As an FYI, Black Jack 8 (Shonen, Akita Shoten, since 1974) shipped everywhere last week EXCEPT Midtown Comics. Even I got it. And yes, it gets recced too.

Midtown doesn't have it this week either, but we do have...

BANDAI:
Lucky Star Vol. 3. Shonen. Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in Shonen Ace since 2004.
Code Geass: Nightmare of Nunnally Vol. 3. Shonen. Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in Comp Ace since 2006.

BLU:
Tea for Two Vol. 3. Yaoi. Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in Ciel since 2003.
Madness Vol. 1. Yaoi. Gentosha, serialized in Lynx since 2004.
Junjo Romantica Vol. 11. Yaoi. Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in Ciel since 2002.

DARK HORSE:
Berserk Vol. 32. Seinen. Hakusensha, serialized in Young Animal since 1989.

DC/CMX:
The Name of the Flower Vol. 3. Shoujo. Hakusenaha, serialized in LaLa DX since 2005.
The Lizard Prince Vol. 1. Shoujo. Hakusensha, serialized in LaLa since 2003.

FANFARE/PONENT MON:
A Distant Neighborhood Vol. 2 (Final Volume). Seinen. Shogakukan, serialized in Big Comic since 1998.

ICARUS:
Their porn anthology.

TOKYOPOP:
Your & My Secret Vol. 5. Shoujo-ish. Mag Garden, serialized in Comic Blade Avarus since 2002.
This Ugly Yet Beautiful World Vol. 1. Seinen. Hakusensha, serialized in Young Animal since 2004.
Takeru - Opera Susanoh Sword of the Devil Vol. 3. Shoujo-ish. Mag Garden, serialized in Comic Blade Zebel since 2005.
Me & My Brothers Vol. 10. Shoujo. Hakusensha, serialized in LaLa since 2004.
Maria Holic Vol. 2. Seinen. Media Factory, serialized in Comic Alive since 2006.
Lagoon Engine Vol. 6. Shoujo. Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in Asuka since 2002.
Future Diary Vol. 4. Shonen. Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in Shonen Ace since 2006.
DNAngel Vol. 13. Shoujo. Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in Asuka since 1997.
.hack//ALCOR. Whatever.


Recs? The second volume of A Distant Neighborhood. My yaoi friends say Junjo Romantica is good. CMX's shoujo titles are always worth a read.

Also, two anti-recs. Maria Holic is hateful, and Lucky Star is boring and badly edited/translated/laid out/etc. The anime certainly improved on the manga there.

Antony and Cleopatra is notable in many ways. It's generally considered the last in a long string of impossibly magnificent tragedies (Julius Caesar, Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, and now Antony and Cleopatra); of course, this leaves out the lesser but interesting Troilus and Cressida (written between Hamlet and Othello) and the later but problematic Coriolanus and Timon of Athens.

It's also an unashamed love story, with the two protagonists simply dominating any scene they happen to be in. True, Romeo and Juliet did this as well, but those two were not as confident and beloved as A&C are (at least at first). Moreover, the scope of A&C is much larger, with power politics playing just as large a role. And considering the depth of feeling of the two lovers, that says a lot for Octavius Caesar.

Technically this COULD be called a sequel to Julius Caesar; after all, Antony and Octavius are both in the former play. But really, there's not all that much referring back to the old play here. It's enough to deal with Cleopatra and what she brings to the table. There's also a lot of gender politics here. Rome is explicitly male, Egypt female. This leads to the main conflict, which is that Antony has let Cleopatra 'feminise' him, making him soft and an unworthy leader. I dunno about making him girlier, but the Romans have a bit of a point about his leadership getting worse once he's met Cleopatra. It doesn't help that he tends to overcompensate so hard that he actually undermines himself in both directions.

This is a busy play, and hard to stage in many ways. First of all, there's the two lads. You DO have to allow Antony and Cleopatra to be over the top and histrionic - they're written that way. But the play isn't just about them, and it's hard to find a balance when the balance is meant to teeter to begin with. Cleopatra is also a very difficult role, and has broken many capable actresses. And worst of all, the pageantry. This play can be taken over by victory parades and gorgeous scenery, especially since it has TONS of different locations. This was very popular in Restoration and Victorian performances. It also dragged the play on for far too long. And, as always, when given a choice between Shakespeare's dialogue and spectacle, spectacle won every time.

