Showing No Mercy for 35 Years! Monthly Shonen Gangan's Post-Arakawa Era Part 1 (2011-2016)

In the July 2010 issue of Monthly Shonen Gangan the 108th & final chapter of Hiromu Arakawa's Fullmetal Alchemist was serialized, bringing an end to what remains the best-selling Shonen Gangan manga of all time; the issue actually sold out nationwide, resulting in Square-Enix reprinting FMA's final chapter in the September 2010 issue. In that very same issue as the reprint of FMA's finale the final chapter of Jushin Enbu: Hero Tales, a manga that Arakawa was co-creator of & drew the art for, was serialized; that manga moved to the magazine in mid-2009, following the closure of Gangan Powered. With both of her active Gangan manga now finished, Hiromu Arakawa decided to move on to other publishers for her next work, continuing her semi-autobiographical series Hyakusho Kizoku - the farmer's life for Shinshokan's Wings (which debuted in 2006 & still runs to this day) as well as debuting both Silver Spoon for Shogakukan's Weekly Shonen Sunday (which she made from 2011 to 2019) & a manga adaptation of Yoshiki Tanaka's iconic novel series The Heroic Legend of Arslan for Kodansha's Bessatsu Shonen Magazine (which is also still running to this day). The July 2011 issue of Shonen Gangan would include Fullmetal Alchemist: The Prototype, which was the initial one-shot version from 2001, but beyond that Arakawa was gone from the magazine (for the time being, at least).

To say that the loss of Arakawa hurt Monthly Shonen Gangan would be putting things lightly.

To be honest, I didn't exactly want to define an entire "era" of Shonen Gangan as being "Post-Arakawa"... but the numbers don't lie. According to the All Japan Publisher's and Editor's Association/AJPEA estimations, Fullmetal Alchemist's popularity helped bring Shonen Gangan's readership to around 370,000 by 2004 (more or less holding on to what the magazine had back in the 90s, if not a bit more), and by 2010 that number had dropped to around 150,000; to be fair, all manga magazines have seen a downturn in physical readership, due to digital's rise. However, the AJPEA also estimated that by 2015 Shonen Gangan's was down to just 20,000 copies, showing just how popular & essential Fullmetal Alchemist seemingly was for readers. It is no exaggeration to say that the loss of Fullmetal Alchemist was Shonen Gangan's equivalent to when Shonen Jump lost Dragon Ball & Slam Dunk in the mid-90s, and while there were still a few big titles around in the magazine to carry some of that load, most notably Soul Eater, they weren't going to stick around forever. Much like what had happened with the Enix Family Dispute about a decade prior, Square-Enix needed to find new hit manga that would be able to keep Shonen Gangan going strong (or, at least, strong enough) in a "Post-Arakwara" world... so what stood up most notably in the first half of the 2010s? Let's find out.

Demo Disc Vol. 25: Handmaiden Hitwomen

Founded in 1999, ComicsOne hit the ground strong by licensing & releasing a wide variety of not just manga, but also Korean manhwa & even Chinese manhua. Not just that, but ComicsOne was also willing to put out both then-recent titles as well as old classics, so alongside the likes of Ginga Legend Weed, Dark Edge, & Lunar Legend Tsukihime there wsd vintage manga like Wild 7, Wounded Man, Bridge of Deimos, & Karasu Tengu Kabuto. ComicsOne was also (quite possibly) the first English manga publisher to try its hand at the digital market as it offered some titles via Adobe eBooks, & even put out some titles as digital-only releases due to their niche appeal, like Bass Master Ranmaru, Pachinker Atsushi, & Loan Wolf; again, this was in 2000! Therefore, it's no surprise that ComicsOne's eventual fate was to disappear in March of 2005, with its printer DrMaster taking over only a portion of the publisher's catalog (most notably Iron Wok Jan!, which was later revealed to be the sole title keeping either company afloat), though DrMaster itself would fold after 2009 (i.e. after finishing Iron Wok Jan!).  Truly, it's fair to say that ComicsOne was well ahead of its time in the English manga industry, and that possibly is what led to its downfall. However, there's no doubt that the catalog ComicsOne wound up having by the time the company (as per DrMaster's own words) "stopped paying its bills and...disappeared" was actually a rather good one, with some honestly outstanding titles that (sadly) may never be given another chance in today's English manga market, despite their quality... and there's one manga in particular that I've always wanted to check out from ComicsOne that, unfortunately, was left unfinished in English.

