You Better Work. Covergirl!
One of the rare delicacies afforded the comiXology columnist is the opportunity to escape the low class operation that is "paying for your comics like a chump" and to have them dispensed, gratis, courtesy of the publisher. It's an even tastier feast when A) it's something you'd actually be willing to pay for and B) except that you didn't know it existed. When it came to the English translation of a now-defunct series of non-fiction Japanese business manga about companies like Datsun, Nissin Cup Noodle, and Seven Eleven stories? You better believe I was interested.
[a]
The
Project X: Challengers series so far—and I'd venture a guess this will be true forever—consists of three volumes:
Cup Noodle,
Seven Eleven and
240Z. After reading them, I can tell you this: two of them work pretty well, and if you can track them down, and you're sort of a freak
[b], you'll probably enjoy them.
One of them isn't as good, and it's not worth the trouble. From looking at the prices on the Amazon marketplace, you'd probably make the mistake of thinking that the bad one is the one about the development of the Datsun 240Z. (For some reason, despite some websites advertising copies of these comics for two dollars, there are Amazon sellers charging upwards of 70 dollars for the Cup Noodle and Seven Eleven editions. 240Z, for whatever reason, is still under eight bucks.)
No, the only one of these comics that fails to do anything other than educate the reader on the corporate history of its chosen corporate venture
[c] is "The Miracle of 8.2 Billion Served, The Magic Noodle, Nissin Cup Noodle."
[d] Whereas the other two manga take the intelligent tactic of presenting their stories by focusing on the young amateur businessmen struggling against the conformist corporate mentality of their superiors, depicting their struggles as little mini-dramas (of which the happy ending is assured by the first pages, where the success has been made EXCITEDLY CLEAR BY AN OMNISCIENT NARRATOR USING
BOLD LETTERS),
Nissin Cup Noodle instead focuses on the team forced to work on a project designed and run by one of the company's corporate honchos, a man who is for some reason depicted at times as if he is mildly insane and/or willing to kill as punishment for failure.
[e]
In a way, that might be more of an honest depiction—I'm not sure what books or websites I would have to peruse to find out how factually accurate these comics are, nor am I sure whether it's in any way necessary to do so—because both the 240Z and the Seven Eleven stories are so close to the plot of any feel-good movie one could imagine that both come across as "too good to be true." (Nor does it help that both those stories seem to have the theme "old people who are set in their ways will never come up with good ideas, ever, and we should replace them quickly.")
It would be interesting to know what the purpose of these business manga was, beyond the basic "make some money by selling something". To know how involved the companies are with the story that's being told, to know how interested the various creators were in taking on the project.
[f] That's not something that can be gleaned from reading the stories, nor from the DMP website.
Intent-guessing is, like most incredibly fun navel-gazing hobbies, inherently a useless game of speculation, usually resulting in some rationalization constructed to prop up whatever the guesser's bachelor's degree is in. That's how the rationalizer, the guesser, the "guy wasting your time", makes you think he or she is smart, and it's usually why they get to stand on the other side of the table while you sit in an uncomfortable chair. Normally, that would be exactly what I do for you: guess at the intent of the publication of something like "The Miraculous Success of Japan's 7-Eleven Stores."
Honestly though, I haven't got anything for you. Since reading these, I've still not stopped by the 7-Eleven that's between me and my train station. I haven't felt the need to pursue a career with 7-Eleven. My affection for a convenience store empire—that hasn't changed from the void that it was two weeks ago. When I saw Nissin Cup Noodle at the grocery store, I didn't say to myself "Why cook chicken and broccoli with my wife? Why not eat cheap ramen noodles out of a Styrofoam cup?" I certainly haven't thought about purchasing a Datsun, although I did look around online to find out if that was even possible.
[g]
The creative team for the manga didn't really wow me much either, at least not enough so that they were noticeable to the point where I'd seek any of them out. There's some moments in here, usually when a younger character has "A Big Idea, One That Will Change The Way We Cook Shrimp Forever", where the artist did funny stuff like draw a bunch of starburst style explosions behind their heads, but for the most part, the art looks very similar to what your imagination produces when somebody tells you the title of the comic and then says "it's a manga." (Whatever just popped into your head? It looks like that, only a little more boring.)
I'm not going to say that makes these comics failures though. Two of them are pretty entertaining to read, they don't take up a lot of time, they serve as a more interesting way to get information than it would be to read a wikipedia page—hey, if they were free? I'd wholeheartedly say "go get yourself some of this stuff!" But they aren't free, and what they're offering?
Well, you can pretty much get the same thing anywhere else. It's pretty easy to find.
It's called "anything." It's a magazine article about what a Russian submarine used to look like. It's a Readers Digest story about a woman's dream wedding proposal. It's a collection of Garfield in a doctor's office. It's absolutely whatever you read when you aren't willing to force yourself to come up with something better. It's a comic book, and it's about a convenience store.
Your call, cupcake.
Notes
[a] Really, really interested. You know how those Kyle Rayner-haters got excited about Hal Jordan coming back? I'm like them to the 16th power. The number most in correlation to my interest is too big for a calculator.
[b] I know it's considered gauche to use the term "freak" when describing one's choice of reading material, especially in the overly sensitive world of comics, where we're all supposed to bow to the attitude that "hey, there's always a fan of something, no matter how terrible, you should think about their feelings, my grandma taught me that and her teeth were made of wood", but let's be blunt: this is an English translation of a Japanese nonfiction business manga about the development of putting ramen noodles in a Styrofoam container. It's not for Joe Sixpack or Jenny Normal.
[c] In their defense, this is probably the only reason the book exists.
[d] Text taken from the front of the book, just so you're aware I'm not exaggerating the tone with which these comics deliver information.
[e] And before you say "Hey, aren't all crazy corporate honchos always depicted like that", you should remember that this guy was a real person, and his anger comes from his subordinates' failure to more rapidly produce a quality container for him to sell ramen noodles in. The stakes don't match his rage levels.
[f] And of course, who it was that thought there was a market for an English-language translation.
[g] It isn't, although Datsun never existed as anything more than an alternate name for cars manufactured by Nissan. The car in this manga does still exists, but is now called the Nissan 350Z.
Tucker Stone's writing may be found in print in Comic Foundry and online at The Factual Opinion, where he frequently reviews new releases.
This Ship Is Totally Sinking is © Tucker Stone, 2008
