A few weeks ago, the final chapters of one of my favorite mangas, Smash, were published. I can’t really say that I’m thrilled with how this manga ended though. I think it’s too hurried, as if the manga creator just wanted to get things over with. Everything was like ‘ok, finished or unfinished, pass your paper’. Heh. Reminds me too much of my elementary school days.

Anyway, the thought of Shouta not winning the Interhigh in his final year in high school and then getting drafted to the Japanese national team and then moving on to win the Olympic gold medal in badminton, everything seemed to be said in just one breath. I felt like getting flushed down the toilet. Like swoosh, and everything over, gone. Only the crystal clear toilet water remains.

I’m not really sure if the manga series was advised to be wrapped up by the editors of whatever magazine (Shonen Jump?) Smash was published hence the quickie ending or maybe the manga creator retired or something. But I guess there’s no use whining now. What’s done is done. Which is just as well since I’m now able to allocate additional hours to browsing other cool sports mangas online.

But thanks to the Smash Badminton manga creators still. You guys created a rocking manga that I really liked (not including the ending obviously). I hope you create other sports related mangas.

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1. Badminton Manga | Smash

One of the mangas that I’ve been following closely is Smash. It is a badminton manga that follows the Toujou Daini High School Badminton Team. They’re supposed to be the strongest badminton team in Japan. So far, the construction of the players’ characters has been well developed. Shouta Azuma as the lead character is slowly becoming a very strong player in order to catch up with his girlfriend Yuuhi who recently won a tournament in Singapore at only 17 years old.

I followed this series because I used to play a lot of badminton until my shoulders gave up on me. Not long after I stopped, badminton also started losing its popularity in our country and people have started taking to the streets to run. I can’t really understand why, but I guess it’s a good exercise for people who have no skills (hehe, please don’t hate me, J/K).

Anyway, back to this nice badminton manga, Shouta is quite popular with the ladies so he’s been getting confessions from his schoolmates and co-badminton players. If you’re into badminton and likes a little bit of romance, even ecchi manga, this is something to read. I can’t say it’s an awesome manga but for being constantly updated, I’ll rate it with 3 1/2 stars..

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I’m currently enjoying the manga works of Morita Masanori, one of the best mangakas around. I’ve been reading a lot of mangas recently but Morita’s works really strike a chord thus this post about him. I just finished with chapter 178 of Rookies and I can’t wait to read the next installment. In the meantime, while waiting for the next chapter I’m starting with Rokudenashi Blues, a boxing manga but the description says it’s more focused on gang warfare.

I really like Morita’s art and the translation is not too shabby as well the guys over at deadbeat-scans.com are doing a splendid job!

With onemanga.com out of the picture, I can now only turn to mangafox.com for my manga fix. Not that mangafox is any lesser than onemanga. After onemanga choosing to honor whatever wishes the mangakas have about not scanlating their works, mangafox reigns supreme now. I just don’t know how they would be able to keep this up.

Morita Masanor’s works include the following (based on mangafox.com)

Rookies*
Rokudenashi Blues*
Beshari-Gurashi
Hello Baby
Shibainu

*currently reading

For sure I will be losing a lot of sleeping time again now that I’ve started with Rokudenashi Blues but it’s alright. I’ve always found Morita Masanori’s works to be really enjoyable and touching.

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Ippo did win after a desperation fight. Woli got excited over the things he learned and is ecstatic to learn some more. He gifted Ippo with a banana which Ippo shared with his friends. This one page really killed me. I laughed so hard after reading this.

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One Outs. Really hard to stop watching once you start. Tokuchi is an AWESOME lead. Same voice actor as did Kaiji.

The story begins when Hiromichi Kojima, the star batter of the fictional Lycaons in Japan’s Pacific League, heads to the southern Japanese island of Okinawa to train and bring himself out of a slump. There, he meet Tōa Tokuchi, a 134-kmph (83 miles per hour) pitcher and the undisputed king of a gambling form of baseball called “One Out.” At Kojima’s urging, Tokuchi signs up with the Lycaons under an unusual contract: he gets 5,000,000 yen (about US$46,000) for every out he pitches, but loses 50,000,000 yen (US$460,000) for every point he gives up. (Source: ANN)

Akagi. I prefer Kaiji and One Outs, but this one is really good. Again, the Kaiji voice actor did Akagi too.

