Manga Review: Tokyo Zombie Tries to Be So Bad, It's Good

The manga that makes it to America is just a small sampling of the range of art and stories that are available in Japan. One lesser-known sub-genre of manga revolves around an aesthetic called heta-uma, or "bad, but good." With the arrival of Yusaku Hanakuma's Tokyo Zombie from Last Gasp in U.S. bookshops, the heta-uma style gets its spot on U.S. bookshelves to offer a raw, over-the-top counterpoint to the pretty romances of shojo manga, martial arts action of shonen manga and even the garden-variety ghouls and gore in other horror manga titles. Instead, Tokyo Zombie strives to be raw, energetic and feverishly bizarre; to be so bad, it's good.

Check out my review of Tokyo Zombie from Last Gasp, and see if America is ready to embrace this twisted male bonding / martial arts / zombies gone wild story, and if it really is so bad it's good, or if it's just plain old bad instead.

Image credit: © 1998 Yusaku Hanakuma