Born on December 26, 1949, Masahiro Shibata (not to be confused with the former actor; different kanji for "hiro") would make his debut in the manga industry in 1973, after first getting his start as part of the doujin group Mikazuki-kai & working as an assistant for the late Shinji Wada, of Sukeban Deka fame. Due to how he got his start, Shibata was initially a shojo mangaka (at a time when men became less & less known for making that kind of work) who focused primarily on sci-fi stories, and his first truly notable works were stories published under the collected name of Akai Kiba/Crimson Fang, which he made from 1975 to 1989. The most well known Crimson Fang manga was the series Blue Sonnet, which ran in Hakusensha's Hana to Yume from 1981 to 1987 for 19 volumes & later received a five-episode OVA adaptation that saw international release via Central Park Media (in the US) & Manga Entertainment (in the UK). After Blue Sonnet Shibata's next major work was Tokime Densetsu Karudaruma, which ran from 1990 to 1996 for 18 volumes in Shonen Gahosha's seinen magazine Young King (not to be confused with its sister magazine, Young King OURs, which tends to be more well known outside of Japan) & became known for its heavy usage of sexual themes & highly suggestive scenes; Shibata was also doing all sorts of one-shots & short-run manga during this time, too. After finishing Kardaruma Shibata would then stick with Young King for his next long-running manga, 1998's Sarai. Unlike before, Shibata would focus almost entirely on Sarai exclusively during its serialization, only making two other shorter manga in 2005 & 2006, and during the serialization Shibata actually suffered both a cerebral hemorrhage & then later serious injury via a car accident!

However, Masahiro Shibata was able to recover from both incidents & eventually finished Sarai in 2008, with a total of 19 volumes, of which ComicsOne only managed to released eight of between early 2001 & late 2002 (i.e. this was cancelled long before ComicsOne went under). On March 30, 2008 Masahiro Shibata would announce on his website that with Sarai over, & his doujin work also done with, he'd take up an offer to be a part-time lecturer over at Kyoto Seika University's manga department, and in 2015 it became a full-time job that Shibata continues to do to this very day, alongside the likes of Keiko Takemiya, Akiko Higashimura, Motoka Murakami, & Akihiro Yamada. For all intents & purposes, Masahiro Shibata has long retired from making manga, so good for him. I remember first hearing about Sarai not too long once I started really getting into manga in the mid-00s, especially when I started reading other works from ComicsOne & DrMaster, and alongside Kazan by Gaku Miyao was a manga that (even by then) was hard to find all eight volumes of for a decent price, in particular the last two volumes (but especially Volume 8). However, much like how I eventually managed to get all of Kazan in 2023 (& that manga truly was excellent) I was finally able to get all eight volumes of Sarai from ComicsOne for a good price earlier this year, so as we near the end of Demo Disc let's see if Masahiro Shibata's "final" manga (or at least 42.1% of it) was truly worth keeping my eye out for over 20 years.

Nessa no Haoh Gandalla: The OTHER Music-Themed Big West Anime (Live via Satellite!)

