Comic Books VS Manga, which do you prefer?

[OtherSideofSky]

DO NOT BUY the Ghost in the Shell sequels. They are all terrible. Honestly, a Masamune Shirow series is probably a terrible place to start reading manga. Avoid all the Shonen Jump stuff too, as it's intended for 8-14 year olds and goes on forever. If you tell me what you like in Western comics I can probably give you some recommendations.

adivce duly noted....

also I know what you mean..it is confusing..BUT at least we have the internet, so you can do reasearch...but yeah hence why its not "newcomer" freindly



my other scource is a store that has a big section of trade paperbacks (and I imagine an even bigger section of manga but I dont go into that section because manga/anime weirds me out..no offece ment)

None taken. Manga is full of bizarre and outlandish things that probably shouldn't appeal to a healthy mind (one of the reasons I like it so much). Besides, if you went into the manga section you might run into those crazy people who insist on being called "otaku" and will talk your ears off about how series X is so mature and deep and nothing like those awful superhero comics even though it's actually serialized popcorn entertainment for middle school students. No one deserves to deal with those people, not even Hitler with Stalin's brain and Liquid Snake's hand.



.

I guess thats why limited/shorter series are good

anyway my aprehension about manga/anime I think is because I asociate it with the seedy backwaters of the internet....and the artstyle always annoyed me (I also asosiate it with emo teenagers trying to draw anime style in the seedy backwaters of the internet..uhh anyway)

BUT that said theres probably no denying theres some great stuff there (Ive been meaning to watch AKIRA for some time, and you dont need to tell me that it has somthing western TV animation lacks)

but anyway, getting into that would be like crossing some kind of line...Im not sure Im ready for the dark side

The manga for Akira is better than the movie (it has a lot more time to flesh out side characters and subplots, for one thing), although both are good and the movie is definitely worth a watch for anyone interested in animation as an art form.

..visually speaking how would you say the manga compares to the film AKIRA? Ive seen pictures of the movie...and the movie poster...DO WANT but I liked what I did see..must have been around or a little before the time AVATAR was on
..

The same guy that wrote and drew the manga had total control over the production of the movie, so they look basically identical. .

yes...also with AKIRA, from my unsterstanding didnt they do the "western" technique of recording dialouge THEN animating?

anyway Perfect Blue seems interesting, aparetnly its VERY similar to one of my favorite movies Black swan...so there must have been some "inspiration there" (which would makse sense since I think the Director of Black swan purchased the rights to perfect blue just to include that bathroom/scream scene in Requiem for a dream)

anyway thanks yourve been very helpful )

Yes, and Akira is the only anime (to my knowledge) with realistic lip movement as a result. It has the unintended side effect of making the English dub seem off in the same way live action dubs do (lip-flaps in most anime never really matched the Japanese dialog in the first place, so this normally isn't a problem). Apparently it was so much extra work that all of the animators involved decided never to do it again.

 

[The Pinray]

Comics because they make sense. Manga has too much sex/gender confusion. And they talk way too much. More than necessary.

Comics... make sense...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider-Man

I rest my case.

OT: Manga, mostly because there are far more varied genres, and in many cases better philosophical discussion then "Do I punch them, or hit them with a bat-a-rang, then punch them?"

No, not really. Nice try, though. I'm talking singular stories, friend. But hey, differing opinions. Crazy, right?

Manga is plain ridiculous to me, but that's just a culture thing.

 

[Yokai]

I read Western comics pretty much exclusively--it's pretty ridiculous how many people think the entire medium is divided into manga and superhero comics, because that is evidently not the case. Transmetropolitan, BPRD, Northlanders, Scott Pilgrim, Unknown Soldier...all are brilliant in their own ways, utterly different from one another, and have fuck-all to do with superheroes. Not only that, but they're doing some interesting things in France and Britain as well, the end result being an absolutely ridiculous quantity of quality comics to read, which in general seem to stretch a lot further in their subject matter than most manga.

Granted, that may just be a problem with what manga is marketed here in the US, and I'm not completely averse to that portion of the medium. I love Berserk and Akira and I'll still occasionally pick up something from the library if it looks genuinely original, but the majority of easy-to-find stuff boils down to some combination of giant swords and yelling, high school drama, impossibly pretty people, and pseudo-philosophical musings that aren't as deep as they attempt to be. Of course, there's the same cliched nonsense with superheroes over here, but it's much easier to obtain the more interesting American comics where I am.

Comic Easily, as to why? Well Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrisson, Warren Ellis, Mark Millar and Garth Ennis. They're possibly the most creative people I've come across working today in any medium. And that's without going into the Artist and the lesser series.