Antony's also pretty different from the tragic heroes that come before him. Like Coriolanus (which I'm currently reading), Antony is not given to long soliloquies where he ponders his cursed fate. He doesn't think before he speaks at all. And in his attempted suicide, which is so pathetic it almost verges on comedy, the words 'tragic hero' start to make you raise an eyebrow. Not that Macbeth, or Lear, were any more likeable. Hell, even Hamlet could be a horrible SOB when in the right mood.

Still, in the end, the epicness overcomes the problems. Yes, it may be another Shakespeare play better suited for the page than the stage, but it's still pretty damn awesome. And it also has the Shaped Like Itself scene, which is as funny as the best of Shakespeare's comedies:

Lepidus: What manner o' thing is your crocodile?
Antony: It is shap'd, sir, like itself, and it is as broad as it hath breadth; it is just as high as it is, and moves with its own organs. It lives by that which nourisheth it, and the elements once out of it, it transmigrates.
Lepidus: What color is it of?
Antony: Of its own color too.
Lepidus: 'Tis a strange serpent.
Antony: 'Tis so. And the tears of it are wet.

At last a fairly small week. Yay!

BANDAI:
Gurren Lagann Vol. 3. Seinen. Mediaworks, serialized in Dengeki Daioh since 2007.

DC/CMX:
Jihai Vol. 3 (Final Volume). Shoujo. Enterbrain, serialized in Comic B'S-Log since 2006.

VIZ:
Pluto Vol. 6. Seinen. Shogakukan, serialized in Big Comic Original since 2004.
Oishinbo Vol. 6 (Rice). Seinen. Shogakukan, serialized in Big Comic Spirits since 1984.
Kekkaishi Vol. 19. Shonen. Shogakukan, serialized in Shonen Sunday since 2004.
Fullmetal Alchemist Vol. 21. Shonen. Square Enix, serialized in Shonen Gangan since 2001.
Case Closed Vol. 32. Shonen. Shogakukan, serialized in Shonen Sunday since 1996.


Recs? Pluto. Oishinbo. There we go. Easy this week, huh?

The new cartoons won't be restored. Costs too much. Bah. Oh well, at least they're good prints and uncut.

At last, some good news from Jerry Beck and the gang at Warner Brothers.

There will be 2 single-disc Looney Tunes DVDs out in April, with 15 restored cartoons each. These will be character-based, one featuring Bugs Bunny, the other Daffy Duck. Cartoons will include Hare We Go (Bugs and Christopher Columbus discover America); The Fair-Haired Hare (Bugs and Yosemite Sam have to share a plot of land equally); and Tick Tock Tuckered (Porky and Daffy try to get some sleep, but tiny things keep them awake all night). There will be no repeats from the Golden Collections. After this, we'll get more single-disc releases in the future, all character-based; no one-shots for now.

The fight continues for a proper remastered and uncut Ton and Jerry with no issues or missing cartoons; no actual news as of yet.

There will be future Disney Treasures sets with cartoons (this year only featured the Zorro TV show).

Popeye's 1940s color cartoons are currently having restoration problems - WB wants to release them, but the prints are utterly crappy and in these current economic times, they can't afford to pay for the huge restoration.

Getting classic Mighty Mouse cartoons - and possibly Betty Boop - depends on our buying the 1980s Ralph Bakshi MM collection.

Universal's cartoons (Woody Woodpecker, etc.) are on hold because of low sales.

No news regarding Famous Studios, Columbia, UPA, or the Gene Deitch Tom and Jerries.

There will be a Saturday Morning Cartoons - the 1980s set. The 1970s set will also have a Volume 3, it did much better than the 1960s sets.

That's it! Better news than we've had for a while!

Henry V is probably Shakespeare's most popular history, especially today now that the love of Falstaff has dimmed a bit. The combination of the 1944 Laurence Olivier movie and the 1989 Kenneth Branagh movies make it a play many are likely to have seen, and it's very good at stirring the emotions. In fact, is it a bit too good? As this is also Shakespeare's most controversial and criticized history.

There's lots of reasons for this. First of all, at the time, there was the killing off of Falstaff. Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 were incredibly popular, and the end of Part 2, even though it featured Hal renouncing Falstaff, seemed to indicate that they would be back soon. True, there was The Merry Wives of Windsor about this time as well, but since Hal and Falstaff seemed so intertwined, no one was expecting anything less than "Henry IV Part 3", only with a new king.

