Manga of Miyazaki

Let's talk about the manga works of Miyazaki, an often neglected part of his career.

I wonder if anyone has read the manga version (not the film comics) of "Nausicaa of the Valley of the wind"? If yes, do you prefer it or the movie more?

The nausicaa manga is quite different from the movie, and it took Miyazaki 13 years to complete it. Personally I really like the manga and it is at the top of my list of Miyazaki works (Kiki is the 2nd, and the 1st if only anime is concerned ^^) .I think with this piece of work alone, Miyazaki can be already regarded as a master of manga. A pity that people seem to overlook his talents in this field while appreciating his animated works.

Another nausicaa-esque manga by Miyazaki is Shuna no Tabi (The Journey of Shuna). It is the best you can get with 440 yen, a fantastic book with detailed water-colour paintings. Different from most of the other mangas, dialogue bubbles are rare. This makes it more like a picture book. The story is really dark, and even darker than the ones in the Nausicaa manga. But the characters of the two bear great resemblance. The hero, Shuna, is a prince of a very poor tiny kingdom in a valley. He seems to be a mixture of Nausicaa and Ashitaka, and the story is about his voyage of seeking a type of seed that can save his own people from starvation.

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i memorize for me not to have understood the latter half of Nausicaa's story well.
i will reread it again from first to last.

i like Shuna. ...possibly, better than Nausicaa.
Shuna contains essences of (those days') Miyazaki.
the layout in (page. Shuna to run in the snow mountain with Yaccl can be seen also with Mononoke.
the animal in the sea of a black hair is lovelyyy.
---its relative seems to live in Laputa.

the story of the boy who keeps traveling,
to impose the mission on himself, and to accomplish it ummm...Ashitaka?
the face of the old woman who is presenting Tea the gun of her husband's keepsake is good.

Yea. Shuna is a great story, presented with fascinating water-colour pictures. Basically it is the best Miyazaki art book you can find, not only in terms of quantity, but also the quality of the pictures. Those paintings are perfect matches with the general tone of the story.

The only criticism is that the characters resemble with each other too much. Shuna at the start of the story looks nearly the same as Thea. And both of them are the same as other Miyazaki girls like Nausicaa. Not that I have a grudge against the Miyazaki girls, but at least Miyazaki can make the two main protagonists a bit different from each other, since they are not twins.

In certain aspects the story of Shuna is similar to Ashitaka. Both young heroes have the fictional creature of yakkul for them to ride on. Their destinations are in the west. They also share the scenes of spending a night with a sarcastic and wordly monk. However, for other parts, the stories are quite different. Still, the story of Shuna may serve as a framework for the later development of the story of Ashitaka.

And yea many characters and designs in Shuna can be found in the later works of Miyazaki, like the marine creatures and the green giants (I suppose the Nausicaa manga did not have the Heedras in 1983).

The story itself is the darkest among all Miyazaki works. Even the hero, who set out to seek golden seeds out of his good will to his own people, is punished severely and suffers from a prolong memory loss. And by the end we still do not know what happen to those who starve in the valley, or whether the trio can return to the valley safely with the golden seeds.

There are also some kinds of symbolism that worth discussion. One of them is the man-eating "creature" in the middle of the land of the god man. Also, why is the moon depicted as a man-eater? Is there any implications?

By the way the Nausicaa manga still occupies the first place in my list of Miyazaki works. Manga or not, it is currently the only book that can draw me into serious thinking of life, without leaving me with a confused or sleepy soul.

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In the new nausicaa dvd I picked up, there is a special offer for ordering nausicaa manga. do you know if that is the same manga? if so i wanna order it. I'm totally new to manga and am interested in something good, and I really liked Nausicaa.

Post last edited by starhawk on 03.08.2005, 06:16 PM.

quote:

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Originally posted by starhawk
In the new nausicaa dvd I picked up, there is a special offer for ordering nausicaa manga. do you know if that is the same manga? if so i wanna order it. I'm totally new to manga and am interested in something good, and I really liked Nausicaa.