In 1973 a former member of Yomiuri Advertising's sales department named Yoshimasa Ohnishi decided to start up his own company, Big West, named (in part) as a reference to his last name ("Ohnishi"="Big West"). In 1977 Big West started getting involved with anime production, with its first work being Chogattai Majutsu Robo Ginguiser, a mech anime that was co-produced by Nippon Animation & Ashi Productions, before also helping produce a number of shows for Sunrise during its early days, most notably Zambot 3, Daitarn 3, Daiohja, Trider G7, & even the original Mobile Suit Gundam. However, it'd be in 1982 that Big West truly hit pay dirt when it teamed with Studio Nue & Tatsunoko to create Super Dimensional Fortress Macross, a mech anime that featured a heavy focus on the kind of pop music that was the style at the time & surpassed all expectations, being extended past its original length & getting two spiritual successors (Southern Cross & Orguss) that together would be deemed the Super Dimensional Series. Macross' success would lead to Big West making its theatrical debut with 1984's Macross: Do You Remember Love?, which was also a smash hit, and going into the 90s Big West would continue to co-produce various anime, like the Apocalypse Zero OVA, Jushin Liger, Getter Robo Go, Irresponsible Captain Tylor, etc. Big West would also return to Macross with 1992's Macross II (which it produced without Studio Nue's involvement, & is now considered non-canon), followed by two new (canon) productions in 1994, the OVA series Macross Plus & the TV series Macross 7. There is the whole mess regarding Tatsunoko, Harmony Gold, & Robotech, but I'm not opening that can of worms here.

However, the Macross franchise isn't the only music-themed TV anime that Big West would produce, and while today it's become immensely forgotten & obscure this OTHER music-themed anime actually has some historical relevance... but, first, we need to go over a certain satellite television network.

Originally founded on December 25, 1984 as Japan Satellite Broadcasting Co., Ltd., JSB would eventually change its nickname in November 1989 to WOWOW, going from a simple united broadcast licensing application company to a full-on satellite TV service that aired its first broadcast (a 24-hour test titled A Japan-US Two-Way Call-in Show: Space TV Will Change the World) on November 29, 1990. The following February WOWOW started offering "scrambled" broadcasts, i.e. you needed to pay a subscription fee to watch it, & later that April traditional "unscrambled" analog broadcasts started airing, eventually resulting in WOWOW getting 800,000 subscribers by 1992. At first a good chunk of WOWOW's offerings (~40%) came from outside of Japan, & the network even got Harrison Ford to act as the spokesperson for a bit, with its first real "hit" being the Japanese broadcast of the late David Lynch's cult-classic TV series Twin Peaks. However, WOWOW was also known initially for re-running animation, both Disney classics & Japanese series that were primarily meant for kids, but eventually WOWOW seemingly realized that if it wanted to remain competitive in the market, especially when other satellite networks started popping up, then it would need to start directly getting involved in the production of new anime... and, coincidentally enough, right around that time the concept of the "modern day late-night anime infomercial" was gaining traction.

The end result, then, was that on "April 10, 1998 at 25:00", i.e. April 11 at 1:00 am, WOWOW debuted the first episode of Nessa no Haoh Gandalla, or (as the end of the OP sequence states) Gandalla, The King of the Burning Desert, the first ever anime that was 100% original & exclusive to WOWOW; this was aired unscrambled, so anyone could watch it if they received the signal. This was a Big West joint, in this case a co-pro between them & Ashi Pro, and in fact was conceived by Yoshimasa Ohnishi, the head of honcho of Big West himself, in what would be his sole creative credit (for anime, at least). However, to be fair, Ohnishi was only credited for "Original Story" & "Creative Supervisor", so it's not as though he himself wrote any of the literal scripts. While Gandalla would be the first late-night anime (if not possibly the first anime, in general) to debut first on a satellite network it wouldn't be the anime that made people take true notice of the concept. Instead, it'd be the follow up that WOWOW debuted the week after Gandalla's 26th & final episode aired on October 16, 1998 that actually made people take note of WOWOW as a real potential contender (& prove the viability of satellite TV as an alternate option to debut anime via)... a "complete" airing of some show that had previously only partially aired on TV Tokyo earlier in 1998 as a last-minute prime time replacement called Cowboy Bebop. Yeah, the WOWOW run of Cowboy Bebop would steal whatever attention Gandalla had as "the first", and after the VHS & LD release finished up in 1999 you pretty much never heard anything about Gandalla ever again. The only exception so far was on July 1, 2015, when character designer Junichi Hayama paid his respects to director Hidehito Ueda, following his passing, by sharing a new Gandalla drawing on Twitter. Even then, Big West & Ashi Pro have never re-released the anime in any form since the VHS & LD release, not even via streaming, and with Big West now able to handle international licensing of anything Macross without Harmony Gold interfereing with things (minus the original SDF, which Harmony Gold still has international control over) there's really no reason for them to ever think about Gandalla again. Hell, even G-on Riders has since been re-released via Blu-Ray & streaming in Japan; what's up with that, Big West?!

