No ordinary chef, Ajisawa is an artist who creates culinary magic -- a freelancer who charges a king's ransom for his services. He is a gifted man who lives on the edge.
These all sound great, and I'll bow to your knowledge. The only one I'm lustful for is that Section Chief KÅsaku Shima, or whatever that series is called.
Section Chief Kosaku Shima is another manga that was partly translated for the Kondansha Bilingual series, so you can get a taste of it if you can manage to track down a copy. Incidentally, Kosaku Shima gets promoted from time to time; last I checked, the title of his comic was "Executive Director Kosaku Shima."
Just about all cooking and food manga are awesome.
Good post, Shaenon. Wish I could've read this last week when I was still in Japan and visiting Nakano Broadway as well.
Your post inspired me to spend my night trying to read the Japanese wiki entry for Atagoul. Apparently it's somewhat popular in Japan, selling 6 million copies through its (still ongoing) life.
There seem to have been 4 series (though wikipedia assures me that reading from the very beginning isn't necessary):
1) Atagoul-monogatari. 1976-1981 running in Manga Shonen magazine (wiki notes that this series has almost no experimental stories). 10 Volumes.
Thanks, Bradford! It looks like the volumes I have are from the second and fourth Atagoul series. Most of the stories are self-contained (although the newest series has some longer story arcs), so you can jump in anywhere.
I recognized the Atagoul art the moment I saw it, and I never knew there was a manga (though I suspected it).
In 2006 I was in Tokyo on a cultural art study and visited many studios. One of them was a 3D studio who's latest production was the Atagoul 3D movie (which others have mentioned). We were given some cool posters for it. Later I saw the Aragoul art book in a store and it was so gorgeous I had to get it. I don't know if you have seen it, but it's a thick book that is half filled with amazing watercolors and inks of illustrations from the original manga artist, and then half filled with concept art for the movie (which is equally cool). It retailed for 2000yen (a steal!) and came with a packet of stationary paper. I scanned the cover here: http://hikarikat.com/mirana/temp/atagoulbook.jpg so you might find it if you haven't already. If you'd like more scans or whatever, shoot me an email. :)
Mirana: That is awesome, and I have not seen it! Thank you!
Ottoemez: Thanks for the correction. As far as Go Nagai goes, "Devilman" has been translated a few times but is pretty hard to find now. There was one volume in the 1980s released by Nagai's own studio, a famously awful colorized monthly version briefly published by Verotik in the 1990s, and a recent Kodansha Bilingual edition. Nagai also drew "Mazinger," the first manga created for the American market, which was published by First Comics back in the '80s, but I've never seen a copy.
Out of all these series, I would most like to see GeGeGe No Kitaro. I've tried searching the net for those Kodansha Bilingual editions but to no avail... don't suppose you know how I could get hold of them??
Also, surely Saint Young Men would fit in well with Viz's Signature line, eh?
