Let's Shan-cercise: How to Get Yourself Into Shape the Xi'an Coy Manh Way!

Looks like Marvel is giving those fabulous new mutants, the New Mutants, a... new... book. Set to star are our classic friends Dani, Sam, Xi'an, Roberto and Illyana and I couldn't be more excited. Dani and Xi'an are perhaps my two absolute favorite Marvel characters. Suck on that, Wolverine! Now's the perfect moment to stoke the New Mutants-mania with a smart ass deconstruction of a classic tale.

Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages, I give you... the story of how Xi'an went from blob to bad-ass in the pages of New Mutants Special Edition #1 by Chris Claremont and Art Adams.

One of the subtexts of the New Mutants series is the forcible undressing and redressing of its female characters-- usually Dani-- in bizarre, fetishy outfits. In this story from circa 1985, the subtext overwhelms the text as the entire New Mutants team undergoes a plethora of strange clothing changes and physical transformations.

In fact, this book is in such a hurry to get to the skin, it opens with the gang frolicking on a beach, their nubile teen bodies on display in skimpy swimwear. In this way Claremont and Adams prefigure the 1990s "bad girl/good girl" art craze. Comic readers might have criticized later books such as Gen13, Lady Death, Witchblade and Fathom for gratuitous cheesecake, but these comics merely extended concepts present in New Mutants practically from the first issue. And nowhere is this more apparent than in this particular tale.

While her pals have fun in the sun, the morbidly obese Xi'an hides out wearing a muumuu in what appears to be some kind of dingy housing project apartment. If you'll recall, world-class gourmand Amahl Farouk had stolen Xi'an's body a while back.

Hello, Bonnie Grape! Not only did Farouk ruin Xi'an's youthful physique, but he also impaired her abilities to put her pink undies away in the bedroom where they belong, instead of in the drawers in the living room. But this is an action-packed Marvel mag, not an issue of Love and Rockets. Within a page of this personal drama, the Enchantress and her flying Viking horde attack.

And since Claremont's plot demands the kids end up in Asgard so he and Adams can work them over, they're ridiculously defeated within the narrative captions of a single tier of panels! It's a plot development every bit as contrived and arbitrary as something in a Jackie Treehorn epic starring Karl Hungus and Bunny LaJoya. This book should be subtitled Mutantjammin'.

Once in the mystic realm of Asgard, we get to what this story is really all about. Dani becomes an armor-clad valkyrie; Amara drinks some kind of magic mead and turns into a faerie who looks like a cross between an Elfquest character and one of the sex-nymphs from Ralph Bakshi's Wizards; and the Enchantress turns Illyana first into a baby (trapped in bondage-y wall chains no less, and still wearing her white bikini from the beach scene... shudder), then into an evil avatar of herself in chain mail and a Darth Vader helmet. Tragically unfunny comedic relief character Warlock changes himself into all sort of stupid things in a vain attempt to induce deliberately the kind of laughter the rest of the story causes inadvertently. Uh... with love.

But most dramatic and happiest of all is what happens to Xi'an. Thanks to one of Illyana's transporter spells, Xi'an ends up in a desert wasteland. But as one of those relentlessly verbose Chris Claremont characters, she retains her ability to state the obvious. Out loud. To nobody:

The problem with deserts is, while they may seem lifeless, they're actually home to all sorts of dangerous fauna. For example:

Giant snake-like monsters! Fortunately for Xi'an, her powers are still working. She can even possess shai hulud! Xi'an Coy Manh no longer needs the weirding module, Stilgar! Long live the fighters, Maud'Dib! Yikes! Too many apostrophes! And as you might expect by now, Xi'an will also soon display copious amounts of bare flesh. Months in the desert leave her muumuu in tatters:

Strategic tatters. Because after a few more months of desert-tracking and sweating and eating only tiny lizards, she has the body of an Olympic swimmer and her rent garments conveniently lend themselves to Xi'an's adapting them into a sexy, savage desert princess bodysuit:

She still has that Claremontian ability to tell, not show. Despite having been so incredibly obese, she displays nothing in the way of stretch marks or excess skin. And she must have somehow had with her an impressive selection of lady's shavers, shaving gel and moisturizers to maintain smoothness in her underarms, legs and bikini area.

