Mag Talk Weekly Shounen Jump [2009] - Discussion & TOC Talk

[StrangerAtaru]

Yeesh, even the Akamaru can't escape from the Bleach effect. If it's not really as popular as it was, why does it seem to get the cover of both the regular mag and the special one?

 

[[Cross]]

Maybe it's overly popular in Japan and we just don't know about it. There has to be some explanation.

 

[Kaiten]

Best way to put it: It's just as popular as ever but wasn't ever quite as popular as international fans like to think ^^

Basically it's one of the most popular series in Japan. Three volumes were among the top twenty (12 and 17 to be exact) best selling titles of last year. The list was compiled two weeks after the fourth volume came out. Based on two weeks of sales it was still 35 for the year. But, fans have always referred to it as part of a "big three". That isn't entirely true. One Piece and Naruto are more popular. Every one of their volumes sell more then a million copies; One Piece in it's first week, Naruto by it's third. Bleach doesn't break a million in a year. A better comparison would be Hunter x Hunter. There sales are nearly identical. Better to call Bleach and Hunter x Hunter the second tier. It may be worth noting, looking over the top fifty, that Naruto has gotten more popular since volume 42 has come out.

 

[hills100]

From Dofla at Ritual:

Akamaru Jump, Spring 2009

Bleach (cover), Reborn (poster), Kochikame, Bakuman, Mago, Kuroko, Psyren, Sket Dance, Inumaru Dashi (bangai)

there will be a naruto chapter next week right?

 

[Maxy Barnard]

yes, but i'm not sure what that has to do with akamaru jump

 

[SSJWill4]

Best way to put it: It's just as popular as ever but wasn't ever quite as popular as international fans like to think ^^

Basically it's one of the most popular series in Japan. Three volumes were among the top twenty (12 and 17 to be exact) best selling titles of last year. The list was compiled two weeks after the fourth volume came out. Based on two weeks of sales it was still 35 for the year. But, fans have always referred to it as part of a "big three". That isn't entirely true. One Piece and Naruto are more popular. Every one of their volumes sell more then a million copies; One Piece in it's first week, Naruto by it's third. Bleach doesn't break a million in a year. A better comparison would be Hunter x Hunter. There sales are nearly identical. Better to call Bleach and Hunter x Hunter the second tier. It may be worth noting, looking over the top fifty, that Naruto has gotten more popular since volume 42 has come out.

This is based on the 2008 top 50 selling manga that animenewsnetwork posted, so it's not perfect but these are the average sales per volume for the jump series that made the top 50.

One Piece: 1,623,062
Naruto: 950,308.75
HxH: 850,477
Bleach: 739,569.5
D. Grey: 602,671.3
Reborn: 533,819.5
Gintama: 487,653

It should be noted that Naruto doesn't always sell over a million. In fact, only 2 of the 4 did. The other 2 fell in around 800,000 and 700,000 respectively. Some Bleach volumes beat other Naruto volumes. Both volumes of HxH beat 2 volumes of Naruto and lost to the other 2. I think it's interesting that HxH continues to sell well after being on hiatus for 20 months and being on a very weird release schedule. Also, Bleach is a cover and color whore, so that could be used to argue the top 3 status.

All that being said, I am curious as to how people in general break down wsj into tiers, and their mentality that goes into placing different series in different tiers. Is it a sales thing? How often a series is placed in the top 5? How many colors and covers the series gets in a year? I'd be interested in hearing different opinions on the matter. In my opinion, I'd say that there are three tiers. The first tier consists of series that sell really well, are constantly in the top 5, get frequent cover and color pages, and those series that sell better than series that meet the first 3 requirements. So One Piece, Naruto, HxH, and Bleach (not including '08 and beyond atm, have to think about it some more). 2nd tier are those series that sell quite well, tend to stay more in the upper-middle of the magazine and may get into the top 5 every now and then, but aren't constantly there, and series that sell better than a series with the previous requirements. So D. Grey-Man, Reborn, and Gintama. The third tier would be series that were established and have since fallen from grace or series that have been around for a while, but haven't quite made it into the first two tiers. I'd include Eyeshield 21, Neuro, To Love, and Sket Dance in that category. Then there are the untouchables; Kochikame and Jaguar. Lastly, there are the other, unestablished series that have yet to prove themselves (aka newcomers). So now that you've heard my thoughts, what are some of yours?