However, is Gandalla really an anime that deserves to be forgotten under the sands of time & left to dry out in the vast anime desert? My year-long celebration(?) of the 30th Anniversary of the modern-day late-night anime infomercial continues with a review of "that OTHER music-themed Big West anime", and a true obscurity, Nessa no Haoh Gandalla!

Showing No Mercy for 35 Years! Monthly Shonen Gangan's Rebirth Era Part 2 (2006-2010)

As mentioned last time, for whatever reason after the debuts of both Ou-sama no Mimi wa Okonomimi & Corpse Princess in May 2005 there wouldn't be another new manga debuting in Monthly Shonen Gangan magazine until the following year, hence why I chose to split this "Rebirth Era" up at that spot, despite there being more notable manga to cover in this half than there were in the first half. However, again, the whole timeline of this "Rebirth Era" of Shonen Gangan is being defined somewhat arbitrarily by the serialization of a single work, Fullmetal Alchemist, so it's not like there's some scientific calculation being done to determine where my stopping points are, anyway. Still, the second half of Gangan's time during the 2000s is an interesting one, as while Square-Enix itself is doing (more or less) just fine as an overall company at this point, no more "family disputes" or merger considerations to worry about anymore, their flagship magazine does experience some interesting comings & goings, in regards to the mangaka it plays home to. As mentioned, the only remaining connections to the very first "Original [United] Era", Ami Shibata's Papuwa & Renjuro Kindaichi HaréGuu, will both be over by the end of this part of the overview, and in this very part we'll see the returns of numerous mangaka from the past, some of which will be making their final appearances here, in turn.

But, without further ado, let's get to the notable manga that debuted during the second half of the 00s (& a couple from 2010) in Monthly Shonen Gangan, as we begin with (shockingly enough) what looks to be the first truly notable baseball manga in Shonen Gangan history!

Yeah, despite its position as (possibly) Japan's all-time favorite sport in the time since it was introduced to the nation in the late 1800s, Shonen Gangan never really had a notable baseball manga until April 2006, which is when Hajimete no Koshien/My First Koshien by Masaki Himura debuted. Himura first made her mark as the 11th winner of the "Can You Tell a Gag in 2 Pages?" project that Shonen Gangan would challenge readers with, followed by a 2nd place showing in the later expanded competition version of the project, losing to Kiichi Hotta's initial one-shot version of You & Me.. Then in 2004 Himura was a runner-up at the 4th Square-Enix Manga Awards (as well as winning the Special Jury Prize, this one chosen by Michiaki Watanabe), and after a couple more one-shots she finally made her serialized debut with Hajimete no Koshien, an expanded take on a one-shot she got published earlier that January. The manga starred Kyuto Niya, the sole student at Doi Nakano High School in Aichi who continues to play baseball as the team's captain, even if it's only by himself. However, one day Doi Nakano's principal declares that the school's team will make it to Koshien, and so Kyuto starts scouting for new teammates (& students), with the goal of eventually forming a team that can make it all the way to Koshien. Much like her gag shorts early on, Himura apparently put a bit of her own upbringing into Hajimete no Koshien, namely the idea of a poor "family" setting & finding a way to rise up from it into something greater, in this case Kuyto finding a real team to play baseball with, with the goal of making it to the apex of Japanese high school baseball, one of the legendary Koshien tournament finals.

