Mag Talk Weekly Shonen Jump [2019] - Discussion and TOC Talk

[TyVip]

A question I have, is it standard for Jump to launch a new batch of series after the last series in the prior batch hit 8 chapters?

usually 12 weeks or 3 months, nowadays 16 weeks~ assume no holiday break in between
but not a definite answer, sometimes you get more series per round, sometimes you get less.

 

[Rain Spectre]

usually 12 weeks or 3 months, nowadays 16 weeks~ assume no holiday break in between
but not a definite answer, sometimes you get more series per round, sometimes you get less.

Hmm...okay then. Saying that because, by my estimates, we have a lot more series to come this year.

 

[Heiji]

Kimetsu no Yaiba get fanbook. Will be out july 4.

 

[Tomioka_96]

Kimetsu no Yaiba get fanbook. Will be out july 4.

This is cool. So it means it will contain info such as the age and birth date of the characters?

 

[Heiji]

Tenjin will end may 29 on Shonen Jump + site.

 

[Nemesis]

I agree about Toriko and I had no idea some considered Dr. Stone to be bigger than MHA, which honestly is just stupid.

That said, here's the thing. Bleach's popularity did go down tho when it's rank was down. Fullbring arc was poorly received and it showed with how the ranks and sales fell. I'm the biggest Bleach fan (even have a tattoo on my entire left forearm) but it's true. So I'd say the ranks themselves don't matter but I do believe their general placement probably signifies how much of buzz that series is bringing to the magazine. Although should be taken with a grain of salt and is not a documentary, Bakuman referenced this as well in many instances, the bit about the placements in the TOC.

When Bleach's final arc became really interesting somewhere between the range of chapters 490-520 (the chapters were so much shit happened that the fandom was going CRAZY), the ranks went back up again and was averaging a lot better. I remember this because I used to track the ranks of series back then (instead of studying for my masters but that's besides the point). Even the sales of the volume around those chapters went up 10-20k week on week when compared to the previous volumes in that arc. And I believe it's because the buzz around the series shot up around those chapters with better reception overall.

Again, with THAT said, it's very easy for the editors to give false impressions of something doing well by placing it on top. It's why ranks are not a great source of popularity measure.
I'm not denying what you're saying or anything. I'm just saying that there is a certain truth to the TOC placements themselves and not the ranks but also agree that it can be easily manipulated to give false impressions.

No, I do agree that Bleach was down at the time of Fullbringer arc which is when it began to have less promotion as well. It's just that in the time it had bad positions and even with less sales, it still was one of the best-selling series on the magazine.

It's a bit similar to Soma, with the difference that Bleach had much more sucess in it's high and low.

 

[Rain Spectre]

Big question I have, does Jump need sport, romance and gag manga to survive? Because right now their battle manga stock is so stable that I struggle to see why the other genres are that necessary.

 

[RafGL]

Big question I have, does Jump need sport, romance and gag manga to survive? Because right now their battle manga stock is so stable that I struggle to see why the other genres are that necessary.

I think this is due to the necessity of variety when offering a compilation of different products. If everything you can offer in a magazine is focused on battles, it's way more possible for lots of those series to become repetitive, boring, and maybe the same when reading all of them when buying the magazine. Also, there's the need to appeal to an abroad audience. Not everyone enjoys every battle manga and they need to give incentives to readers to buy the magazine even if they are gonna read just one series that may be sport or romance focused. Even if everything is hypothetical and it's not likely for someone to read 1 series of a magazine, as a business there's the need of considering that kind of audience and try to target them to increase your benefits. It's pure product line expansion in marketing.

 

[Ctkk]

I agree about Toriko and I had no idea some considered Dr. Stone to be bigger than MHA, which honestly is just stupid.

That said, here's the thing. Bleach's popularity did go down tho when it's rank was down. Fullbring arc was poorly received and it showed with how the ranks and sales fell. I'm the biggest Bleach fan (even have a tattoo on my entire left forearm) but it's true. So I'd say the ranks themselves don't matter but I do believe their general placement probably signifies how much of buzz that series is bringing to the magazine. Although should be taken with a grain of salt and is not a documentary, Bakuman referenced this as well in many instances, the bit about the placements in the TOC.

When Bleach's final arc became really interesting somewhere between the range of chapters 490-520 (the chapters were so much shit happened that the fandom was going CRAZY), the ranks went back up again and was averaging a lot better. I remember this because I used to track the ranks of series back then (instead of studying for my masters but that's besides the point). Even the sales of the volume around those chapters went up 10-20k week on week when compared to the previous volumes in that arc. And I believe it's because the buzz around the series shot up around those chapters with better reception overall.

Again, with THAT said, it's very easy for the editors to give false impressions of something doing well by placing it on top. It's why ranks are not a great source of popularity measure.
I'm not denying what you're saying or anything. I'm just saying that there is a certain truth to the TOC placements themselves and not the ranks but also agree that it can be easily manipulated to give false impressions.

