Yikes.

I finally found something to blog about! Anyway, I've been researching stuff lately about American/Western manga just out of curiosity and came upon this article. It's old, but relevant.


For those who don't know, any comic made outside of Japan that utilizes their manga-style are colloquially known as OEL Manga, or Original-English-Language Manga. To summarize key aspects of the Q&A from a panel with editors of manga-publishing companies, as an aspiring comic creator inspired by the manga art style, I am predisposed to failing hard.

Normally reading this would be like shooting oneself in the foot, but it really is fascinating. There were a lot of people like me with the similar ambition of creating their own manga. However many of them overestimated the popularity of the manga scene here and came to one crippling truth:

The stuff they put out sucked.

Before I even began pursuing my own subsequent demise, the OEL scene was fairly prospective in the late 2000's with the manga publishing company, Tokyopop taking a proactive stand to break out original, Western manga to the mainstream. However, what had turned out was that OELs sold like crap. They eventually lost both investors and the publishing rights to many Japanese manga, and in 2011, closed up shop in the US while shanghaiing the rights to all the OELs they had published here with them in hero-gone-villain fashion. I guess you can only live long enough to see yourself become the villain, Burtman.

What had killed the prospects of OELs in the late 2000's was due to the fact that many published OEL creators at the time were not adequately prepared (both art and business-wise) for an English manga industry. According to C.B. Cebulski, an editor at Marvel Comics:

"The problem with OEL mangacreators is that a lot of them aren't artists. They're manga fans who draw." 
"Many OEL (original English language) manga kids were thrown into, and taken advantage of, by a fledgling business they had no education in or understanding of. Early OEL chewed up and spit out a lot of artists who did have talent and just needed guidance and support."
Another editor, Lillian Diaz-Przybyl, said that many of the OEL creators that she had worked with did have skills for storytelling and great character designs, but lacked the art skills for illustrating a story. While Japan has apprenticeships for honing one's manga skills and a more lucrative industry toting more than 60 years of experience, those of us foreigners who happen to not be Japanese pretty much have to play Jerry the Jury Rigger with the tools that we have.

So far, we have the internet, instructional books and videos on how to make manga strangely by non-Japanese people, expensive art schools that laugh at the Japanese manga-style, and the Western comic book industry that does not give a damn and will strangle the little guy unless you are with Marvel or DC. It does not help that there is a negative stigma towards OELs because "Hurr they're not reals manga, it's fakes lololzroflahrahfl;AH." But to be fair, I will call myself out on that one since I did not like any of the OELs that I have ever glanced or briefly looked through at libraries and bookstores. My comic will probably get the same appreciation, but hey, I deserve it.

Oh well. You know the saying: when life gives you lemons, gouge both eyes out with a spoon.

I should call it quits too, but unfortunately I have inherited the stubbornness of both my parents, so that makes me double stubborn. So while I remain double stubborn, I may as well keep my hat in the ring. The fire inside still burns fierce, and these damn obstacles just makes the flames even hotter.

Anyway, I am inking the short practice comic I've been working on for some time. It's a silent comic, so there will not be any lettering or word bubbles and is mainly for practicing paneling, sequence, and background. It's a pain in the ass, but I hope to have it done by the end of July... hopefully. I'm also practicing basic stuff like anatomy, yada yada yada, and have managed to finish a prologue script. According to Bakuman, I did it wrong and was supposed to storyboard. What a dumb Westerner, am I right?

I may not be able to update the blog as often as I can, but you may find more life on my DeviantART page when I upload some crap sketches. Anyway, have a funderful fourth of July. You see, the Japanese may have the upper hand in manga, but at least we Westerners have bootleg fireworks. Much more mightier than the typical 180 page manga book.

Comments

Popular Posts