CMX’s Tenjho Tenge Posted March 3, 2005 at 3:42 pm

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Numerous reports are coming in that the first volume of Tenjho Tenge has been extensively edited by publisher CMX for content. There’s a detailed list of the edits in an article on ListerX and a lengthy discussion on the Anime On DVD forums with fans weighing in and links to both the edited and original (NSFW) content for objective comparison. From what I gather, the vast majority of edits involve cropping and added clothing to remove nudity and sexual content. To complicate matters, the edits fly in the face of CMX’s purported claim of near-perfect authenticity.

Tenjho Tenge, or simply TenTen, was already well-known and quite popular in fan circles for its candid depiction of sex and violence prior to its domestic release. I am familiar enough with the content and premise of the series to say for certain that it is intended for a mature demographic. CMX’s decision to edit TenTen, label it as Teen, and stick it next to the likes of Yu-Gi-Oh! seems ill-conceived at best. I suppose the promise of a wider market and ever higher sales can often be too great. I’m severely disappointed.

I was looking forward to enjoying a mature manga series that didn’t delve into darkness and depression quite as much as Berserk, which has done quite well in unaltered form despite being even more graphic than Tenjho Tenge. A proper domestic release of Tenjho Tenge easily has the potential to be the breakout manga series for mature readers. As it is, I will definitely not be supporting CMX’s decision to release TenTen in its current form.

I’ve compiled a list of resources and discussion threads following the editing of Tenjho Tenge. I will try to keep this list updated as things pan out.

Edit: Anime On DVD regularly purges their discussion forums of old topics. Most of the original discussion have been lost. The most current threads can be found in the Manga Editing forum.

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