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Post some of your favorite manga, Lain. If possible, a brief description would also be quite helpful.

Oyasumi punpun is from OP's pic, also. It's a manga about the life of an average boy. The reason he is drawn like a small chick is because the author didn't want him to be too pretty nor too ugly, so he decided on a chick. It's very depressive, but certainly one of my favorite manga and i highly recommend for anyone. It's very realistic and touching.

>Aku no hana It's also a manga about growing up, but this one is specifically about the crossroads between being a teenager and an adult, and the fact that not everyone will ever leave their teenage years. It begins as a VERY pretentious manga, the protagonist is the embodiment of a "well, actually" person. However that is intentional, the manga is about his experience growing up, and the fact that pretentiousness was all he had as a child. It's also a very, very depressive manga.

Pic related is Gakkou Gurashi. Although it might seem as a moe indulged manga with the usual cute girls doing cute things archetype, it actually takes place during a "zombie" apocalypse. A story about survival and coping with the fact that everything around you is crumbling down while you can only hide. The backstory of each character is quite sentimental, they're not flat. In addition, the methods in which they cope with the national disaster is amusing. Without any spoilers, the main character is the Pollyanna of the group who tries to maintain a sane environment while avoiding her own mental breaking point. Basically high school friends who rely on each other for the sake of maintaining some ounce of hope.

>>140 As a continuation of this previous suggestion, here's Mahou Shoujo Apocalypse. Don't let the title deceive you either, it's not a manga entirely based off innocent magical girls. It's actually about evil magical girls who cause an enormous genocide. The plot is almost merely impossible to describe without spoilers being included. It's sort of convoluted but if you enjoy action and science fiction then this manga will definitely appeal to you especially as it progresses. The art style is unique, so it could be a turn off for some. Another honorable mention would be Mahou Shoujo Site which comes from the same illustrator. Violence among magical girls again.

Where does lainchan download their manga? I love reading CBR files on my kobo.

>>142 I read them at kissmanga. Otherwise i just look for it randomly through trackers, public and private.

Kokou no Hito First and foremost a manga about mountain climbing (and a good one at that), it tells the story of a boy who becomes obsessed with climbing. In terms of tone, it's a lot more mature and darker than your typical sports manga, dealing with subjects of failure, social anxiety, risk taking and sexuality. The art is breathtaking as well.

>>139 >>138 Respectively these are my two favorite manga's of all time. Ultimately I'd like to add that although both of these manga's are depressive at time, their tone is ultimately extremely hopeful and uplifting. Oyasumi Punpun will make you cry like a bitch and then you'll feel alright.

glitterboy and trannies squad arrives, this time in 'coming of age' flavor. It isn't as cynical as bokura no hentai, i give you that, even though the author made some strange decisions near the end.

Onani Master Kurosawa is worth adding onto the list here. >>139 Similar to Aku no Hana in the sense of both protagonists sharing egotistical traits. Looking down upon others. Anyways, it's a story of redemption and changing the way you look at the world from such a dim perspective. Deals with the topic of objectifying all of those around you.

>>146 >>144 they were both heartrending though my favourite 'hidden gem' kind of manga is probably Kakukaku Shikajika

Manga about the war between fictional country not-japan and another fictional country not-russia. Set in a fantasy world where dragons exist and give psychic powers to some humans on earth. The protagonist, a member of an elite force that fights alongside saber-tooth tigers, is forced to fight seemingly hopeless battles and does some fuarrrked up soykaf in order to help his country. It's a manga about war, inefficient bureaucracies and camaraderie. Art by the same guy who drew Shut Hell.

>>149 I should add: this manga is based on a series of novels, and was cut after it covered the events of the first volume (I think), which is a shame.

Umibe no onnanoko. Its by inio asano, same guy as oyasumi punpun. Its about the loneliness, cruelty and need of affection that teenagers go through. It has a lot of sex though so be careful where you read it.

Nickelodeon, by Dowman Sayman It's a great series of one-shots, usually with slight surrealism, and lots of interesting themes.

>>139 I was about to post this. Damn it lain you beat me to it.

>>152 their voinich hotel was great too!

MW Yokohama Kaidashi Kikō Lone Wolf and Cub Golgo 13 The Spider-Man manga from the 1970s, by Ryoichi Ikegami.

>>151 Finished reading it and it's pretty good, Lain. It's not as good as Oyasumi punpun, but it's short and gets the message across. Really enjoyed reading it, thanks.

Shouldn't this thread be in /vis/? And shouldn't /vis/ be in the navbar?

>>157 It should! /vis/ is part of /culture/. If you look at that you'll see /vis/ along with /inter/, /lit/, and /music/. Eventually the top-bar will be customisable in the options, but that's not implemented yet.