 

[Maxy Barnard]

basically the first tier are the hard hitters of sales and the TOC, or that have solidly popular adaptations.

At present the top tier literally looks like this:
One Piece
Naruto
Bleach
Toriko
Bakuman

with the voice comic approaching(or already happened) i wouldn't be surprised if Toriko usurped Bleach.

the second tier is usually series that have/had adaptations, perform well in EITHER TOC or volume sales, and have a sizable amount of time under their belt. at present this is:

D. Gray-Man
Reborn!
Gintama
Eyeshield 21
Neuro
Love Trouble

Love Trouble and Neuro may shift down, but volume sales are still exceptional. Sket Dance and Nurarihyon no Mago would be sneaking into here but both lack adaptations and Sket has suffered schizophrenic sales.

next up is the third tier, which are the powerful newcomers, the ones who stand out a fair bit, but lack that one thing to propel them into a higher tier (not just adaptations, it can be tank sales (be it consistent or none released yet) or low TOC positions. At present this tier consists of:

Sket Dance
Nurarihyon no Mago
Psyren
Kuroko no Basket
Inumaru Dashi

The final Tier are the bombs/yet to be ranked. Series that are either unpopular, or just plain haven't been about enough to garner notice. of course these are:

Bokke-san
Hoop Men
Beelzebub

Past that is the non-tier, the ones that just don't matter because they're hits that avoid positioning or risk by various means. these are:

Kochikame
Pyuu to fuku! Jaguar
Hunter X Hunter

and we should pay them mind as solidly awesome series. Not to mention they sell well



yeah.... that's pretty accurate methinks

 

[Koen]

Nice work noodles, but you forgot one tier

Spoiler: the I can do evertyhing I want tier

HxH

Anyway I don't agree with the fact you place baku-man in the top tier. Though having had its good results, in contrast to toriko, it hasn't proven a top consistency yet. Baku-man is a very good manga. So please don't shoot the messenger but imo I think you should place bakuman in the third tier but it being the best of the third and reborn should be place in the top tier

 

[Maxy Barnard]

Bakumans a hard one to place. sales wise it's really good, but you're right, with the toc in mind and such i should move it down.

reborn however is undeniably second tier, especially with it's ongoing anime bolstering it

 

[Kaiten]

i can sort of understand placing Bakuman high: after only two volumes it's passed Eyeshield and ToRa in sales. But I'm not thinking it will ever reach the same level as Bleach or Hunter x Hunter. I expect it to settle in with the D. Gray Man tier. I'm not prepared to give Toriko and Mago a place in the hierarchy yet either. For all the hype it's still to soon to see how Toriko will sell. After three volumes it's in the low 100,000 after it's first week. That is outstanding for a new series, It certainly will go up again with volume 4 but it remains to be seen how much. Same goes for Mago.

Naruto, as I said, seems to have gotten more popular late last year. In the months since the top 50 came out volume 44 crossed the million mark and volume 45 was also a million seller. Something happened last year to raise Naruto's popularity.

My tiers look like this:

Top:

1. One Piece
2. Naruto

2nd

3. Bleach
4. D. Gray Man
5. Reborn
6. Gintama
7. Bakuman

3rd

8. To Love Ru
9. Eyeshield 21
10. Toriko
11. Mago

As I said above, both need to prove themselves in sales, Mago has TOC issues, and it's to hard to predict how each will improve. I guess we'll have a better idea next week when Mago's sales figures are posted

4th

12. Neuro
13. Sket Dance
14. Psyren

Sket and Psyren are following in the foot steps of Muhyo, Mx0, and Neuro; series popular enough to make sustained runs, maybe even get an anime, but aren't necessarily juggernauts. Unless something like an anime gives them a big bump I would expect three or four year runs.

