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Dark Horse Adds Legal Drug, Drug & Drop, Oreimo: Kuroneko
posted on by Jennifer Sherman
North American publisher Dark Horse Comics announced during its Sakura-Con panel on Saturday that it has licensed the Legal Drug, Drug & Drop, Oreimo: Kuroneko, Satoshi Kon's OPUS, and Seraphim: 266613336 Wings manga books.
Dark Horse will release an omnibus edition of the three-volume supernatural series Legal Drug on September 10, 2014. The story centers on Kazahaya Kudō and Rikuō Himura as they work at the mysterious drugstore Green Drug. The series launched in 2001 and went on hiatus in 2003. Tokyopop published the series in North America in individual volumes between 2004 and 2005.
Volume 1 of the Legal Drug sequel series Drug & Drop will ship on January 7, 2015. William Flanagan (xxxHOLiC, Tsubasa, RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE) is translating the series. The manga reveals Kazahaya and Rikuō's pasts as well as the background of Green Drug. The series launched in November 2011 and went on a three-month hiatus in 2012. The series returned that December, and Kadokawa released the second compiled volume last October. The series returned again with a special chapter in Kadokawa's Young Ace magazine on April 4.
Dark Horse will release the three-volume Oreimo spinoff manga Ore no Kouhai ga Konnani Kawaii Wake ga Nai under the title Oreimo: Kuroneko. The Japanese title will serve as the version's subtitle, and Volume 1 will ship on April 15, 2015. Unlike Tsukasa Fushimi's original Ore no Imōto ga Konnani Kawaii Wake ga Nai light novel series, Sakura Ikeda's spinoff story features Kuroneko as the heroine instead of Kirino. The original light novel series concluded with the 12th volume this past June. It also inspired a television anime series in 2010 and a second season in 2013.
Satoshi Kon's OPUS manga will be compiled into one volume and ship on November 26, 2014. Zack Davisson (Shigeru Mizuki's Showa: A History of Japan) is translating the two-volume series. OPUS serialized from 1995 to 1996 before the late acclaimed anime director Satoshi Kon made his directorial debut with Perfect Blue in 1997. Tokuma Shoten reprinted the series in 2010 with the "illusive ending" to the story that was not printed during the original magazine run. Kon's widow Kyōko Kon revealed in 2012 that both his OPUS and Seraphim: 2-Oku 6661-Man 3336 no Tsubasa manga would be sold in French, Italian, and Korean.
Seraphim: 266613336 Wings (Seraphim: 2-Oku 6661-Man 3336 no Tsubasa), a one-volume manga drawn by Kon and written by Mamoru Oshii (Patlabor, Ghost in the Shell), will ship on February 18, 2015. In the story, three wise men and a girl named Sera embark on a journey to solve the mystery of the fatal "tenshi-byō" (angel disease). The manga originally ran in Tokuma Shoten's Animage magazine from 1995 to 1996. Tokuma Shoten reprinted part of the manga in October 2010, before a complete reprinting was released in December 2010.
Dark Horse also announced that it will release CLAMP works digitally, beginning with Clover on May 21, 2014. Other titles will follow, including Cardcaptor Sakura on June 4 and Chobits on June 18.
Sakura-Con is being held in Seattle's Washington State Convention Center from April 18 to April 20.
