Michael B. Jordan's Favorite Anime List Might Be A Sign Of A Bigger Problem

Japanese publishing giant Shueisha launched Shonen Jump in 1968 to compete with Weekly Shonen Sunday ("Urusei Yatsura") and Weekly Shonen Magazine ("Hajime no Ippo.") It distinguished itself from the competition by what Takeo Udagawa, in his cultural history "Manga Zombie," calls the "Great Two" system. The first was "watertight contracts binding artists exclusively to the publication." The second was "comprehensive reader surveys." Each magazine carried a poll in which readers voted for their favorite comics and characters. If artists fared poorly, they had to change or face expulsion. That's not to say Jump was against racy or experimental material. One of its first big hits was "Harenchi Gakuen," a controversial sex comedy by "Devilman" creator Go Nagai. Per Mainichi Daily News, "school PTAs across Japan campaigned strongly against it." But the comic sold well, and kids wrote in to say their parents "were reading much raunchier stuff than [Nagai] was producing."

Jump had other successes in its early days, including the comedy series "Gutsy Frog" and the boxing saga "Ring ni Kakero." But it wasn't until the 1980s that the magazine truly erupted. Akira Toriyama's "Dr. Slump" was the most innovative comedy of its time and inspired a 1981 anime series that lasted for over 200 episodes. In 1983, "Fist of the North Star" combined martial arts with "Mad Max" costuming to phenomenal effect. Then came Toriyama's 1984 series, "Dragon Ball," the blueprint for all subsequent action comics published in the magazine. Its paneling, story structure, and stylized designs inspired a generation of artists. Toriyama himself would always prefer the anarchic "Dr. Slump" to the comparatively structured "Dragon Ball." But there was no doubt what Jump's readers loved best.

Shonen Jump has continued to evolve in recent years. A mobile app released in 2019 made thousands of issues accessible to readers for just $1.99 a month. While the price increased this year to $2.99 a month, it's still one of the best deals in comics. Many of Jump's biggest contemporary hits, such as "Spy x Family" and "Akane-banashi," hail from the web-based Shonen Jump+ branch rather than the magazine itself. The artist that best embodies the spirit of Jump+ is Tatsuki Fujimoto. While his series "Chainsaw Man" began serialization in the magazine, his debut "Fire Punch" was serialized in Jump+. Fujimoto followed the first part of "Chainsaw Man" with two Jump+ exclusive one-shots, "Look Back" and "Goodbye Eri." After a hiatus, the second part of "Chainsaw Man" has since been released on Jump+. Artists like Fujimoto have benefited from the looser content restrictions of Jump+, allowing for weirder and wilder material that might otherwise be out of place next to "One Piece."

Anime based on Shonen Jump properties have also changed. In the early 2000s, series like "Naruto" and "One Piece" ran for hundreds of episodes alongside the ongoing manga. Today, while some ongoing series like "Boruto" remain, others like "My Hero Academia" are made and released seasonally. The quality of each episode is relatively consistent, and in the case of "One Piece," exceptional. Films based on Shonen Jump properties have also been unusually successful in recent years. "Demon Slayer: Mugen Train" rode the popularity of its previous TV adaptation and the stresses of post-Covid Japan to become 2020's biggest film. While previous Shonen Jump films were non-canonical playgrounds for animators to go wild, "Mugen Train" was a canonical new installment based on manga material.

Before I raise anybody's hackles, I should add that many of the most popular anime abroad has nothing to do with Jump. "Attack on Titan," the series that inaugurated the legal anime streaming boom in 2013, began in the pages of Bessatsu Shonen Magazine. (Shonen Jump rejected his initial one-shot, which I imagine haunts the magazine to this day.) "Fullmetal Alchemist," which began my love affair with anime and manga, ran in Square Enix's Monthly Shonen Gangan. Not to mention "Sailor Moon," which remains a generational touchstone despite being poorly served over the past few years. Or "Pokémon," which is its own beast entirely.

Other mediums have inspired popular anime adaptations in recent years. Light novels, a vein of anime-inspired young adult fiction published in Japan, inspired anime franchises like "Sword Art Online" and "Monogatari." The web fiction site Shosetsuka ni Naro (Let's Become a Novelist!) has been highly influential recently due to high-profile adaptations of "That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime" and "Mushoku Tensei." Crunchyroll partnered with the Korean comics publisher Webtoon to adapt "Tower of God" and "The God of High School" in 2020. Meanwhile, the success of "Castlevania" on Netflix led to a glut of animated video game adaptations. One of these, "Cyberpunk: Edgerunners," walked away with anime of the year at Crunchyroll's 2022 Anime Awards.

