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Media Blasters, Del Rey Announce New Manga Licenses

At the MangaNEXT convention in Secaucus, New Jersey this past weekend, representatives of Media Blasters and Del Rey Manga unveiled several new titles. MangaNEXT is North America's first and only manga-oriented convention which was held for the second time this year.

Media Blasters will be releasing Akihabara @ DEEP, Makoto Akane's six-volume manga adaptation of Ira Ishida's novel of the same title. It was originally serialized in Comic Bunch magazine. The manga does not deviate from the story of the novel, which deals with six super-fans who band together to resolve the various problems and issues that residents of Tokyo's Akihabara geek mecca neighborhood face in their daily lives. Akihabara @ DEEP is also the source of an 11-episode live-action TV series and a feature film. Earlier this year at Anime Expo, Media Blasters confirmed that it will be bringing this film out under its Tokyo Shock label.

Media Blasters' second new manga acquisition is Ai Morinaga's Strawberry-chan no Karei na Seikatsu ("The Mangificent Life of Strawberry-chan"). Morinaga is best known to American readers as the creator of Your and My Secret and My Heavenly Hockey Club and the script writer of the 1994 children's anime film Junkers Come Here. Media Blasters also announced that it will use the title Fujoshi Rumi for the previously announced license for the Mōsō Shōjo Otaku Kei manga.

Del Rey also announced new licenses for manga and other media. It will be releasing Yu-Ko Osada's Toto! The Wonderful Adventure, a five-volume series about a boy who comes across a dog wearing an experimental collar. Their second new manga title will be Haridama Magical Cram School, from Venus Versus Virus creator Atsushi Suzumi. In addition, Del Rey will bring out Aaliyah's novel Maid Machinegun. Del Rey's final announcement was that it will be releasing selections from Kodansha's prose and art magazine Faust. Just some of the creators who have been contributed to its pages include Hajime Ueda (FLCL, Q-ko-chan), Tatsuhiko Takimoto (Welcome to the N.H.K.), and Death Note artist Takeshi Obata.

Del Rey also clarified two announcements made earlier in the year. Akira Hiramoto's Me and the Devil Blues will be published in a two-volumes-in-one format, while the first two volumes of Hiro Mashima's Fairy Tail are slated for simultaneous release on March 25 of next year.