VIZ Media
VIZ Media, LLC, headquartered in San Francisco, California, is a major American anime, manga and Japanese entertainment company formed by the merger of VIZ, LLC, and ShoPro Entertainment. The company is commonly referred to as "Viz", the same name used in previous incarnations of VIZ LLC.
Viz also produces a manga and anime review magazine, Animerica; as well as an English language version of Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump (shōnen manga) magazine, and a shōjo manga monthly called Shojo Beat.
It formerly published Animerica Extra, a monthly manga anthology (which was converted to shōjo partway through its run), and PULP magazine, an adult-oriented monthly manga anthology that featured story lines inappropriate for younger readers, though not pornography (see seinen, josei).
It is jointly-owned by Japanese publishers Shogakukan and Shueisha, and licensing house Shogakukan Productions (ShoPro), a Shogakukan subsidiary.
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
Viz is the one that produces the English JoJo's Bizarre Adventure manga.
This Viz edition is known for having three main changes done to the manga. One being the art alteration one being the changes in some characters names, and the last being the skip in parts.
Art Changes
As JoJo is known for its graphic violence, Viz changed a few scenes. While most of the art was kept, a few scenes involving animal death was changed. In the Yellow Temperance fight, a panel in which a dog lost its head was changed so that, while the dog still died, it wasn't as bloody. In the Death 13 fight, the death of another dog was changed in which, instead of a dog, it was a rat.
Names Changes
In order to avoid lawsuits, Viz changed the names of some characters. Some by alternating part of their names while others were completely changed.
Characters names who were changed include:
- Enya Geil = Enyaba Geil
- Devo the Cursed = Soul Sacrifice
- Steely Dan = Dan Of Steel
- Oingo = Zenyatta
- Boingo = Mondatta
Initial Skipping of Parts
The third part, "Stardust Crusaders" was initially published by Viz in its entirety starting in 2005. It was originally released every other month, however possible low sales forced the company to cut it down to a quarterly release schedule, which pushed its conclusion to December 2010.
One interesting aspect of Viz's initial release of the series was that the first two parts, Phantom Blood, and Battle Tendency, equating to volumes 1-12 of the original Japanese publication were skipped. This was possibly done because Part 3 is the most popular part in the series. To compensate for the lack of story material explaining the events of those volumes, Viz put together a special chapter, adding different panels from Part 1 along with a an explanation of Part 1 to the beginning of the first volume, as well as taking the final chapter of volume 12 and adding it to the Japanese volume 13 to make the US volume 1.
Due to this skipping of Parts, Viz initially presented Stardust Crusaders as simply "Jojo's Bizarre Adventure" acting as if the Japanese volume 13 was the official start of the manga and labeling it "Volume 1". This remained the norm in America for Jojo, continuing until the series eventually went out of print and official US Volumes became semi-rare. After fans clamoring for a reprint, Viz announced that not only would Stardust Crusaders be receiving a reprint in May 2014, but the first two parts would finally see release in the US. Starting in Late 2014, the series began to be released starting with Part 1: Phanom Blood using the Jojonium covers from Japan. The release consisted of a digital-first platform with the print editions to follow in 2015.
Due to this, the reprint of Stardust Crusaders had the covers altered and now includes the subtitle "Part 3 - Stardust Crusaders" on the cover, restoring that portion of the story to its proper chronological place.
