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Archive for the Licensing Category

Media Blasters Sneaks In A Few More Yaois, DtB Omnibus

By Lissa Pattillo on Monday, September 21, 2009

AAAAnime and RightStuf have made some recent updates to their inventory lists and a few new titles have wiggled their way in. Plus, we don’t want to think I’m just an Amazon-splunker, right?

Media Blasters has two new-ish yaoi listings up, continuing their history of under-the-radar licensing. Both are set for release this winter:

Erotikku ni Oborero! by Higashino Yuu, titled under the name Drawn To Him. (11/24/2009)

“Tomoki was specifically requested by Tougo Tsubaki, popular romance novelist to do the illustrations for his novels. Tougo calls it “inspiration” and seduces Tomoki. A love that started from sex…! His heart is racing and his body is so hot! Drawn to him is a manga artist’s professional and private life, with lots of sex!”

Douse, Koi Dakara by Naoka Kasuga, titled under the name Because of Love. (12/16/2009)

“Could you stop acting like my older brother already? I told you not to tease me, didn’t I? I’m not going to stop even if you beg me now.” Hana always seems to catch Nodoka at the most unflattering moments. I don’t like Hana treating me like his little brother. I’m not in high school (middle school) anymore. Tempted by Hana’s flirtatious demeanor, Nodoka takes Hana by force and…?! A story about a guy pursuing his older crush. (Heart) This book contains many short stories.”

There’s also a recent listing for Ellie Mamahara: Baseball Heaven, a boys’ love title licensed by Tokyopop’s yaoi imprint, BLU, which has been on hold for some time now. BLU’s website, rarely updated, doesn’t currently have the book dated for release but AAAAnime lists it for September 1st, 2010.

And on the not-yaoi side of things, there’s a listing up for a Darker Than Black omnibus from Yen Press. On their website Yen Press currently has two volumes listed for the series, each one priced at $12.99 at 192 pages while the listing on AAAAnime is priced at $18.99.

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Boys' Love/Yaoi, Manga, Yen Press

Welcome Back Internet, Del Rey Goodies on Amazon

By Lissa Pattillo on Wednesday, September 9, 2009

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Eep, where has the time gone?! Oh right, I lost it in the obscurity of an internet-less world for two weeks moving into a new apartment. But now I return! Apologies for that little gap in updates, the first in two years and hopefully (if possibly?) the last. Lots of spiffy stuff has happened in the past week, including Tokyopop’s second webinar, news of Kodansha’s cutting ties with them and a variety of other goodies that always make Brigid of MangaBlog a mangaverse blessing.

I already made a quick post to appease the eager fans of Chi’s Sweet Home, to the later disappointment of Vertical’s denial of license, but that wasn’t all Amazon had to offer my return to the internet. It likely goes without saying that my Amazon posts are consistently the most visited on my site so I suppose it works out that my first posts after a (albeit short) vacation, cater to those fan-wants.

Del Rey was the company with a bunch of new updates on Amazon.ca this week. The first interesting find was a new license listing for Ikeda Miyoko and Kikuto Michiyo’s Yokai Navi Runa, a multi-volume story about a bracelet and a girl and boy who turn into a cat and an owl. That’s the extent of my understanding so fans of the series please feel free to elaborate.

More interesting than this to me however, was a few listings for what looks like upcoming Del Rey omnibi for currently running series. Hell Girl volumes 7-9 are listed as one book of 624 pages, as are volumes 8-10 of Mushishi, volumes 6-7 of Psycho Busters and volumes 3-5 of Orange Planet. All are series Del Rey is currently publishing one volume at a time.

With several manga companies requiring some belt-tightening to keep things financially doable, it’s nice to see a company take an alternative route to series cancellation. 624 pages is pretty hefty but fans of both series will undoubtedly be thrilled to recieve so much in one go. On top of that, both books are listed at $24.99, only ten dollars more than one individual volume. Good deal!

Other new listings of note are Del Rey’s books based on the movie based on the series Avatar: The Last Airbender. The two books, Avatar The Last Airbender and The Last Airbender were announced in detail at this year’s San Diego Comic Con.

