destroying all monsters

Yotsuba&! volume six disappears!

JUST WHEN I thought that ADV had, finally, got into its stride again with its Yotsuba&! manga releases, volume six, which originally seemed to be slated for a February 1st, 2008, release, has vanished.

The book had been listed on Amazon and other places for ages. We had official English cover artwork (pictured above, compare with this), and everything was looking nice and rosy.

February 1st, however, came and went. The shipping information on Amazon clicked over to the dreaded “three-five weeks”, and then, unsurprisingly, the online retailer informed me out of the blue that it would no longer be able to sell me the damn thing. ADV, nooo! Bad dog. I was going to post about this before, but life got in the way. Thing is, as the weeks tick over I guess the subject is as pertinent as ever.

Anyway, this is depressingly familiar territory for many fans of anime and manga series that are licenced to ADV. We’ve already had to put up with one considerable hiatus (two years!) in Azuma Kiyohiko’s outstanding series (see my previous blog post here), which has even become the stuff of biting satire.

This isn’t the only franchise to suffer. Gunslinger Girl, another series that was resurrected a year or so back, appears to have stalled again, just one volume ahead of Yotsuba&! on book six. If you’re French, you can purchase right up to the ninth in the series (released in late February 2008), as well as the missing Yotsuba&! 6, so translation problems can’t be the issue here (well they can, but it’s doubtful), even if the French are notoriously mad keen on their comic books.

Of course, our friends across the Channel also have the benefit of GG being produced by Asuka éditions and not ADV, while Azuma’s series is a Kurokawa title. Coincidence?

On a related note, I’ve already whinged enough about the lack of a UK release date for Makoto Shinkai’s 5cm Per Second, another ADV licence, but I’m sure there are probably several other franchises that are stuck in limbo, I only take note of series I’m interested in.

Now I’m sure that there are very good reasons why these titles haven’t appeared, but a little information from ADV would go a long way to putting people’s minds at ease (is it all related to this, for example?). There is nothing whatsoever about future books in either series on ADV’s website, and in this Internet age, this is no excuse.

Ultimately, what I’m saying to ADV is just release the goddam things! How difficult can it be?

There’s lot’s to look forward to. From the scanlations I have seen so far, volume six is great, while seven maintains the same high standard as the previous books. So let’s get this franchise going again.