Alternatively titled: Dr. Stockholm, Or: How I Learned To Stop Hating and Love Black Clover.

^ I was thinking of making that the episode title but I thought it would be too long. But yes, today's episode is all about the up-and-coming Shonen Jump hit, Black Clover, to celebrate it passing 100 chapters, two years of serialization, and an upcoming anime. Colton never continued with Black Clover past the first chapter, but since the start of the year, he's been working his way through the series in preparation of doing this very podcast. It was a tumultuous journey, full of ups and downs as Colton struggled to decide whether he enjoys or hates the series. And now, three months later, he finally has his answer. I won't spoil his position, but to quote a certain letterer, "Hooray for stockholm syndrome!"

Who is this "certain letterer" I'm referring to, you ask? Why, she's only our special guest for this episode, the one and only Annaliese Christman, the official english letter for Black Clover and World Trigger in Viz's Weekly Shonen Jump, not to mention a ton of other Viz titles including Terraformars and Goodnight Punpun. In the face of Annaliese's excited cries of "BLACK CLOVER!" even the cynical, cold-hearted Colton couldn't help but warm up to the series. But just in case, we had another backup prepared in the form of good friend and frequent guest Maxy Barnard of Friendship! Effort! Victory!, whose favorite currently-running Shonen Jump manga happens to be, you guessed it, Black Clover. Poor Colton. He never stood a chance...

But seriously, talking with Annaliese was an absolute delight, as she dived into her experiences as a letterer and the challenges of the profession. Not to mention delving into details and factoids about manga publishing not often talked about, including insight regarding Black Clover's translator "HC Language Solutions Inc." (which in retrospect we could've easily researched, but still!). She also shares interesting anecdotes about her experiences meeting with Tabata-sensei and Katayama-san at Jump Festa, and helps us answer questions regarding the Black Clover light novel everyone's curious about! Not to mention providing a ton of fun observations and passionate discussion on Black Clover itself! If you're a fan of Black Clover, our nearly two and a half hour discourse on the series is surely not to be missed!

But, to quote Asta, we're not done yet! Before we get to the discussion we have to cover the news first, and somehow manage to take care of it in less than an hour? What! That can't possibly be right, can it? Yes, we changed format a bit and decided to talk news without our guests before we did the discussion, which in retrospect really worked out in our favor since we were able to be more efficient taking care of news and had more time to be able to devote to the discussion itself. Expect this format to continue going forward. Anyways, news topics this week include new details on the upcoming Rurouni Kenshin: Hokkaido Arc manga, new manga adaptations coming to Netflix next year, and a poll where japanese fans ranked the manga they most wanted to see adapted into anime...with surprising results! Oh, and LumRanmaYasha rants a little bit about how terrible the Fuuka anime's major plot change is and why it makes no sense and misguided and infuriating. Oh man, is that a topic that could make for it's own podcast one of these days...

PODCAST BREAKDOWN:

Part 1: News

00:22 - Intro & Updates!
3:17 - New Yen Press Licenses!
5:37 - One Peace Books Will Publish the Mikagura School Suite Light Novels & Manga
6:13 - Dark Horse Will Finally Release More Drifters and Blood Blockade Battlefront Volumes!
8:23 - Ikumi Fukuda launches manga adaptation of Nana Toshi Monogatari novel by Yoshiki Tanaka
10:23 - Weekly Shonen Sunday News
14:00 - Tonkatsu DJ Agetaro Will End in 2 chapters
15:17 - New Manga by Coolkyoushinja On the Way
17:20 - Sasaki Hisashi Reveals New Details of the Upcoming Rurouni Kenshin: Hok