386 MANGA
Anime releases in the mid-to-late 1990s, such as Dragon Ball Z and Pokemon ,
helped to raise the profi le of manga to the level of a major publishing force. One new
publishing upstart, Mixx Publications, began publishing shojo titles that were then rare
in the United States, such as Sailor Moon. Mixx, which was later renamed Tokyopop,
revolutionized how manga was published in America. While other publishers were
printing manga in the format of comic books before compiling them into digest format
paperback collections, Tokyopop bypassed the comic book format entirely, publish-
ing titles in a signifi cantly cheaper paperback format designed to mimic the original
Japanese editions. Tokyopop promoted their manga titles to major bookstore chains,
particularly the Borders and Waldenbooks chain, rather than direct-market comic
book stores. Eventually, all of the major American manga publishers would adopt a
similar business model, selling hundreds of titles in high volume at all of the major
bookstore chains as well as many of the major media retail outlets and online. By the
mid 2000s, some manga titles were appearing on bestseller lists, attracting the notice
of some of the largest book publishers. Viz became a publishing subsidiary of the Japa-
nese publishing conglomerates Shogakukan and Shueisha, and Tokyopop negotiated
a business partnership with HarperCollins. DC Comics founded a manga publishing
imprint, CMX. Random House began publishing manga under a new branch of its
science fi ction and fantasy imprint Del Rey, in partnership with the Japanese publisher
Kodansha. Finally, Hachette Book Group founded Yen Press to publish original titles
as well as licensed content from Japan.
Manga’s explosive popularity in America has additionally led some American and
European artists and writers to explore the style. As discussed previously, comic
artists such as Miller have been incorporating manga drawing techniques since the
1980s, often in comics that otherwise off ered little resemblance to manga. After
2000, however, Western artists began to create artwork that revealed a sincere
devotion to manga beyond simple emulation. Th is type of manga became known col-
lectively as OEL —Original English Language —manga. Signifi cant creators include
Bryan Lee O’Malley, creator of Scott Pilgrim (2004); Chynna Clugston, creator of
Blue Monday (2000), Becky Cloonan, creator of East Coast Rising (2006) and art-
ist for Demo (2004), written by Brian Wood; and Kazu Kibuishi, creator of Daisy
Kutter (2006) and Amulet (2008), as well as the editor for Flight , an anthology that
includes manga-inspired comics. Manga has also inspired a number of popular web-
comics, such as MegaTokyo and AppleGeeks , as well as video games, animation, and
other media.
In addition to its infl uence on the American comics industry, manga is also leading
a trend in what some are referring to as world comics , a style of comics that embraces
international themes and styles. By embracing manga style, creators from Europe, Asia,
and the Americas are able to craft work that crosses borders and interests.
Selected Bibliography: Gravett, Paul. Manga: Sixty Years of Japanese Comics. New
York: Harper Design, 2004; Kinsella, Sharon. Adult Manga: Culture and Power in
