By Mat K.
Anyone out there read the series “Blame”? Or subsequently, “Noise”? Of course you have, that was rhetorical. They’re only the best dark future cyber-punk series to come out since Ghost in The Shell. Does anyone else remember a Marvel Comics mini-series called “Wolverine: Snikt!“? In case you never got around to reading it, it was wolverine in a dark alternate future fighting giant murderous robots of some kind. What’s that got to do with anything? Well obviously the common thread is Tsutomu Nihei. Nihei is the new master of robo-apocalyptic futures and how to kick ass in them. “What’s this all about?”, you say? Nihei’s new series is finally getting released and it’s called BioMega.
The coming of BioMega breathes a sign of relief in the world of cyber-punk, since Ghost in the Shell has only just come back into print, and Blame has been out of print for forever now, (though, it is a Tokyopop book, so it’s to be expected). In the world of BioMega Zouichi Kanoe and his A.I. companion Fuyu, whose “luminous form” is intergrated with the system of Zouichi’s motorcycle. They have been sent by Toha Heavy Industries to seek out and retrieve humans with the ability to resist and transmute the N5S infection that’s spreading across the world turning people into “Drones”, basically disfigured zombie-like creatures. Yup, dark future cyber zombie apocalypse. And motorcycles. So full of awesome you wont even know what to do with yourself. Oh, and this one is being brought to us by Viz, so don’t worry about it getting cut off half way through, or the first volume going out of print before you even get to the third.
Some of you might be glad to hear that after last week’s major releases, this time around we’re pretty minimal. Though it does seem to be an action/adventure kind of week. Also showing up is Jormungand Volume 2, Rampage Volume 1 from CMX, Ikigami: The Ultimate Limit Volume 4, and both Inu Yasha Volume 45 and Inu Yasha Viz Big Edition Volume 2. I suppose it’s no surprise that this week is once again dominated by titles from Viz media. All those other publishers better start stepping up their game. I know a couple of them have been hitting hard times, but maybe that’s because people can only buy your books if they stay in print longer than 2 weeks.
Now for the yaoi fans, we didn’t forget about you. Last week there was actually nothing for the BL fan base except the Little Butterfly Omnibus (but that’s all rehash anyway), and well, Naruto and his special relationship with Sasuke, but at least this week we got a little something for you. Yeah, this week belongs to Makoto Tateno bringing two of her new titles at once. First up is 9th Sleep. Once upon a time the planet died, and on the day of it’s death a god appeared named Shishioh and saved the world. But now his throne is empty and a vicious battle between two brothers for the seat begins. I know that doesn’t sound like there’s much boy love in it, but that’s why we loved Yellow so much, its about the action and adventure, with a little love somewhere in the mix.
Her second book this week is less subtle with the unrequited love of one boy for his malicious and abusive upperclassman in How To Capture A Martini. Weakness and pantience blur when a boy is hopelessly in love with the guy that took his first kiss, and even his virginity, but gave him only harsh words and abuse in high school. Four years after high school they meet again, and even though the cruel Shinobu is now giving his body to everyone, he still only has abusive words for his younger admirer. Anyway, that’s all we’ve got this week. Til Next time!
Ja Ne!
