Muddy is the perfect manga if you were to mention examples when you argue that female mangaka shouldn’t make shounen. It ended so soon and didn’t connect well with the Shounen Jump readers. Not really a reason not to read it, it’s a fun read. Clay was a promising smart person who grew up as a failure…more like as an ehh. What is he suppose to be good at? Making chimeras, artificial life. After a certain point, he’s fired too soon as he makes a human chimera from mud. The name of the new lifeform in the shape of a small child is Muddy. Because of Muddy’s innocense and wild nature, Clay decides to raise him. There’s plenty of action and you get to see the many sizes and forms of Muddy with his female form likely being the most popular.

Why should you read this manga is simple. It’s has a simple theme, only has twelve chapters, and little Muddy is very loveable. Volume one in Japane with all the chapters is out incase you wanted to add it to your collection.

So for those who read my Clannad Visual Novel write up or just like Clannad in general, I thought I would post about some items that are currently out and about to come out. There are only 2 but they are pretty worthy of money I think. Since these measurements are in centimeters, you’ll have to work out inch conversion for yourself if your in the US.

First up we have a Clannad Tapestry which looks quite nice. It measures 120cm x 65cm so physicaly it’s quite large which is a good thing. I’ve ordered this one today so I can’t say much for the quality of it but judging from the price i’d bet it’ll be really nice. Speaking of price, this currently runs for 4,000 yen, which works out around $38 US. A bit more expensive than what you would find at other online shops selling Hellsing or Naruto (eucgh) equivalents, but I’m sure that this is made up for in quality. My only gripe? NO FUUKO! WHAT GIVES?! She is the best character in the entire game/series and they leave her out?.

Next up we have a plush Botan which just looks adorable. He is about 18.5CM long and looks pretty much exactly as you would expect him to look. This little guy also sells for $38 US so again he isn’t cheap, but cmon… look how adorable he is. Awwwww. The only thing that would make him better is if when you hugged him or applied pressure to him, he viborated. Not sure if that was shown in the anime version but he does it in the Visual Novel. Yeah dont ask.

I’ll be sure to pick 1 of these up for my birthday

So it’s been awhile since I lasted posted something and figured that since my latest anime package just arrived I’d do a write up on 1 of the main things I bought. So here is my write up of the Lucky Star Limited Edition DVD 1 pack.

So no doubt many, if not most, of you have at least heard about Lucky Star. Many loved the show and an equal amount of people disliked it for it’s slow, pointless episodes. Being one of the former, when I heard that this show was getting an english dub I was straight away worried. It may be just me, but Lucky Star always seemed to be a show that is only good if you understood the many abundant culture refrences. If you are new to anime and hear characters talking about Otaku, Moe and “Flags” you would be very confused and miss many of the shows jokes; mainly made by Konata. However I will not go further into this as I am mainly concerned with the package itself and not the content of the show. Onward we go

Collectors Box
Straight away when I opened my package I saw the collectors box that this show comes in. While it isn’t excatly as big as I expect it to be, It is still as impressive. The box is covered, inside and out, with many colourful images of the characters of the show and is visualy extremely pleasent to look at. If you had this on display with other DVDs it is likely to be the first to grab your attention which is a great thing. 1 picture seems a bit out of place though. On the underside of the box (what I presure is the underside) is a picture of Kagami and Tsukasa in rather… interesting… poses with Konata off in the distance looking shocked. This picture wouldn’t be out of place in a form of H-manga which I think is odd for the box art. Still, for some this isn’t a bad thing so i’m surely not complaining about it. Opening the magnetic flaps at the top of the box reveals even more of the wonderful artwork that went into this. Both flaps have artwork on them (including a very nice picture of Konata in a maid outfit. Service anyone?) and the inside of the box itself has pictures of the character’s faces in it which is rather fitting. This box is ment to eventualy house the 6 DVDs that will be released so right now it may seem a bit oversized but that will be fixed soon enough.

Shirt
Now that the box is out of the way, the first thing I noticed was the shirt that comes with this. A white, XL shirt with the winter school outfit (known as Sailor Fuku) printed/swen into on the front. Personly I think that this shirt is something you would only wear around the house or when you are alone as being seen in public with this… well it just doesn’t seem right to me haha. The shirt seems well made so quality wise they did well with this as too. So far that is 2 good grades for this. Next up would be the 2 CDs that come with the set.

