Sometimes when I get frustrated, it helps to go
back and remember the reasons I got into this
hobby to begin with. This cel is not very
impressive to look at, but it's one of my great
treasures. Area 88 is an unusual series for me,
because it is one of the few series that I fell
in love with the manga before ever seeing the
anime.
VIZ started translating the series in the
mid/late-1980's (same time as Mai the Psychic
Girl?), releasing it in a standard comic format.
However, except for the flipping of the artwork
(still standard for a lot of translated manga,
and at the time the accepted way to publish
Japanese comics in the US), there were remarkably
few edits, and an apparently high quality
translation effort. At the time when I started
reading the comic, I was mainly into science
fiction and fantasy, and I only really collected
superhero comics. The fact that I was not only
entertained, but in fact captivated by this black
and white saga of a young whiney Japanese pilot
stuck out fighting in the deserts of North Africa
really says a lot about the quality of the story,
characters, and artwork. In fact, I have to rate
the author, Shintani Kaoru, as one of my favorite
manga artists.
Anyway, the story took a lot of soap opera-like
twists and turns, but the most interesting and
heart-rending of all was the story of Saki
Vashutal, the prince of Asran. He was a great
tragic hero, siding with his uncle against his
own father and brother in a country waging a
bitter civil war, and leading a bunch of rough,
mercenary fighter pilots from a secret base
through all sorts of dangerous, potentially fatal
missions, unafraid to take the risks to do the
things that had to be done. D*mn, he was cool!
When I finally saw the OVAs, I was a little put-
off by his Japanese voice (of course I had
imagined his voice differently), and also by the
subtle, yet significant, differences between the
manga and anime artwork. However, it was still
Area 88, and he was still Saki.
When I started collecting cels I tried to find
some from Area 88. But the only ones I could
find at that time were REALLY expensive - cels
aren't that common from those OVAs. Not only
that, but finding a cel of SAKI was almost
impossible - when I did see cels from Area 88
they were always cels of Shin (the main
character). I had pretty much resigned myself to
never owning a cel from Area 88. However, when I
came to Japan I went to Anime World Star and
found a few lower-quality, inexpensive cels from
Area 88! I was ecstatic! Even if they were cels
of McCoy and Ryoko, at least they were from Area
88! I also started browsing Japanese cel dealer
pages, and one day I stopped and almost
screamed. Saki! I found him! He was on a
Japanese dealer's page. My Japanese wasn't that
great, but I decided to take a chance and order
him. And I got him!
Other people would look at this and see a cel of
a guy with his eyes closed, stuck to a pencil
drawing. I look at this cel and see one of my
favorite characters from one of the best scenes
in the OVA. So his eyes are closed. So what?
That's not what's important. Look closely. He's
LAUGHING! Saki's life pretty much sucks. How
many times do you think he actually gets to
laugh? How many times in the OVA series does he
even smile? But this scene was beautiful. Shin
was leaving Area 88, and all the rough, tough
mercenaries were taking off to go with him to the
border. They were just a bunch of old softies
after all! And so Saki laughed.
I can't recommend the manga highly enough. If
you can find the back issues, VIZ translated 40-
something issues of standard size comics, and
then they continued the translations for a while
in Animedia magazine. Unfortunately, they
stopped translating around volume 8 of the
Japanese tankouban (there are 23 all together).
But it's a fantastic series. Now go, find it!
Read it! Love it! ^_^
Seriously though, I hope you feel better about
the hobby. Try not to let the stupidity of
others ruin it for you. It's fun to read your
posts on this and other message boards.
Jennifer
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