5th

15. Bokke - san: looks like the only canceled with less then 25 chapters series currently in the magazine.

The unranked; to new to judge

Kuroko, Beezlebub, Inumaru, and Hoopmen

Untouchable:

Kochikame, Hunter x Hunter, Jaguar

 

[Koen]

Bakumans a hard one to place. sales wise it's really good, but you're right, with the toc in mind and such i should move it down.

reborn however is undeniably second tier, especially with it's ongoing anime bolstering it

Could you please elaborate why reborn's anime makes you place it in the second tier? I think an anime is a standalone fact that has nothing to do with the ToC. I think volume wise and positional wise: top tier would be

One piece
naruto
bleach
reborn
toriko (potential to get between one piece and bleach in the future)

 

[Maxy Barnard]

i misread like a goon (thought you said it should be third)
and i suppose it could be top tier, moreso if i keep the novelisations in mind. but if reborn were there so would gintama

 

[Kaiten]

Problem with placing Reborn so high is sales. Reborn averages around 550,000 copies sold while One Piece sells 1.5 million and Naruto sells 1.2 million. SSJWill4 conveniently did the math for us:

One Piece: 1,623,062
Naruto: 950,308.75
HxH: 850,477
Bleach: 739,569.5
D. Grey: 602,671.3
Reborn: 533,819.5
Gintama: 487,653

Reborn is comparable to D. Gray Man and Gintama, but not One Piece, Naruto, or even Bleach. Toriko remains a wild card in my opinion. Consistently landing in the top 5 should be a sign of a very strong series. Thus far Toriko has preformed very well in sales. But it remains to be seen if Toriko will actually surpass Bleach in sales, match it, or end up between D. Gray Man and Bleach in popularity. And it is to early to speculate on the answer. It should be noted that volume 3 of Toriko and Mago were nearly identical in sales. While Mago started lower, it's growth rate is higher then Toriko's, at least for now. I'm very, very curious how much Mago volume 4 sold, how much better then volume 3. I'll have an answer of Wednesday.

I personally take anime into some account when judging a manga's popularity. Anime does give a series a boost, both on the TOC and in sales. But I'd consider it a small factor. For the record: One Piece, Naruto, Gintama = really popular anime. Bleach, Reborn = not so much. There are things to be judged besides sales and TOC; anime, cosplayers, novels, doujin. Things get a bit to complicated trying to draw all those factors into judging the popularity of manga. At least for cats posting to a forum.

 

[VASSiLi]

Jump #19 ~ Cover from Akatsuki's Scan

Spoiler: Click Here For Full-Viewing

 

[Magicoreo]

out of curiosity, would anyone happen to know when the Spring 2009 Akamaru jump is coming out?

 

[Kaiten]

Should be during Golden Week, the first week of May.

 

[DeidaraGrimmjow]

I personally take anime into some account when judging a manga's popularity. Anime does give a series a boost, both on the TOC and in sales. But I'd consider it a small factor. For the record: One Piece, Naruto, Gintama = really popular anime. Bleach, Reborn = not so much.

How do you know that the Reborn and Bleach animes aren't popular?

 

[Imitorar]

Ratings. One Piece is almost always in the top 10 ranked anime (I believe only three episodes weren't, maybe the number's off a bit). It usually places around 5th or 6th. Naruto often makes it into the top 10 when something else that usually makes it isn't there that week. Bleach? Reborn? I've never seen them make it. I mean, I'm sure that they're relatively popular, but not as popular as the One Piece or Naruto anime.

 

[Kaiten]

Gintama, Naruto, and One Piece are always high on the over all DVD charts. Bleach and Reborn generally are low on the anime sales chart while failing to make the over all charts. When it aired D. Gray Man was usually more popular as well, though less popular then Gintama, Naruto, and One Piece.

 

[KuwabaraTheMan]

It's true that Bleach and Reborn! don't have as much popularity in anime form as One Piece or Naruto, but they have to be doing fairly well. They wouldn't keep producing them otherwise. They certainly seem to be more popular as manga, however.