Finally, she runs into some friends who are shocked not only by her advanced hygiene but also the recapitulation of her former svelteness. Doug proves himself a master of the obvious as well:

Thanks, Doug. Without your genius for observation, we stupid readers might not have picked up on the subtle differences in the way Adams drew Xi'an at the beginning of this epic and how he depicts her on this page. Well, whatever. It's lucky she's back in fighting shape, because no sooner have they reunited than they're set upon by some human-shaped screentones mounted on what appear to be horse-shaped screentones and she's going to start kicking ass:

Kicking ass and reverse-stabbing people, Hong Kong cinema-style. This is where Butch Coolidge got the idea for killing that one guy with a katana in Pulp Fiction:

Yes, thank heaven you only wounded him, Xi'an. Because an injury caused by a broadsword being driven completely through the small intestine, a kidney and out the back heals quickly and easily and leaves scarcely a scar. Being a war orphan and thus underexposed to pop culture, Xi'an thinks the Black Knight scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail is from a documentary.

Hmm... Pulp Fiction. I've always thought it was kind of odd that such a crappy pawn shop would have an actual katana on display, rather than one of those cheap-ass knock offs shops here in Japan generally sell. Those things wouldn't cut butter, but the sword Butch uses goes right into a man's torso with little effort on Butch's part. And I've always wondered what happened to the Gimp after that scene. Butch just leaves that freak chained and unconscious as he hightails it out of there. I imagine Marcellus Wallace and some of his men killed the Gimp soon after they completed their medieval workout with "Mr. Soon-To-Be-Living-The-Rest-of-His-Short-Ass-Life-In-Agonizing-Pain Rapist." But I bet the Gimp enjoyed it. He would've been right at home in this comic book story.

There. That's how the New Mutants got naked and Xi'an got herself back into shape. And killed some people. Now you can do the same thing. Get fit, get healthy, backwards stab your enemies. Get the new New Mutants book when it comes out in May! I mean, if you're interested. I'm enthusiastic and definitely going to give it a try, but I don't want you to think I'm mindlessly shilling for it. At the very least visit the Marvel.com announcement and check out the sweet preview images by original New Mutants artist Bob McLeod and superstar painter Alex Ross.

Imagine that. Marvel is actually producing a book I want to buy.

A New Comic Book Toy: Triad's "Lone Wolf and Cub" Figures

Toy maker Triad Toys is making figures based on the classic manga series Lone Wolf and Cub (or Kozure Okami in Japanese). Which means 1/6th scale toys of ronin Ogami Itto and his son Daigoro. There's a little discussion on the Sideshow Freaks forum (a message board for fans of Sideshow Toys and pop culture collectibles) on whether they should be based on the movies or the original comic book series. Movie-version backers want a realistic figure and fear a "manga-style" sculpt.

But I disagree. Kojima Goseki's art would lend itself to a really nice-looking sculpt, and it could still look like a real person. His art style is of an older vintage than some of the newer, ultra-slick, stylized stuff that most people associate with Japanese comics. The supporting or incidental characters can be kind of caricatured or cartoony, but Ogami Itto himself is a steely-eyed killing machine.

To me, the real Lone Wolf and Cub are the comic versions. I'd love to see the movies someday (they look super-cool and the guy who plays Ogami Itto also plays the Japanese coach in The Bad News Bears Go to Japan), but Kojima was the best storyteller in comics, period-- and I'd prefer to see a figure that honors the original inspiration.

Evidently, Triad isn't basing their figures on the movies or the comic. And this kid probably won't get to play with them:

Hawaiian Eyes: Magnum Meets the New Mutants!

Picture, if you will, America in the early 1980’s. Ronald Reagan is in the White House after defeating former president Jimmy Carter in a vicious knife fight, Michael Jackson is in his early twenties and yet to enter puberty, Steven Spielberg is about to unleash his most adorable creation since Bruce the Shark, a wrinkled creature from another world soon known far and wide as Dr. Ruth Westheimer. And in Hawaii, a lanky, dimpled, mustachioed hunk of a man by the name of Thomas Sullivan Magnum IV fights crime while wearing a Detroit Tigers baseball cap, a colorful Hawaiian shirt and khaki shorts.

Even without shoes, Thomas Sullivan Magnum IV cut a dashing figure in the early 1980s.

