Shaman King Nation

On April 18th “Ultimo” the joint created manga by Stan Lee and Hiroyuki Takei will be released in Japan. However, in a press release sent out by Viz today, some new information has been annouced.

On April 18th, the same day as the release in Japan, Stan Lee will be at New York Comic Con along with Takanori Asada (Editor, Jump SQ.), and USA’s Shonen Jump Editor-in-Chief Marc Weidenbaum to give some new information about the series. The annoucement at the time, will be that Viz has plans to release this manga series in the USA via their monthly Shonen Jump manga magazine. As an exact time of release has not been set, but it may only be a few short months after it’s release.

In the press release, Stan Lee states, “I am deeply honored for this great opportunity to collaborate with an award-winning artist/writer of the stature of Hiroyuki Takei.  I enthusiastically expect that the combination of an American story-telling style merged with Takei-san’s acclaimed Japanese style will result in our joint creation ‘ULTIMO’ presenting an original, exciting type of manga that will appeal to comicbook fans around the world”.

Along with this press release, several new facts and a summery of the story has been revealed:

• This is a prologue chapter (meaning there will be more chapters)
• 32 pages in the starting chapter
• 3 color pages (a single color page, followed by a double color page spread)

Summery of the story:

High above Farmless City, citizens are stunned by the sudden appearance of two floating figures. Are they human boys, monolithic robots, or something much more strange? As the battle ensues between them, destruction and devastation falls on the hapless city. One figure is Vice, and seems to be as evil as his name implies. The other is Ultimo, intent on trying to stop Vice from wreaking more havoc. But who are Vice and Ultimo really? Where did they come from? A new mystery begins with the fate of the world possibly hanging in the balance!

It is interesting to note, that “Vice” is the name of one of Takei’s characters in “Jyuki Ningen Jumbor” and “Ultimo” was original created by Stan Lee. However, neither of these characters appear to be connected to the Ultimo storyline. It’s fairly ironic that “Takei’s character” (Vice) will be playing the part of the antagonist, since Takei dislikes making characters that are “pure evil.” While Stan Lee has a tradition of creating characters with a more “dark side” and his “Utimo” is playing the line of the “good character.”

Along with this press release, the Japanese JumpSQ website also updated with some new Ultimo information. These come in the form of new images featuring the 2 main character. Please click the “Read rest of this entry” to view all the High Quality resolution image from the Ultimo section on the JumpSQ website.

With it’s not-yet-annouced US release, Ultimo will released in Jump SQII on April 18th in JumpSQ. You can have a chance to win a hand signed copy (by both Stan Lee and Hiroyuki Takei) of this issue by going to the following website, provided by Viz’s Shonen Jump website: www.shonenjump.com/ultimosweeps. Future chapters will most likely be in future JumpSQ issues. A set date has not been annouced yet or confirmed.

Shaman King Nation will continue to monitor this news story for both Japanese and English releases.

Updated on 4-06 and 4-07 for fixing dates.

Read the rest of this entry »

Today, May 4th, Volumes 3 and 4 of the Shaman King reprints were released. Along with this release, Shueisha also updated their websites. Click on the following links to view a sample of each volume:

Volume 3 Preview
Volume 4 Preview

Volume 3 contains chapters 21 through 31. While Volume 4 contains chapters 32-42 along with a “Funbari No Uta” (or Funbari Stories) special chapter. This special chapter is the same as the original Volume 5 print stort story at the end. With this pattern, it will appear that each volume will contain 11 chapters. If that is the case, this is the following chapter breakdown for the remaining 23 volumes:

Volume 5 -> 43-53
Volume 6-> 54-64
Volume 7 -> 65-75
Volume 8 -> 76-86
Volume 9 -> 87-97
Volume 10 -> 98-108
Volume 11 -> 109-119
Volume 12 -> 120-130
Volume 13 -> 131-141
Volume 14 -> 142-152
Volume 15 -> 153-163
Volume 16 -> 164-174
Volume 17 -> 175-185
Volume 18 -> 186-196
Volume 19 -> 197-207
Volume 20 -> 208-218
Volume 21 -> 219-229
Volume 22 -> 230-240
Volume 23 -> 241-251
Volume 24 -> 252-262
Volume 25 -> 263-273
Volume 26 -> 274-284
Volume 27 -> 285-295

Outside of prediction, several changes were made with Chapter 21 in Volume 3 reprint. The first 2 pages were removed. These pages were replaced with a single “cover page” on the third page of the chapter. It’s also interesting to note that, the 2nd page in the reprint chapter was completely redrawn.  On the Volume 4 reprint table of contents there is a letter “q” placed on the page. This is most likely a printing error.

Shaman King Nation will have a complete comparison of Volumes 1 and 2 soon, with a general summery comparison of Volumes 3 and 4 will be made once scans are found.

On April 4th, the second wave of reprint volumes will be released in Japan. Volumes 3 and 4, as listed below, are the two volumes to be released on this date. It is expected that Volume 3 will contain “Last Word Vol 2,” and both volumes to contain new Shaman Files. There has been no new updates on any additional extras in these volumes.

シャーマンキング　完全版 3
Shaman King Kang Zeng Bang 3

ISBN: 9784088742052
Format Size: A5
Pages: 232
Price: 1,000yen

シャーマンキング　完全版 4
Shaman King Kang Zeng Bang 4

ISBN: 9784088742059
Format Size: A5
Pages: 236
Price: 1,000yen

Based on the images from “Last Word” Volume 1, we can assume, the following:
Volume 5: Horohoro
Volume 6: Tamao (possibly doubled with Manta)

Shaman King Kang Zeng Bang volumes 3 and 4 will go on sale this Friday in Japan. Shaman King Nation will have updates from these volumes, as well as a comparison and review of Volumes 1-2 next week.

