At Wondercon 2016, Kodansha Comics, the U.S.’s second largest manga publisher, was present to talk about their upcoming collaboration project: Attack on Titan Anthology. In addition to the AoT Anthology, Kodansha also talked about some of their upcoming titles. Let’s get to those first.
Some of the new titles they announced, most of which are due this fall, have something for just about everybody. First up is the cat samurai title, Nekogahara, from Shamen King creator Hiroyuki Takei. Next up was action Shojo title, Cells at Work by Akane Shimizu, which is set inside of the human body. Following Cells at Work was the shonen battle manga (with ballroom dancing), Welcome to the Ballroom by Tomo Takeuchi. In/Specter, by Chasiba Katase, is about a young girl who is kidnapped by yokai and becomes an intermediary between yokai and people. Unfortunately for her, this comes at a cost of a eye and a leg.
Finally, on to the big meat of the panel: the Attack on Titan Anthology. The Attack on Titan Anthology will be a two hundred and fifty page, full color book and features a variety of western comic artists and writers including Scott Snyder, Gail Simone, Keven Wada, Tomar and Asaf Hanuka, Faith Erin Hicks, the Batgirl team of Babs Tarr, Cameron Stewart and Brenden Fletcher to name a few. A few new names they announced to the talent list were Orphan Black comic series writer, Jody Houser and Phil Jimenez, who will be contributing at duties for Gail Simone’s story. Most of the stories will take place within the Attack on Titan Universe, like Houser’s story which takes place before the manga’s first volume. The story is about the search for a collection on banned art after an art collector is killed after a titan attack. For the anthology, since the main story is primarily about the military conflict, they wanted to tell the stories of the everyday person. Not all stories are in universe, though. The Batgirl team’s story takes place at a convention where a convention goer turns into a titan. There are also some smaller, newspaper comic strip type stories from Evan Dorkin. They also mentioned that there were strict uses on the main characters as to not conflict continuity or reveal things that might be planned for reveal later. In addition to the sixteen stories, there will also be a variety of pages of art pinups.
The Attack on Titan Anthology is due for release this October by Kodansha Comics with a sampler out this upcoming Free Comic Book Day.