Across the United States, billions of TV viewers have fallen in love with Tom Selleck’s affable gumshoe character, and the students at Professor Charles Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters are no exception. Boys and girls alike nurse crushes on handsome star of Magnum, P.I., pop corn and gather ‘round the school’s lone television set on Thursdays at 8PM for their weekly ritual of ogling prime beefcake and his adventures in a tropical paradise.

Stop comforting each other! It's TV time! A typical Thursday night at the X-Mansion.

"Hey, you guys, Magnum's on. You watching it with us or not?" Because we wouldn't want you interacting socially or bonding emotionally. Not while Magnum, Rick and T.C. have a case to solve! Notice how Sam also changed from a plain white tee to his scarlet "Magnum-watchin' shirt." This was as close as the impoverished boy from the hardscrabble coal-mining regions of Kentucky could come to a Hawaiian shirt of his own:

Xi'an is faking interest in the show. A Vietnamese national unfamiliar at the time

with American pop culture,she would not become a fan of a TV program until the

2004 debut of The L Word on Showtime.

I’m not sure what Sam Guthrie means here by exhorting the others to “look at that man move.” Move? It’s not as if Magnum were the second coming of Bruce Lee. Mostly, Magnum walked around annoying Higgins and his two evil-faced Doberman pinschers (Zeus and Apollo), or drove Robin Master’s Ferrari 308 GTS. Sometimes, during his Vietnam flashbacks, he wore face paint and tiger-stripe camo fatigues while creeping though the jungle, but Sam must be the only viewer to define any of these activities as “moves,” watchable or otherwise.

While Selleck was athletic enough in real life to eventually portray a convincing big league first baseman in the mildly amusing fish-out-of-water comedy Mr. Baseball, his fighting style as Magnum consisted mostly of punching people. Or shooting them. These also aren't really the stuff of “moves.” Perhaps Guthrie is referring to one of the many scenes where Magnum seduced a female guest star by offering her one of his patented “swimming lessons,” or jogged shirtlessly on the beach, or emerged dripping wet from a swimming pool to shake a spray of diamond-like droplets from his tousled mane and mustache, then toweled off his broad shoulders and hair-covered chest.

Sam’s frequent fan letters to Selleck garnered him-- in those more innocent times-- an invite to the TV show’s Hawaiian set, but Professor Xavier forbade him to go due to a conflict with the school’s SAT preparatory course schedule. A heartbroken Sam received something of a consolation prize a few years later when he worked as a production assistant on Three Men and a Little Lady, but by then the bloom was off the hibiscus, so to speak.

Even Illyana Rasputin proved susceptible to Magnum’s virile charms. No sooner had she emerged from her interdimensional magical limbo than she began plastering her room with Selleck posters:

This is a panel from the cult online comic "New Mutants Plus Garfield," in which, in a whimsical act of post-modern deconstruction, some brilliant person has painstakingly added lasagna-loving feline Garfield to every single panel of a New Mutants issue.

“Sam gave it to me,” Illyana told her instantaneous best friend Danielle Moonstar when asked where the poster came from. It’s heartening when a girl born on a collective farm in the Soviet Union-- who’s spent her pubertal years hanging out with a maniacal demon and a giant beast ripped off from a Dave Sim comic in an unearthly realm existing in a timeless void somewhere beyond reality-- can so quickly assimilate the media fancies of suburban America, almost as if her netherworld prison featured cable TV jacked right into the CBS network.

For a time it seemed as if everyone in the Marvel universe was somehow caught up in what editor-in-chief Jim Shooter called "Magnum-mania." Several young slumber party guests at the X-mansion summoned forth the Mustachioed One (as Stan Lee dubbed Magnum during this heady era) as part of a quartet of teen-girl sexual fantasy figures:

At one point during Magnum P.I.'s run, the Impossible Man stopped by the X-Mansion to catch an episode with the gang. Unfortunately, their intense worship of all things Magnum caused them to crowd around the TV set so much Impossible Man was unable to see the screen. He was able, however, to get a really great view of Dani's and Sam's asses in tight jeans:

While Warlock's rapt attention demonstrates how Magnum's charms were a universal constant, affecting even techno-organic lifeforms from other worlds, notice how Rahne has lost interest in both Magnum, P.I. and her friend's denim-clad asses. This prefigures her leaving the team for a stints in X-Factor and Excalibur.

