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Posted

As the title says, I'm looking for a place that carries the books. I was able to pick up the first 9 books at my local comic shop, but they don't have anymore and they said they can't order more because the books are out of print. I've really become hooked on this series and I know there's a lot more than the books I have. Help please!

Posted
As the title says, I'm looking for a place that carries the books. I was able to pick up the first 9 books at my local comic shop, but they don't have anymore and they said they can't order more because the books are out of print. I've really become hooked on this series and I know there's a lot more than the books I have. Help please!

I feel your pain. I, fortunately, managed to scrape together a full set of the volumes. I bought a lot of them from Barnes and Noble online (believe it or not). Try using their used and out of print search. Try the same thing on Amazon. Obvious, I know, but I scored a few volumes that way a while back.

Next, try calling a Kinokuniya bookstore (http://www.kinokuniya.com/). They were very helpful in tracking down the last couple of issues that I needed.

Finally, poke around on www.gearsonline.net they actually have a FSS section (including a FSS trade section)in their forums. I believe that it is the ancestral descendant of the old waxtrax forum...

Hope this helps...

Posted

Hmm, while we're on the topic, I was wondering if the English version comes in thin issues or a full volume/tankoubon (or both?). I remember seeing the former format but not full volumes.

Posted (edited)
Hmm, while we're on the topic, I was wondering if the English version comes in thin issues or a full volume/tankoubon (or both?). I remember seeing the former format but not full volumes.

FSS fanatic reporting. :ph34r:

the english version is thinner than the japanese ver (usually 2-3 eng ver book = 1 jp tankouban)

2 types of english versions, distributed by:

1. Kinokuniya - staple bound books 1-12 (approx equivalent to jp vol5)

2. Diamond - square bound books 1-26 (approx equivalent to jp vol10)

Edited by Shun
Posted

Just wanted to say thanks again guys for the help. I've been able to score all of the books except one, just waiting for them to be delivered! I can't wait :D

Had another question though, I heard a while ago that there were plans to produce more ova's of FSS and was wondering what the status was on them? Hadn't heard anything in a while so I assume that the idea has been put on hold indefinitely or scraped altogether. Just wondering if anyone knows for sure.

Posted

There is only ONE FSS movie (roughly the story in JP vol 1/ eng vol 1-3), and no plans for any other fss animation at all. as far as i've heard. :(

Although u might want to watch Heavy Metal L-Gaim ('80s anime) which is basically by the same author and very similar story to FSS Part 2 (where Daba = Colus 6 leads the rebels against the empire). U will find alot of similar designs/characters to those in FSS.

As for the author Mamoru Nagano, he's working on an OVA animation titled GothicMade (GTM not really related to fss) since 2005, and serialization for FSS has since stopped.

To be a FSS fan, u must have lots of patience... :p:rolleyes::lol:

Posted

I'll have to check out L-Gaim then. Seems like it's the closest I'll get to animated FSS aside from the actual DVD. I still have the wonderful manga series though. Thanks for the info. :)

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted
There is only ONE FSS movie (roughly the story in JP vol 1/ eng vol 1-3), and no plans for any other fss animation at all. as far as i've heard. :(

Although u might want to watch Heavy Metal L-Gaim ('80s anime) which is basically by the same author and very similar story to FSS Part 2 (where Daba = Colus 6 leads the rebels against the empire). U will find alot of similar designs/characters to those in FSS.

As for the author Mamoru Nagano, he's working on an OVA animation titled GothicMade (GTM not really related to fss) since 2005, and serialization for FSS has since stopped.

To be a FSS fan, u must have lots of patience... :p:rolleyes::lol:

Patience alone doesn't do it...you've also got to REALLY BELIEVE that Nagano is immortal...he's been doing it for, what, 23 years? And he's only covered about 200 of the 5000 years he said he would cover.

Not only that, but with loose ends drifting about from both before and after the FSS timeline, at the rate he's going it'll take him 7777 years to write the thing...

FSS is up there with Sandman as one of my all-time favorite comics, but I've given up hope of Nagano ever actually finishing it.

As a side note, my understanding is that he strenuously denies any connection between FSS and L-Gaim...I wonder why, since you'd have to be brainless NOT to see the connections. Or maybe I misunderstood his comments...

