Helvetica Standard

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I read the Vertical Inc. release of Helvetica Standard. It's an full-color anthology of Keiichi Arawi's comic and design work.
It comes with the said Helvetica Standard 4-komas, but also comes with the nichijou 4-komas that were serialized as promotional material for the released volumes. It also contains many promotional and miscelanious art pieces from nichijou and other Keiichi Arawi's works, as well as some stories and funny tidbits all around.

The Helvetica Standard proper 4-koma is random and very silly, but but that paired with good panel timing and beautiful art is what makes it unique and special. It's something that is nice to enjoy, ... even if you might not "get it" sometimes.
But the rest of the content is what really drew me in by surprise. It all feels like a love-letter to Keiichi's work, and of nichijou in its entirety. Looking at drawings, little 4-komas and reading all sorts of stories and comments from the author that I never knew. It felt like discovering new things of an old anime you like, and just getting to appreciate it a bit more.

If you like Nichijou, or Keiichi Arawa's work, this is fantastic. It's a funny, cozy read all the way through, and just a really neat thing to experience.

Helvetica Standart is a 4-koma manga by Keiichi Arawi which is well-known for Nichijou.

I was a big fan of Nichijou ( the Anime only) so i was really curious and had quite high expectation about his previous work.
You can also find some moment of Helvetica Standart during Nichijou anime that i found quite funny.

But I have found Helvetica really bad :

- It was the first time for me reading a 4-koma manga, and I don't appreciate 4-koma at all.
- The humour was really below what we could find on Nichijou's anime. I think it is mostly because having animation makes this kind of ... humour really to an higher level.
- I am not fond of the art, but it is not really important for this kind of comedy, so i will not judge about it. I can only say that I have found the art way below Nichijou.

----------------------------- Summary-----------------------------

Helvetica Standart is for hardcore fans of Nichijou, for people that really want to see what Keiichi Arawi made before Nichijou.
Also if you are just curious to see what it looks like, go ahead, but do not have high expectation like me.