Interview With Mike Montesa, Senior Editor of Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess Manga

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess manga is based on the 2006 videogame, which recently got its first digital release since publication. The manga had originally only been available legally through physical print copies.

Not long after the digital release of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess manga created by mangaka duo Akira Himekawa, TheBestWarGames got the opportunity to sit down with Mike Montesa, Senior Editor at VIZ Media to hear his thoughts about the series, his work, and more.

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Q: How did you first come to meet the authors, Akira Himekawa?

Montesa: The editors at VIZ Media actually do not have very much contact with the Japanese creators, except if they are guests at conventions. That's where I first met the duo Akira Himekawa, I think at Anime Expo in 2016, then I saw them again at New York Comic Con in 2017, and then one more time at London Comic Con in 2019, just before the pandemic.

Q: You’ve been editor of some highly prolific titles, including Black Lagoon and My Hero Academia, to name a few. What draws you to the series you end up editing?

Montesa: Sometimes the series are assigned to us, and other times we are able to push for things we want. When we have our acquisitions meetings, sometimes we know what's coming. They'll ask if anyone is interested in doing this one or that one, and you can put your hand up for it (chuckles). In the case of Black Lagoon, that one was assigned to me when first started at VIZ, it was the very first series that I ever took from Volume 1. I didn't know what I was getting when I got it, but I'm glad I did. It was, and still is one of my favourites. With The Legend of Zelda, I'd known about it for a long time and when that one came around, I was happy to work on it too. Sometimes we get to choose, and sometimes we get assigned, but I'm generally very happy with what I'm working on.

Q: So, is it safe to assume that you chose Twilight Princess?

Montesa: I think – I'm trying to remember (chuckles). Yeah, basically. I had done the first Legend of Zelda series that we released from around 2008 or 2009, and that was a series of 10 volumes of stories based on different Legend of Zelda games, like Ocarina of Time. I can't remember some of the others off the top of my head, but there were probably four or five different games that those particular volumes were based on. It wasn't like Twilight Princess where it was just one single series; but those were very interesting, I really liked working on those.

Q: The consensus seems to be that Twilight Princess is considered to be one of the darker installments in The Legend of Zelda game franchise. Do you agree, and if so, why do you think that's the case?

Montesa: I'll be honest, I can't speak to the tone of the game, but I can say that the manga; while it isn't heavy or grim, it is a bit more serious and a little darker than some of the other older entries in the Zelda manga series. Speaking with the creators and hearing them talk about this sort of thing at conventions and such, basically, with each Zelda project they do, they look for what makes the story unique or different and try to bring that into their manga.

With Twilight Princess, they did want to explore Link as a more mature character. In some of the earlier manga, Link was more boyish or a lot younger, while in Twilight Princess, Link is depicted as, perhaps not a full-on adult, but an older teenager certainly en route to maturity. Some of the themes explored in the Twilight Princess manga were more mature and not quite just for kids – themes of morality and death, that sort of thing. Link was occasionally having more existential conversations with himself (chuckles). Overall, the tone of Twilight Princess was a bit darker than the previous ones.

Q: That leads us into the next question; what demographic, if any specific one at all, do you think would best resonate with Twilight Princess?

Montesa: Wow, that's a little hard to answer. As we know, Zelda as an intellectual property goes back decades. You could say that it would appeal to anybody – from anyone who was playing the game in the late 80s and early 90s all the way until now – and that's three generations of fans. I remember it back in the day, and I'm certainly no spring chicken anymore! (Chuckles)

Manga overall certainly appeals to a younger demographic, like middle schoolers; high schoolers, but I think real fans of manga stick with it into adulthood; past college and definitely into their later years. Currently, the main customer for this is going to be teens and so forth; but I think anybody who's a fan of Legend of Zelda, regardless of their age, will find something they enjoy if they pick up the manga; particularly if they read the older series and find one that's based on a game they loved back when they were playing it.

Q: What aspect of the manga would you say is the number 1 thing you liked about the Twilight Princess?

Montesa: I think what I like about it is that it's like a step beyond the game. It gives more depth to the story and characters. In a lot of the Zelda games, Link doesn't speak, but in Twilight Princess there's a lot more dialogue going on, and there's a lot more character development and focus on particular characters. You can get deeper into the character motivations, like Link has a number of existential conversations with himself which are quite interesting. Akira Himekawa's art is fantastic, particularly in Twilight Princess where they went for a more realistic style that I really liked.

Q: You said that the previous installment was based on various games in the series. Do you think that some of the more recent videogame installments, like Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom, are going to be privy to the same treatment by the authors?

Montesa: That is a common question! (Laughs) I don't have any inside information on whether they're going to do something like that. It seems like a no-brainer to do Breath of the Wild, but it really depends on whether Akira Himekawa feel up for it. The Zelda has been the most successful work that they've done in the last 15, 16, approaching 20 years. It would not surprise me if they do come back to do another Zelda series, but you know artists want to explore other things, so they may have other projects, but never say never.

Q: Now, about you. What is your biggest inspiration?

Montesa: It's hard to narrow that down (laughs). In life, my biggest inspiration is very specifically Japan. I lived there for a long time, I have a lot of friends and family there, and by extension, that has also encouraged me to really embrace travelling and meeting different people. Life is a collection of various experiences, and I'm trying to get as much of that as I can!

Q: You've done lots of translation work in your career. What's the one project that you look back on with the most fondness?

Montesa: That's also a hard one – "which child is your favourite?", right? (Chuckles) My top three favourites are Slam Dunk, Monster by Naoki Urasawa and Golden Kamuy by Satoru Noda, which is a more recent one. Those are the ones I think are the best in terms of overall quality and the value they present, but if I were to have a pet favourite, it'd probably be Black Lagoon. It was the first series that I started on right from Volume 1. When I started as an editor, I was given other series that were ongoing, Black Lagoon was right from the start, so I was able to shape the look and feel of our release. That's been running since 2008, so that's 15 years (chuckles), it's still ongoing and when I look at recent releases I see a lot of things that I wish I had known back then and make it better or different.

Mike Montesa is an editor at VIZ Media who has worked on a number of high-profile titles, including Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba; Fist of the North Star, and more.

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess manga is available on the VIZ website.

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