Showing No Mercy for 35 Years! Monthly Shonen Gangan's Rebirth Era Part 1 (2001-2005)

On March 12, 2001 Monthly Shonen Gangan celebrated its 10th Anniversary with the release of the April 2001 issue of the magazine, and from a public point of view everything within publisher Enix looks to be doing just fine... but, in reality, tensions within the editorial department were hitting a boiling point. As mentioned last time, in the mid-90s decisions were made by higher-ups at Enix in an effort to change the focus & direction of what exactly Shonen Gangan (& its sister magazines) was by debuting more manga adaptations of video games, alongside an increased presence of things like video game reviews; after all, Enix was, first & foremost, a video game company. However, this didn't match the vision of Yoshihiro Hosaka, the first Editor-in-Chief of Shonen Gangan who come 2001 had become Enix's Director of Publishing Business. In the end, Hosaka would leave Enix & on June 5, 2001 founded Mag Garden, a brand new publishing company, while at around the same time G Fantasy's Editor-in-Chief Yosuke Sugino did the same exact thing & would found Issaisha that December; Issaisha would later merge with Studio DNA to form Ichijinsha. This resulted in a major schism within Enix, with many editors & mangaka deciding to leave & move over to either Mag Garden or Ichijinsha, which also resulted in many series also moving over to their new homes, usually with some new or altered title, to maintain copyright; a similar thing happened back in 1992, when a mass exodus left Kadokawa Shoten to form Media Works.

This would go on to be called the Enix O-Ie Soudou, or the Enix Family Dispute, in reference to numerous samurai & aristocratic disputes that happened in Japan during the Edo period.

A new manga? Bah, let's give the cover
to something that'll ditch us in half a year!

The damage this did to Enix's publishing division was massive. While Shonen Gangan was still notably hit with the departures of Sakura Kinoshita (Mythical Detective Loki), Nanae Chrono (Shinsengumi Imon Peace Maker), & Mayumi Azuma (Star Ocean: The Second Story), as well as other mangaka who had previously been serialized in the magazine (like Minene Sakurano & Natsuki Matsuzawa), it wreaked havoc elsewhere. Gangan Wing was where the majority of the mangaka had departed from, resulting in ~80% of its active serializations coming to an end, while Monthly Stencil was hit so hard that it had to move over to an "every two months" publishing pace, before eventually being outright cancelled in September 2003; Gangan Wing would manage to revitalize & continue publishing until May 2009, when it was replaced by Gangan Joker. Second (& then-current) Editor-in-Chief Yoshihiro Iida would launch a new initiative dubbed the "New Age Comic Campaign" in an effort to keep things going, but in September 2001 would also leave Enix & move over to Mag Garden, eventually becoming President of the company in 2018.

Meanwhile, Enix itself was also suffering some rough times, in general, as its video game division wasn't doing much better due to various delays, & some releases simply didn't perform as well as hoped. Sure Dragon Quest games continued to generally sell very well, but the same couldn't necessarily be said for smaller releases like Planet Laika, Suzuki Bakuhatsu, Ø Story, Endonesia, Super Galdelic Hour, or The Fear; also, game development costs were only increasing with new consoles coming out. Things were getting so bad that Enix expressed interest in merging with either Namco or even (its RPG rival) Square, and while initial merger talks would start with Square they wound up getting put on hold when the all-CG movie Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within tanked in the box office. Still, while Enix was certainly experiencing some "hard times" come mid-2001 that only meant that there was an opportunity for a rebirth, of sorts, and when it came to Shonen Gangan all that magazine needed was a fresh new face that could lead the way into a new era. Sure, the Enix Family Dispute took a lot from the company... but that simply meant that what was lost could be replaced with something else of equal value (if not more).

I believe that's called "The Law of Equivalent Exchange"?