KAT-TUN's Kame Stars in Anime-Based Humanoid Monster Bem

Kazuya Kamenashi, Anne, Fuku Suzuki play ostracized monsters who fight for humans

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A live-action television series adaptation of the classic supernatural adventure anime Humanoid Monster Bem (Yōkai Ningen Bem) will premiere on Japan's NTV network this October. Kazuya Kamenashi (Gokusen, The Wallflower, Kami no Shizuku) of the musical group KAT-TUN will star as the title character, while model/actress Anne will play Bem's teammate Bera and child actor Fuku Suzuki (2011 Hana-Kimi) will play the young monster Berro.

In the original 1968 anime, Bem, Bera, and Berro are ugly humanoid monsters (yōkai) who fight for justice. The monsters live among humans and protect them from evil yōkai. The three find themselves ostracized from both humans and other yōkai, but the three continue to fight in hopes of one day becoming humans themselves.
 
Masafumi Nishida (Tiger & Bunny) is writing the live-action Humanoid Monster Bem series, just he did for another recent live-action adaptation about supernatural creatures caught between the human and monster worlds (Kaibutsu-kun).

The first anime series already inspired a 2006 anime series remake.

Top 50 Manga Creators by Sales Since 2010

On Thursday, the September issue of the Nikkei Entertainment magazine published a list of the top 50 manga creators by sales since January of 2010, along with other statistics:


One Piece's Oda tops list with 54.9 million, followed by Naruto's Kishimoto, Kimi ni Todoke's Shiina

Rank	Creator	Sales	Representative Work	Age	Gender
1	Eiichiro Oda	54,856,000	One Piece	36	Male
2	Masashi Kishimoto	11,035,000	Naruto	36	Male
3	Karuho Shiina	8,768,000	Kimi ni Todoke	35	Female
4	Hiro Mashima	7,743,000	Fairy Tail	34	Male
5	Tite Kubo	6,954,000	Bleach	34	Male
6	Takeshi Obata	6,264,000	Bakuman.	42	Male
7	Hideaki Sorachi	6,227,000	Gintama	32	Male
8	Hiromu Arakawa	5,883,000	Fullmetal Alchemist	38	Female
9	Hikaru Nakamura	5,541,000	Saint Young Men	27	Female
10	Hiroshi Shiibashi	4,623,000	Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan	31	Male
11	Hiroya Oku	4,535,000	Gantz	43	Male
12	Akira Amano	4,465,000	Katekyo Hitman Reborn!	38	Unknown
13	Tsujitomo	3,979,000	Giant Killing	34	Male
14	Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro	3,492,000	Toriko	36	Male
15	Kenta Shinohara	3,383,000	Sket Dance	37	Male
16	Gosho Aoyama	3,320,000	Detective Conan	48	Male
17	Hajime Isayama	3,181,000	Shingeki no Kyojin	24	Male
18	Takehiko Inoue	3,085,000	Vagabond	44	Male
19	Tomoko Ninomiya	2,971,000	Nodame Cantabile	42	Female
20	Yūji Terajima	2,792,000	Ace of Diamond	37	Male
21	Ryūhei Tamura	2,778,000	Beelzebub	31	Male
22	Takeshi Hinata	2,756,000	Ahiru no Sora	39	Male
23	Kenjirou Hata	2,558,000	Hayate the Combat Butler	Unknown	Male
24	Kanan Minami	2,498,000	Kyō, Koi o Hajimemasu	32	Female
25	Tadatoshi Fujimaki	2,427,000	Kuroko no Basuke	29	Male
26	Yana Toboso	2,358,000	Black Butler	27	Female
27	Yellow Tanabe	2,303,000	Kekkaishi	Unknown	Female
28	Takeshi Konomi	2,271,000	The Prince of Tennis	41	Male
29	Io Sakisaka	2,261,000	Strobe Edge	Unknown	Female
30	Asa Higuchi	2,241,000	Big Windup!	41	Female
31	Kazue Katō	2,218,000	Blue Exorcist	31	Female
32	Yuki Suetsugu	2,112,000	Chihayafuru	35	Female
33	Jinsei Kataoka, Kazuma Kondou	2,039,000	Deadman Wonderland	Unknown	Female, Male
34	CLAMP	1,991,000	xxxHOLiC	Various	Female
35	Motoka Murakami	1,901,000	Jin	60	Male
36	Mari Yamazaki	1,893,000	Thermae Romae	44	Female
37	Katsura Hoshino	1,847,000	D.Gray-man	31	Female
38	Miki Yoshikawa	1,841,000	Yankee-kun to Megane-chan	29	Female
39	Oh! great!	1,839,000	Air Gear	39	Male
40	Ken Akamatsu	1,780,000	Negima	43	Male
41	Atsushi Ohkubo	1,767,000	Soul Eater	Unknown	Unknown
42	Gō Ikeyamada	1,726,000	Suki Desu Suzuki-kun!!	Unknown	Female
43	Natsumi Aida	1,670,000	Switch Girl!!	Unknown	Unnown
43	Akiko Higashimura	1,670,000	Kuragehime	35	Female
45	Tamiki Wakaki	1,667,000	The World God Only Knows	39	Male
46	Chūya Koyama	1,649,000	Uchū Kyōdai	33	Male
47	Shoji Sato	1,572,000	Highschool of the Dead	Unknown	Male
48	Hiro Fujiwara	1,558,000	Kaichō wa Maid-sama!	Unknown	Female
49	Chica Umino	1,516,000	March comes in like a lion	Unknown	Female
50	Akira Akatsuki	1,504,000	Medaka Box	33	Unknown

