thanks for nasu

Fan Boy Joined: 05 May 2004 Posts: 15

it simply changed the way i look at manga, and the things a mangaka can accomplish within the medium. i think kuroda did that for a lot of us shonen-tards.

again, thanks and looking forward to japan tengu party!

Posted: Mon Feb 21, 2005 5:45 pm

Yeah, really, Nasu was simply great. Definetly one of MS top 5, which is a lot to say, if you consider you guys scanlated Beck, 20th, Monster, H2, Hanaotoko, Love roma, Mushishi, Homunculous, Happy... well maybe it wont show up in my top 5, but Im sure it would be in a lot of "All time MS projects Top 5". But Im still a shonentard, you know ^^
I loved Sexy Voice too. And now to wait for Japan Tengu Party... Very Happy

Groupie Joined: 03 Apr 2004 Posts: 118

guess i should actually read this now...since it is complete and all...

Street Musician Joined: 13 Oct 2002 Posts: 402

Thanks alot for doing Nasu, have just read the whole project thanks to the complete BT.

OK, the artwork. It is really beautiful. If I were to describe it; i'd say, if Bill Waterson (Calvin and Hobbes) were to draw manga, it would look like Nasu (or Sexy Voice). I'm a big fan of Calvin and Hobbes, so that's a compliment. I don't know if it's just me, but i find alot of similarities; especially the contrasts and the play with perspectives.

As for the story, most parts i felt it kinda like Yokohama Kikou (ie scenes of everyday lives). The characters are like what i expected after reading sexy voice. Vibrant and spunky, sometimes to the extent of overkill. I really really wish that he'd tone it down a notch.

Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 6:30 pm

I'm very sorry, but Nasu blows Yokohama Kaidashi Kikoku out of the water.

My top 5 favorite Nasu chapters:

1. The newly wed couple and the international conspiracy
Hilarious.

2. Playing catch at the riverside
The sublimity of this chapter is just unreal.

3. The film location
My favorite is when the producer wonders if his crew is holding a grudge because of the lousy catering he once put them through, and a few scenes later, someone actually is complaining about that one time. Okay, that probably doesn't sound like much, but then again manga humor is never funny when it's retold in words.

4. The video game
The very idea that one must finish a video game before setting out on a journey seems to me to be a joyous celebration of slackerdom. Too bad that the lifestyle is denied to me right now...

5. The bicycle race in Japan
The scene where a cyclist gets the laps wrong is just classic. Surely that could never happen in a real life racing situation, could it? The should've made this into a movie, not Summer In Andalusia.

Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 7:09 pm

In addition to 1, 3 and 5 from Summer's list above, I really enjoyed the hardboiled chapter with the guy on the run from the hitmen, and the chapter featuring the truck driver. Also the one where Takahashi and Saki work at the uncle's inn/boardinghouse place.

Scoundrel Joined: 17 Feb 2003 Posts: 403

YKK is crap no matter how many kerns back it.

I still prefer sexy voice, sorry.

Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2005 10:44 pm

summer will be happy. I will need to reread Nasu to post my favs, so there. And, btw, whats up with the Angel one-shot? Are you ever gonna finish it stephen?

Posted: Tue Mar 01, 2005 1:22 am

I'll translate it if you want to edit it.

Posted: Tue Mar 01, 2005 5:58 am

Sure as hell. Dunno when but I will do it.

Roadie Joined: 02 Sep 2003 Posts: 61 Location: Belgium

Summer Soldier wrote:

Surely that could never happen in a real life racing situation, could it?

Actually it does happen, but very rarely of course. Though what i haven't seen is that the cyclist sets foot on ground and quits the race after doing so.

Groupie Joined: 03 Apr 2004 Posts: 118

Read all of Nasu in one go. Wow, I liked it more than Sexy Voice and Robo, and I really liked Sexy Voice and Robo.

My favorite chapters:

Two People - the dynamic of their relationship was interesting. And that chicken thing looked really yummy. really captures that somewhat comforting tone that Kuroda has.

The Truck Driver one - The giant ebi sushi doll did it.

Married Couple Conspiracy - Like everyone else I thought it was so funny.

Japan race - Funny again. The newspaper headline.

Video Game - I liked the scenes of her at work (and the fish guy hitting on her) and the video game quest.

Lightning Speed - How many times will he mention "and I'm really hot so..." and that horrible horrible sense of music.

Backpacking in India - Just totally "what the hell?!" Funny in its abruptness and surreal.

I think I don't like stories so much as characters. The slacker girl, the farmer guy, and the workaholic cooking girl are my favorites. (God I suck at names. Like that truck driver who can never remember foreign ones lol.)

My least favorite is that attack of the killer eggplants story. The Edo one had great dialogue, but didn't catch me. The translation was awesome though. I was laughing so hard. Good job at capturing the old language style.

Summer in Andalusia is a good one to animate I think, of all the stories in the book it seems the most fitting for it. (Longer than the Japan race at least.)

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2005 12:40 am

jennwenn wrote:

I liked it more than Sexy Voice and Robo

Hmph.

The truck driver really intrigued me because he represented a character type that I've never seen before in a Kuroda manga. We all know what a typical Kuroda character is like - spunky and energetic, a la Niko, Takahashi, the femme fatale at the aquarium, and that girl who managed to embody an oxymoron by being an "energetic slacker". Not all of his characters fit this of course (Robo, Takama etc.), but none of them really had any unlikable qualities. The truck driver on the other hand is a bigot, a womanizer, and, well, generally a dickhead. But he's painted in such a light that it's hard to not forgive these faults (and hey, he seems like a good dad, if a less than desirable husband).

I'm not sure if Kuroda is even capable of creating unlikable characters. Some might find fault with this, but really, if you want your views on human nature to be scarred irrevocably, then go read Naniwa Kinyuudo instead.

Posted: Sat Mar 05, 2005 10:15 pm

A few thoughts

I can't choose a favorite between Nasu and Sexy Voice and Robo. I think what jenn said about the characters being more important than the plot is true, for me the characters in SVaR and Nasu could very easilly inhabit the same basic world.

Kuroda's strength is more in building places for us to inhabit than telling any one story or spinning plots. His frame never dwells on one character or thought very long. I'm thinking how he'll go off on a random tangent like the spy-movie sequence and then pull back to a panel focusing on the wife, while you can see the husband still daydreaming in the background (The Fried Eggplant & Beer chapter).

For comic comparisons Love and Rockets comes to mind. It also reminds me of Robert Altman's films (I think someone else may have done this comparison with Sexy Voice already).

The panel where moped girl is riding in the snow talking to herself about how lame the blond kid is (I'm terrible with names too) is really cool. That might be my favorite image in the whole series. Attack on Fuji is the only story I didn't like.

Street Musician Joined: 16 Feb 2003 Posts: 530

Summer Soldier wrote:

I'm not sure if Kuroda is even capable of creating unlikable characters. Some might find fault with this, but really, if you want your views on human nature to be scarred irrevocably, then go read Naniwa Kinyuudo instead.

Dude, Kabachitare is even worse than Naniwa Kinyuudo.
And I think Suenobu Keiko's "Life" was a lot more scarring than Naniwa. At the very least it would probably make young kids very afraid of girls.

[edit] Also I finally got around to reading Nasu, and all I have to say is "I want early retirement too."