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Del Rey, Global Manga, Manga

Chi Finds New Sweet Home With Vertical

By Lissa Pattillo on Tuesday, September 8, 2009

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As if responding to recent request, Amazon.ca delivers what will undoubtedly be exciting news to hopeful fans: Vertical appears to now hold the license for Kanata Konami’s Chi’s Sweet Home.

What is Chi’s Sweet Home? I’m not entirely sure but I can venture it’s about a cat and is very cute. I’m not a cat person myself, but the description of “…it’s Yotsuba with a kitten instead of a green-haired pre-schooler.” from Precocious Curmudgeon is enough to pique my interest. Enjoy cat lovers! By Amazon’s listing, the first volume is slated for release in June 2010.

Edit: Ed Chavez of Vertical has informed me that Vertical does not infact have the license for Chi’s Sweet Home. Currently there is no word as to why this information was submitted as such to Amazon, which now lists the book on both .com and .ca websites.

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Manga, Vertical Inc

Tokyopop Webinar: Part One

By Lissa Pattillo on Thursday, August 6, 2009

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Early this afternoon (or early this evening as in my case), Tokyopop held its first webinar: a live webcam-based session where Tokyopop staff took the time to share some information about upcoming titles and answer a whole lot of questions from the attendees.

Thanks to a quick transit home, I was able to attend this first-of-two sessions and you can read about what was said under the post cut.

As for my impressions of the Webinar as a whole: fantastic idea. It allows the opportunity for a convention-type industry panel but that people around the world can join in on from the comfort of their own homes. It’s a great way to communicate with fans and I give Tokyopop major kudos for putting it into place. Most impressively was the number of questions they were able to answer thanks to the in-order, streamlined method of submission. Very organized and a great opportunity to hit a lot of proverbial birds with one stone (I had all my questions answered so that was snazzy). I certainly hope I can attend the next one as well.

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Alice in the Country of..., Hinako Takanaga, Manga, Shoujo Beat, Tokyopop

Del Rey With Kodansha Listings, Digital Manga Picks Up DQ License

By Lissa Pattillo on Thursday, August 6, 2009

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Some note-worthy new listings popped up on Amazon over the week and this time one of them even comes with a confirmation from the company.

Two new Digital Manga listings of interest: one is for another omnibus edition of a previously released series of theirs, this time Hinako Takanaga’s fantastically charming Little Butterfly (big recommendations from me on this one!). This joins the already confirmed omnibus for Makoto Tateno’s Yellow.

Speaking of whom, Makoto Tateno’s boys’ love series Yokan is now listed on Amazon from Digital Manga under the name Preminition. Some yaoi fans may recall this title as having been previously licensed by the now defunk DramaQueen (under the title Omen). Word is that several of DQ’s licenses have begun to expire after years of no releases, which means there’s a likely possibility for more license rescues in the coming future. Preminition, along with a couple other newer licenses, are now listed on Digital Manga’s website.

Other Amazon finds of interest includes two editions of Yen Press’s upcoming first volume release of Soul Eater, one of which apparently coming with a presumably-snazzy slipcover. Extra attention for a series with a big fan base? Speaking of big fan-base (which should be bigger still!), Yen Press will be releasing not one, not two but six volumes of Yotsuba&! this September!

And lastly, though my Twitter followers heard this from me a couple days ago, listings for Akira by Kodansha Comics (previously reported as one of the most solid pieces of Kodansa-related news the English manga world has gotten so far) are now all being listed as the following: Akira Volume # (Akira (del Rey)).

This isn’t the first time I’ve noted overlap in publishing credits between Kodansha Comics and Del Rey, who already has a close connection with the company and releases their titles predominantly. Of course this could just be a slip-up on Amazon’s part, though some other retail sites have the publisher for Kodansha Comic’s rereleases of Akira and Ghost in the Shell listed as Random House (of which Del Rey is an imprint of). Is Del Rey merely helping Kodansha find footing in North America? Or could Kodansha Comics show up as another Random House imprint as a more all-inclusive joint agreement for manga releases? Time will (we hope) tell for sure!