Mission Impossible -- Spy MyeongWol

I have started to watch a new Korean TV series lately. It is called "Spy MyeongWol". This TV series is showing on the Astro KBS channel (channel 391) on every Monday and Tuesday at 9:05pm until 10:10pm. This is a romantic comedy series about the North Korean spy with the South Korean famous celebrity.

Title        : Spy MyeongWol
Genre     : Drama, Comedy, Romance, Action
Episodes : 16
Air Time : Every Monday & Tuesday @ 9:o5pm - 10:10pm @ Astro KBS Channel (channel 391)
Story      :
An elite North Korean spy, Han Myung Wol, and her partner, Choi Ryu, infiltrates South Korea on a mission to disrupt the Hallyu Wave by kidnapping one of their top stars, Kang Woo. Despite her proficiency at her job, Myung Wol's one weakness is her uncontrollable curiosity. One day, MyeongWol receives a mission from her superior, which is she needs to marry the famous South Korean celebrity Kang Woo in 3 months time and makes him become the North Korean. Thus she has to attend a number of trainings within 4 days in order to become very feminine in order to attract Kang Woo to fall for her.

Cast :

Han Ye Seul as Han Myung Wol
Eric as Kang Woo
Lee Jin Wook as Choi Ryu
Jang Hee Jin as Joo In Ah
Lee Duk Hwa as Chairman Joo
Jo Hyung Ki as Han Hee Bok
Yoo Ji In as Ri Ok Soon
Lee Kyun as Lee Dae Kang

Han Ye Seul

Eric

Lee Jin Wook

Jang Hee Jin

The lead actress, Han Ye Seul is from the TV series of "Couple or Trouble"or "Will It Snow in This Christmas". She is very funny in the series. She even disguised as many characters, eg. the high-school girl, lady Zorro, or an elegant lady. As for the actor, Lee Jin Wook, he is very cool in this series. He is very good-looking and smart in this series and he acts as the superior of MyeongWol. He has a lot of actions scenes too. From an interview, he said that when he is shooting for this series, it reminds him the life of his in the military service. FYI, this is the first TV series of his after he completed his military service. I like him in this series.

This TV series is also shot in Singapore. OK, let us take a sneak preview of "Spy MyeongWol".

Well, if  you want to catch this romantic comedy series, please click into "Spy MyeongWol."

Enjoy watching!!! ^.^

Hotaru no Hikari Romance Manga Gets Live-Action Film

The live-action television series based on Satoru Hiura's women's romance manga Hotaru no Hikari - It's Only Little Light in My Life is in turn inspiring a movie spinoff. The movie is scheduled to premiere in 2012, but a title has yet to be decided. The stars of the television version, Haruka Ayase (Oblivion Island: Haruka and the Magic Mirror's Haruka, Crying Out Love in the Center of the World's Aya) and Naohito Fujiki (20th Century Boys' Chōno, GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka's Ryuji Saejima) will reprise their roles in the story to be set and filmed in Rome, Italy. Hiroshi Yoshino, a director on the television series, will also direct the film, and shooting will start in the middle of this month.

The Hotaru no Hikari television series already ran two seasons, and the second season aired in Japan beginning in July of last year.