This pretty much. Plus Brian K. Vaughan, Ed Brubaker, Brian Azzarello and so many more. To be honest though I think Mark Millar peaked on Ultimates 1 and 2.

Yes! People with the right idea! I'll continue the list with Brian Wood, Joshua Dysart and Brian Michael Bendis...there's been a complete overload of immensely talented writers in the last decade; I love it.

 

[theevilgenius60]

Comics vs. Manga? Comics by a mile. I freely admit to being the grown up version of that kid who used to explore new comics in the local comic book store all the time. I love superhero comics, but I love other genres as well. I just love the medium and the way things are presented. I grew up with it and it makes sense to me. I've tried manga, several different ones because I figured it was just the one I had tried, but I just don't feel it the way I feel comics. Spidey fan by the way.

 

[Jonluw]

Well, I definitely like manga better than the American superhero comics with their ridiculously complex continuities and lack of a single story. (Note that I do not like manga/anime like Naruto and Bleach for this very reason)

This is exactly why I stopped reading Bleach. It just got ridiculous and I got fed up with it.

It didn't make sense that even after

Spoiler

Aizen was defeated

it had a whole other arc.

And yeah the continuities are just ridiculous with American comics. The 'New 52' DC reboot was nothing short of a blessing.

I remember I used to like reading Spiderman as a child. I used to buy magazines sporadically.
A couple of years back I thought I'd try buying a new issue, and what I ended up with was some stuff about a "Civil war". I just read through the issue and looked at it in disbelief for a bit.
I think that was the real turning point for me. The point when I really stopped having any sort of real interest in western comics.

[sub]Well, aside from the artsy stuff. That can indeed be interesting once in a while.[/sub]

 

[thylasos]

It's not a fair question, really.

Comparing Alan Moore's political/occult/philosophical meisterworks to... Love Hina wouldn't be fair.

Nor is comparing the utterly mindless Superman vs. Predator to the immensely detailed dissection of a human relationhip in Kare Kano, or historical epics based on Sengoku period such as... Vagabond, etc.

These things are media, not genres. Moreover, they're the same medium. Pictures and text, working in harmony. The fact that they're from different countries is not immaterial, but one could draw a similar line, though it may not be as metaphorically thick, between British and American comics.

 

[BlastedTheWorm]

They're the same fucking thing.

 

[TheVioletBandit]

I've tried manga and for some reason it reminds me of the soap operas my grandmother watches so
I prefer comics.

 

[Hazy992]

Well, I definitely like manga better than the American superhero comics with their ridiculously complex continuities and lack of a single story. (Note that I do not like manga/anime like Naruto and Bleach for this very reason)

This is exactly why I stopped reading Bleach. It just got ridiculous and I got fed up with it.

It didn't make sense that even after

Spoiler

Aizen was defeated

it had a whole other arc.

And yeah the continuities are just ridiculous with American comics. The 'New 52' DC reboot was nothing short of a blessing.

I remember I used to like reading Spiderman as a child. I used to buy magazines sporadically.
A couple of years back I thought I'd try buying a new issue, and what I ended up with was some stuff about a "Civil war". I just read through the issue and looked at it in disbelief for a bit.
I think that was the real turning point for me. The point when I really stopped having any sort of real interest in western comics.

[sub]Well, aside from the artsy stuff. That can indeed be interesting once in a while.[/sub]

Yes it's really daunting. I've been wanting to read them properly for ages but I was really put off. It's a good time to get into them though as there's been a bunch of reboots and things.

 

[Jonluw]

Well, I definitely like manga better than the American superhero comics with their ridiculously complex continuities and lack of a single story. (Note that I do not like manga/anime like Naruto and Bleach for this very reason)

This is exactly why I stopped reading Bleach. It just got ridiculous and I got fed up with it.

It didn't make sense that even after

Spoiler

Aizen was defeated

it had a whole other arc.

And yeah the continuities are just ridiculous with American comics. The 'New 52' DC reboot was nothing short of a blessing.

I remember I used to like reading Spiderman as a child. I used to buy magazines sporadically.
A couple of years back I thought I'd try buying a new issue, and what I ended up with was some stuff about a "Civil war". I just read through the issue and looked at it in disbelief for a bit.
I think that was the real turning point for me. The point when I really stopped having any sort of real interest in western comics.

[sub]Well, aside from the artsy stuff. That can indeed be interesting once in a while.[/sub]

Yes it's really daunting. I've been wanting to read them properly for ages but I was really put off. It's a good time to get into them though as there's been a bunch of reboots and things.

