Akira 35th Anniversary Box Set

My new favorite manga set, art on the book sleeves look amazing and far bigger then expected(viz regular and perfect Edition manga for scale). Also stitched on spines and premium pages allow you to fully take in Akira's amazing art.Bounus artbook is a added plus.

it is utterly perfect. you will not regret buying.

The box set came in perfect conditions! A lot of attention to the packaging! Its a beautiful collection! Thank you!

Exactly what was expected Christmas Gift

worth every penny.

I am beyond happy with my purchase. I've never received anything as well packaged as this. They must've stepped up their packing skills after the one guy complained about it in his review. I swear it could've fallen out of one of the delivery trucks and been hit by a car and it would've still arrived in pristine condition. I'm a huge Akira fan and I feel this set is a must have. It's definitely a show piece and for the price it's a steal. Be aware, the books are bigger than they appear in the images. I expected a normal sized manga book. These are more the size of a Stephen King book.

First of all, the quality of the manga goes without saying, if you are a fan of Akir you need no further convinging, the boxset itsef is also fantastic, all the books and the box they are compiled in look great. This is the reason i don't want to give anything less than 5 stars.BUT, the packaged arrived with the opening of the box ducktaped, and as you expect removing the tape damaged the cardboard box. I don't know which genius came up with that bright idea but i am guessing it happened during the shipping process or maybe customs. Can't imagine it was the manufacturer's fault.Its such a bummer and really hurts the display. Even looking pass the ducktape which might not be their fault I think Amazon does a pretty bad job overall when it comes to packaging books for shipping so thats worth mentioning. You order a toothbrush and it arrives with a pile of bubble wrap and cardboard padding but for some reason they never add anything to help secure books which can be easily dented and damaged during transit. This is a heavy box and the corners all have sings of stress because it had no padding on the box and was just left to tumble.I'll live i guess, but its worth pointing it out. In short, 11/10 books but the shipping leaves a lot to be desired

Kodansha really knocked this one out of the park. There's a attention to detail here that's impressive on multiple levels for Akira/Otomo fans. The overall box is impressively, surprisingly, larger than you might expect from seeing photos. I've had the set now for a few months and am still debating where/how I should display it. The 'clamshell' opening reveals the spines to all the hardcover editions as well as some impressively laid out artwork on the inside of the box. It's hard not to be impressed when you initially see the entire set. Fortunately, that level of detail and thoughtful design touches aren't isolated to the outer enclosure. I found that the same attention to detail and most every decision Kodansha made appears to be made with fans in mind.Each volume of the manga has different artwork for the 'actual cover' and the dust sleeve. The internal pages/paper are definitely higher quality than your typical manga. I've seen a lot of people state in various reviews that the paper is typical for manga and this just isn't true. It is definitely thicker stock than typical, but it is still a matte finish. Personally, I prefer the matte finish as it's closer to what you'd expect from the source material. I found no issues with the binding on any volume in my set and the outer box had no visible damage. Everything looked crisp on the page to me so I didn't have any complaints about the print quality. The Akira Club book is pure fan service bliss if you grew up a fan of the film. It really serves as a time capsule taking you back to the time the Manga was running and the film was released. I found it a lot more interesting than I originally expected it to.If you're a fan of the film and have never bothered to read the entirety of the original manga this is a great way to get it all at once in a very handsome collection that you won't regret having on your shelf for years to come. The manga expands and extends the story from the film in numerous ways that make it well worth your time. It is in no way a 'retread' if you are only familiar with the film. Otomo's artwork alone is worth the price of admission here and is frequently mind boggling considering the era it released in.If you've already read this or own a previous form of it maybe it's time to upgrade your collection. I can't imagine how they'd improve on this collection with a later release down the road.Finally, there's the patch and it's awesome.If I really had to think of criticisms of the set I could only think of a few.- There are some very minor binding 'fit and finish' issues with the collection's box.- Some people might not like the right to left reading orientation or the 'sound effects' being in their original untranslated form throughout the collection. This is ultimately a personal preference because it's not difficult to figure it out without checking the translations, and I, for one, appreciated these decisions as I think most manga fans would agree. This isn't even really a criticism, but something I could see some people taking issue with.Finally, if there were shipping issues in the past those appear to have been resolved. My collection was shipped in a internal box that was then held in place with foam inserts in a outer box. Any damage that would have occurred wouldn't have been due to poor packing in my case.