CDs
Included is the opening theme, Motteke! Sailor-fuku, and Lucky Star Character Song Vol.001 Konata Izumi. Each CD has 2 songs, and 2 instrumental version of those songs, making 4 songs in total on each CD. Since these CDs proved so popular in japan, it’s very nice that they added these into our boxed set. If you have seen any of the Haruhi Character Song albums then you can expect about the same type of artwork on the CDs that come with this. Motteke! Sailor-fuku is a great song with a very addictive and recognizable beat so this song automaticly gets a pass for me. I havn’t listened to the 2nd song on the album yet so I can’t comment on that. As for the Konata album, it is very unfortunate that the most popular character in the entire show (arguably) has such a standard album. Her songs are decent but no where near as good as what Kagami’s are, which is a shame. Still though they aren’t BAD so this also gets a pass from me. This should provide you with about 30 min of music give or take a bit if you listen to them both back to back.

Screen Wipe
Quite an odd little item burried underneath the Shirt inside the box. This item is a furry little chocolate cornet which I thought was going to be a lot bigger than what it actualy is. At first this was disapointing but what I didn’t expect was that this only houses the actual screen wipe. If you pull on the bit of cloth inside the cornet a bigger, but still small, cloth comes out that you can use to clean your screen or glasses I expect. Just dont pull on the cloth too much as I just did then because the cloth can actualy come completely out of the Cornet housing and then you are stuck with the annoying task of feeding the small thread back through it. Since i’m lazy i’m just going to leave it as it is. Despite it being small and semi-useless (unless you live in a dust filled room and why would you be?) I still think it was neat to add this so again another passing grade.

DVD
So the last part of this goodie filled box is the actual DVD itself. I guess I dont really have to mention anything about the show itself because if your buying this boxed set, you already like the show and know what you are going to get. The box art is very basic and when compaired to the collecters case and CD art, it seems very basic and flat. On the front is a big (and bad) picture of Kagami in a shrine maiden outfit who looks very angry to boot. No doubt this was supposidly drawn by Konata is she is always making fun of Kagami. On the back of the case we have a bit more to show off. The standard DVD seatures menu, episode list (4 per DVD) and DVD extras menu. All basic stuff you would find on any dvd. Incase you have forgotten in the few moments since you saw them last, is also a little bubble telling you what is contained in the special edition boxed set. Quite a pointless thing to add if you ask me but oh well. Inside we have a very nicely printed dvd and a fold out insert that has a bunch of show notes from the translaters about jokes you may not understand, random objects placed in the show and other things such as “Episode 4 – When Kagami can’t sleep, she is reading the novel Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo”. Mostly this is just full of useless info but it is very pleasent to have incase you dont get something. Yet again I give this a passing grade.

Overall
All in all, if you liked the Lucky Star show when you should invest in this because it is well worth it. It may seem a bit expensive but when you consider you are getting a shirt, 2 CDs (which sell for around $15 AUD each) and a screen wipe in addition to the dvd and a special box to keep everything in it is quite the bargin. I don’t regret paying for this awesome show at all and glad to support it. Now if we can only convince more companies to make special editions like this.

Hand’s is a shounen manga with a sports theme, but it really isn’t a sports manga. There’s two chapters scanlated by promfret, however, they have dropped it. Hand’s is a single volume series, though, so it’s very worth buying if you can read the rest. You have a young kid named Tachibana Daigo who is pro at handball, but has a loser dad who offers him to the handball coach. The coach also has a daughter Nishioka Mizuki who helps create the wonderful moments in this manga.

Hand’s is really action and drama with a tomboy and a short but very daring kid who wants to be a hero. At times Daigo seems almost unhuman and he’s sometimes is shown as so in subtle ways. Also like to state that this is one of the few manga that pulls off baggy clothing well.

Cloth Road volume six has just been released today. The author is the really highly thought of Hideyuki Kurata, the creator of Red or Die and Red x Hand. Cloth Road’s style will be the the part that will keep you reading, even though the plot is has a unique idea and premise, too. Battles with fashion and styled clothing with a pair that discover they have a sibling. Jennifer and Fergus are brother and sister, they have to fight in such tournaments in order to keep from becoming too poor. Who can someone battle with clothes? The story takes place in the future where computers have made it into clothes with very tiny nanobots inside. Then you’re likely thinking about why they’re fighting? All about the brand names.

The Cloth Road manga originally appeared in Ultra Jump, from the company that brings you Shounen Jump.

The forums is having its second birthday today. There’s an exclusive signature made for it with the Hand x Red manga. You can discuss it by dropping a comment or in this thread.