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Few war films are as much of a gut punch as Studio Ghibli’s Grave of the Fireflies. The 1988 animated classic has become the go-to example of emotionally compelling storytelling. It takes just under 1.5 hours for Isao Takahata to drag audiences through a tear-jerking journey of love and loss. In the decades since its release, the film has gained a reputation for being a masterpiece that most can only stomach watching once.

However, anyone who wants to seek out the same emotional torture can find another version of the same story. Almost two decades after Takahata’s film, Nippon Television (Ntv) released an updated retelling of the tale. This 2005 remake is directed by Touya Satou and has an eye-watering 2.5-hour runtime. In many ways, it’s a faithful retreading of the source material. Both Takahata and Satou build upon a short story by Akiyuki Nosaka. But each film takes a different approach.

Horror manga legend Junji Ito has been nominated for the Will Eisner Comic Awards Hall of Fame this year. He is one of 18 nominees, with voters set to choose the six new inductees. Alongside Ito, Shigeru Mizuki, a late manga creator, has already been pre-selected for induction.

Ito, who won the Inkpot Award from Comic-Con International in 2023, has also had his work nominated for Eisner Awards in the past. His Black Paradox manga was nominated for Best U.S. Edition of International Material—Asia in 2023.

Related: All 24 Junji Ito Books in Order

In addition to his manga success, Junji Ito is making waves in film and TV. Through the Lens Entertainment and Fangoria Studios are working on adaptations of his works ‘The Mystery of the Haunted House’ and ‘Bloodsucking Darkness’ into films.

Ito’s latest anime, Junji Ito Maniac: Japanese Tales of the Macabre, which adapts 20 of his stories, launched...

Anime, or animated film and television projects produced in Japan, cover the entire spectrum of genres and tones. As effervescent and joyous as anime movies can be, they can also be absolutely dreary and melancholy, depending on the story. The award-winning animation production company Studio Ghibli excels at this juxtaposition, with their acclaimed and beloved films celebrating life's wonders and tragedies in equal measure. When anime movies lean in for sadder moments, they do so with heart-rending effectiveness that can leave audiences shaken long after the credits roll.

Simply put, as long as there's been anime movies, the medium has embraced the possibilities of using it to tell tragic stories. These can be films with an absolutely downer ending to movies that tap heavily into melancholy themes, even if the main characters eventually come out okay. There's just something about a true anime tearjerker that hits differently than their western animation counterparts.

Nakazawa's famous historical manga Barefoot Gen entered the Will Eisner Hall of Fame this year, acknowledging the series' powerful and heartbreaking story. The manga, which is based on the events of World War II and how Japan was affected in the conflict, has been praised for years, and has received an animated film adaptation. The recent progress made in the Western comics industry to recognize the significance of Japanese manga artists is a positive shift for the industry on a large scale.

Japanese author Keiji Nakazawa has been posthumously inducted into the Will Eisner Hall of Fame. This is both a recognition of the artistic importance of Nakazwa's magnum opus, Barefoot Gen, and further proof of how Japanese media has been gaining traction in the West as both a form of entertainment and artistic expression. Nakazawa was previously nominated for induction in recent years, before his acceptance in 2024.

As reported by Anime News Network,...

Around this time last year, Barefoot Gen creator Keiji Nakazawa was among those nominated for the Eisner Hall of Fame. While the late manga author didn't end up getting into the 2023 class, he's officially in this year as part of a group of 19 total automatic inductees. Other automatic inductees for the 2024 Eisner Awards Hall of Fame include Kim Deitch, Creig Flessel, A.B. Frost, Billy Graham, Gary Groth, Albert Kanter, Warren Kremer, Oskar Lebeck, Frans Masereel, Don McGregor, Noel Sickles, Cliff Sterrett, Elmer C. Stoner, Bryan Talbot, Ron Turner, George Tuska, Lynn Varley and James Warren. Related: Barefoot Gen Creator Keiji Nakazawa Among 2023 Eisner Hall of Fame Nominees Keiji Nakazawa—who passed away in 2012—was also nominated in 2020. Barefoot Gen is one of a handful of manga he authored to depict the first-hand experience of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Following his I Saw It manga in 1972, Barefoot Gen ran...