One stormy night, Nangou is playing a game of Mahjong with the local yakuza. Soon, he finds himself on a losing streak. If Nangou loses, he will have to pay with his life. Suddenly, a young teenaged boy, Akagi Shigeru, barges in, drenched from the rain. After watching a couple of games, he offers to replace the struggling Nangou. At that moment, a new legend was born.

Legendary Gambler Tetsuya – Never tried it, but i’ve heard it’s okay.

In the year 1947, the people of Shinjuku are down on their luck. With little money to buy food or necessities, some resort to gambling in order to survive. Traveling Tetsuya chooses to spend his time at Mahjong parlors where he is wiping the floor clean with his adversaries. However, when Tetsuya meets the intensely skilled Boushu-san, he realizes that his skills are still lacking.

Hikaru no Go – There’s no actual gambling, but it’s an anime based on the game of Go and I think it has the same excitement (to some extent) that you find in other gambling anime shows.

12 year old Shindou Hikaru is just your average 6th grader. One day, while searching through his grandfather’s attic, he comes across an old Go board. Upon touching the Go board, Hikaru is possessed by the spirit of Fujiwara no Sai, and continues to be haunted by him soon after. Sai was once a great Go player, who committed suicide and continued to stay in the world as a spirit desiring only to play Go once again. Finally bending to Sai’s pleas, Hikaru allows Sai to play Go through himself, unknowingly attempting the first game with the young prodigy Touya Akira. Time has finally started moving, as Sai’s quest for the perfect game, “The Hand of God”, is set underway. Based on the manga by Yumi Hotta and Takeshi Obata.

Shion no Ou – Sort of like Hikaru no Go, but not as long or as good. It’s about a game called shogi. Again, no gambling, but the playing is exciting in the same way.
Shion no Ou follows the story of Yasuoka Shion, a 13 year old Shougi player with a past of tragedy. Shion’s parents were brutally murdered in front of her when she was 5 years old. The murderer sat down with her and challenged her to a game of Shougi, after telling her that if she wanted to stay alive she should forget how to speak, and forget what happened that night. Now Shion has entered the realm of female pro Kishi, mute but strong. As her playing gathers more and more attention, so do the questions about her past and the brutal murder she witnessed. Shion’s memories slowly come back, and the mystery begins to unravel, thread by thread.

Saki – I’ve watched some of this one and it’s kind of exciting, but the fanservice and yuri elements get tedious.

Miyanaga Saki is a high school freshman who doesn’t like mahjong. Ever since she was a child, she would lose her New Year’s gift money during her family mahjong game. If she won, her parents would be upset, and if she lost, well, she lost. As a result, she’s learned to play in such a way that her score always remains plus/minus zero: not good enough to win, but not bad enough to lose. When we meet her, she’s being dragged to her school’s mahjong club by an old friend. How will a girl who hates mahjong, yet has become adept at the game as a result of her upbringing, survive in this environment?

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Portgas Ace died. Whitebeard died. Blackbeard usurped the dead Whitebeards earthquake power. Monkey D Luffy mentally collapsed.

What happens now? Looks like more than the Marines, Luffy has a really formidable opponent in Teach, that traitorous, murdering bastard. I hope Luffy gets some new power to augment his third gear.

Maybe he could borrow from Naruto? hehehe. Oh well.

This manga is getting better by the day. And that’s saying something considering that it’s been going on for so long now and yet the end is still nowhere in sight! More adventures to come!!

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I just finished the latest chapter of Kenji, a new manga over at my favorite manga site– mangafox.com.  Kenji is a first year high school student (as of latest chapter) who really likes martial arts.  He’s been training since he was a little kid under his grandpa who is a bajiquan master.