Hmm... Magnum-mania seems to be contagious! And the only antidote is... another look at Thomas Magnum in all his masculine glory:


Way t'go, Magnum, indeed!

The Japan Media Arts Festival: Where Comic Books and Cartoons Win Big Awards!

The Japan Times Online has an article about the recent Japan Media Arts Festival. It's going on right now through February 15th in Roppongi and seems like it would be a blast to catch. High-tech, digital media, Miyazaki Hayao-phobia, creators on the cutting edge and all that neat-o super-keen stuff the beatniks and teddy boys are into these days when they're not playing bongos and hanging out at the malt shoppe. With my economic status it's doubtful I'll get to make even a one day jaunt to Tokyo to catch it, but here are my favorite bits of comic-related info gleaned from the article:

Music-themed manga are now popular in Japan, thanks to artists such as Akira Sasou. His "Maestro," about an orchestra revived by an enigmatic conductor, won a second-place prize. A professor at Kyoto Seika University, Sasou hopes to publish the first Japanese university textbook on creating successful manga.

"High-quality drawings are important, but the story needs to pull the audience to the next page," he said.

That's news to me and I live here in Japan! I do know that Nodame Cantabile remains a favorite and just mentioning it to some of my students usually lights up their faces. And I don't just mean teeny-boppers. I'm talking all ages, from teens to middle-aged women who, if American, probably wouldn't read a comic book with your eyes. I wish music-themed comic books were all the rage in the United States and comics themselves were as mainstreamed there as they are here. And:

Of the 35 manga winners, only 10 were women. Critic and festival judge Yukari Fujimoto recommends "shojo" (girl) manga as a way for overseas women artists to enter this male-dominated arena. Shojo manga is targeted at a female audience.

It seems women have more inroads both as creators and as readers here in Japan than they do in the States, so I'm surprised at these numbers. I'd kind of assumed a more 50-50 split. But I'm pretty stupid when it comes to this kind of analysis and I don't have the patience or the time to go digging through the numbers. Then again, if a comic book festival were handing out thirty-five awards in the U.S., do you think as many as 10 women would win, or even receive nominations? Ten?

And shojo manga may be targeted at a female audience, but when the book is as groovacious as Yazawa Ai's Nana, there's no reason its popularity can't cross gender lines. I'm addicted to Nana, and weather some funny looks whenever someone asks me what Japanese comics I like and that's the first thing out of my mouth. I'm proud of my ability to recognize something superior despite its being aimed at an audience I'm ostensibly not a member of.

I think if the story quality is there (as per Sasou Akira's quote above), the audience for a book can grow beyond its intended demographic. That's one thing that seems to be missing in a lot of the "what can we do to make American comics appeal more to female readers" discussion (which I think needs to be broadened to a more general "how can we get more people buying comics period" movement)-- quality will generally draw readers and quality itself will generally replace all those problematic tropes, cliches and dramatic failings we always complain about.

My answer will always be to challenge our creators to produce better books. And if that idea fails, I seriously doubt there's more you can do to get anyone into comics.

Lastly:

"Shojo manga is booming," [Fujimoto] said.

What's the American equivalent of shojo manga? Hmm... probably actual shojo manga. Is that booming back home as well?

The Many Styles of Hopey Glass: "Love and Rockets Volume 1" Edition

Love and Rockets by Los Bros Hernandez is a strange beast-- a serialized comic book narrative that extends seemingly into infinity, but where the characters actually age and change, and sometimes die. The protagonists and the supporting cast evolve organically over time the way actual human beings do (only more colorfully, because it's fiction). And few human beings were ever as engaging or as dangerous to know as Esperanza Leticia Glass. That's Hopey to you and me, Russ.

During the first volume of Love and Rockets, Hopey undergoes several fashion transformations. Let's take a look at that glorious punk tornado, La Hopita. Keep your arms and hands inside the car at all times.

Since Jaime Hernandez makes frequent use of flashbacks, in order to get the fullest understanding of Hopey's many transformations, we have to start near the end of the first volume, in the "Wigwam Bam" storyline. Here Jaime's leads Hopey and Maggie separate after an argument. Indeed, Jaime cuts Maggie out of the narrative completely, focusing instead of Hopey's misadventures in an East Coast city where she falls in with a former TV star who is now an aged, prune-faced perv engaging in some kind of club for other aged, prune-faced pervs where they dress prostitutes as little girls and engage in who knows what.