Isao Takahata’s Grave of the Fireflies is a strong contender for one of the most emotionally tragic animes of all time, but when it comes to depicting the horrors of war, it’s hard to achieve the same level of despair as Mori Masaki’s 1983 masterpiece Barefoot Gen. Adapted from Keiji Nakazawa’s (who also wrote the screenplay) acclaimed manga of the same name, Barefoot Gen is unique in the sense that it actually comes from a Hiroshima survivor, with the author mercilessly channeling details from his own childhood memories to portray a story that is both historically authentic and packed with gruesome detail. While it never garnered the attention or success as Takahata’s own masterwork, Barefoot Gen still ranks among the greatest anime movies of all time, and an essential entry into films that depict the devastation of the atomic bomb.

Barefoot Gen, an animated Japanese film, offers a horrifying depiction of the bombing of Hiroshima through the eyes of a young child. A Compassionate Spy explores the story of physicist Theodore Hall, a Soviet spy who leaked information on the atomic bombs, presenting a different perspective on the bombings. Threads, set in Sheffield, England, depicts the aftermath of a nuclear bombing and provides a shockingly realistic portrayal of the devastating consequences.

Oppenheimer has reignited interest in the dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan, and here are 10 other movies about the horrors of these weapons of mass destruction. The atomic bomb has been the subject of all kinds of films since they were dropped in August 1945, with Japanese cinema, in particular, reminiscing on the tragedy. Oppenheimer is arguably one of the most popular films on the topic, but it is far from the first. So, here are 10 other movies that...

Once upon a time, "Gojira" was a creature of the atomic bomb. This is no longer the case. Through years of evolution, "Gojira" drifted from nuclear anxieties. Its successors developed their own iconography: moths, plants, three-headed dragons. In the process, these monsters became inhabitants of a fantasy world drifting further and further from our own. This does not mean that new kaiju movies are bankrupt per se. The Heisei "Gamera" films of the 1990s are genre films, concerned only with being the best giant monster movies they can be. Yet they are some of the best films of their era regardless, with their own memorable characters and ideas. 2016's "Shin Gojira" reclaimed its titular monster as a political metaphor. Rather than drive audiences away, it instead became a major critical and commercial success in Japan. Kaiju still have life in them yet.

Even so, the original "Gojira" stands alone in film history.

Who decides what is pornography? Who gets to stop people from seeing it? And why do they bother?

A Utah state senator got a bill passed declaring pornography a public health crisis. It’s been a while since I’ve been in Utah, but I was in New York City a couple days ago and I figure if porn is a “public health crisis” in Utah, there would be some sign of that in the Big Apple. I saw no signs of any public health crisis whatsoever. I asked my fellow ComicMix columnist Mindy Newell if she’s seen any signs of a porn-related health pandemic; by day Mindy’s an operating room nurse in the New Jersey portion of the metropolitan area. She acknowledged that pornography might be a threat to the health of certain religions that maintain broad governmental power, but it’s not a physical health threat like,...

In this unflinching portrait, we see the devastation of the 1945 nuclear bombing of Hiroshima through the eyes of an ordinary family, particularly that of a young boy. Adapted from Keiji Nakazawa's 1972 manga and based closely on his own experiences as a six-year-old in the stricken city, this uses the stylised strokes of richly-conceived animation to show what would conventionally be unfilmable.

Never Forgotten

On August 6 of 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima less than one month after their initial test. With the clear intent of ”completely destroying Japan’s power to make war”, a second bomb was then dropped three days later of the city of Nagasaki. This is the must-see story of the only people on Earth who survived a nuclear blast.

Here is a complete rundown of the candid survivors who shared their stories ( it might seem tedious at this point, but suck it up, it’s worth it ). Yasuyo Tanaka and Chiemi Oka were the eldest of 20 or so children in an orphanage when the bomb went off. ”Why did I survive?” asked Kiyoko Imori visually traumatized by her experiences. While Shigeko Sasamori wondered out loud in broken English: ”If I didn’t get bomb, what kind of life I had?”.

After...

Some weeks are like this, Internet: you struggle to fill your largely ignored weekly comic book column with new, interesting releases that aren’t tie ins to crossovers or being made into movies, but some weeks you just clutter the week with Batman. And that’s okay, because Batman is awesome and superhero comics are good. The world just shouldn’t revolve around them. But this week they can, because two awesome Batman books are coming out in the same week. Batman, Batman, Batman.

Welcome to This Week in Comics, where every day is a comic book. And many days are Batman.

Monday

First Issues

Robocop #1

(Rob Williams/Faviano Neves)

Dynamite Entertainment

I like RoboCop. That’s all I’m sayin’.

Tuesday

New Manga Day

Barefoot Gen Volume 9: Breaking Down Borders & Barefoot Gen Volume 10: Never Give Up

(Keiji Nakazawa)

Last Gasp

Do you know someone who writes off...