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I do not have any R1 release of Ghibli films, but I suppose the Nausicaa manga in the special offer is the one we are talking about.

The amazing thing is that even though the Nausicaa movie itself stands out as one of the best anime, it is still no match with the manga version.

The manga is a masterpiece, not only a masterpiece of all the Miyazaki works, but also a masterpiece of the world of manga and graphic novels. This is where the imagination of Miyazaki flies without having to worry about practical problems involved in producing animated films (like length). With more time and space available, the characters are more fully developed, and the story is more sophisticated with quite a number of plot lines running at the same time. The world is even more realistic when compared to the movie. Wrapped inside the beautiful line-art drawings are Miyazaki's views towards life, death, politics, nature, human, technology and many other things. As it took 13 years (82-94) for Miyazaki to complete the manga, you can notice the development of Miyazaki himself through the subtle changes in his view. Some readers compare the manga with the works by Tolkien.

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btw have you read "Sabaku no Tami : People of the desert"?
its not marketed as a book. however, this is certainly work when Miyazaki is young.
it cant be said that this work is a masterpiece.
the feature of Miyazaki appears in an individual picture.

quote:

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Originally posted by nanashi
btw have you read "Sabaku no Tami : People of the desert"?
its not marketed as a book. however, this is certainly work when Miyazaki is young.
it cant be said that this work is a masterpiece.
the feature of Miyazaki appears in an individual picture.

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I would love to have a look. But as you have said it is not commercially available. Another problem is that I do not live in Japan. In fact, being able to get "Shuna no Tabi" here is already quite an accomplishment.

Btw Miyazaki initially intended to made the world of Nausicaa a desert. Would it be influenced by this piece of earlier work?

quote:

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Y: The movie became the flag bearer for the ecology movement, which was just beginning to boom in the 1980s...

M: I myself wasn't thinking about it at all, but I think it happened to be there. It was what we had been thinking about for much longer, and it started with such things as the book of Nakao Sasuke-san.
I mean, I didn't start Nausicaa to write a story about the ecology for the sake of environmental protection. At first, I intended to write a story which took place in a desert, but it wasn't interesting when I put it into drawings, so I changed it to the forest. Then, it became that kind of story.
In that sense too, I didn't have any big plot. The writing process was such that "it looks that way, so let's go that way." I faced a writer's block, so I wanted to have something huge, so, the sleeping God Warrior... This one too, I just wrote it into the story saying such thing as "what's gonna happen? I'm in trouble." I continued working, telling myself such lies as "it'll work out eventually. The magazine will go out of business before that..." -laughs-

Y: What did you try to write when you were thinking about a desert?

M: I really don't remember. I know I must have been thinking many things... The only thing I remember is that I was so irritated. It's the fact that I was disgusted with the way the society works or such things.

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"The Sabaku no Tami : People of the desert"
http://rose-rote.hp.infoseek.co.jp/miya/sabaku/index.htm

i am pasting URL.
its Japanese, it isnt translated.
the En outline is written.
(sorry. please disregard the advertisements that exist in the top and bottom of the page. because its free web space...)

Post last edited by nanashi on 03.16.2005, 02:26 PM.

quote:

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Originally posted by nanashi
"The Sabaku no Tami : People of the desert"
http://rose-rote.hp.infoseek.co.jp/miya/sabaku/index.htm

i am pasting URL.
its Japanese, it isnt translated.
the En outline is written.
(sorry. please disregard the advertisements that exist in the top and bottom of the page. because its free web space...)

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Wow was the scanning done by you? Thanks a lot . I have never thought of I could ever have the chance of reading this early piece of work of Miyazaki. Now I can take a close look at it. It is also neat to include the summary for each episode. Thanks again for sharing the manga with us.

