First let’s look at the “within a week of broadcast” component: Viz said in its release that “beginning January 15th the latest episode…will be available for free viewing…within days of its original airdate in Japan” with subsequent quicksubs appearing on a Thursday schedule. As of this posting, 84 episodes of Shippuden have aired so far in Japan, the latest premiere occurring on Nov. 13th. Taking into account that the regular schedule may take a break for Christmas and New Years’ Day, as those holidays fall on Thursdays this year, episode 90 would likely be the ‘latest episode’ once the 15th rolls around unless the translations for #91 are already ready in time of compete against raw viewership (and Crunchyroll’s base of paid subscribers).

(Projected Japanese Shippuden airdates:
11/13 – #84; 11/20 – #85; 11/27 – #86; 12/4 – #87; 12/11 – #88; 12/18 – #89; 1/8 – #90; 1/15 – #91)

The other half of this budding online initiative is a batch availability of eight subtitled episodes each Friday beginning on Jan. 2nd “until the series eventually catches up to the current third [sic] season”. (Shippuden is currently in its fourth twenty-six episode season but who’s counting?) That eight episodes a week rate means that the batch containing #89 through #96 would debut online on March 20th. The use of the word ‘until’ implies that the batch uploads would halt after the catch has been completed so I hope Viz keeps their more advanced episodes online all along, meaning that the first 109 episodes will be online by then (#99 would’ve been posted the day before on Mar. 19th).

I figured I would track when the regular series might finish its initial run on American TV. This past Saturday, November 15th, saw the airing of episode 203 out of 220 on Cartoon Network so if the pace of one episode per week continues, episode 220 would air on March 14th, 2009. The accelerated “11 volumes in three months” manga release schedule laid out by Viz confirms what was suspected a few weeks ago based on Simon & Schuster and Amazon listings.

There is no question that this is a smart move by Viz in order to divert views and traffic away from Dattebayo and scanlation sites in order, as ICv2 described, “to garner the promotional and advertising benefit of distributing new episodes on its own site, rather than ceding it to pirate third party sites” as well as to stave off any ill effects from scan-hosting sites by tightening the gap between Japanese and American manga volume releases.

[Update 11/21: Dattebayo has said they would stop fansubbing Naruto once the freely available, legally subtitled episodes begin appearing online on January 15th out of respect that "Viz and Crunchyroll have gotten their acts together and are trying something new". They will still continue to work on Bleach.]

The moment I read the news that Viz would be releasing the Shonen Jump-based series Hunter X Hunter in season box sets beginning in Q4 2008, a huge grin appeared on my face. At last, this awesomeness will be brought to America! The manga by Yoshihiro Togashi is already on volume 19 (Vol. 20 comes out May 6th) and for those of you who have never heard of HxH, shame on you! (For a good introduction to the plot, read this Animefringe feature from September 2005.)

To get some perspective of how long it has taken for this anime to hit US shores, the anime was created in 2000 and it has since been dubbed into French, Spanish, Italian, Portugeuse, Tagalog, and even Arabic. Viz pitched HxH and Monster to television broadcasters at this year’s NATPE and they have DVD rights for both so the next logical step would be to get Monster on DVD and perhaps TV. (Adult Swim, you know you want a psychological thriller/drama to replace InuYasha…) Failing that, just Hunter x Hunter getting onto Toonami would be fantastic.

P.S. Did you know Viz is a part-owner of a future 150-seat movie theater to be the main attraction of the yet-to-be built J-Pop Center in Japantown?

When I was in Germany last August, I bought the first volume of Honey and Clover and wrote about how Tokyopop GmbH was releasing titles noticably ahead of US licensors. Now that Viz’s English version has hit shelves, I bought one of those and looked for differences and similarities between the German and American adaptations. What follows is a comparison of many features between the two in attempt to determine which is the better visual adaptation.

Front Covers:

The image of Hagu with peaches remains the constant among the three versions of the cover but the German one has a significantly brighter. The US cover by comparison looks a bit more washed out than the original Japanese and bears the number framed by a crescent motif that appears on all of Viz’s Jump and Beat titles.

Back Covers:

Like the front cover, the back covers have the same “Takemoto in a speckled shirt” picture with the US version featuring the largest version. The descriptive text in that version becomes shorter and more punchy than the longer German iteration.

Sound Effects:
In terms of sound effects, the German version keeps most of the original Japanese characters and places subtitles next to them while Viz made up their own onomatopoetic words and lettered them in the same places. The redone effects make the panels easier to read and mimic the size of the replaced characters but it

Also, in the above scene where Morita leaps from the second floor window and displaces Takemoto from the scooter, the word “Geronimo” is a specific American-influenced translation IMO since it reminds me of Bugs Bunny diving off something. Contrast that with the German “Jaaaaaah!!” that better matches the original “tou!!” since both have one elongated syllable and sound more savage.

Chapter Titles:

Viz’s placement of the series’ phrase and logo on chapter pages is very faithful to the original whereas Tokyopop moved it to another part of the page while omitting the logo. The reasoning could be to provide a more intact shot of the art, such as Morita’s legs above, but that at times seems not to be true so I’m not sure.

Other Aspects:
The speech in Viz’s edition is in all caps like pretty much every other manga on the shelves whereas Tokyopop Deutschland used capital letters only when merited and in the process expresses a more mature, or at least subtler, dialogue between characters. It’s worth noting that this style seems be one exception to the rule as the stuff I’ve seen from Carlsen Comics (example) and Egmont Manga & Anime utilizes the common practice capital-letter comic style font.

Another aesthetic quality of the German version is the whiteness of its pages and how that translates into crisper drawings. The American version is slightly more pulpy in color on the level of other Viz titles. Also, the American version has its cultural notes (called a “study guide”) in the back while the German version has on-page notes. Finally, the German version has a pair of color drawings before the table of contents.

Verdict:
Each version has its advantages – the American version seems to more faithful in design and translation (e.g. Viz’s reference to a System 6 Mac is more accurate than a C64) while the German edition has on-page reference explanation notes and, to my eyes, crisper lines and cleaner pages. Importing one over buying your local version would be silly and fiscally unsound given shipping and the current value disparity between the dollar and the Euro so just pick up the one in your respective region. But if I had to choose a victor, I would pick the German one because now that I’ve seen non-all caps dialogue in thin type (I am such a font geek!), I really wish that this style would cross the Atlantic and perchance give some manga a more mature sensibility.