Obscure Adventures in Geek and Nerd Culture

The Urushihara Lineage  Kurosawa school Mamoru Kurosawa  Hideyuki Morioka Tatsuya Oishi  *Do note that Mamoru Kurosawa still goes for a speedier direction more akin to that of Atsuko Ishida’s style instead. There also is a slight Masami Obari shade thanks to Urushihara being one of Obari’s friends, but it mainly feels somehow more similar to Norimitsu Suzuki’s own gliding school. Urushihara School Satoshi Urushihara  Nozumu Abe  *Urushihara is strongly influenced by Hideaki Anno’s, Akiyuki Shinbo’s and Masahito Yamashita’s early careers, but his style is otherwise more related to those of both Kawamoto and Hirata, even though it still stays rather close to Obari’s own. He also is one of the many unlikely influences of both Takahiro Shikama and his Okiura and Takahata-based junior Yutaka Nakamura. This likely means that most of the gliders are far more likely to be distant honorary cousins to at least 3 major processes; Norio Matsumoto’s speedy physics, Mitsuo Is...

In order for comic artists and illustrators to blend with each other regardless of gender, we can finally see the stylistic evolution of various Tarzan designs in comics, animation and artworks from the 1960s onward.  J. Allen St. John + Violet Oakley = Jack Kirby  Marvel figurehead Jack Kirby seldom drew Tarzan, although his art style’s more akin to those of both Oakley and St John’s art than to those of most other Marvel artists who later joined the Marsh/Buscema squish movement.  P.J. Monahan + Marion Senones = Burne Hogarth  Although Burne Hogarth’s art style was largely self taught, he did have major indirect influences in both P.J. Monahan and the French globetrotter Marion Senones, which resulted in his classical yet very dynamic art style having a strong French influence even into the 1970s.  Neysa McMein + Alex Blum = Roy Krenkel Roy Krenkel’s art is derived from both the realistic bodies of Neysa McMein and the blustering inks of Alex Blum. Ethel Hays ...

Apart from Rubi, which spawned its own bigger franchise, there is no Mexican adult comic as captivating as Rarotonga, even though it’s rather stereotypical by both Mexican and most developed countries’ standards. Otherwise, keep in mind that despite its inherent objectification and misogyny (racism is also pretty bad in the comic, albeit not as obvious as the moderately toned down sexism), it remains the better written (1970s onward) and more captivating reboot of a 1950s Mexican adult comic named Taboo, which itself couldn’t hold up much in as early as the sixties, rather tellingly due to being more blatantly flagrant in terms of sexism than even the original Astro Boy manga created in 1952.  As suggested by looking at her somewhat ambiguous features in such a comic (itself somewhat fair for its day), Rarotonga surely is one of Mexican comics’ first mixed race baddies to gain consistent international popularity (at least in much of Latin America). Although she’s confusingly called...

The Showa Children’s History series is an underrated look at the Showa period as it was known to people of many generations. 6 of the books are now in my collection. My first one is about jungle heroes and their ilk, as well as their impact on many cultures around the world.  Much of the book is dedicated to Yoshimasa Ikeda’s character Baalumba (Barumba), a book character who’s a very tall, snowman like pretty boy raised by wild jungle animals. He also spawned his own, somehow better known spinoff counterparts, Burūba (aka Zamba) and his own fan-made son Shōnen Burūba.  Since Kyuuta Ishikawa was a big mighty fan, he created Shōnen Burūba (1960-61) - the sequel of Kunio Watanabe’s manga tie in to the movie - and (childhood to adolescence-focused) Zamba (1962-64) - the manga set between the wild man’s adoption by beasts and his first full fling with romance. As a result, thanks to his unpredictable writing and mildly uncanny valley artwork for both semi-official tie ins to the B...