Thanks for the insightful question. Yes, Japanese comics have the opposite read of American comics. The read is from right to left. Typically, the entire page used to be flipped for translation if there was more than one panel on any given horizontal tier. If every panel covers an entire tier, there is no necessity in flipping the page because both cultures read from top to bottom. Occasionally, panels were flipped individually if, as you indicated, there was graffiti on the side of a building or any sort of large writing in the background. Sometimes pages were invariably flipped if, let’s say, the main character had an eye patch (more common than you might think).

These days, most manga is reprinted with the original reading direction. It saves so much time and teenagers seem to think it’s cool and unique, like watching undubbed manga with fan-subs.

As for these Akira pages, I can safely say they must have been flipped as a whole. There is more than panel per tier, and they could not have been individually flipped due to their unique interlocking shapes. Does that mean Kaneda was originally pushing from the right and his run to the left throughout the whole page? Yes, but the point remains. Otomo is keeping track of where he is on the page, and the run is in the direction of the read, no matter which language we are in!

Great question!

I do have a question, though, since Akira is still manga, and Japanese manga books are read from right to left, weren’t the pages mirrored when transitioning the book to the colored western edition? When you say “Notice how his push is always from the left, his run to the right throughout the whole page.” could that be a result of mirroring? I heard that sometimes mirrored things just don’t look well (flags, for example) and those panels have to be left as they used to be for the new diagram. Thus altering the whole comic book design.

I am seriously just asking this like, out of curiosity, because all that I’ve said before I’ve known from unreliable sources, and since you’ve taken the time and effort to analyze the material longer/harder than me (I only own Vol. 1…) I thought maybe you could enlighten me on that topic?

If it’s not a problem, of course!

Thanks so much for the support. I keep in touch with my former roommate Sean through his blog daily. It’s fantastic stuff, isn’t it? He’s a little more interested in the story side of comics than I have ever been, but his appreciation and understanding of the art side is more evident everyday. I’d love to do a magazine on comics with him where we split the reviews into story and art to play to our strengths…maybe some day!

My scanner bit it the other day so posts were interrupted. However, I’m staring at my beautiful new Epson, so expect more tonight. My class needs some info on character design.

I’ve always loved Oliff’s colors, and they seem so suited to Akira. I mean Domu really doesn’t need anything more. Even moody colors would take away from its creepiness. And if you’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing any of Otomo’s early short story work, in particular one in which a murderer has a moment of clarity seconds too late, I think you would agree color would spoil the starkness of the narrative. But Akira is widescreen in all respects. Baba O’Reilly meets Clockwork by way of Moebius needs color — if only to keep all the character’s straight over its thousands of pages. I only wish I had the full Epic run.

Oliff was really ahead of his time in terms of how he used computer colors. When Youngblood and WildC.A.T.s debuted at Image, everyone noticed, “Hey, those are a lot of colors on a page! Lookit how they do that.” But Brian Murray’s colors were hideous pastels, which became the house style for a bit (thanks, DIGITAL CHAMELEON (you can’t make that up!)), and I never loved Joe Chiodo’s omnipresent pinks. I’d rather see Jim Lee colored by Joe Rosas WITHOUT a computer like he was back on Uncanny. Rosas and others seemed overwhelmed by the choices Photoshop gave them, so they threw EVERY color in with meaningless gradients everywhere.

But Oliff never lost his design sense and beautiful palette. I would say the biggest reason people had to sit up and take notice of fledgling Image Comics was because suddenly overly-worshiped Todd McFarlane’s pages actually looked beautiful — and it was because Oliff gave them some mood that fit the tone of the setting and “story”. Suddenly all Todd’s absurd and superfluous tiny marks which cover absolutely everything were hidden by tone and made to blend into the overall image. Those gorgeous contrasting warm oranges and heavy blues gave Spawn an atmosphere McFarlane aimed for with his “serious” and adjective-less Spider-Man which always sported gaudy colors with giant white spaces between. Oliff made the whole work hang together, because, honestly, one should not be trying to find minuscule spiders or Felix the Cat, or considering whether EVERY damaged wall would really have plumbing in it when reading a comic. One should be READING. Oliff let us do just that on Spawn. (In retrospect, maybe he shouldn’t have.) And in the case of Akira, he added even more smarts to a book that wasn’t hurting for them in the first place!

By the way, it’s awesome that you’re using the Marvel Oliff AKIRA, now (alas) probably lost forever. His color job never ceases to impress me… especially considering the time.