>>154 It is awesome. Is it finished yet?

battle angel alita last order. Amnesic cyborg fighting intergalactic threats and the mad doctor who rebuilt her. This manga has great worldbuilding.

>>159 Yes, I remember reading the ending.

>>146 I just finished Hourou Musuku and it was amazing. Only the ending seemed pretty abrupt. Does anyone know whether it was axed?

Finished reading what there is translated of currently ongoing Dead Dead Demon's Dededededestruction. The art is great and all, as expected of Isin, I especially like the facial design choices in this one. And as expected of Isin, manga tells the coming-of-age story of a group of female friends living in Japan under the alien "invasion", however there aren't as many simple everyday scenes as in his other works. Characters are lovable, especially Ontan - she's as adorable as she's infantile. What I don't quite like about this manga is the fact that Isin decided to get hip and cool and catch up with what's popular among people (probably), because the story is full to the brim with imageboard and gamer slang, along with a strong political and kind of humanitarian subplot with left and right contending over the problem of "invaders" and what not. But Isin, I'm afraid, failed at turning it into something other than a pretty depth addition to the plot. Although the theme of external policy and tension between Japan and other countries rising is shoehorned constantly into the story, it really bears no clear effect on the heroes of the story or the environment around them. It's internal side, however, isn't as useless and inconsequential - trains stopping when an AA laser has to shoot down yet another flying saucer, as mentioned earlier, the whole invasion thing has spawned a lot of agitation and controversy among the citizens, so it adds a little bit to the dynamic of the story. A small little bit. So far I've noticed a bunch of silly plotholes, like an alien in the body of a member of some boysband who had died during one of the initial saucer crashes, and nobody paying attention to that sort of thing and an Emo kid avenging the girl he seemed to have never loved after she died. Other than that, there aren't that many inconsistencies. There are scenes that don't really matter (at least for now, who knows?), but there aren't many. The part where a dying alien said that the Republican party has taken over the mothership and now they were going for a kamikazi attack had me laughing for quite some time. Overall, it's nice. More stuff is coming, and I already have some speculation on what it's going to be. But, not here and not now.

>>139 This one's pretty good. >>151 Check out What A Wonderful World and Nijigahara Holograph by the same guy.

>>679 Yes the manga is flawed in some areas, it's definitely not perfect. Even so I enjoyed the atmosphere and dialogue too much. As expected, the art is appealing too especially the detailed settings. The manga isn't as deep as Pun Pun but I try not to take it seriously. A lighthearted read for a couple of laughs from my perspective. Ontan's big bro is best character.

My favorite manga by far would be Shirow Masamune's Ghost in the Shell, Koji Kumeta's Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei, and Chiho Saito's Revolutionary Girl Utena. Tho I'm about to add Mahou Tsukai no Yome (The Ancient Magus Bride) to my list. Man it's such a good fuarrrking story. I'm in love with it.

Excellent thread, Lain! I'll sporadically add some of my favourites that people may not have heard of over the next few days when I get time. First off is Dainana Joshikai Houkou, a manga about some high school girls who live in the future, and their various escapades with futuristic technology. It doesn't have a very deep plot, but is great for an occasional read when you don't want something heavy like things by asano inio.

Here's a random very misleading page from Berserk, a manga everyone should read. It's about a ripped guy named Guts killing demons with a big sword. Might sound dumb but it's actually really great - the art is incredible and the characters each have rich, detailed storylines, backstories, and motivations. It touches on themes of failure, struggle, will to power, friendship, and desire.

>>687 Seconding Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. Kouji Kumeta is a great, yet not that recognized author. I greatly admire the wit and creativity he puts into his works. His artstyle is also very distinct and just pleasant to look at. Some of my favorites alongside Kumeta are Arawi Keiichi, Nobuyuki Fukumoto and panpanya. Keiichi isn't that popular of a mangaka, too, and unlike Kumeta he hasn't drawn a lot of manga, in fact, he has only two serious works, with one of them being an ongoing manga: Nichijou and City. I extremely liked Nichijou. It's absurdist humor really hits the nail for me. It also includes tons of culture references - both Japanese and non-Japanese, and bilingual jokes. The style is cute and simple. Characters are lovable. As for Nobuyuki, well, he made Kaiji and Akagi - is there anything else to say? He excels at conveying the psychological state of his characters and at creating ridiculous, yet nerve-tingling gambling games. His drawing style is also very distinct, and although his characters don't seem to look that "serious" and fit some comedy gag series rather than constant on-edge mind games, that's what so good about Nobuyuki - he takes this exaggerated style to his advantage to create some really memorable grimaces and just tension overall. panpanya is a little bit different from the three already mentioned, because he (or she) is here because of the mystery that envelopes the author. I mean, the art is really great, panpanya's short stories really remind me of Yume Nikki - and I loved the game for its surreal feel, but there's more: the appeal lies in the unknown for me. As a guy who likes digging up stuff on people who I'm interested in (creepy, I know), panpanya has really left the biggest impression on me so far, because there isn't much known - and It'd be cool to find at least some info on the guy (or a girl). Maybe if I could read moon runes the mystery would quickly unveil to me, but hey, better preserve that mystery, a little bit - to some extent, you know?

