂とその客 reminds me of Karakida in Grand Jump!
- キラキラとギラギラ, great concept and great title to match lol
- 煙と蜜, ヴラド・ドラクラ, ハクメイとミコチ, ウスズミの果て, 魔女のエデン, Servant Beasts, 神に誓って偽りです: GOD THE ART ON THESE LOOKS SO GOOD!!!
Speaking of the art, it all looks so good! Do you think that the magazine only publishing 10 times a year (with some series only 6 times) allows for a higher quality of art? Also, how long are the chapters (in general, if there is an average)?
This makes me really want to read Harta now!!! Like really really really really badly!! Now I regret spending this weekend planning my next magazines to read, now I have to make some difficult choices! 
I was thinking about good! Afternoon, Afternoon, and Big Comic Superior as my next options, but dangggggg these look so good!
For people interested in 殺し屋の推し, recently in Grand Jump there was another series by the author that I read (and never posted a review on because it got transfered to Grand Jump Mucha right before I start my project, WHOOPS):
Thanks so much for writing this up and sharing it!!
Edit: forgot to mention if there was anything that would make it more useful as a primer would be some sort of scale of difficulty or anything that you would think would be a barrier for reading these series. You did a great job of content warning!
Also, I found my pictures of finding these magazines, but I should have picked them up!!
I was really intrigued by these covers but then I remembered what you said about the Harta covers!! Gosh I wish these were series!
6 Likes
Thank you so much for the kind words!!
I totally agree! That series in particular is one that I love, but also feel a pang of sadness in my heart every time I read it that the American comics industry never quite provided an environment where a series like it would be a viable path forward…
Yeah I wanna push Shishosei on the Kusuriya crowd! I don’t remember if Kusuriya had like, fake dynasty names and fictional historical texts but Shishosei does and it’s great!
Hahaha, and you know what, the art in the most recent volumes is probably way better! It definitely hurt me to post Hakumei and Mikochi art from chapter 1 when it looks really off model and weird 11 volumes later 
.
Come to think of it I don’t know that I’ve read any weekly manga magazines yet… But I do think it’s got to be a factor in that on some level. For the 開花アパートメント entry I know I mentioned it but I was familiar with the author 飴石 from previous one-shots and intuited there was no way in hell their art style would be able to come out even 10 times a month. In general I do think though that what little manga magazine explorations I’ve done have so far at least confirmed the feeling that Harta is specifically doing something special (rather than my just being into it because it was my first magazine), and even the manga contest winners I don’t find as consistently interesting personally, so there may be editorial selection/contribution at play elevating stuff too, I don’t really know for sure how much is one factor and how much is the other.
As for the chapter length – honestly it’s really hard to tell from just gut estimating. My impression reading casually, which was strengthened while making this primer, is that it varies wildly, including from chapter to chapter in the same series, and from series to series. I’m nearly positive for example transitional chapters that are mostly plot details moving to the next plotpoint fet fewer pages and go later in the magazine on the whole than big climax moments in the same series (which tend to get more and are placed earlier in that issue). And in general I would say the 6/year series likely have more pages per chapter than at least some of the 10/year ones…
… but again it’s hard to say. I should count them someday, and it’ll be really embarrassing if it turns out they’re all a regulation American single issue 22 pages.
Honestly, the best guesstimate might just be to divide the chapter number I gave by the volume number. The tankos are probably all about the same page count, and it did seem like as I was doing this some series had way more volumes for a low chapter count than others, and I think that corresponds to my reading experience (like outside of Harta but recently I read FullMetal Alchemist and that had 4 chapters per volume and they were noticeably quite long).
Hahaha, I’m torn because I’d be selfishly disappointed to not hear about something new to me, but selfishly gratified to have pushed Harta on someone!! So go with your heart! 
…a
That makes sense, and I appreciate the feedback!
I confess I’m somewhat radically anti focusing on levels too much, and I was partly writing for a purely English-speaking audience – but that said 司書正 or 峠鬼 would probably be the hardest because of the fictional historical texts/dialogue, second maybe いやはや熱海くん because of the Kansai (but ignore all of that because those are also the ones I most want other people to read!!) and otherwise I think they’re all about the same level of “not that bad but written for an audience expected to be mainly adults so don’t expect too much furigana.”