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if someone can be pleased, im glad.

can jiji understand 3 languages? (Cantonese, English, Japanese)
Wow, is it 4 languages?
Cat's Language can be understood.

quote:

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Originally posted by nanashi
if someone can be pleased, im glad.

can jiji understand 3 languages? (Cantonese, English, Japanese)
Wow, is it 4 languages?
Cat's Language can be understood.

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Hehe, my Japanese stinks, so that does not really count.

But I can understand some Mandarin, provided that the speaker do not shoot out the words too fast.

__________________
My light novel review blog: ラノなの！@ novel.co.nr

quote:

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Originally posted by nanashi
"The Sabaku no Tami : People of the desert"
http://rose-rote.hp.infoseek.co.jp/miya/sabaku/index.htm

i am pasting URL.
its Japanese, it isnt translated.
the En outline is written.
(sorry. please disregard the advertisements that exist in the top and bottom of the page. because its free web space...)

---

Sorry to revive an old topic, but I've been looking more closely at this, and it seems to me that Sasan is the prototype for the typical Miyazaki heroine -- she bears lots of similarities to Cathy, Thea, Nausicaa, and Sheeta. She's much stronger than she first appears to be -- when captured by a soldier, for example, she acts pretty aggresive, pulling him down, instead of waiting for Tem to rescue her. Instead of being passive, she seems to be a moving force during the story. She has compassion and intelligence as well. I really like her . Of course, I can't read Japanese, but the storytelling is very visual like most of Miyazaki's works, and the summaries of each page are a great help.

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“Miyazaki is the greatest living animator… His frames are brilliantly, sunnily ‘lit’, with exhilarating shifting perspectives and cinematic movement, and a drawing style that is as detailed and dense as Brueghel.” — Philip Lopate, Film Comment

Hi, dear my old post, after long time.
and I post this today.
this are only Japanese, not transrated, no summaries.
but you will be able to enjoy Miyazaki Hayao's early visual.

Puss in Boots / Nagagutsu wo Haita Neko (Miyazaki Hayao）
http://rose-rote.hp.infoseek.co.jp/miya/.../neko/index.htm

Animal Treasure Island / Doubutsu Takarajima (Miyazaki Hayao）
http://rose-rote.hp.infoseek.co.jp/miya/...akara/index.htm

Post last edited by nanashi on 08.04.2006, 01:46 PM.

quote:

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Originally posted by nanashi
Hi, dear my old post, after long time.
and I post this today.
this are only Japanese, not transrated, no summaries.
but you will be able to enjoy Miyazaki Hayao's early visual.

Puss in Boots / Nagagutsu wo Haita Neko (Miyazaki Hayao）
http://rose-rote.hp.infoseek.co.jp/miya/.../neko/index.htm

Animal Treasure Island / Doubutsu Takarajima (Miyazaki Hayao）
http://rose-rote.hp.infoseek.co.jp/miya/...akara/index.htm

---

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Jarinko Chie English subs v2 (22/03/10) -
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=KX6BECB7
My Neighbours the Yamadas Comic -
http://rapidshare.com/files/119113404/My..._Comic.rar.html
Imouto He Scans -
http://rapidshare.com/files/120625788/Imouto_He.rar.html
Le Roi Et L'Oiseau English Subs -
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=J732GAHR
Original Mononoke Story in English -
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=K8A2YGU6

----------quote from Ghibli conversation blog--------------------------------------------------------

Sabaku no Tami, or "People of the Desert," was a weekly comic drawn by a young Hayao Miyazaki from 1969 to 1970.
Published in Shonen Shoujo Shinbun
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Daniel’s Ghibli conversation comments about “Sabaku no Tami” today.
http://www.conversations-on-ghibli.blogspot.com/
This manga was serialized on Shonen Shoujo Shinbun (news paper for kids)
This paper is published by Japan communist party(JCP). I guess Hayao was a labor movement activist at Toei Doga in those days and related with JCP. Btw Kondo Yoshifumi was a member of JCP. It was revealed after his death. JCP has had influence to Japanese labor movement especially in movie industry.