On Monday 24th, 2008, the official Jump SQ website updated it’s preview page. By clicking on the following link, you can scroll down and view the image that will be the pin-up poster in the next Jump SQ issue and a small promo banner image lower on the page.

Link: http://jumpsq.shueisha.co.jp/yokoku.html

A translation of the title can be  ”The Skilled Machine Boy Ultimo,” but this is hardly an official title. “Ki Ko Douji Ultimo” is another way of calling the Stan Lee X Hiroyuki Takei oneshot manga. For future reference, Shaman King Nation will refer to the manga as just “Ultimo.”

Based on the last image released and based on how the title is formed, it seems that this manga will have many parallels to Takei’s last manga series, “Jyuki Ningen Jumbor.” It appears that characters will fight with some type of modified hands. Either these people will be called “Ultimo” or possibly the main character is named “Ultimo.”

Ultimo will be released in the Japanese Jump SQ II on April 18th. 

On March 4th, Viz officially released Shaman King Volume 15.  This volume begins “Funbari Hot Spring’s” first battle in the Shaman Fight’s official tournament against the “Ice Men.”

MSRP: $7.95USD 
Length: 200 pages (actually 192, but who’s counting?)
ISBN: 1421516578

 I am extremely surprised on how few edits there are in this volume. This volume has ALL of the original background signs and lettering on “Funbari Hot Springs” clothing remain in Japanese. Sometimes an English translation is provided, other times not. It is assumed that once you read the translation once, you’ll remember it. Thanks Viz for doing less work. Sadly, the SFX is still being translated and wrote over with English replacements. However, this volume they don’t pop-up very much, and they have done a great job of keeping it small and not removing as much of the artwork as before. If you read my previous review, you’ll also notice that I was really against the “whiteboxing.” Thankfully, the whiteboxing has been removed, and the traditional placement of text, overlapping artwork (without a box) has returned. John Hunt did an excellent job redrawing in the images, instead of just adding bigger text. Very few spots were missed. There was so few edits, I don’t feel there is a need to do a chapter by chapter breakdown! Yes, it’s very good, quite possibly the single best volume of Shaman King released to date (in terms of edits). Personally, I think the story is dragged on a bit much here, so it’s not one of my more favorite volumes in terms of story. Also, alot of the material for the Shaman King Character Book “Man.Ji.En” came from this volume. However, Viz has no plans to release this special book at this time. If the book were to be released, it would be released around the time after Volume 20. This would be a 2009 release, if it were to happen.

So, if you haven’t purchased this volume yet, get on it! Volume 16 will be released on May 6th.

March 4th, 2008, it’s the begining of the end of Shaman King in Japan. So, I would like to take a moment to make note of the manga volumes that have been released:

United Kindom:
Shaman King Volumes 9 & 10
United States:
Shaman King Volume 15
Japan:
Shaman King Reprint Volumes 1 & 2

Please consult our Guide to Importing the Reprint Volumes for importing the reprint volumes from Japan. If you can, please purchase one of the books listed above. The fandom is based on purchasing these products. Shaman King Nation will have a review of Volume 15 once I go out and purchase it.

On a final note, Shaman King Reprint Volumes 3 & 4 will be released on April 4th, NOT April 1st, as originally predicted.

Shaman King Complete Edition (KanZenBan or Kang Zeng Bang) official website is now online.

Website front page contains :
- the 6 Kang Zeng Bang new features (Oversoul Covers, new 380 pages for the end …[see older post]) on the left,
- and the volume 1 cover on the right.

Website Menu is at the bottom, and there’s only two pages for the all website.
- The first one takes you to a page displaying all the volume, with a link to their preview via s-manga.net. Only links to released volume are available.
- The second one takes you to the message board, where you can give your opinion.

After previewing the first chapters on S-manga, I can say :

• 5 first pages of chapter 1 are colored, and volume 1 have chapters 1 - 9
• 4 first pages of chapter 11 are colored, and volume 2 have chapters 10 - 20
• There’s a [SHAMAN FILE] in each volume.

For the moment, we haven’t any more informations, and nothing about the extra.
I don’t know if the first page of all the chapters are colored, or only the volume first pages. But the extra colors pages we see are already colored and published in the artbook some years ago, so no new news ….
As for the chapters colors page, we can also guess that they’re already colored some years ago, because in the old edition, these pages are printed with these colored pages (look at the contrast level).

Once in a while, one of our news reporters will write an editorial about some aspect of Shaman King. While none of this would be consider “new” news, some aspects of these editorials may not be common knowledge. Our news reporters have been long time fans of the series (each averaging about 4 years a piece), and have studied the series and various other aspects of the series (such as ratings, products, controversies, .etc).  Today a new editorial has been updated to the site titled “Guide to Importing the Reprint Volumes.” You can find this editorial in the Editorial link at the top of every page, or click on this link:

Guide to Importing the Reprint Volumes 

The next Editorial will be called “The History of Shaman King, Part 2,” and it is currently being written. Please look forward to this editorial and future editorials along with the latest news right from Japan!

We’ve finally got a better version of the first two volume covers.

Remember, these “Oversoul Covers” have the oversoul : Amidamaru Spirit Ball form and Anna 1080’s on a separate overlay cover.