And it's during this story that Jaime gives us a glimpse of child Hopey:

Biographical details such as these give some much-needed vulnerability to the otherwise seemingly invincible Hopey. It also supplements an even earlier flashback from the "Jerusalem Crickets"/"Flies on the Ceiling" period, in a brilliant little story that focuses on Hopey's mentor and discarded lover Terry Downe, "Tear It Up, Terry Downe." Here, Jaime presents a pre-punk Hopey as an introverted teen, terrified of the new girl in class who would soon change her life irrevocably:

Generally, throughout the narrative, Hopey's motivations are either somewhat obscure (what causes her to womanize and generally keep love at arm's length) or else patently transparent (she cannot stop hitting on women in the most blatant of fashions). Consequently, she often comes across as person almost without inhibitions. Here Jaime hints at Hopey's inner complexity and discovers the wounded psyche that births the independent and charismatic persona she adopts. Because by the end of that story, Hopey (under Terry's tutelage) has fully metamorphosed into a raging hardcore punk with a shaved head. It's around this time that she first meets Maggie. This initial encounter-- engineered by Maggie's friend Izzy-- evidently does not go as planned:

But it proves a momentous event. Jaime revisits this Hopey a few more times, including once in volume two.

Now we come to what I think of as "Classic Hopey." This is how Hopey first appears on the pages of Love and Rockets:

She sports a spiky boy's haircut and lots of androgynous punk gear. Jaime's art style-- while certainly very pretty-- is a bit unformed here, but Hopey herself is already in full-swing as she makes comic book history. Jaime's artwork becomes slicker and more controlled over time, but Hopey maintains this basic look throughout the middle period Love and Rockets and through several pivotal storylines, albeit with some minor variations.

Here's one: bleached blonde Hopey wearing what appears to be secondhand clothes of a more traditionally feminine mode. A head scarf like a Hitchcock film heroine, what looks like someone's old letter sweater, various belts as accessories, a calf-length pleated skirt and some torn tights:

Can't tell much about her footgear there, but they appear to be some generic black sneakers.

Blonde Hopey breaking the "fourth wall" to get even with fangirl Maggie:

This is the basic hairstyle Hopey wears during her infamous grafitti battles against Officer Sado, her arch-nemesis. One of my favorite aspects of Hopey's style during this period is the way Jaime shows her willing to actively challenge the gender dichotomy of "straight" society. While Maggie occasionally derides her as a "boy-looking peesashit," Hopey seems to delight in otherwise challenging gender expectations, as when she pairs her butch haircut with a very feminine 1950's style sundress, complete with bow detail. She has a kind of Jane Wiedlin/Go-Go's look going on here:

I can't help but picture the dress as pale pink. Of course, she sports a very phallic prop, her bass guitar. With Hopey, femininity comes with an edgy quality. This is also expressed via Hopey's fearless sexuality and erotic adventurism. Here she's practically falling out of an unbuttoned shirt-dress, adopting an aggressively open posture and it seems she couldn't care less:

I tend to assume Terry's nonchalance here is a bit of a put-on. But why shouldn't Hopey flaunt it a little? Jaime often makes Hopey the fought-over object of desire by any number of would-be lovers, and gives Hopey a full awareness of her physical and emotional impact on others. In fact, she seems to delight in it and frequently takes advantage, as shown in the "Wigwam Bam" sequence where she plays various people against each other in order to secure places to crash for days or weeks at a time.

Here's an interesting look at Classic Hopey in a more boyish punk state. This is from the bizarre fantasy "Easter Hunt," (based on a story Jaime's brother Gilberto wrote as a child) where Maggie and Hopey revert to earlier visual states in order to eat Easter eggs, fly around in a UFO and murder Julie Wree. She's wearing a torn DOA tee and pegged punk pants probably in black denim, although Jaime doesn't add any surface detail and instead opts for a bold all-black silhouette. Earlier in the story, she's barefoot, but in these panels is foot-clad in black high top Chuck Taylors:

Quite androgynous. Note her unbuttoned fly and visible underwear. And here's Classic Hopey in her long, black pea- or trenchcoat. Full-on punk tomboy mode:

Planning payback against Officer Sado. Oh, Hopey, will you never learn? Those are some fierce looking buckled shoes/boots. No doubt Jaime could tell us the exact make. This follows a charming sequence in which Hopey gets her haircut in that most masculine of style-environs, the old school barber shop. She emerges with a slicked up boy-cut that she musses into spikes.