Post last edited by Kanta on 08.04.2006, 08:31 PM.

wow I'm excited to read 'People of the Desert', thanks for posting that because I had no idea it existed!
I'm interested in Miyazaki's manga mainly because I love the Nausicaa series. I haven't finished reading it yet (I don't own Vol. 7 but I'm getting there)

For anyone who is interested in Nausicaa it's well worth it to get your hands on the manga. They have been reprinted within the last couple years to be in the original Japanese format (brown instead of black ink, reading from right to left, with the original Japanese 'sound effects' left in). Find it on Amazon.com .

Ok I'll stop advertising now lol.

Just some comments on the manga so far is that Nausicaa's character strikes me as more of a warrior - as the only heir to The Valley of the Wind, it is her duty to pilot the Gunship to fulfill an old alliance with Tolumekia. She is always ready for battle, and there is breathtaking sequence in one of the volumes where she rides Kai into battle against The Doroks. The manga also covers more character development; it follows Kushana, Yupa, and Dorok monks and sometimes we don't see Nausicaa for many pages. We even meet the Forest People, who actually live inside the Toxic Jungle and survive by living in harmony with the insects. As ever, Nausicaa's strength and compasion come through just as strongly if not more so in the manga. I hope this gets everyone excited for reading the Nausicaa manga

All of you are SOO right about the Nausicaa manga! If I had one wish for Miyazaki, it would be to transform the manga series into an anime series (here's where I got all 7 volumes from: http://www.animecornerstore.com/). Let me repost my paragraph from the "favorite scenes" thread:
Princess Kushana in a ditch on the ground protecting two of her surviving soldiers, from a gigantic attack of enraged insects at the surface. While she's remembering her psychologically ill mother, one of those insects with a soldier half chewed in its mouth, sees her in the ditch, but accepting death she peacefully looks at it, and after a brief while the insect flies away (much to her surprise)

Princess Kushana is trully one of my favorite and most admirable characters of all times, especially because she wasn't a superwoman, she went through the same sufferings in her family as many people do. Unfortunatelly she was portrayed so differently in the movie...

Actually after reading this thread, I feel like such a novice in the manga world (I actually discovered Miyazaki and restarted watching animes only at the beginning of this year), but actually I'm happy to see there are many things for me to discover!

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Post last edited by aviator on 08.06.2006, 01:27 AM.

Yeah, that novel is the best thing Miyazaki ever wrote. But it would never work as an animation. You'd have to committ to a 10-year production ala Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings, and even then, much of the grittiness of the original pen and paper would be lost in the transition to animation cells.

No, it's much better because it is a novel, and a long, sprawling one at that. It's interesting to see how it veers into new directions every time the author returns after a lengthy hiatus (after making one or two movies). The scope of the Nausicaa books just keeps expanding and expanding.

This is the main reason why Otomo's Akira manga never appealed to me. It's clear that he was pushed to keep it going after the film was made, and the story just spun its wheels in neutral, never moving beyond the boundaries set by the movie. What's the point in that? Keep the fans happy? Keep the money rolling in? Steal even more bits from Future Boy Conan?

Maybe that's just me. I've been long frustrated by Katsuhiro Otomo's career, aside from his Metropolis script, which remains his best achievement. Why he hasn't achieved more in film is a mystery to me.

But back to Nausicaa, it remains the best graphic novel ever made, just edging out Art Spiegelman's Maus and Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics. There are so many brilliant lines to quote, for just about any given situation.

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ive never read a single manga comic or book or watever in my life, but cheers Jiji for the pictures of the manga.
& is it just me or does Shuna look like the pilot from Pejite Asbel? & he's standing in front of looks like Nausica?

&, if any1 knows where i can get english Nausicaa manga from can you plz tell me?

cheers