There are reasons to be nervous about Shonen Jump's grip on the imaginations of anime and manga fans abroad. The first and most pressing is the magazine's historical role in corporatizing manga production. In "Manga Zombie," Takeo Udagawa writes manga have always been "works of art and commercial products at one and the same time." Even so, the epochal success of Jump in the '80s represented something new: the mastery of manga as a commercial product, shifting the balance of the whole industry in the process. "The only expertise publishers now cared about was how to sell manga in greater volumes," Udagawa says. "What mattered was pressing the reader's buttons with pinpoint accuracy."

Another reason is that despite its significant female readership, Shonen Jump remains a sexist institution. In 2019, an anonymous Twitter user quoted HR from the magazine's publisher Shueisha. While a woman could be hired as an editor at Shonen Jump, the HR representative said, "You have to understand the hearts of boys." This sounds eerily similar to the words of former Ghibli producer Yoshiaki Nishimura, who told The Guardian that compared to women, "men ... tend to be more idealistic — and fantasy films need that idealistic approach."

Yet both statements are quaint compared to Jump's history. In 2020, "act age" writer Tatsuya Matsuki was charged with committing "a coerced indecent act on a female middle school student." In 2017, "Rurouni Kenshin" creator Nobuhiro Watsuki was charged with possession of child pornography. In 2002, Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro was caught paying a 16-year-old girl for sex. Not only has "One Piece" creator Eiichiro Oda continued to give Watsuki a platform, but Shimabukuro went on to publish popular series like 2008's "Toriko" in the magazine. Only Matsuki has so far been blacklisted.

But the world of manga is so much bigger than "Shonen Jump." You don't need to look that far afield to find comics in the vein of "Chainsaw Man." The work of Shuzo Oshimi, whose breakthrough "Flowers of Evil" was published alongside "Attack on Titan" in Bessatsu Shonen Magazine, is similarly preoccupied with adolescence, sexuality, and the apocalypse. Elsewhere, Weekly Shonen Sunday has been serializing Q Hayashida's "Dai Dark," which features grotesque monster designs and a quirky sense of humor "Chainsaw Man" fans might recognize. Hayashida's earlier series, "Dorohedoro," was adapted into an anime produced by "Chainsaw Man" studio MAPPA in 2020. All of these works are now available in translation for English-speaking audiences. They might not be available in a web app, but you may be able to find them at your local library.

The great strength of Japanese manga is its variety. There are comics about cooking, business management, and soap. There are award-winning series for children and adults filling every possible niche. Many of these do not sell as well as comics published in Shonen Jump or other heavy hitters of the manga industry. But many sell just enough to establish themselves as viable alternatives. Each small success empowers the business as a whole. This same dynamic can be seen in countries like France, where comics are treated as a medium rather than a genre. Shonen Jump is famous there, but they've also published avant-garde artists like Atsushi Kaneko. Not to mention that France has its share of comic legends, including Jacques Tardi and Manu Larcenet.

For manga and anime to truly be viable abroad, they must thrive outside the walls of Shonen Jump. Thankfully, there are comparative examples to draw upon in the manga publishing industry. One of the most popular horror comics artists in the U.S. is Junji Ito, who has transformed from a cult artist to a publishing sensation. Viz has released so much of his back catalog to meet this demand that they've arguably diluted the appeal of his work. Not everything he's produced is at the same level as "Uzumaki," after all. But other publishers like Kodansha have capitalized on Ito's success by publishing work by other Japanese horror artists, including Masaaki Nakayama and Kanako Inuki. Even small publishers like Star Fruit Books have gotten in on the action, returning the likes of Hideshi Hino to print.

In a speech at the 2020 Golden Globes, "Parasite" director Bong Joon-ho said that "once you overcome the one-inch-tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films." You could say the same for anime and manga. There is so much more on offer than just Shonen Jump. Sure, the app is convenient. I suspect the magazine's editors have more respect for the art form than their harshest critics admit. The best anime adaptations have enough great episodes to dissect for years. Not to mention that revisiting old favorites with friends can be fun in its own right. But Shonen Jump should be the beginning of your journey through the medium, not the end. Great wonders exist elsewhere. You just have to be willing to open the door and travel that world without roads.