I appreciate the pictures! When I was in a bookstore in Japan I made sure to at least pick up and hold a physical issue of Harta for a moment, even if I didn’t buy it! In some alternate universe there’s probably a world where it’s distributed as a magazine instead of as a book and I ended up picking that up at Kinokuniya every month instead of Weekly Pro Wrestling every week…
Edit to add: lol also I remain ever suspicious of the marketing copy but yesssssssss get it Atami-kun get that ファン急増! I am doing my part by god and someday someone I know will like that manga
5 Likes
god, can you imagine a western comics industry as vibrant as the japanese one… actually hold that, I don’t know it is in france or anything, maybe it’s sick
4 Likes
Funnily enough, Marjane Satrapi’s (who is french-iranian) “Chicken with Plums” gives me some of those vibes. Hyperfocus on an instrument (iranian “tar”) and the dish “chicken with plums” also being at the center of the story. But of course, it’s not a long running series but more like a one-shot. But I do think there’s a lot of nice comics outside of Japan as well.
Edit: I am probably biased because I was very active in “zine culture” a few years ago (I also made my own zines!) so have been in contact with a lot of smaller comic artists and publications that are definitely vibrant and exciting. But it’s not really as accessible as it is in Japan, that’s for sure.
7 Likes
Me, finding out about Harta alternative: haha i’m in danger
oh no, kindle unlimited has magazines and stuff on here… uh oh…
7 Likes
woah all of those look really interesting! thanks for posting that here, otherwise I would have never found it!!!
5 Likes
Oh yeah, I realized after I made my initial comment that Introduction to Mineralogy would be perfectly at home as even say, a First Second graphic novel or something and I should have qualified it more! Still, there’s something special about it being serialized in the same pages as a zombie manga, a veterinarian manga, a manga about the historical Vlad Dracula, etc.
4 Likes
I wish I could tell you but my knowledge of Chinese history is close to zero
From my experience leafing through dozens of different magazines, it definitely seems like they are!! Thats why I’m soooooo tempted, especially since its only ten magazines a year… I think I’ll pick one or several up to check it out and also scope out the lengths of the chapters so I can also do a vibe check!
Apparently its like the best western comic scene if you like the variety of manga scene. Also manga is big over there from what I know. I remember that picture of the prime minister reading One Piece, and I know that the French goverment has given a bunch of awards to Japanese mangaka like Rumiko Takahashi for contributions to comics.
Ooooh ooooh oooh! Tell us more! I would love to hear about your experience making zines/zine culture!
From my purusal, a lot of it is from Futabasha, including Manga Action (Seinen with lots of Gravure) and Manga Goraku (example below)
No shade to Futabasha, but their circulation numbers have been really low for a while, which is probably why they agreed to this deal with Kindle. They do have some hit manga like Kobayashi’s dragon maid, and some old hits like Lupin III, My Brother’s husband, I want to eat your pancreas. It also has some… other manga, like Peter Grill and the Philosopher’s time (my personal opinion is that its straight garbagio), but I’ll refrain from judging everything that they make.
What is really really really shocking is that Shonen Ace is on Kindle Unlimited!!
I’m fucking ビックリed. This is a big magazine!!! It has stuff like Nichijyou and Sgt. Frog! Also a lot of light novel/snime tie ins like SAO and Higehiro, and used to run the Eva manga, welcome to the NHK, and Toki wo kakeru shoujo! It also used to run some great manga like Kereberos Panzer Cop, and famous manga like Future Diary and Deadman Wonderland. There is also a very famous ギャル manga in it called はじめてのギャル! not for me personally, but I think you would like it! Really suprised this on Kindle Unlimited!
3 Likes
I’ve also found Comic Cune which think seems to be a 4koma/yuri??? manga in the line of Manga Time Kiara? Only two issues on KU though by the looks of it.
Holy crap browsing magazines digitally is so much easier than the giant ass IRL tomes
/edit oh hey Weekly Manga Town is on here, this one is okay. Shin-chan on the cover half the time lol
3 Likes
One great feature of Kindle is that each magazine has the chapters listed, so you can zoom to any series in the magazine instead of painstakingly checking the front/back and just kind of guessing!
2 Likes