Saturday PM
It’s important to note that the “Saturday Morning” feel is WELL known to nerds. The group, in total, either experienced it directly, or mourned the lack of it as they listened to their precursor nerds exclaim the sense of freedom and adventure released from viewing entertaining, informative, hopeful animated series. This comfort, away from the responsibility of scheduled education and correct-answer-borne senses of self-worth, simply allowed us to fall in love with stories outside of ourselves that still showed us the lengths WE ourselves could reach if our determination was greater than our adversaries.
An entire creative and publishing team under the name of Saturday AM has taken this feel and planted it into print.
And they’re prolific, family.
They have creators from multiple nations who all love the manga art format. They aspire to draw your worthy fandom the same way that the contemporary, well-known production houses do. And I think they hit the mark. I’d give three short examples to entice you all to give it a try.
UNDERGROUND: By Jr De Bard starts off seeming a little Cain and Abel (Light wolf, Dark wolf). A Taekwondo haksaeng, Karim Yun (the rough and rowdy individualist), and his equally skilled brother Elijah (the more traditional martial artist) are meeting at the top of this story in the middle of a conflict derived from their clashing perspectives of the martial art and their father, taekwondo Grandmaster Yun. I have three brothers. So… I get it! Right out the gate. Even the mom scolding them for fighting in their hallway by the front door of her home. And I love that this creator gives details to many small things traditional manga artistry requires. Even the bottles in the background of a diner scene have detailed label work on them. All of these attributes of character and earnest set design makes the read feel one way: authentic. Not just for the fact that it looks like manga I’ve seen masterfully produced by eastern Asian sources, but because my mind says lines that characters in the story later express themselves. It makes me feel like I’m not always reading, but sometimes standing alongside these characters. AND! Because the genre of this manga is seinen (“young man”/action/adventure/violence/politico) you better believe hands are requested and provided throughout the series, which is filled with characters operating under the same premise that any good story of conflict suggests: I’ll prove to them that my way is valid!
CLOCK STRIKER: Story by Frederick L. Jones and Art by Rekse, is the story of BLACK GIRL MAGIC SCIENCE. Cast, a young striker is the mentee to a Smith (One-man army type of characters that are intellectually superior to the common man. But let’s get right to the point. Race- and gender-based bias issues still exist in this post-war society. But, as is natural, smart black girls don’t have time for that. You see a young battle-hardened scientist in Cast that is so about her business the disrespect that she faces (FROM EVEN THE VICTIMS SHE’S CHARGED TO PROTECT) doesn’t even stall her for a second while she’s calmly and skillfully working to accomplish her job--even when that requires safely capturing and defeating a group of racist, kidnapping, slave-trading thugs. And as to avoid spoiling ALL the hype moments Cast single-handedly provides us in this manga--because she’s only got one hand, mind you--I’m just speaking on the FIRST chapter alone. ABSOLUTE MUST READ.
BACASSI: One of WhytManga’s earliest seinen* introductions to the Saturday AM and Saturday PM roster. This manga does a style of storytelling that is often used in order to exclude representing black characters, BUT does it to include them instead. Naturally, the fantasy genre allows us to tell stories with less limits. However, even in non-illustrated fantasy media, black characters are less common than aliens, magical creatures, and non-humans at large. This means when you see the anti-hero of Bacassi being a vulgar, anti-social brawler, you’re seeing just one character, who happens to be black, expressing themself AMONG DROVES OF OTHER BLACK CHARACTERS. Some of these black characters are also a part of the magical/alien communities in the manga as well, so what was originally a form of othering in the genre and industry is flipped into a centralizing strategy, where non-black characters are maybe less frequent than non-humans, and black characters happen so frequently they also have places throughout the strata of societal echelon. Daemon, Shawna, and Wilton are the trinity we follow in this world where people--and even demons alike--are suffering from the inhumanity, but not letting it stop their journey by any means necessary.
*Please note, this manga, similar to Underground is seinen genre, meaning it can have more mature and inherently less PG characters and material (such as Daemon, the anti-hero, and his misogyny in the beginning of the manga), but not at the expense of worthwhile story involving evolving characters.
So there you have it. The prodigal son. The “unfit” hero. And the anti-hero. Just three of the available tales that anyone can enjoy by directly supporting the publishers of the Saturday AM, Saturday PM, and Saturday Brunch manga anthologies. You can download the “Saturday AM” app from your digital app store and enjoy it along with your other weekly and monthly manga reads. You’ll love where you find yourself in these stories.
P.S. All three stories feature main and side characters of intersectionality.
