Japanese Comics

     Tatsumi Yoshihiro was a Japanese comic book artist who died in 2015. He is famous for creating a style of manga college "gekiga" and this means dramatic pictures. This style of manga became very popular, but he had many years of hard times as an artist. He wrote graphic novels before anyone else, and he took comics and made them for grown-up readers. He used manga to create mystery, action, and horror comics and created a new visual language.

     In "Battle Angel Alita" the manga style is seen in a female hero. She has a round face and large round eyes and a small nose and mouth. She is very feminine, but she can really kick butt. She is small so people do not expect her to be so strong. This story is not for children, and we would not this type of grown-up comic if it had not been for Tatsumi Yoshihiro.