These VIZ licenses may not be new to some, but they were to me!
This evening, while perusing the Amazon listings for Beast Master, by Kyousuke Motomi, my friend and fellow manga blogger Jennifer Dunbar noticed a listing for Dengeki Daisy by the same creator with a July 2010 release date. I checked the Simon & Schuster site, and sure enough, there it is!
Dengeki Daisy
From the site: One day at school, Teru accidentally breaks a window and agrees to pay for it by helping Kurosaki with chores around school. Kurosaki is an impossible taskmaster though, and he also seems to be hiding something important from Teru…
This inspired me to check for other new prospective Shojo Beat titles on Amazon, and I struck gold with a listing for Seiho Boys’ High School! by Kaneyoshi Izumi, mangaka of Doubt!!, with an August 2010 release date.
Seiho Boys’ High School
From the site: Remote, lonely and surrounded by the ocean. This isn’t Alcatraz we’re talking about, it’s Seiho Boys’ High School, where the student body is rife with sexually frustrated hunks! How can these young men get girlfriends when they’re stuck in the middle of nowhere? These are the stories of the students of Seiho High and the trouble they get into as they awkwardly pursue all girls who cross their paths.
I’m not sure that Seiho will really appeal to me, but I’ll probably give it a shot. I’m really happy to see more from Kyousuke Motomi, though, since Beast Master is adorable. Looks like this is a slightly longer series, as well.
Ug, you know what I wish they’d license? Though I’d even take it from Tokyopop if it meant I’d get to put it up on my shelf. Yoshiki Nakamura’s Tokyo Crazy Paradise. I’d really like to know why it isn’t licensed yet. Skip Beat seems to do well, so it can’t be that they don’t think it would sell….
Sorry, I know that’s totally unrelated here…. Just, every time licenses are rolled out, that one is always missing, and I don’t know why.
I was just thinking the same thing yesterday, actually! Get out of mah brain! 🙂
But yes, I find it curious that the back cover of Skip Beat! always proclaims, “From the creator of Tokyo Crazy Paradise!” or words to that effect, but yet that series is not available here.
VIZ seems to be debuting one new SB series per month in 2010. So far the schedule’s like:
Jan – Natsume’s Book of Friends
Feb – Crown of Love
Mar – Cactus’s Secret
Apr – Stepping on Roses
May – Flower in a Storm
Jun – Library Wars
Jul – Dengeki Daisy
Aug – Seiho Boys’ High School
So this leaves room. In an ideal world, it’d go…
Sep – Tokyo Crazy Paradise
Oct – Cat Street *
Nov – Crazy for You **
Dec – Gokinjo Monogatari ***
* By Yoko Kamio, creator of Boys Over Flowers
** By Karuho Shiina, creator of Kimi ni Todoke
*** By Ai Yazawa, creator of Paradise Kiss and NANA
I add that while I desperately want 7SEEDS (by Yumi Tamura, creator of Basara) to be licensed, I’d rather see it under the VIZ Signature imprint.
Ah! You’re right! It says that on the back there…. That IS weird. Clearly they believe people have read it, or they wouldn’t put that on there, right? Or maybe that is the problem? That they think everyone’s already read it, so no one will buy it? I have, and I so would! I loved the series, and if I ever really wanted anything licensed, it’s TCP.
More Ai Yazawa would be good, too!
Though I can’t really knock Natsume’s Book of Friends, because it’s delightful. Crown of Love seems to be interesting, though I haven’t gotten to look at it myself. Flower in a Storm is the only other one I’ve seen, and I was very underwhelmed by it.
Yeah, it’s a weird assumption to make. “Clearly, our customers read scanlations!” I think TOKYOPOP actually does something similar on the back cover of its new series, Karakuri Odette, advertising that it’s by the creator of Akuma to Dolce, which isn’t licensed.
And yeah, I’m certainly not complaining about the titles VIZ is bringing out. I’m just greedy for more. 🙂 I do agree that Flower in a Storm‘s synopsis sounds very blah, though. Joy, more demanding guys and girls with superpowers.
I’m also curious about why VIZ hasn’t picked up Natsuki Takaya’s latest series yet,”Hoshi Wa Utau”. Well, since they’ve already picked up “Gesalt” by Yun Kouga
I’m surprised Hoshi wa Utau isn’t licensed yet, too, though I’d look for that one to come from TOKYOPOP, since they’ve been releasing all of Takaya’s other works.
People seem to believe there is a “bidding war” on that title. Obviously I don’t know the truth but if the title is going for too much no publisher can bring it over, I’m sad to speculate…
Ah, I hadn’t heard that. That’d be a shame. I’ve heard that cost is what’s keeping Rose of Versailles out of our market, too. This makes me very sad.