But Shakespeare had already given signs that he was a bit sick of the Falstaff gang. (I will go into more details when I get to Part 2 of Henry IV.) What's more, the plot was shaping up in such a way that it would be very difficult to use Falstaff. If he reformed, he'd be dull, but if he didn't, how would be be near the King at all? Pistol took his place for most of the comic scenes in Henry V, along with the Welsh captain Fluellen, who was allowed to have most of the jokes *and* be a competent soldier. Falstaff, meanwhile, died offstage. And by the end of the play, Bardolph and Nym were dead, and Pistol mentioned Mistress Quickly dying of syphilis. Really, this is almost Shakespeare kicking his audience in the teeth.

And then there's Essex. I haven't mentioned the Earl in some time, but it's hard to avoid him here. The epilogue to this play is basically a giant paean to Essex's campaigns, comparing his wars against the Irish to Henry V. Of course, a few months later, Essex would return from Ireland defeated. And then conspire to assassinate the Queen. Shakespeare's plays have had their awkward timely references (Richard II is another good example, and almost as controversial), but even in Henry VIII his patronage wasn't THIS obvious.

In modern times, Henry V has also been rather awkward. One of the bigger reasons is one that we've come across many times before - Shakespeare rarely likes to let his character's motivations be obvious and one-sided, always preferring to draw subtle shades of grey to black and white. Of course, here he's doing so in a play whose plot demands black and white. Is Henry an awesome warrior king, restoring England to her rightful glory? Or is he a hypocrite and chessmaster, using his subjects for his own ends? Well, yeah. Certainly fans of Hal were already irritated with him after his throwing off Falstaff in IV-2, and he does a few things here that raise an eyebrow (the tennis balls are hardly a good reason for war, although you can argue he wanted a random excuse; he also tries to bribe divine vengeance).

Modern productions have occasionally chosen to add darkness to several scenes - Bardolph's execution, for instance - which I think fits in very much with the tendency of Henry IV plays to have serious, melancholy Falstaffs these days. Many are simply uncomfortable with the idea of comedy in the History plays, feeling that it makes light of the wars and death that surround them. (What these people make of Hamlet, which is frequently hilarious, is best left for another time.)

In the end, I think Henry V works best on stage or screen, when you can let yourself get carried away by its fervor. On the page, with only cold words to analyse, Henry is a lot less easy to like.

Yes, it comes out on Wednesday. Veteran's Day is only a semi-holiday. And there's quite a bit of it again.

801 MEDIA:
Dog x Cat Vol. 1. Yaoi. Core Magazine, serialized in Drap since 2007.
Love Skit. Yaoi. Libre Shuppan, serialization unknown, 2006.

DARK HORSE:
Oh My Goddess Vol. 13 (unflipped). Seinen. Kodansha, serialized in Afternoon since 1988.

DC/CMX:
Deka Kyoshi Vol. 1. Softbank/Flex title.

DEL REY:
Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle Vol. 24. Shonen. Kodansha, serialized in Weekly Shonen Magazine since 2003.

DIGITAL MANGA PUBLISHING:
Blue Sheep Reverie Vol. 2. Yaoi. Nihon Bungeisha, serialized in Karen since 2006.
Ciao Ciao Bambino. Yaoi. Core Magazine, serialization unknown, 2005.
Devil Inside. Yaoi. Shinshokan, serialization unknown, 2003.
Great Place High School Student Council Vol. 1. Yaoi. Houbunsha, serialization unknown, 2008.
Millennium Prime Minister Vol. 2. Whatever Wings Is. Shinshokan, serialized in Wings since 1998.
Train Train Vol. 3 (Final Volume). Whatever Wings Is. Shinshokan, serialized in Wings since 2002.

GO! COMI:
Ultimate Venus Vol. 5. Shoujo. Akita Shoten, serialized in Princess since 2006.

UDON:
Swans in Space Vol. 1. Kodomo. Poplar, serialized in Comic Bunbun since 2006.

