Suppli 3
December 19, 2008
I had meant to link to a campaign on Manga Recon about saving the series, since it looks like volume 4 may be delayed indefinitely, but the Tokyopop difficulties from this week kind of overshadowed it. Instead though, read this great article about cancelled series in general, and steps you can take to save them yourselves. And remember: please, please buy Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. I can’t stress this enough.
I feel like this was probably a gift from Tokyopop for everyone who was following Tramps Like Us when it ended earlier this year. I didn’t quite pick up on this until after I’d read Tramps Like Us recently. The two are very different series, but series starring working women like this are definitely few and far between in English. Come to think of it, maybe Tramps Like Us was a gift for everyone who followed Happy Mania, too, since it it started just before the last volume of that came out. Again, the two are nothing alike, but Shigeta is (mostly) a working woman, if not really a “professional.”
It seems to take me a minute to get myself re-acquainted with all the characters when I start into each volume of this series, which is part of the reason I love having character intros and a plot summary at the beginning of my manga volumes, something sadly lacking in most books (but present here! on a side note, Tokyopop is my favorite for next volume previews, too). It doesn’t take long to remember what happened at the end of the last volume: Fujii’s new beau is dating one of Fuji’s coworkers on the side. Fujii lacks the courage to ask him directly about this, but her coworker doesn’t lack the courage to antagonize Fujii to try and get her to back off.
Amusingly, the two actually wind up working together and forging a sort of friendship and strong working relationship when they get stuck with a rather large and famous talent on what is apparently a hopeless project. I like the work aspect of this series far better than I did in any of the other josei-like series I’ve read so far, and I like that the character can be so far into her work that she can forgive and forget any personal problems, or use work to forgive and forget personal problems, at any rate.
The volume ends on a fairly positive note all around, with things looking good for Fujii and all her friends. This leaves a drama vacuum for next volume, which will perhaps be kicked off by the spurned girlfriend who seems to be accepting things with a good amount of class in this volume. Hmm.
I don’t often talk about the art in series, but it is notably beautiful in this one. Occasionally this gets in the way of the storytelling, because I have more trouble placing characters in settings here than I do in other series, but I absolutely love the compositions and the somehow… well, lyrical way everything is drawn. One of my favorite touches was the symbol the author took to using to show when Fujii’s mind was on other things while she was doing something else, usually in the sense of multitasking things at work.
It’s quite beautiful, and I have to say I’ve grown to like it after my initial negative reaction to the first volume. It’s far more mature than other josei series I’ve read, and I truly appreciate the realistic portrayal of Fujii’s life. I certainly hope to see the fourth volume sometime, if not soon then eventually. I’d hate to see Tokyopop break their tradition of really solid josei titles.
December 19, 2008 at 8:30 am
i think there is no hope for volume 4. and it kills me because of that last statement she makes…how she didn’t know she was pushing him away….makes me want volume 4 so bad.
December 21, 2008 at 7:10 am
I’m pretty hopeful. Tokyopop generally doesn’t cancel series, so I’m hoping things will start moving again when sales in general start to go up once more. That may take awhile, and by that time everyone may have forgotten, so there’s no reason to continue, but… I can hope!
December 23, 2008 at 3:52 pm
[...] with vols. 1 and 2 of Dark Metro at Yellow Menace. At Slightly Biased Manga, Connie checks out vol. 3 of Suppli, vol. 2 of Time Stranger Kyoko, Dear Myself, vol. 1 of Croquis Pop, vol. 6 of Bastard, vol. 3 of [...]