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Welcome to my blog!

This is the official patokon.com blog, which will also be linked to the official fandomain blog (coming soon). I'll be putting up news, sketches, food-for-thought, life-in-japan anecdotes, along with pop-culture/sub-culture madness to be enjoyed by all. Enjoy #67 from my 100 robots pic-a-day series that is hosted on http://comicspace.com/patrikwashburn Cheerz!
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Tokyo Akahon Manga “Gulliver’s Travels” by NAKAMURA Hiroshi

According to a post by akahon manga researcher Yuuzora Retro (pen name), the Tokyo-based publisher Taikōdō ( 泰光堂 ) created their Manga Classics series in response to the PTA backlash against manga contributing to delinquency in Osaka. This is Gulliver’s Travels by NAKAMURA Hiroshi (中村ひろし), a B6-sized 3-color akahon* printed with red ink fills on either blue or green lines costing 85 yen. NAKAMURA seemed to be the main artist for Taikōdō as evinced by the ad pages at the back. There is no publishing date, but it probably wasn't too far from 1951 when "Cinderella" and "Snow White" from the same series were published. Looking at the stamps on the endpapers on the back, we can see that this particular book was rented out at a kashihon-ya (rental comic shop) in Saga, Kyushu called Imazato Neo Shobō. It was lent to me by a Mr. Fujita, a collector heavy into Showa-era items. I will continue to introduce the books I was able to borrow from his...
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Starry-eyed heroes of Akira 'Leiji' Matsumoto

Hello, friends and manga-philes.      You probably know that my interest in Japan was originally fueled by a combined interest in Japanese animation and martial arts. My interests expanded somewhat over the years, but one big change happened about the age of 15 when I bought my first Japanese collected comic. From that moment on, I became more interested in comics than animation and eventually after moving to Japan, I started to collect the comics of Mr. Leiji Matsumoto .       At first, I was put off by the heavy-lined art and blocky characters, but the more I got into the stories, the less I cared about the style. Eventually, though, I started to appreciate the artistry much in the same way it took me a while to warm to Jack Kirby's art.      Like most Leiji fans, I was heavy into Space Cruiser Yamato , Captain Harlock , Queen Emeraldas , and finally, Galaxy Express 999 . These comics were created in the 70's and are representative of ...
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