Posted

Nagano has the Daughter chip like Rogner so he can keep cloning himself. :)

the problem is we don't have one :ph34r:

Anyway, the thing about FSS is that it was ALREADY completed even before it started - want to know what happens at the end? Read the timeline. That's the special part about this story, we already know whats gonna happen. Nagano's just filling in the gaps and giving us a more indepth look into the events. So in actual fact, he don't need to 'finish' it, because he already did. With that said, i hope he'd start the serialization asap... -.-

Hmm... where did u read that he denies any connection between L-Gaim and FSS? The connection is definitely there: Five planets, Temple Knights -> Mirage Knights, Heavy Metal -> Mortar Headd, Poseidal backwards -> Ladios Sopp (somewhat lol), Daba/Kamon Myroad 6 -> Colus 6, L-Gaim -> Junchoon, Aug -> Auge.... etc etc ... even some designs are the same - those hovercraft vehicles Diggs are same design. Fatimas in mecha head cockpits, in fact there were preliminary designs of those fatima/co-pilots in L-Gaim.

Posted
Nagano has the Daughter chip like Rogner so he can keep cloning himself. :)

the problem is we don't have one :ph34r:

Anyway, the thing about FSS is that it was ALREADY completed even before it started - want to know what happens at the end? Read the timeline. That's the special part about this story, we already know whats gonna happen. Nagano's just filling in the gaps and giving us a more indepth look into the events. So in actual fact, he don't need to 'finish' it, because he already did. With that said, i hope he'd start the serialization asap... -.-

Hmm... where did u read that he denies any connection between L-Gaim and FSS? The connection is definitely there: Five planets, Temple Knights -> Mirage Knights, Heavy Metal -> Mortar Headd, Poseidal backwards -> Ladios Sopp (somewhat lol), Daba/Kamon Myroad 6 -> Colus 6, L-Gaim -> Junchoon, Aug -> Auge.... etc etc ... even some designs are the same - those hovercraft vehicles Diggs are same design. Fatimas in mecha head cockpits, in fact there were preliminary designs of those fatima/co-pilots in L-Gaim.

I think it was in an essay in the back of one of the English volumes...somewhere between 23 and 26 (I don't have them handy so I can't check). The writer mentioned (IIRC) that Nagano got upset when someone mentioned that FSS seemed like a prequel to L-Gaim, and responded, "Five Star Stories has never been L-Gaim's rear end!"

The Timeline is funny...some things (like the destruction of Kallamity Goderce) are told in enormous details, while others are much too brief ("Atropos goes into seclusion with an infant LED Dragon"...who would of thought it would take more than 700 pages to explain THAT line?), and a lot of things aren't there are at all. So although we all know that Amaterasu and Lachesis end up together, there's still a lot that will be left unanswered if he drops dead anytime in the next forty years (unless he drops everything and does nothing but draw FSS morning, noon, and night).

It kind of reminds me of Robert Musil's novel, The Man Without Qualities. As it stands, it's incomplete at more than 1700 pages, which are set during the months before WWI. Musil died before he could get any further, but, from his notes, it's clear he planned to take the story through WWI and into WWII, with no big jumps in the story...obviously, this would be impossible, unless he had started writing the book when he was five years old. He really seemed to believe he had infinite time to complete the book.

I'm not really complaining...FSS can be confusing and frustrating, but that's just because it's so damn good, and if he decides that he'll quit writing it, I'll be upset, but I'll still be grateful that I got to read as much as I did.

Posted (edited)

Well IMHO, the timeline is a good outline for him to create his stories, and a great guide for readers. In this way, he reliefs himself from the pressure of "completing" the story and is somewhat responsible to the readers in case the story cannot go on for whatever reasons. But he can always jump to whatever timeline and tell the story about certain characters, so his story is never ending! very smart way of story telling!

Also, he tells alot of stories and lots of bits of info in his supplement books such as Designs and Characters series, further enriching the world of FSS. There are more supplementary books than his manga tankoubans lol...

Edited by Shun
Posted
Well IMHO, the timeline is a good outline for him to create his stories, and a great guide for readers. In this way, he reliefs himself from the pressure of "completing" the story and is somewhat responsible to the readers in case the story cannot go on for whatever reasons. But he can always jump to whatever timeline and tell the story about certain characters, so his story is never ending! very smart way of story telling!

Also, he tells alot of stories and lots of bits of info in his supplement books such as Designs and Characters series, further enriching the world of FSS. There are more supplementary books than his manga tankoubans lol...

I wish my Japanese was good enough to read those supplementary books...I can't even read the manga in the original (It's easier than Shirow, however).

And yeah...I'm sure the story is deliberately unfinishable...every time I think I've grasped where the story has to go next, he widens the scope...first with the "Beyond the 7777" chapter in Traffics1, and then with the AD Era stuff in "The Chvalries."

At the rate he's going though, as long as he finishes "The Magestic Stand," I'll be happy...

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