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Boys' Love/Yaoi, Del Rey, DramaQueen, Hinako Takanaga, June, Makoto Tateno, Manga, Yen Press

Dark Horse Acquires Multiple CLAMP Series for Omnibus Editions

By Lissa Pattillo on Friday, July 31, 2009

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Unable to attend the Dark Horse panel at SDCC this past weekend, and hopelessly technologically limited since then, this news has taken its time making the way to the front page at Kuriousity, but that’s certainly no indication of my excitement over this announcement!

Dark Horse employees announced at their SDCC panel that they’ve acquired the licenses to multiple CLAMP series and will be releasing them in their entirety in special omnibus editions. This is a part of their continued celebration for CLAMP’s 20th Anniversary, including their recently released omnibus collection of CLAMP’s lyrical Clover series.

The series announced were Magic Knight Rayearth, Cardcaptor Sakura and Chobits. All three of these series were previously published in English by Tokyopop over multiple-volume runs (in that order).

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: CLAMP, Dark Horse, Manga

Kuriousity at SDCC: Del Rey

By Lissa Pattillo on Monday, July 27, 2009

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Technical troubles are delaying this post of mine on Del Rey’s Saturday panel, but I did attend and there was plenty of info shared by the pleasantly enthusiastic staff.

The panel of staff members included Del Rey’s Associate Publisher, Editor, Licensing and Acquistion Handler, Marketing Manager… and “just a writer” (info was withheld so as not to spoil news delivered in the panel).

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: CLAMP, Conventions, Del Rey, Manga

Kuriousity at SDCC: CMX Manga

By Lissa Pattillo on Sunday, July 26, 2009

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Here we go at the convention’s last industry manga panel: CMX Manga! A few technical difficulties slowed the start but it gave some attendees time to share a few con stories with the staff, and then soon enough, things began!

Note: Due to technical problems of my own, I wasn’t able to live blog the panels that happened yesterday but I do have all the information so that will all hopefully be up tonight!

CMX staff begin by showcasing multiple series,most of which acting as elaboration for previously announced/revealed titles while the others near-the-end are new:

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: CMX, Conventions, Manga

Kuriousity at SDCC: Yen Press

By Lissa Pattillo on Friday, July 24, 2009

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Lots of great announcements here at the Yen Press panel, so as before while this will be a brief overview until I have the time to write something full, but here’re the goodies in the meantime!

New license announcements:

Black Butler by Yana Toboso
Darker Than Black by Bones, Tensai Okamura, Nokya, Arklight
Romeo & Juliet by William Shakesspeare/Adapted by COM, Gonzo, SPWT
Bunny Drop by Yumi Unita
Sasameke by Ryuji Gotsubo
Omamori Himari by Milan Matra
My Girlfriend’s A Geek (Fujyoshi Kanojo) by Pentabu & Rize Shinba
Novel By Pentabu (blog collection by boy that inspired the Fujyoshi Kanojo)
Otome by Yuuki Fujinari
Dragon Girl by Toru Fujieda
Natsukashi Machi no Rozione by Sumomo Yumeka
Kobato by CLAMP (Coming May 2010)

Lots of great titles in the list, and following the licensing is a nice-sized Q & A which you can read a few excerpts from after the cut.

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Categories: Licensing
Tags: Black Butler, Bunny Drop, CLAMP, Conventions, Manga, Manhwa, Yen Press

Kuriousity at SDCC: Viz Media Manga & Anime

By Lissa Pattillo on Friday, July 24, 2009

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It’s Viz again today as a full room is present to hear the news at Viz Media’s Manga & Anime panel. As with the previous panel, I’ll share the big updates here and then update later with the complete panel information later this evening.

The panel opened up with information on the previously announced Shonen Sunday. Viz staff shared some information about Shonen Sunday’s history (had no idea it’d been around in Japan since 1939!) before showcasing the current titles available in the new imprint:

Rin-Ne – Rumiko Takahashi
Kekkaishi – Yellow Tanabe
Arata: The Legend – Yu Watase
Maoh: Juvenille Remix – Kotaro Isaka & Megumi Osuga
Hyde & Closer – Haro Aso

The new titles which have not yet been released by Viz, will be available in book form in 2010 but are currently being released per chapter (for free!) over at the spiffily launched ShonenSunday.com.

You can read lots more under the cut:

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