Remember

Remember - Benjamin (ZHANG Bin 本杰明) Appeal Characteristics:


I loved this story better than Orange. I love it because my dad use to tell me stories from his days in college as an artist...and he had this CRAZY artist girl-friend...and he knew he could never date an artist...so he picked a 'normal' girl who didn't know anything about art, my mom. Needless to say, that is not the premise of this story. There is a crazy artist with a crazy girlfriend. He is trying to navigate through the bureaucracy of the publishing industry in China...where comics should be "clean and made for kids." I love that this story illustrates that while there's a market for kids in comics why perpetrate that comics "HAVE TO BE" for children. The fact that the artists portrayed is such a mimic of world-wideart/music sub-culture...is so awesome! This story is packaged full of longing, regret, nostalgia, and the "unexamined life is not worth living."

Again, this one was translated a bit better than Orange. It was so bittersweet, It made me wish for some dark chocolate. Maybe, I just loved the subject matter more but the story telling was just so full of nostalgia--It had me going down brief memory lane about regrets of the "should've, would've could've" Anyway, the visualizations are just as rich and lush as Orange. You do get a few extra stories in Remember, too. You get one about a boy reminiscing about his college days, and the girl he loved. This just made my appetite for wanting to checkout other Chinese manhua. Sadly, I don't think Tokyopop is here anymore. Hopefully the digital publishing of titles will take off and I can score some more comics.

Red Flags: language, adult situations, sex, violence