The second half of Ensemble Stars begins more cohesively than the first half with less rushed editing and more time for the musical numbers the actual point of the show. It’s a rather fun episode focusing on the colourful supporting cast. The focus this episode is on the tokusatsu idol group putting a musical production together. The bonds the singers share is truly heart-warming. The English dub puts together a fun experience to watch.

With the recent announcement of a Star Wars Kabuki play I thought it was time to finally revisit my thoughts on Shōwa Rakugo Genroku Shinju because there both Japanese performance arts related and I had no better ideas to write about today. A cursory reading of Britannica articles on the history of various different theater types to emerge from Japan proved interesting. In addition to Kabuki and Rakugo there are other kinds such as Noh. These descended from types of plays performed at temples and have centuries of tradition and memorization to them. Passed down from one generation to the next.

Showa Rakugo often discusses the dying art of rakugo itself and the the steeper competition which comes as more entertainment methods and technologies are introduced. To me at least this in itself was the most compelling part of the show. It reminded me of prose and how it’s also going into the background more and more as more visual narrative forms continue to be introduced. No deeper meaning to any of this just passing thoughts pondered.

Seperate Margaret also known as Bessatsu Margaret tends to focus on teen melodrama a lot more than its younger aiming counterpart Margaret. The narratives can also be a touch repetitious. Awkward teenage girl whose kind of a dork likes awkward teenage boy. So far all fine but the narratives never really have anyyhing else happening in Bessatsu Margaret, at best there’s other jealous girls at school or a romantic rival. There’s really no other issues in their lives other than “pretty boy A won’t notice me.” There’s never really anything driving the nareatives forward or really any narratives to speak of for that matter. It all ends up feeling like a lot of nothing and the same.

It’s been an exciting year for Margaret. Many delightful series are presently running in the magazine. The current issue features a lot of exciting moments. A boy comes to terms with his sexual orientation, some fantasy narratives have exciting developments this issue one series I have been paying close attention to had some shocking reveals about the heroine’s future. There was more to this narrative than I previously thought. A mystery manga also had some curious developments. I hope these titles are eventually localized in English so I can understand the dialogue. Margaret’s visuals storytelling abilities are excellent at conveying the general events. This is a top tier manga magazine for a reason.

Going back to revisit To Terra’s Prologue through Manga Planet after all these years I was blown away. Keiko Takemiya is an exceptional artist with lush, detailed art and paneling. I first stumbled across To Terra in high school. At the time, I delighted in each and every detail of manga and To Terra was no exception. I cannot begin to describe how excited I am to return to reading the property years later and look forward to more!

I finished the first Professor Layton Game trilogy. Each game in the series has excellent writing, voice acting, and so on. I just cannot put a Professor Layton game down once I begin it.

Each character you come accross has so much charm to them. The first trilogy is mostly set in small isolated towns where the citizenry is to put it mildly odd. Despite being mystery puzzle games the characters are the biggest highlight specifically the interactions between them. Level 5 excels at clever writing and originsl ideas and Professor Layton is an excellent example for this.

The puzzles themselves prove to be a challenge. They require a clever wit and creative out of the box thinking to solve. Each entry in the first trilogy is solid enough to stand on its own while continuing narrative threads keeps players invested in the next entry. If you are able to find a copy of them I recommend picking up the first professor Layton Trilogy.

So Comicedy has been going in a slightly different direction recently you might have noticed the site is now focusing more on adding to discourse both on Japanese manga magazines and video games in addition to tidbits of news which slipped through the cracks of other news outlets. It will be continue in that direction. I’ve settled into having my Patreon be for my fiction writing while Comicedy will be more for article writing. I apologize it took so long for things to shake out. Personal growth was needed I can be rather passionate but also impulsive in decision making. I’ll likely continue messing up. I’ll try my best not to. Thanks to everyone who reads my writing I hope it brings someone some joy which has always been my goal.

A staple of Tokyopop’s shojo licenses over a decade ago Kadokawa breaks up current chapters of series running in Asuka and serializes them weekly on Comicwalker for free for literally anyone to read in Japanese. Queer comic fans won’t want to miss Asuka it’a from Kadokawa so it’s innovative and forward thinking shojo manga. Asuka’s trademark trait is breaking new territory in shoujo manga. It’a been home to Trinity Blood Zone 00, D.N. Angel, and many other amazing series in the past and continues to publish deliciously readable manga even to this day!

I started thinking about the history of entertainment today and how it’s progressed over thousands of years. Specifically about how the technology used to transmit it has evolved. And how reactionary people are to each new development. In the last century there has been so much paranoia around new developing mediums like comics, film, television, and now video games.

It fascinates and baffles me how paranoid people are about these developments. Video games will inevitably become normalized over time as more and more generations grow up with them and age. The medium will also develop over time as its audiences change and grow. Genres develop and fall into obscurity only to come back again decades later in every medium and I feel video games are going to be no exception. Right now as younger gamers have grown up you see them demand games cater to them not really understanding that there’s younger gamers who will also grow up over time too. New genres develop as markets emerge manga is the perfect point of comparison for this. In Japan, they also had issues with Japanese comics readerships aging and there were and still are attempts by older generations especially in government positions to keep it contained to young readers as a medium.

Regardless of their attempts however it evolved just the same, right now there are manga magazines for housewives and men well into their fifties. It’s all just different methods of dispensing media people scream about it as the end times decades pass people realize it wasn’t the end times and have likely forgotten about it and have moved onto something else to overreact too. Such is the frustrating flow of time.

Big Comic Spirits has had my attention recently and I could not put my finger on why until I did some digging both through my memories and the internet searching type. Ikki comix an alternative comic magazine put out by Shogakukan was still around in my adolesence. IKKI itself is an offshoot magazine of Weekly Big Comic Spirits which emerged in the early 2000s. Over the next decade, it attempted to localize its titles in English through Viz an co-subsidiary of Shogakukan and Shueisha. This attempt failed but it was an important event for me as it was a time in my life I wanted more adult media while still interested in Japanese comics. Viz put out a free web magazine for a few years translated into English. However, this all died out with the bubble economy crash of the time. Anyway, I digress. IKKI was relabeled as Hibana independently of all this before Hibana folded with Weekly Big Comic Spirits and its monthly companion magazine Monthly Big Comic Spirits being the final resting place for many series from the magazine. I picked up Weekly Big Comic Spirits, dropped it then picked it up again inevitably falling in love with the comics from my youth all over again unknowingly. It all just comes full circle in the end.