Gangan Mangaka Punished with Upside-Down Printing
- Categories: Manga, News
- Date: Mar 25, 2013 22:10 JST
- Tags: Mangaka, Production Controversy, Shonen Gangan, Square Enix
Square Enix manga magazine Shonen Gangan has astonished readers by deliberately printing a manga upside-down “as punishment” for the author missing a deadline.
The manga in question, Haru ni Naru Uzuuzu Shichau by Fumi Fujimura, has been serialised in Monthly Big Gangan since 2011.
The most recent edition saw 8 pages printed upside-down, with a right-side-up note printed on the page stating that:
“As punishment for Fujimura-sensei breaking a deadline, the manga will be printed upside-down. We apologise for causing readers annoyance with this inexcusable measure.”
The odd punishment has provoked a distinctly mixed reaction:
“This is a joke, right?”
“Editorial onanism? Wouldn’t it be more sensible to reduce the mangaka’s pay?”
“Even as a marketing stunt this is a bit lacking. I guess they didn’t want to use blank pages either.”
“Just sack the mangaka already!”
“These magazines give the impression that their editors are a bunch of children…”
“This is at least quite entertaining to see once in a while.”
“In spite of the deadline the editors seem to have plenty of time to mess around like this!”
“This is just taking things too far.”
“I can’t believe they did this without Fujimura’s consent. It’s quite entertaining… will they restore it for the tankobon?”
“Just a publicity stunt, surely. They have been doing this kind of stuff too much lately.”
“So now the readers get punished along with the mangaka? What is wrong with these companies…”
“Somebody is going to ask for a refund, like when they manage to print pages out of order.”
“Don’t involve the readers in this stuff!”
“It certainly seems Gangan is not doing too well these days.”
“This must have really confused the printers…”
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here's a question, is the text upside down or the complete pages? if it's just pages couldn't you just flip the manga while you read those 8 pages..?
Everything is upside-down, so yeah you can just flip it.
SPECIAL ISSUE: UPSIDE-DOWN CHAPTER.
Marketing strategy right there.
SPECIAL ISSUE: EVERY PAGE IS UPSIDE-DOWN.
Wait...
I wonder if the anime will be upside down too...
Zura, when upside-down chapter of Gintama will be out?
Yeah you could, but then you'd have to go through the pages like we westerners do. Totally impossible
It wouldn't be so funny to them if 50% of the readers suddenly ragequit and stopped buying their shitty upside down manga.
So they are apologizing for an inexcusable measure that they have taken deliberately.
This makes my brain ouch.
complete nonsense
why is this even an issue to literally anyone, does no one posess the amazing state of the art technology known as 'rotating the magazine to read it correctly'.
I can not for the life of me understand why people are getting all ragey about it.
I thought it was pretty funny, its obviously just a joke.
Exactly my thoughts.
Because it was an incredibly stupid and retarded way to "punish" the author. Fucking moron.
It may be a 'joke', but it's incredibly UNPROFESSIONAL. This isn't a school newsletter or a university newspaper, it's a professionally-edited, commercial magazine- something people PAY FOR.
This just shows that the editors and staff of the magazine have no standards of professionalism and makes you wonder how petty they would be in the case of a *REAL* problem?
Someone is in denial.
If the editors really wanted to fuck with us, they should have the cover be a collage of high quality artwork then fill the magazine with blank pages.
genius anon strikes again
So the next time a mangaka misses a deadline, he should submit his work upside down to the editors so when the editors flip it when they publish it, it'll be the right side up! Lesson learnt.
I think it would be fair to have a public reading, while the mangaka is upside down. That would be a more reader-friendly stunt.
This type of petty little passive-aggressive, public 'humiliation' is what passes for revenge in japan. Funny thing, like that time when my company refused to listen to request from a yakuza and they just sent this one fuckin bitch punk chinpira to our lobby to sit there and threaten people.
It was funny watching him slink away with a bow-gait after the security threw him out the front door.
Can't people just turn the magazine/ manga around for a few pages? It's not really much of an inconvenience. If they really wanted to screw with both the author and the readers they should have horizontally flipped all the characters so you could only read it in the mirror. But god forbid that'd take them -effort- to do.
The pages would be out of order. They'd have to first read the left page from right to left, then jump to the right page. It's not that big of a deal, but the effect can't be completely negated. IMO readers should boycott Gangan this month (or demand a refund if they already bought it) to punish Square Enix for involving the readers in their pathetic internal squabbels.
"As punishment for missing our deadlines, we will inconvenience your readers!"
".. on second thought we will cause inconvenience to OUR readers!"
It's like going to a McDonald's and having the manager spit in your burger, because the employee didn't make it fast enough. Not so brilliant, are we?
It won't bother us who likes to read manga online. The translator will make it normal again.
hah so it actually encourages ppl to read online instead of buying the magazine... really brilliant move
I'm pretty sure it's meant to stop readers from reading the manga for a sec so they can be notified of an irresponsible mangaka's deeds. If the readers think, "This mangaka is irresponsible with deadlines," that might decrease the popularity of the manga in the magazine and encourage its ending and replacement with another series instead.
If you ask me, that's worse for a mangaka than decreased pay.
This isn't about trolling the readers nor really punishing the mangaka, it's just more like a joke between a mangaka and her editor.
Why are you a pikachu?
Why aren't you?
Because he has a dick?
;-)
Seems to unprofessional to be anything other then just that a joke between the two.
God is a Pikachu.
Awful.
he is god!!!!!
GOD DOESNT EXIST!
God does exist!
The only problem I could see arising is with those double page landscape shots.
It's like DRM on games = pure shit, FUCK YOU SHONEN SHIT STAIN.
want me to wash off your shounen stain? ;)
At least, it isn't a bloody mirror.
new punishment - filthy foreigner print edition, everything is flipped
And in broken English barely matching the original story.
What a bunch of fucktards.
Lol, deadline = still have time to edit each page to be upside down.
They took less time in rotating the pages than me or you writing these comments, believe me.
Troll logic.
I hate how this site had no moderation... smh
somebody please call an exorcist?
In the states, the artists make the rules, if they miss a deadline, they simply just get docked pay or don't get published in time, but from what I've read artists are pretty much slaves, here, that type of public humiliation would be grounds for a law suit.
mangaka is now legend
it's hard to rotate the magazine to read it, and this is silly, I mean why would you not just cut his pay?