Bad news for manga lovers today: DC Comics is closing CMX, its manga division, as of July 1.

CMX set up shop six years ago and got into hot water with fans a few months later, when they tried to publish Oh! Great's boobs-and-battles manga Tenjho Tenge with a teen rating by censoring it heavily. Fans reacted with indignation, but a CMX editor was heard to remark years later that TenTen was its best-selling title. The imprint also published a number of classic shoujo (teenage girls) manga series, including Swan and the comedy-adventure title From Eroica With Love.

Asako Suzuki took over as director of manga in 2006 and quickly shifted the tone. She and Editor Jim Chadwick went out of their way to establish rapport with fans, and a number of the series they licensed, including Emma, The Name of the Flower and Kiichi and the Magic Books, garnered good reviews. They also published a number of all-ages and kid-friendly series, such as The Palette of 12 Secret Colors. CMX books were hard to find in bookstores, however, and at conventions the imprint often seemed to be an afterthought, with little space allotted to the division in the DC booths and panels.

In addition to Japanese manga, which it licensed through a co-publishing agreement with the Japanese cell-phone publisher Flex Comics, CMX also published Fred Gallagher's Megatokyo. That series will continue under the DC banner.

The official statement can be found after the break:

Over the course of the last six years, CMX has brought a diverse list of titles to America and we value the books and creators that we helped introduce to a new audience. Given the challenges that manga is facing in the American marketplace, we have decided that CMX will cease publishing new titles as of July 1, 2010.

The shuttering of the CMX line does not affect the best-selling series Megatokyo which will continue publication, now as a DC Comics title with story and art by Megatokyo's award-winning creator Fred Gallagher.

We’d like to take a moment to acknowledge the efforts and dedication of the CMX staff and to thank our fans who have supported CMX.

- DC Comics Co-Publishers Jim Lee and Dan Didio