>no one posted the Legend Of The Strongets Man Kurosawa

Dungeon Meshi, or Delicious in Dungeon, is a pretty neat twist on your standard D&D style manga, where protagonists adventure through a dungeon, playing to many of the common tropes. Mostly these tropes are acknowledged and mocked, as the party adventures through a dungeon, eating everything in sight, since they couldn't afford to buy rashions in the town. It's a very charming manga, with genuine moments of glee.

I'm really digging into Taiyo Matsumoto's work. I loved the ping pong anime and the Tekkon Kinkreet movie was also good, so I decided to read his other stuff and it's awesome. I already finished Takemitsu Zamurai and right now is one of my favorie mangas; now I'm reading Sunny, aaand sometimes I feel it's kind of pretentious, but fuarrrk it, it's really good as well (soykaf, I even cried in the first chapter lol). And yeah, the art is awesome. >>688 I love this one, the moment I started reading it I fell for it. It's so simple yet genius; something like Soremachi (wich I love too).

I am a Hero is a manga with a terrible name, but everything else going for it. Hideo is a struggling mangaka who finds himself in a zombie apocalypse. The art is incredibly drawn and the characters are all interesting enough to not fall into the common themes that you'd find in an apocalypse manga. Most of the time, after it happens at least, the zombie outbreak is just a part of the world, and not really the main focus of the manga. I find it really hard to describe this one without spoiling too much, but it's certainly my favourite manga of the past few years. As far as I'm aware it has also won lots of awards, too.

>>140 One of my absolute favorites. I went into it by watching the anime first, and went into the first episode with no prior knowledge, on the recommendation of a friend. The twist, which you spoiled, was amazing. Fabulous series, and as you said, the characters are all very well done. I like how the manga makes a point of showing that the biggest danger to the survivors are other survivors and not the zombies themselves, and it goes out of its way to show how every single person was affected by the zombie apocalypse, most of them not in a good way. >>738 It started out really interesting, then got kinda weird, and now it's dived into full-blown acid trip territory and I have no idea what the hell is going on. Goblin Slayer is a relatively new manga, and a damn good one too. It's set in a fantasy world with a hero's guild, offering jobs to heroes who want to slay monsters. It's a pretty crapsack world: high-ranking adventurers who are skilled and have good gear only want to fight high-level monsters like dragons and demons because they pay the most, thus allowing low-level monsters like goblins and such to run rampant over the countryside. Low-ranking adventurers have no skills, no experience, and crappy gear and go out to slay low-level monsters expecting an easy time of it... and typically get slaughtered because they have no idea what they're doing and underestimate the enemy. Goblins, for example, have the size and strength of children and are fairly dumb... and are incredibly vicious and utterly without mercy. They employ ambushes and booby traps as a matter of course, use poisoned weapons and superior numbers to overwhelm the enemy, and are all male; to reproduce, they capture, rape, and impregnate human (or elven, etc.) women, who give birth to more goblins. These women typically don't last long as they are tortured and mutilated just for fun. Goblin Slayer is a high-ranking adventurer whose entire reason for living is to perpetuate total genocide against goblins. He's pissed at the high-ranked adventurers for letting them go unchecked, he's pissed that goblins overran his home and raped/murdered his entire family, and he is obsessed with killing them all in revenge, to the point that he pushes himself to the point of nearly dying just so he can keep killing goblins. Once, when forced to join up with a party (he prefers killing goblins solo), they run into an ogre, which causes all the other adventurers to crap their pants because of how dangerous it is... and Goblin Slayer has no idea what it is and dismisses it because it isn't a goblin. Goblin Slayer shows signs of normal humanity when he isn't actively on the hunt, and he even takes in a newbie adventurer when the rest of her party gets slaughtered by goblins on their first time out, but it's made clear that he is a very disturbed, mentally unhinged person whose sole reason for living is killing as many goblins as he can. He's a very damaged person, and there are signs that he's almost as much of a monster as the actual monsters; his newbie apprentice and new party members are a humanizing influence, as are the people he lives with when he's 'off the clock', but as soon as the prospect of killing goblins comes up he's an unstoppable murder machine again. It's a brutal and graphic story; not quite as dark as, say, Berserk, but the series is still young.

Planetes is pretty neat. I don't know how similar it is to the anime or not.

>>767 The anime is sublime. Haven't the faintest idea about the manga though.

