I’m sure they take forever to make, but I’d love to see more like this. Or if anybody knows of any actual comics written at this level (even without English explanations), let us know.

BTW, you don’t need to explain who Nakama Yukie is. We know.

You mention at one point だ is the informal form of です. On the other hand, there’s Tae Kim who vehemently denies this In his excellent guide to J. grammar he gives a clear explanation. Now, although I agree with Tae Kim, at the same time I would say that in some cases a sentence which one would want to make formal is made by simply replacing だ with です, even if it’s in the past/negative/negative past. This makes it kind of hard for me (and I think I’m not the only one to know how to exactly feel about だ and です, especially since it’s an important part of everyday spoken Japanese. I know I can do the whole “go with the flow” approach (and I probably will that this and this sentence means that and that, I think it would be cool if you could offer your view on the matter.

So, what’s the truth about だ and です? Is it that they are grammatically different words which sometimes simply take the same meaning (apart from the difference in politeness)?

Thanks a lot in advance!

An older student, with diminishing eyesight, I am much encouraged by this simple decision which has materially supported my progress. My son has loaned the book copy of Heisig to a friend and with this large size to study, I find I can move forward with some confidence in the stroke order.

In the explanation: だから 早く 起きて!

In the comic, it is written: だから早くおきろ!