Hopey sports this look consistently thoughout the "Jerusalem Cricket" stories in which she embarks on an ill-fated cross country tour with the punk band La Llorona. It's here that Jaime begins to depart from the series' status quo. He also embarks on more extended and complex narratives. Here it appears she's wearing a peacoat:

That's a gorgeous panel by Jaime. He has always had a reporter's eye for detail and a masterful way of reducing an image to essentials. Your mind fills in a lot of what Jaime has deliberately left out of the drawing. From the drummer's expression, I'd imagine Hopey has once again managed to fuck up the bass line.

While the characters undergo emotional development and changes, Jaime echoes this with visual changes. Maggie rapidly gains weight, becoming more curvaceous. And Jaime realistically depicts the effects of touring on Hopey, in various seedy venues and run-down motels, as her clothes grow shabbier and her hair longer. Jaime teases the readers by keeping Maggie and Hopey apart for hundreds of pages and various misadventures. Eventually, Hopey is gone from Hoppers and the narrative for so long, she becomes almost legendary. Here, Maggie speculates on Hopey's appearance:

What Maggie has no way of knowing at this point is that Hopey now looks like this:

They meet in a police station and react to the physical transformations each has undergone:

But Jaime does not allow the two to enjoy their reunion for long. He almost immediately puts them into conflict with each other and now it's Maggie who vanishes from the narrative, leaving a changed Hopey adrift in a world of perversity and violence. This, then, is "Wigwam Bam," the penultimate storyline of volume one. In it, Hopey emerges briefly as the central character, and sports a wild plume of cropped hair. I call this look "Crazy Hair Hopey," and it's actually one of my favorites. I love the little shout outs to bands from Jaime via Hopey's tee's:

The Damachers are a fictional band in which Hopey eventually plays bass following the demise of La Llarona and at least one other band she's fired from. But this next band is quite real:

After concluding "Wigwam Bam," Jaime returns Maggie to her familiar role as central protagonist and embarks on the emotional "Chester Square" storyline to conclude Love and Rockets volume one. Here we find a more girly-girl Hopey still playing bass for the Damachers, but constantly distracted by Maggie-centric daydreams. She sports a very feminine hairstyle and look here, kind of like a compact Audrey Hepburn (who Jaime would later reference more overtly when Penny Century styles Hopey's hair into a kind of neo-Holly Golightly 'do):

A stylish a-line cloth (tweed? wool?) coat hints at a more sophisticated Hopey. But if you look closer, you see the material is frayed and worn; Hopey is still a punk at heart, and still living fast. Her thin, bare legs give her a fragile quality that seems at odds with her edgy personality. This is Jaime giving us visually the characterization a lesser creator would have to do with prose narration or dialogue.

And with that final Hopey style transformation, Jaime brings Love and Rockets volume one to a close. Still, I wonder what hardcore punk Hopey would say if she knew she exists merely as a fictional character whose various clothing choices not only reflect her growth as a person, but also entertain us as readers:

Destroy All Superheroes: "Nana" 5 Review

Nana vol. 5
Publisher: Shojo Beat/Viz Media
Writer/Artist: Yazawa Ai
English Adaptation: Allison Wolfe
Translation: Tomo Kimura

Capsule review: Hotel room trysts bookend Nana 5 as Nana and Hachi chase rock & roll fantasies and true love. Yazawa Ai's elegantly angular work gives the drama a fashion magazine gloss as new characters rise to prominence in the narrative and wishes fulfilled promise complications galore in this gripping, pivotal outing.

I had an epiphany during the recent Internet brouhaha over a certain caped crusader’s sudden passing. With stark clarity, I realized I have absolutely no emotional investment in that character, nor in any of his costumed compadres. Their lives, their deaths, their conflicts mean nothing to me after all these years. I remember as a teen I moped all day when I read about Jean Grey’s death. When DC killed off Superman in the 1990s, I was somewhat interested. Then I read the story and found it severely lacking except as a nakedly obvious publicity ploy and sales gambit.