I recently finished an ongoing shoujo manga called 3D Kanojo. Of course I'm gonna say right off the bat that this isn't for everyone especially if you don't enjoy a plot based on romance. I won't hesitate either though to state that it's one of the best titles within the genre that I've encountered so far. To summarize, the protagonist is a huge weeb who's given up on 3DPD but ends up developing feelings for a female outcast. It's an easygoing/heartfelt series. Unfortunately the paperback edition is only available in Nipponese which I think is tragic, because I'd purchase it in an instant otherwise. The art style is also very flattering and adorable. Each supporting character has their own chapters which I appreciate, I believe that's rare nowadays.

>>747 I'm still upset that they killed Kougami and left Uhara alone. I'm honestly curious over how things would've turned out if he was left alive. Poor babbu. Father turned into lifeless corpse.

Went to the book store the other day and picked up a bunch of stuff. Great Teacher Onizuka volume 2. I've seen some of the anime and I liked it. It's really nice. Aria Vol 2. Love the Anime and picked it up immediately. Kazue Amano's art is gorgeous! Mijeong by Byun Byung-Jun, a series of short stories dealing with youth, loss, love, and survival in the city. Very beautiful art. And Monokuro Kinderbook by Kan Takahama. I haven't really started on it yet.

The Walking Man Basically a short series of vingettes about your average salaryman finding the time to slow down, breathe, and really enjoy the simple things in life. Beautifully drawn with little dialogue.

>>793 That's really pretty.

>>146 >tranny >wanting a dick reverse trap?

I've recently been reading Space Brothers and I'm really enjoying it. It's set in the nearish future, about two brothers who want to go to space. It follows the older brother, who after years of being a bit of a deadbeat decides to finally chase his brother and apply for JAXA, the Japanese space agency. What follows is all the various trials and competitions that he needs to succeed in to follow his brother to space. I tried to post a screenshot but lainchan accused me of being a bot.

Tomie, or anything by Junji Ito honestly Tomie is about a girl who every guy that meets her falls in love. But, all of them end up murdering her and chopping her to pieces, only for her to regenerate in horrific ways, and she brings misfortune to the people around her

Slightly off topic, but can anyone recommend me a mystery and/or investigative manga or anime? I'm looking for something well written, like punpun or aku no hana except for mystery. All mystery manga i've seen are really...silly, which is a shame because the concept is really exciting, but the execution is always poor, full of huge mary sues that serve no purpose other than to look cool.

>>967 I'm not sure if it will suit your tastes, but 20th century boys has some mystery elements to it. (Though it's not really a traditional detective story.) It definetly doesn't have a self insert genius protagonist.

>>795 >FtMs don't exist kek Seriously though, it has all sorts of characters. MtF, FtM, cute glasses bundle of sticks, guy into crossdressing and so on and so on

Monster Musume! It's basically porn about monster girls, with comedy and drama and stuff. Really light-hearted and hot.

>>1000 >It's basically porn about monster girls I have basically two problems with that manga. First of all, the lore and story were pretty good at the beginning. The author could have made a godlike story about it, but no, he had to go for the "b-b-but I can't fuarrrk you because laws!" harem route. fuarrrk that, seriously. On the other side, man, I HATE the fact that it isn't just porn. Whenever I read/watch/play one of these tease-only things I end up dropping it because I want to see the character bang each other really hard and I know it'll never happen. fuarrrk that too. Miia best girl. My opinion is completely biased but it's only because of the disappointment I felt after a 10-12 chapters.

Anyone got something to recommend to me? I really enjoyed Berserk (especially the Golden Age arc) and Vagabond was also quite good. Atmospheric manga in a medieval/fantasy setting would be ideal. I tried Vinland Saga but couldn't get into it.

>>1003 Claymore

dorohedoro is about a guy trying to find the wizard who cursed him to have a lizards head. however, it quickly becomes way more intricate than just that, following multiple groups of characters whose story threads all become intertwined as they move closer to the truth of the world(s) they live in. it has a really great, grimy art style and sense of dark humor that suits the dark "hole" of a world it's set in to a tee. in fact it's basically the "low life" aspect of cyberpunk without the "high tech". the thing that stands out to me the most is the characters, and just how invested you become in their individual fates. even though many of them are on opposing sides you're always torn between who to route for as they're all likeable in their own ways. i know most of this has been pretty vague but i don't want to spoil even one bit of it, it's just that damn good.

Confession time. I have never actually read any manga. My anime tastes are in the vein of lain, Paranoia Agent, and Perfect Blue. Could anyone recommend me well-written manga with similar themes?

>>1001 I feel like it's a matter of expectations. If you go in expecting porn or something serious, you're not gonna have a good time. If you go in expecting comedy and tits, you'll be quite pleased. It is pretty darn sexually explicit though, for what it is.

>>1011 I didn't have any expectations. I went there to see what I could find, and all I found was wasted potential to create a great story with porn.