Serialized in Kodansha's Kiss magazine from 2004 to 2009, the manga follows the life of the 27-year-old office worker Hotaru who is uninterested in love. Hotaru's situation gets complicated as she suddenly finds herself living with her boss Seiichi Takano. Various office romances develop as Hotaru tries to find her path in life.

Taboo Incest -- Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru (I Love My Little Sister)

I have accidentally found an OVA during the weekend. It is called "Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru". In English it is known as "I Love My Little Sister". It is adapted from the same name shoujo manga series by Kotomi Aoki. A very taboo story about incest and love between twins. The length of this OVA is 50 minutes.

The series focus on fraternal twins Yori and Iku, who fall in love with one another despite being siblings. Iku has always felt a close connection to her twin brother Yori since childhood, but recently Yori’s been acting distant and even cold toward her for no apparent reason. He walks away from her whenever she tries to touch him, and everything that comes out of his mouth is a negative remark. She doesn’t know what she’s done to cause him to hate her, but something has definitely changed between them. He especially gets upset at her for talking about wanting a boyfriend of her own, and his anger is so hurtful that she runs to her bed crying. Torn between his feelings and his guilty conscience, he decides to go with his feelings and kisses her softly on the lips as an apology for his past behavior. He finally confesses to her that he’s never seen her as his sister but as a woman that he’s loved since the day they were born. Even though he knows it’s wrong and immoral to lust after his sister, he can’t help the feelings that he has for her and begs her to love him in return not as a brother but as a man. Filled with confusion and emotional turmoil for wanting to continue seeing Yori as a brother and now possibly loving him as a man, she’s unable to decide on her feelings for him until a couple of obstacles are thrown in her direction – discovering that her best friend Tomoka slept with Yori and the realization that he’s moving away to attend a different high school – allows her to make her decision. Scared that she’ll be apart from him if she doesn’t take any action to keep her brother by her side, she makes a promise to love him as a man and kisses him passionately on the lips. And their love story begins…

Characters Description :

Yori Yuki (結城 頼, Yūki Yori): The male lead character. He is Iku's twin brother. He is intellegent and somewhat cold, but is actually nice, especially to Iku. He has been in love with Iku since childhood and embarks on a relationship with her, even though he is tormented over their incest taboo.

Iku Yuki (結城 郁, Yūki Iku): The female lead character. She is Yori's twin sister. In contrast to Yori, she is dense and clumsy, but has a determined spirit. She loves Yori deeply as a brother, but later decided that she loved him as a man. Unlike Yori, she feels content with their taboo relationship, but has some doubts over how wrong it is. Halfway through, she learns that Yori is actually her half-twin brother.

Haruka Yano (矢野 立芳, Yano Haruka): Yori's best friend from junior high school. He and Yori have similar personalities, somewhat delinquent attitudes, and intellegence. He knows about the twins' incestuous relationship, but keeps it a secret. He eventually falls in love with Iku after Yori leaves for high school.

Tomoka Kusunoki (楠 友華, Kusunoki Tomoka): Iku's former best friend from junior high school. She has a huge crush on Yori and even sleep with him. However, he later rejects her and she discovers of his and Iku's love. She threatens to expose them as part of getting revenge on them, but is unsuccessful, as Yori is more conniving and intelligent than she is.

The above are the main characters of the series. Personally, I am kind of curious about the sotry and therefore I started to read the manga series after watching the OVA. When I am reading the manga series, I am always wondering would such matter happening in the real life. If it was happening to me, what am I going to do! Haha! Just the imagination.

Anyway, the manga series besides adapted into the OVA, it is also adapted in the live-action film. I also watched it but I do not like it as the pace of the movie is very slow and it makes the movie quite boring. Moreover, I also do not like the lead actor who acts as Yori, as I think he looks a bit old for the role. On the other hand, I prefer the actor who acts as Yano, he looks cute for me! :P The movie length is 122 minutes.

The film was directed by Hiroshi Ando and was released in Japan on January 20, 2007. The film features Jun Matsumoto as Yori Yuuki, Nana Eikura as Iku Yuuki, (the lead actress from the movie "April's Bride") Ayaka Komatsu as Tomoka Kusunoki, Yuko Asano as Saki Yuuki and Yūta Hiraoka as Haruka Yano. The ending theme of the movie is "Kitto Eien ni" by Crystal Kay.

OK, if you are interested to read or watch the OVA or the movie of Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru, you may click on the respective links below.

Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru OVA
Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru Manga Series
Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru Movie

Enjoy watching and/or reading! ^.^