VIZ:
Flame of Recca Vol. 33 (Final Volume). Shonen. Shogakukan, serialized in Shonen Sunday since 1995.
Hayate the Combat Butler Vol. 13. Shonen. Shogakukan, serialized in Shonen Sunday since 2005.
Ikigami The Ultimate Limit Vol. 3. Seinen. Shogakukan, serialized in Big Comic Spirits since 2005.
Inu Yasha VIZBIG Edition Vol. 1. Shonen. Shogakukan, serialized in Shonen Sunday since 1996.
Inu Yasha Vol. 42. Shonen. Shogakukan, serialized in Shonen Sunday since 1996.
Jormungand Vol. 1. Seinen. Shogakukan, serialized in Sunday Gene-X since 2006.
Record of a Fallen Vampire Vol. 7. Shonen. Square Enix, serialized in Shonen Gangan since 2003.
Switch Vol. 11. Shonen. Square Enix, serialized in GFantasy since 2002.
Yakitate Japan Vol. 20. Shonen. Shogakukan, serialized in Shonen Sunday since 2002.

YEN:
Cat Paradise Vol. 2. Shonen. Akita Shoten, serialized in Champion Red since 2006.
Crimson Shell. Shonen. Square Enix, serialized in GFantasy since 2005.
GA - Geijutsuka Art Design Class Vol. 2. Seinen. Houbunsha, serialized in Manga Time Kirara Carat since 2006.
Higurashi When They Cry Vol. 5. Shonen. Square Enix, serialized in GFantasy since 2005.
Ichiroh! Vol. 2. Seinen. Houbunsha, serialized in Manga Time Kirara since 2007.
Sundome Vol. 6. Seinen. Akita Shoten, serialized in Young Champion since 2006.


That's a lotta manga. Recs? Flame of Recca finally ends, a loooong series. For those who never read Inu Yasha, the VIZBIG edition is bigger and unflipped. I really enjoy Hayate the Combat Butler. Jormungand should appeal to Black Lagoon fans. GA is cute 4-koma. And I'm enjoying seeing how they kill 'em all again in Higurashi, which starts the Curse Killing arc with this volume.

Cover goes to Oresama Teacher.

Color pages for Seiyuu Kaa! (2), Love So Life, Monochrome Kids, and Akatsuki no Yona.

The one-shot is from a newbie, Hio Izumi. This is her debut in Hana, she's had stuff in The Hana before.

Breakdown:
Seiyuu Kaa! 9
Gakuen Alice 122
Love So Life 17
Oresama Teacher 41
Berry Berry 10
月刊なかとば (gag comic)
Monochrome Kids 15
Nice To Meet You, Kamisama 33
Hana To Akuma 40
Hoshi Wa Utau 44
Akatsuki no Yona 6
鎌田ギュウ乳販売店 (gag comic)
Kyou Mo Ashita Mo 31
Isshi Ni Neyou No 13
Black Cat And My Master (one-shot)
幸福ローン (short manga)

Skip Beat!, Jiu Jiu, and Tadaima na Uta are off this issue.

27!!!

It's Yaoi-Con, so there's a pile of new yaoi licenses from Digital Manga Publishing. They are all 1 volume unless noted.

Double Cast. Yaoi. Shinshokan, serialized in Dear+ since 2007.
Koyoi wa Kimi to Chi no Kiss wo. Yaoi. Shinshokan, serialized in Dear+ since 2008.
Café Latte Rhapsody. Yaoi. Libre Shuppan, serialized in Magazine Be x Boy since 2008.
Ayashi no Kimi no Koiwazurai. Yaoi. Libre Shuppan, serialized in Magazine Be x Boy since 2008.
Koi suru Boukun. Yaoi, 6+ volumes. Kaiousha, serialized in Gush since 2005.
Soba ni Oitene. Yaoi. Libre Shuppan, serialized in Magazine Be x Boy since 2005.
Seven Days. Yaoi, 2 volumes. Taiyo Tosho, serialized in Craft since 2007.
Koukyuu no Arika. Yaoi. Taiyo Tosho, serialized in HertZ since 2007.
Doushitemo Furetakunai. Yaoi. Taiyo Tosho, serialized in Craft since 2008.
Spiral of Sand. Yaoi. Taiyo Tosho, serialized in HertZ since 2005.
Kizuna (Deluxe Edition). Yaoi, 11 volumes. Libre Shuppan, serialized in Magazine Be x Boy since 1992.
Cho Maniac ni Aishite. Yaoi. Libre Shuppan, serialized in Magazine Be x Boy since 2008.

Good times for yaoi fans.