>I’ve come to realize that most of my blogs cover either super-heroes, Vertigo titles, or parodies of super-heroes. Sorry, I run with what I know. One genre I have neglected in my bloggage is manga. I went through a brief phase where I was into manga and anime, but not too many things have really stuck with me.

One of my favorite mangas would be Hiroaki Samura’s Blade of the Immortal from Dark Horse. It’s a good old fashioned feudal Japan samurai story, except the main character can’t be killed no matter how much he gets hacked to bits in his encounters with various, brutal members of a rogue martial arts school which embraces all styles. In that same vein, would be the Vagabond series, of which I’ve had the pleasure of reading one volume, but was so struck with the artwork and more of that good old fashioned feudal Japan samurai action. The story of Vagabond is a re-telling of legendary swordsman Miyamoto Musashi, best known for battling his opponents with nothing but a wooden sword, and managing to defeat them all. I particularly enjoy Vagabond’s link to Japanese folklore.

As far as non-samurai oriented manga’s, I’m a fan of Trigun, which I was initially introduced to via Adult Swim’s airing of the anime series. I enjoy the amalgam of sci-fi and western, and Vash the Stampede’s adherence to his vow to never kill, despite being the world’s best shot. I haven’t been able to read the series in it’s entirety, as manga series’ tend to become lengthy. The other space-western series that is near and dear to me, although more so for the anime series is Cowboy Bebop. Bebop was the series that got me into manga and anime in the first place, and is still today one of my favorite TV shows in general. Honestly, it was the theme song that got me hooked, the story that kept me around through the end.

As far as what I consider to be the best manga ever, that honor is reserved for the classic Akira. Not only as a manga, but as an anime, and movie in general, it will mess with your frontal lobe in a good way. Theres something about verge-of-apocalypse dystopian stories that seem to strike a chord in me.

Recently, I haven’t read as much manga as I used to, but considering all the good things I’ve heard about Death Note, I may have to give the genre another chance.

-Jim

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