And now, at this late hour, the bloom is definitely off the funeral lily. Because they constantly die and resurrect, because their stories seemingly have no end and the conflicts, plots and subplots endlessly repeat in a self-contained loop, because ultimately they’re nothing more than brand names and corporate logos, mainstream superheroes have achieved a flattening of effect. Or perhaps it's merely another example of the Law of Diminishing Returns. There are only so many times you can exploit the familiar, and there’s little drama or excitement amidst this colorful (or sometimes murky) frenzy, even when scripted by skilled writers. It’s meaningless. I’d be about as sad if someone murdered the Trix Rabbit.

So what fictional comic book characters do I care about? Thanks to the insanely appealing creative work of mangaka (that’s “comic book writer/artist” to you and me, Russ) Yazawa Ai, I’m absolutely obsessed with the soap operaish world of Nana, Hachi and all their friends. It’s all goopy, lovey-dovey drama queen stuff, but it’s compelling and addictive and fresh in a way Bat-this and X-that haven’t been in years. It’s happening as you read it!

I could say as much about Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead, but instead of “goopy, lovey-dovey drama queen,” substitute the words “gory, gut-wrenching horror zombie freak.” When Kirkman kills a character, it’s as if he came to your house and personally punched you directly in the stomach.

Yazawa hasn’t killed any of her cast so far, but volume by volume, she shows no reluctance to torture the reader with each new story development. In Nana 5, she places Nana and Hachi in the front row for a Trapnest concert back in Hachi’s little hometown. On guitar for Trapnest? None other than Nana’s ex-boyfriend Ren, the spike-haired Sid Vicious of J-Pop. As Hachi sends desperate mental commands for Ren to take notice of Nana, Trapnest completes their set and exits the stage. No reaction, at least as far as Nana and Hachi are concerned.

Backstage, it’s a different matter entirely. Bassist Takumi takes the usually perfect Ren to task for screwing up a song, and Ren rushes for some private time to make a quick cellphone call to his old friend Yasu: “Yasu?! Why’s Nana here?!”

In Yazawa’s glamorous version of Japan, even drug abusing rock gods have tender hearts. And a fierce, Vivienne Westwood-wearing punk rock girl, as hard and as vulnerable as any stray cat or Holly Golightly, finds herself looking foxy in sunglasses, black cami tank and ragged blue jeans (Yazawa clothes all her characters in exquisitely specific outfits; you could hit a hip shop in Kichijoji or Harajuku and put together any of the cast’s exact looks), making her way to Ren’s hotel for one final confrontation, and to return the key that unlocks the chain around Ren’s neck…

Things in Nana, as in life, seldom go as planned. But Yazawa takes these moments and turns them into page-burning cliffhangers. And it’s here, in volume 5, major events change both Nana’s and Hachi’s lives forever. And this is because when she's not meddling in Nana's love life, Hachi assigns herself to a "secret mission" she's all too eager to tell everyone about-- finding a boyfriend for herself. Candidates abound. Bald lawyer Yasu, Nana's sweet natured but somewhat naive bandmate Nobu, underage man-whore Shin, and the Trapnest fangirl's idol, Takumi. Hachi is forever plagued by selfishness, indecision, unrealistically romantic notions and a flighty nature, and yet Yazawa makes her a sympathetic charmer.

As Hachi says, "It's been a roller-coaster, but what an amazing day!"

But still, there's a strange melancholy that hangs over the series' signature “Hey Nana” narration:

Hey, Nana… I totally adored you. I wanted to be like you. I still feel that way to this day. So please… Sing for me one more time.

What happens down the line to Nana and Hachi that separates them and gives birth to this sad, dreamy reverie? Do the pressures of rock star fame alienate Nana from Hachi? Or... does something even worse tear their platonic love apart?

Vivid characters and heartbreaking situations and no idea whether we’re bound for joy or despair. Now that’s how you make a reader care about your protagonists. Sorry, superheroes, for all your sturm und drang and your plastic crap on clearance at Wal-Mart, you just can’t compete with Nana. And its plastic crap at Animate and Mandarake.

No Music, No Life: "Nana" 4 Review

Nana vol. 4
Publisher: Shojo Beat/Viz Media
Writer/Artist: Yazawa Ai
English Adaptation: Allison Wolfe
Translation: Tomo Kimura

Let me tell you right now the outfit that Sachiko wears in scene where she inadvertently faces off with Hachi outside the restaurant where she and Hachi’s boyfriend Shoji work just absolutely kills me! What is that… some kind of fleece Alpine bonnet? With dangling puffballs? And her backpack matches her full-length skirt; obviously, she made both of them herself… she’s a fashionista with a pixie cut!