“Kenji is a manga about a Japanese teenager named Kenji, who practices the martial art Bajiquan, and his encounters with other martial artists, some of which are from real life (e.g. Adam Hsu and Liu Chia-Liang). This series primarily features Bajiquan, but also gets into Tanglangquan, Baguazhang, Chen Taijiquan, Piguaquan, Xingyiquan, Xinyiliuhequan, Shaolinquan, Hung Gar, Daito ryu Aikijujutsu, Shotokan Karate and numerous other styles. Kenji’s archnemesis is a gangster named Tony Tan who practices Hung Gar and later Xinyiliuhequan.

The series is based on the author’s life, Ryuchi Matsuda (Song Tian Long Zi in Mandarin), and has history involving Hakkyoku-ken (Bajiquan), Li Shu-Wen, and Liu Yun Qiao.”

The manga gives big lessons about courage and about life in general.  It’s a pretty new manga in mangafox.com having been only added this year 2010.  From what I can see, it could be turning out to be a harem with two new love interests for Kenji showing up, one is Akira, who’s family has close ties to the Yakuza (unless I’m mistaken), and Yumi who is also a martial arts practitioner like himself.

I like the historical references of this manga and how they take pains to show the steps of the techniques used during the fights unlike other fight mangas where the training and how guys turn out to be really strong are left to your imagination.  The manga art is quite different as well.  I wouldn’t say that it’s great art but its quite different from the usual manga that I read where sometimes the characters profiles and appearances resemble other characters from other mangas.

From what I can read so far it seems that the manga is building up for some final showdown with Tony, Kenji’s counterpart and chief antagonist.  I just wonder whether something new would come up somewhere in the future for this manga to gain longevity.

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Do you like curry?  Well I do and I try to find the best curry restaurants here in the Philippines and eat as much as I can.  So far I’ve tasted Indian style curry and Japanese curry (via Teriyaki Boy and UCC) and I have to say I like the Indian style curry better.  Japanese curry has that sourness in it that I’m not so crazy about.

Anyway this is not going to be a foodie post.  This is actually about one of the manga’s I’m following and it’s title is, you guessed it right, ‘Addicted To Curry’.  It’s a funny and serious manga about a genius curry chef (Makito Koenji) who lives and dies for curry.  It is a bit ecchi as well and there are some parts where a little nudity is involved.

“Makito Koenji is a curry chef with a mysterious past who helps Yui Sonezaki keep her father’s curry restaurant, Ganesha, open through a lack of customers, a hostile takeover attempt by a huge company, and many other challenges. Get addicted… to Curry.”

The chef is a little perv who peeps on the owner of the restaurant every chance he gets. lol.  It also gives an insight on the Japanese’s attitude towards sex.  I don’t know japanese culture that well but if this manga is any indication then I kinda like it.

In some situations, there would be this warning about the chief girl protagonist (Yui Sonezaki) being still in high school and Koenji being an older guy but those around them, including the mother would advice the him to use ‘protection’ which is pretty funny.  Koenji readily agrees as if things are certainly bound to happen while Yui is exasperated as hell.

It seems that the thrust of the manga is about learning some lessons after a curry competition just like what happens in another manga, Yakitate Japan.  What I like about this manga aside from the funny moments is that after every chapter, they give out recipes for the curry that was cooked in the chapter.

I still have to try and cook curry using their recipes but one of these days I most surely will.

The bad news here is that the last scanlation released for this manga was last November 2009.  And so far there have been new chapters yet.  Too bad coz it’s really light reading and quite enjoyable.  I hope they continue this manga.

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Portgas Ace, Luffy’s blood brother is dead, killed by the Marine admiral Akainu, and I must admit I was a bit teary eyed when it happened. Now all hell is breaking loose as Whitebeard is on a rampage in the latest chapter of One Piece (chapter 575). Luffy has mentally collapsed and I can’t wait on how he will avenge the death of his brother.

A new development occured as Blackbeard, the murderous Teach has made his appearance.

Whitebeard has separated the pirates from the Marines by splitting the plaza in half. What strength that old guy has.  Will he kill Akainu as well to avenge Ace? Or will Luffy do the honors.

Things are getting pretty tight! Hold on to your horses One Piece fanatics!

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