My letter to the editors at DC Comics/CMX

[nockergeek]

Here's what I sent to the editors at DC, regarding their version of Tenjho Tenge:

To whom it may concern,

Yesterday, I picked up the first volume of your English translation of the Tenjho Tenge manga, brought stateside by your CMX imprint. I've really been looking forward to this title, after watching the anime and reading online translations of the original Japanese version; having an actual handheld paper version of the manga in a format I could read was something I was highly anticipating.

However, after flipping through a few pages, I was surprised to find that the artwork had been censored. Any scene with nudity had been completely eliminated, either by adding underwear or extra clothing where it wasn't there before, zooming and cropping panels to hide any revealed flesh, or darkening/eliminating panels entirely. I was actually able to compare page by page with the Japanese version and discover how completely you had deviated from the original art.

I'm curious as to why you chose to go down this path with this series. Was it to shoehorn it into a Teen rating? I noticed that you have three ratings for CMX title - Everyone, Teen, and Mature. You have TenTen rated as a "Teen" title, despite the fact that you also list it as having graphic violence, something that's listed under the conditions for Mature titles. Ironically, none of the violence was removed from the volume, only nudity. Tenjho Tenge is what I would consider a mature title, and yet nothing in the original book goes beyond what's been shown in titles from your Vertigo imprint, so why try to make it teen-safe? Is it because you think only teenagers buy manga? If so, that's a disappointing viewpoint, because there's literally a manga title for every age-group and demographic. What are you going to do to later volumes of the series? I ask, because if anything, the violence and nudity only escalate from here.

I will say that, as my first CMX title, this has left me with a very poor first impression of how you treat the titles you're bringing stateside. Seeing a series heavily censored, when no other publishing house that I can think of would do the same (Tokyopop's translation of Battle Vixens/Ikki Tousen comes to mind, as it is very similar in theme and content to Tenjho Tenge), is very discouraging. At present, I'm unable to recommend your version of TenTen to anyone, and I doubt I'll be buying Volume 2 unless it's uncensored. In fact, I highly doubt that I'll even give another CMX title a second look. You've shown that you have very little respect for the original artist's vision or intent, and that's a view that I cannot stand behind.

Sincerely,

Rob B.

You can send your own letter here.

Comments

[nockergeek.livejournal.com]

They announced it back in October or so, when they launched their CMX imprint, which they're using to bring over lackluster manga series. TenTen's the first decent one they've brought over, and they censored it all to hell.