The thing is, even if the TOC was a perfect reflection of those surveys they do, the people that answer them are only a small subset of the wider audience, since not everyone that buys the volumes buys jump, and not everyone that buys jump bothers with the survey.

But the TOC is not completely random. Yuuna and Sumo don't sell much and are usually at the bottom. It's pretty obvious that that being placed low is a bad signal for new series. Mha has only gone down recently, but it was consistently top 5 before, so this could just be a reflection of the transition chapters between arcs, or perhaps people not being much into the new arc because it doesn't have the main characters in it. If Black Clover is in the climax of an important arc, it's natural for people to be more excited about that, even if mha just has more fans in general.

KnY and WNL are so high clearly because of the anime, but it's a chicken or egg thing. Is the editor using the anime to promote them, or are people just more into them because of it?

 

[Rain Spectre]

The thing is, even if the TOC was a perfect reflection of those surveys they do, the people that answer them are only a small subset of the wider audience, since not everyone that buys the volumes buys jump, and not everyone that buys jump bothers with the survey.

But the TOC is not completely random. Yuuna and Sumo don't sell much and are usually at the bottom. It's pretty obvious that that being placed low is a bad signal for new series. Mha has only gone down recently, but it was consistently top 5 before, so this could just be a reflection of the transition chapters between arcs, or perhaps people not being much into the new arc because it doesn't have the main characters in it. If Black Clover is in the climax of an important arc, it's natural for people to be more excited about that, even if mha just has more fans in general.

KnY and WNL are so high clearly because of the anime, but it's a chicken or egg thing. Is the editor using the anime to promote them, or are people just more into them because of it?

Regarding HeroAca and Haikyuu, their placement is simply indicative that they've stabilized and aren't doing anything "big" right now. Hence, no need to promote them.

 

[yela]

Bleach didn't get popular until the anime and even during its biggest years it had serious competition with other series in the mag.
Again, you're overestimating Bleach''s popularity. "The big 3" was a western invention.

With this data: https://web.archive.org/web/20180310003605/http://www.geocities.jp:80/wj_log/rank/ Bleach volume 12, this is 2 volumes before the anime, it had a first print of 520,000 copies, so Bleach real sales had to be around 500,000 copies because the editorial possibly had to adjust the print run of a series without anime if they didn't want to have too many copies unsold. It's not exceptional or even very good, like, for example, Naruto, that by volume 13 had 800,000 copies in print without anime, but it's still pretty good. The first Bleach arc wasn't popular, Kubo himself admitted that in the first artbook, but Bleach had started increasing its sales, and rankings in the magazine, by itself, with the SS arc, before the anime. Volume 15, 2 months after the Bleach anime started, had 780, 000 of first print, so, apart of more copies in print because of the anime, the manga was surely still increasing its sales in the previous volumes because people liked the arc.


During its run only Death Note had better sales (and Hunter x Hunter, I had forgotten this one), and Prince of Tennis was the only one that it was close (during both series peak), but the volume with the best first print of Prince of Tennis had 1,100,000 copies, and the best fist print volume of Bleach had 1,330,000, so there was still a difference. Naruto best first print was 1,620,000, and One Piece 4,050,000 . So, going by comparisons, rather it would be the big 1

 

[Xzone]

that sounds like World trigger or Kimetsu.

 

[Rain Spectre]

Holy shit, Naruto sold 800k by Volume 13? That's, like, genuinely insane, considering the numbers we have now. I know there's a variety of factors contributing to that, but it's no wonder it was sitting near the top of the TOC for practically its entire run.

Also, it says something about One Piece that it's selling maybe half of what it did at its peak, and yet it's still the best selling manga out there by a considerable margin.

 

[Newkerzy]

How long did it take for MHA to reach 1M again?

 

[Rain Spectre]

How long did it take for MHA to reach 1M again?

It hasn't. Not in physical, anyway. With digital it may have, but we ultimately have no proof.

 

[MangAniMY]

(initial) print? , haven't reached it

(oricon) sales? smallest (known) gap is 899 days (slightly above 808 is also acceptable)

 

[Newkerzy]

It hasn't. Not in physical, anyway. With digital it may have, but we ultimately have no proof.

I thought you meant the total number of volumes up till that point, not that one volume. I do know MHA has already surpassed 22M in total though.

 

[MangAniMY]

I thought you meant the total number of volumes up till that point, not that one volume. I do know MHA has already surpassed 22M in total though.

oh, 3 volumes

 

[Rain Spectre]

It's important to remember of course that Japan's declining birth rate, the rise of digital and the general makeup of the industry are all pretty crucial influences in sales. Still, I think it's pretty much sealed that no manga will ever again be in the same position Dragon Ball, One Piece and Naruto had. I mean, Jump tried with Toriko, and look how well that turned out.

 

[DyanSon]

It hasn't. Not in physical, anyway. With digital it may have, but we ultimately have no proof.

As far a i know vol 1-10 already pass 1M