Proper Japanese Title: 週刊漫画アクション
Weekly Manga Action began in 1967 as one of the first seinen manga magazines (back before there really was such a concept) and was also an important magazine during the height of the gekiga movement despite the magazine title. Most gekiga magazines of the era used the word "comic" in their title instead of manga as the two styles were distinct from one another (Comic Magazine, Young Comic, Play Comic, Big Comic, Leed Comic, Top Comic).
Many of the creators for the establishing era of the magazine came from the kashihon industry and most of them were active in multiple magazines during their years in Action. Major recurring creators from this early era included Baron Yoshimoto, Keiji Yoshitani, Kazuo Kamimura and Shirō Kasama. Many major authors appeared for shorter or irregular serializations and one-shots like Shotaro Ishinomori, Shigeru Mizuki or Takao Yaguchi. But two long-running hits from this period significantly raised the profile of the early magazine.
The first began in the very first issue and was the work of the magazine's dedicated cover artist (Monkey Punch), Lupin Sansei. Although Monkey Punch was the magazine's cover artist in its early years, the covers were not intentionally of his series' and just general pin-up girls despite the occassional resemblance to Lupin at times. He did covers for issues where he did not appear and despite its continued iconic status, the original Lupin series ended within two years and in the magazine's 100th issue he began his second Manga Action series. Eventually Monkey Punch was phased out for other cover artists and the magazine's own serializations getting the cover but he remained a continued presence in the magazine into the 80's with many of his serializations getting collected only decades later if at all. Because of Lupin's popularity he did sometimes return to the character and ultimately serialized its longer sequel, Shin Lupin Sansei, but in later decades when Lupin remained a face of the magazine, it was through spin-offs drawn by other artists.
The other major long-running hit from this era was Kozure Ōkami, written by Kazuo Koike and drawn by Goseki Kojima. Goseki was already a fixture of the magazine from its first issue but this was with another series, three years into the magazine's run (1970) he began Kozure. This was his first collaboration with Koike and they would go on to have many others (including in Manga Action itself). This series became one of the early classics to get official translations in English during the first manga boom in the comic industry of the late 80's (in English it was retitled Lone Wolf and Cub).
While still in this gekiga era, by the mid-70's Action was also publishing authors of the smaller "New Wave" movement. Some of the very first published works from authors like Katsuhiro Otomo and Daijirō Morohoshi were in Weekly Manga Action. In the early 80's the gekiga and new wave movements were replaced by what would more directly be seen as the beginning of what became seinen manga with the launch of new magazines like Weekly Young Jump, Young Magazine, Big Comic Spirits or Comic Morning. Manga Action rookies like Otomo or Kaiji Kawaguchi found much greater success as early mainstays in these new magazines and long-established authors like Kazuo Koike or Baron Yoshimoto also moved over.
With an author like Dookuman as an early successful example, a lot of iconic authors and franchises in the 80's and 90's were on the much lighter or comedic side. Jarinko Chie, Ganbare!! Tabuchi-kun!!, Kariage-kun, Katte ni Shirokuma, Crayon Shin-chan and Kamakura Monogatari were among the most iconic and in some cases longest-running serializations from these middle decades with several of them ultimately leaving the magazine for Futabasha's own 4koma manga magazine, Manga Town (2000). Other significant authors of this period included Eiji Kazama, Hasegawa Hosei, George Akiyama, Yasuyuki Kunitomo and Hisashi Eguchi.
In its final years, a few of its 80s authors remained and Lupin was now a regular again with new artists drawing his spin-offs. Significant serializations of these later years included those by veterans who were new to the magazine (Cutie Honey: Tennyo Densetsu and Loose Senki: Old Boy) and those that had been regulars in the magazine already for decades (Shamo). The magazine remained weekly until it was cancelled in 2003 but like a number of long-running weekly magazines in decades before and after, it quickly revived itself as a non-weekly magazine. However, due to the year gap and the magazine resetting its numbering (besides author turnover in Weekly and the creation of other Futabasha magazines), the revival magazine (Manga Action) has minimal direct connections to this one.
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