The setting takes place in a world where chocolate and other fun things in life are illegal. Media and propaganda vehicles take the message of eating healthy to your home and streets. Much of the technology featured in Chocolate Underground is a blur between the past, present, and future. Trucks that transform into mechs and ways of detecting chocolate are just some of the future aspects. Yet it has normal television sets and helicopters. All this to enforce the law of selling, producing, and eating of chocolate and other naughty things like fireworks. Chocolate soymilk is healthy, why must they ban that? The two boys Huntley and Smudger aren’t fans of these laws, which will bring them into the illegal practice of secretly helping people get chocolate.

Huntly = hunt and Smudger = smuggler?

Each episode is short because the anime is an ONA, anime that originally airs on the Internet. Chocolate Underground is lightly based on the British novel called Bootleg by Alex Shearer. For an anime not aired on television or in theaters the animation is pretty good. The start shows how seriously these laws are taken, even for something so little. Personal property means very little.

Youtube Interview Contest

If you’re willing to answer questions from the community and are willing to have it on Youtube, we’re looking for you. Just need a webcam or way to record yourself. Comment, send a message, or post in the Community Kinship forum for info. There will be a prize.

Know of a forum, site, or Livejournal community willing to have a joint graphic contest? The idea is that users of both places give their works, then votes are counted up from both. Ask for details.

Anime publisher ADV ended the magazine Newtype USA and replaced it with a general media magazine PiQ. Of course subscribers weren’t happy getting something unrelated to what they paid for. It also didn’t help that a reputation of insulting and poking fun of its reads was growing. Without much shock PiQ has ended after four issues. This could also be another sign that ADV as a whole is having problems and perhaps near an end themselves?

The mainsite for PiQ does hint at more news coming soon. Newtype USA was making profits when it was published, why ruin it? But it’s true that it was expensive and in theory it didn’t help grow interest in anime and manga with non-fans.

It is quite unfortunate that amazing manga like this will rarely see the light of day outside of japan. Wether it be the series is considered too short or that people don’t believe that it would do well, it is when you come across a manga like this that you really just hope that someone notices it’s brilliance and decides to pick it up for translation. For those who have read this series you no doubt enjoyed it and agree with what i’ve said. As for everyone else, if you are a fan of romance then I cannot recommend this enough. It rivals Kanon 2006’s Makoto story arc which (IMO) was 1 of the 2 best and saddest romance stories i’ve encountered. This is a short series that only runs for 5 books, and was made quite awhile ago but it still remains a brilliant work. However lets get on with the point of all this.

STORY

We follow a man by the name of Yoshizumi Ikuru who lives in the future. As I read this series over 4 or 5 months ago I cannot remember exactly if you find out how old he is but he seems to be around his eairly 20s. Unfortunately due to a major traffic accident when he was young that claimed his parents, he is now close to dying. He was able to survive and avoid his imminent death by scientists grafting body parts of another person onto/into him. This allows him to live but not for much longer. As he only has short time left to live, he turns in his application for an Ai-Ren. What is an Ai-Ren? Well as the manga puts it they are

“Human beings made out of artificial genes with the purpose of relieving the mental despair of a patient during his/her last moments of his/her life”

They are custom grown to suit the person they are given to. Unfortunately their life span is also not as prolonged as 1 would hope. They usualy die a few months after being “born” which in itself is quite sad but in this case is just worse. Ikuru decides to name his Ai-Ren simply Ai, as that is all she can say for the first few hours after taking her home. With both of the main characters introduced, the story now follows them together as they experience life together and eventualy fall in love with each other.

Characters

I figure more information on the main focus of this series wouldn’t be too out of order so i’ll go into some further depth of the characters. There are more that you meet but Since 90% of the story is based on 2, I will only go into detail about them.

Ikuru: He is a rather intelligent person who often has dreams/nightmares about his impending death and about his body’s deterioration. Sometimes these are so severe that they leave him unable to eat or even move due to bodies reaction. He doesn’t seem to mind cleaning and is pretty good at cooking too. He is an exceptionaly kind and understanding character that unfortunately feels cut off from the rest of the world. He seems to feel guilty about applying for an Ai-Ren but that later disappears through time when he becomes truly happy he did.

Ai: Born/grown at the request of Ikuru in a lab. She physicaly looks about late teens, eairly 20s but since her mind requires a short span to mature to her physical age, she acts very childish at first. Drawing on walls and never being able to stay still and the like. Although her personality is designed to compliment Ikuru’s, she seems to enjoy flashy things in life such as rock music which Ikuru doesn’t. She learns to play the piano thanks to Ikuru but soon passes him in skill and picks up the guitar as well. Together with Ikuru they grown vegetables outside of their country house. She keeps a diary of her life with Ikuru and always writes in it about her day and what happened.

Final Comments

Unfortunately that is about as much as I am able to write up about this due to it being short. However don’t take that as a bad thing has writing any more would just spoil it for the people who wish to read it. If you are looking for a great romance series that wont suck up too much of your time then I cannot suggest a more perfect book. It has great artwork in it that is minimalistic at times, but really shows a sense of the atmosphere and surroundings. A great read that should be on everyone’s list of “must read” manga.

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