Spy Kids 2 Cine-Manga

    (Tokyopop, 2003)
™ and © Tokyopop

The Spy Kids 2 Cine-Manga is a fun, colorful, essentially faithful retelling of the movie Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams. But what makes it manga?

Manga are Japanese comics. There is a certain style of drawing typically associated with manga, as well as certain storytelling conventions. This adaptation has none of these.

So what does make it manga? Perhaps it’s the format. It may be short like a manga comics collection, but many other kinds of books are the same height and thickness.

No, Spy Kids 2 is not manga, “Cine-” or otherwise. It is a fumetti book. (“Fumetti” refers to stories told through photographs with word balloons.) It’s essentially the same as the Fotonovel adaptations that go back to 1970s films such as Hair and Grease.

That being said, it’s a fine book, heartily recommended for kids 7 and up. It can complement the DVD (Get the kids to read something they’re already into!) or can easily stand on its own merits.

It’s just not manga.

— Jack Abramowitz
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Cover Price: $7.95
1 copy available for $4.99