Sorry, I have a weakness.

On a cold night, Nana Osaki keeps her hapless-in-love friend Nana company as they wait in the parking lot outside for Shoji to get off work. Hachi learns Nana is from some frigid prefecture where snow is common, and listens as her punk friend sings some soft song to the night….

That’s when Yazawa Ai brings Hachi, Shoji and Sachiko together for a tearful confrontation where the painful truth emerges. The build-up is exquisite, as is the payoff. Nana sticks up for her friend, ready to pound the two-timing Shoji right in the face with one of her ring-laden fists. And Hachi? She’s the one who’s been betrayed, and this after waiting a whole year, saving every yen for the move, sacrificing everything to live her dream for both of them. How does she react?


Nana volume 4 is like an emotional elevator for Hachi and the hapless readers. Up- Hachi’s growing fascination with Nana. Down- Shoji. Up- tickets front row center for a Trapnest concert in her hometown. Down- no one to go with. Up- Black Stones’ first Tokyo show. Down- Nana’s gosu-rori groupie Misato.

The middle section depicts the show itself, and Yazawa throws in a lot of little reportorial details. The place only holds a limited number of standing-room-only bodies, the cover includes a ticket for a free drink. I once ordered a Coke at one of these shows and the bartender looked at me like she’d just met Forrest Gump live and in person. Oh yeah, I’ve been to quite a few shows here in Japan; only we don’t call them “shows” or “concerts” here. The preferred term is “live.” You might tell a friend the next day, “I went to Black Stones’ live last night.”

“Where was it?”

“At the live house.”

Doyyyyy…

The show takes place in a small venue somewhere in Shinjuku (Check out local landmark, the Epson building, as Junko and Kyosuke drive past on their way to the show). After the first band, the crowd’s ready to split, but Hachi and Misato (in sausage roll hair, her floral and petticoated skirt and knee-socks, she looks like a living doll) perform a little impromptu sketch:

Hachi: Ya wanna know what? This next band is, like, the best band in the world!

Misato (shouting): I totally agree! Doesn’t Blast just totally rule?! The singer, Nana, is amazing! Her voice is so strong and beautiful!

Their interest piqued, a few curious onlookers filter back into the live house. Yazawa makes even the extras stand out. There’s the tall girl in the spiky, modified-ducktail haircut and star print tee who wants to know if the band’s all girls, her friend in the plaid beret, the buzz cut dude wearing a slick motorcycle jacket and his pal with the rolled-up sleeves and sweatband on his wrist. Everyone seems to be fully accessorized. It must be a blast for her to come up with these distinct and accurate hipster looks. I’ve seen these people! At lives!

And then Blast takes the stage, Nana tying a rose to the mic stand.

There's even a chance the show might've taken place in Shin-Okubo, a neighborhood just a stop from Shinjuku on the Yamanote Line. It's certainly close enough for Junko and Kyosuke to drive there, and there are a few live houses just outside the station within easy walking distance. In fact... here's one now. You've seen the Nana version of a live show in Japan, now here's the real thing. Melt-Banana at Earthdom, September 2007:

What it lacked in Nana-like elegance and fashionability, it more than made up for in energy and power. Melt-Banana's total sonic attack destroyed eardrums and the crowd moshed with frantic intensity. I ended up hobbled like an oldster, leaning on my umbrella as if it were a cane, my body sore, but my heart soaring. Welcome to my world!

That’s at least one of the many ways this book gets its addictive hooks in you- presenting the familiar and the ultra-dramatic side-by-side. Like the semi-similar Love & Rockets, Nana presents a heightened reality filled with situations that are similar to things you’ve been through, only amplified for fictional effect. Nana is an unrepentant soap opera, in comics form. And that Yazawa Ai is a fiend. Pure evil, I tells ya! She created these characters, all the cute girls and pretty boys, put them in a fun milieu and set them into motion with Nana and Hachi as the story’s beating, bleeding, loving hearts, their every action creating emotional chaos, making the readers want more, more, MORE.

Pure wickedness.

If the Nanaishness is too much for you, check out my Melt-Banana show reviews here and here.