Tokyo These Days is about nothing more than the act of creation. It ends prematurely, cutting the protagonist’s journey off short with a brief ‘and then it happened’ handwave coupled with a baffling endcard, but you see, that’s because Matsumoto was sick. Sick of talking about creating, and wanting to do it. Much like the characters within these very same pages.

There’s a loose throughline - leading man Shiosawa, a veteran of the manga industry, retires from the (totally-not-Kadokawa) publication company, and vows to leave the life of behind him…only to place on himself the dream of creating the 'ultimate manga’. All Avengers-like, Shiosawa seeks to assemble a group of talented creative elites for this project, each in their own stage of life and career, but each with something rich that only Shiosawa can see. What follows is an anthology of stories about different mangaka, whether they be writers or artists or editors or mix-matches of any certain degree, and how each of them see art, and how each of them approaches art, and how deeply this art juts into their soul.

“In many ways, it’s the anti-Bakuman.”

Ohba and Obata’s manga Bakuman, wherein they tackle the same subject of mangaka, their dreams, and the ultimate project, flies through its hot-blooded shonen-style plot with sheer recklessness. As the protagonists are young, so is its spirit. Just as the characters are older, so too adjusts the tonality of Tokyo These Days to accommodate its spirit. It takes a measured approach that one from the industry would do, and only one from the industry would know. Each mangaka chosen for the projects has their own personal decision to make on whether they want to. Whether it be for the reasons of age, mental well-being, other occupations, lack of skill, or flat out rejection, not everyone comes on board for this dream project of veterans. Shiosawa gets it, though. The artists accept or deny his offer and he takes each response as the same. Tokyo These Days doesn’t shy away from the fact that manga is work, just like anything else, and while it’s lauded as an golden dream job in Bakuman, it’s combated by creation as droll and difficult in Tokyo These Days.

It’s a side that you don’t see talked about often; the Melancholy, the Mundanity, the same old, the day-in day-out, the cyclical. Not to say that there isn’t this Joy in the process of creation, too, because Matsumoto makes a point to say yes, this is the reason why we all do it, the Spark, the Feeling! But! To get there requires bones. To get there requires dark circles and addictions and troubles of their own, headscratching and pulling and yelling and despair. To tell a story, to spin a yarn, is not so easy as putting words and drawings on paper. Sometimes, it is work. These are the words of a hardened veteran.

With the characters as mouthpieces, maybe for Matsumoto, but maybe for others, and through the city, as ritual, and the pen, as a constant work to be done, the author speaks, and speaks freely and ugly and true, because of his vehement love & understanding of this job, this love, this passion. This is the author’s life purpose, this is what he was meant to do, placed on this Earth for, and you can feel that in every stroke of the pen, every meandering conversation, every loving panel of the city. To be an artist is to struggle, and suffer, and yearn…But so is it to succeed, and fail, and love. Not a bit of emotion is left behind - To create art is the human experience.

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