I’ve been reading American superhero comic books since the early ‘90s when the medium was at the peak of its popularity. I dabbled in some Japanese manga throughout the years — namely Akira and Dragon Ball Z — but I never considered diving deeper. I respected manga, especially since most of the anime I watched were manga adaptations, but I was satisfied reading my superhero stories.
Things have changed in recent years. The quality of American comics, particularly those from Marvel Comics and DC Comics, has dropped precipitously (in my opinion) over the past decade. I kept reading them on the now-defunct Comixology app, but there was only so much I could stomach. After over a year of not reading comics regularly, I had a strong yearning for sequential art books. That’s when I considered the once unthinkable — reading manga.
