Swans in Space
holy shit.
I'm going to be screaming out into the void with this one but. This is so so important to me specifically- as the presumed only person here who even knows what Swans in Space even is.
SO.
I just did a deep dive, and because I want to talk about it and physically can't, I'm gonna put it all here. Here we go.
Grab a snack or something ig.
Swans in Space is a manga created by Lun Lun Yamamoto. It was originally released in the early 2000's, with Swans in Space volumes 1, 2, and 3. The manga follows an outgoing sixth-grade girl named Corona Hoshino, her quiet classmate (and eventual friend) Lan Tsukishima, and their adventures with the "Space Patrol." The Space Patrol, as far as Corona knew, was a silly kids show her brother and dad were obsessed with, that was about people going through the universe and helping alien creatures in need. But, after what was essentially her bluffing to Lan and getting a vibe check from her, Corona discovers that it's real, and she's now the newest member. The rest of the series follows the girls and their duties as Space Patrol trainees. Things like finding a lost pet or delivering an item across the galaxy, to filling in for a shift at a local diner or helping someone (space) hurricane-proof their home. It also follows the girls' real lives, as 1 hour in space in only 1 minute back home. Corona has to juggle being the sixth-grade class president, becoming friends with Lan, keeping up with her own social life, homework, her family, and the boy she likes. Lots goin on for her, my overworked queen.
Anyways. That's the entire series. It's 3 books, each with 4 chapters and some cute little bonus things in the back like a coloring page or a board game or bios or fun facts.
And I LOVED it.
The amount of times I've re-read this series is. Probably a lot. I was obsessed with this as a kid. I even hand made myself a paper bracelet that was supposed to be the "space receiver" the girls have on their wrists all the time.
So. Why am I telling you all of this?
Well first of all I think the manga is cute and deserves more attention so if you like how this whole summary sounds then you should try to find it and read it cuz it's super cute and fun. Love a good ol' space adventure.
BUT.
Today. I found something.
I was feeling nostalgic and decided to look up Swans in Space on tumblr and the bird app to see if there was like. Any content at all. As per usual, there wasn't, just the posts from when I submitted Corona to the "unknown character competition" a while back. She actually made it pretty far, which I was quite happy with! Anyways. I was craving content, so I decided to look up the author's name, to see if she had a personal page or anything.
She does.
And upon scrolling further down, I am met with the biggest news to me.
Swans in Space has a french version called "Cosmic Girlz."
That's not the big news though.
The big news was that there were 6 of them.
6
That's more than 3.
So I'm sitting here like. What the fuck.
How are there more?
Why were they only printed in french? What about the english versions?
So naturally I start searching.
I'm checking left and right and I find that they DO in fact. Exist.
And I could buy them.
I found their ISBN and everything to double check that they were real, checked the details of how many pages they had, who published them, the publisher's websites, all of that.
I even google translated the descriptions and they had content that I knew were not in the original 3.
They're real.
So now I'm sitting here going, "am I about to spend money on the french version of a kids manga that I just so happened to find existed 5 minutes ago?"
...
Could I pass this off as an early birthday present to myself?
I'm honestly still holding off because. 5 and 6 are reasonably priced, but 4 is 50$? The original 3 are like. 10$ each, not even. So I'm like. aaaaaaaaaa
But honestly. If I did get them. I would take the time to sit here, write out all of the french, translate it, and have the english script on hand whenever I wanted to re-read it.
So there's that.
Thanks for coming to my TedTalk.