I'm sure that might be the case, but my concern is not that the continuities make the comics hard to get into.
What keeps me from reading them is that I'm not interested in reading a neverending tale of a couple of superheroes broken up into smaller storylines. I want a proper story with an ending. A story that is treated as one. A story with its own characters and setting.

It appears that this neverending story deal is something inherent to western society. Perhaps it is a product of capitalism.
I really liked the first season of Dexter when I watched it. The same goes for Breaking bad. However, I stopped watching both when I realized they weren't trying to tell a serious story: They were trying to get me hooked and subscribing to their money-machines with a great opening, as evidenced by both series lying at around 5 seasons at the moment.
They aren't true stories to me. They're soap operas in disguise.

In my opinion, a story has to be written with an ending in mind, and preferrably a predetermined length.
All the best series I've watched were between 12 and 50 20-minute episodes long, and the longer ones (e.g. Death note) could definitely stand to cut some material out of the middle.

 

[Jonluw]

I've tried manga and for some reason it reminds me of the soap operas my grandmother watches so
I prefer comics.

If you don't mind my asking: Which manga, exactly, was it you tried?

 

[NathLines]

After some thinking I'll have to go with manga. When I think of comic books, I can only really think of superhero comics that will never end. Ever. Manga can be about all manner of things(I know there are most likely comics that aren't about superheroes/gags but I have not seen any) and actually tend to have endings; at least if you stay away from some shounen stuff.

I do love me some Marvel though.

 

[Grimh]

I like the one where the narrative is conveyed through sequential art and word balloons.

 

[Kahunaburger]

I like the one where the narrative is conveyed through sequential art and word balloons.

This. "Manga" is Japanese for "comic book."

 

[Jonluw]

I like the one where the narrative is conveyed through sequential art and word balloons.

This. "Manga" is Japanese for "comic book."

Oh quit being such a pedant.
It's pretty obvious that the OP means "do you prefer western or Japanese comics". It's phrased the way it is because in the west we refer to Japanese comics as 'manga' and western comics as 'comics'.
In the same sense 'Katana', in Japanese, just means sword. In the west, however, the word is used to denote a specific kind of Japanese sword.
The phrase "Do you prefer Katanas or longswords" wouldn't make sense to a Japanese person, but it does in the west. The same way "Do you prefer comics or manga" does.

 

[Kahunaburger]

I like the one where the narrative is conveyed through sequential art and word balloons.

This. "Manga" is Japanese for "comic book."

Oh quit being such a pedant.
It's pretty obvious that the OP means "do you prefer western or Japanese comics". It's phrased the way it is because in the west we refer to Japanese comics as 'manga' and western comics as 'comics'.
In the same sense 'Katana', in Japanese, just means sword. In the west, however, the word is used to denote a specific kind of Japanese sword.
The phrase "Do you prefer Katanas or longswords" wouldn't make sense to a Japanese person, but it does in the west. The same way "Do you prefer comics or manga" does.

The point is more that they're both pretty broad categories. "Do you prefer a comic book from country X or country Y?" makes no sense.

 

[Jonluw]

I like the one where the narrative is conveyed through sequential art and word balloons.

This. "Manga" is Japanese for "comic book."

Oh quit being such a pedant.
It's pretty obvious that the OP means "do you prefer western or Japanese comics". It's phrased the way it is because in the west we refer to Japanese comics as 'manga' and western comics as 'comics'.
In the same sense 'Katana', in Japanese, just means sword. In the west, however, the word is used to denote a specific kind of Japanese sword.
The phrase "Do you prefer Katanas or longswords" wouldn't make sense to a Japanese person, but it does in the west. The same way "Do you prefer comics or manga" does.

The point is more that they're both pretty broad categories. "Do you prefer a comic book from country X or country Y?" makes no sense.

I think it makes a decent bit of sense.
They are corresponding aspects of two very different cultures. Asking which one you prefer is hardly less meaningful than most things discussed in the forums.

Asking if you prefer all western comics to all Japanese comics naturally doesn't make sense, but it's still fine to ask which culture's trends and traditions you feel are superior.

 

[Daggedawg]

seriously..find me a manga with a "bowel disruptor" or "Jesus sneakers" and mabye Ill give it a go

Well, there is a manga where Buddha and Jesus are living together in modern day Japan.

*EDIT also Jesus wears sneakers....and bunny ears

And that is also one of the most awesome mangas ever.

Me, I don't read either that much, but if I had to choose, I'd say manga.