Anime World Order Show # 27 – Beware of Clown Pistols and Cat Musketeers

It’s another 90 minutes of mirth as Gerald talks about Goshogun: The Time Etranger aka. Time Stranger in the newer DVD release, Daryl reviews Discotek’s latest classic anime DVD release Puss n’ Boots, and Clarissa gawks over little boys more than even Michael Jackson would as she discusses CLAMP Campus Detectives!

Introduction (0:00 – 22:12)
Everyone is dismayed this week. The Ninja Consultants are dismayed that we didn’t play their message sooner, the Maharaja Mack Daddy is dismayed that we don’t have control over Google, and Jeff “Rich Lather” Tatarek is dismayed that his voicemail messages are so darned lengthy. Clarissa is dismayed that 12 year-old girls keep asking her to provide them with gay porn, Gerald is dismayed that Daryl shot him with a clown pistol (twice, as if the stabbing wasn’t enough), and Daryl is dismayed over the fact that not only was this podcast done immediately after completing Show 26, but also that he just had to write “dismayed” so many times.

But there is at least a cure for Daryl, and it’s in YOUR hands! If you’re planning to attend the San Diego Comic-Con on Saturday July 22nd, you are ORDERED to attend Kazuo Koike’s panel. Don’t be like those comicbook fandom killjoys who think Lone Wolf and Cub is real! Ask him about the GOOD STUFF. Mad Bull 34, Offered, Wounded Man, and all of his other real-time sequential art documentaries that we talked about! Click your heels together and wish hard enough, and maybe they’ll feel the joy in the room and officially announce an English language edition of The Starving Man right then and there! Yoshihiro Tatsumi, author of The Push Man and Other Stories and basically the man who kicked off the gekiga movement (of which Golgo 13 is a fine example) will also have a panel that day. So show up to these, record their panels, and send them to us! Or if SDCC forbids that, then take notes with a pen and paper during these sessions and send them to us! And while you’re at it, check out Jerry Beck’s panel where he shows the worst cartoons ever! If only we could get copies. 🙁

Let’s News! (22:12 – 37:51)
This is the first show we’ve done since Anime Expo’s reached its conclusion, so we talk about what went on there. Sort of. Reading off all the licenses and news is for wussies, so Gerald opts instead to talk about the few things he found which he deemed interesting. And this time he’s got a John Sirabella post to back him up!

Promo: The Greatest Movie EVER! Podcast (37:51 – 38:36)
Paul Chapman somehow managed to beat Dave Riley to the punch by getting a promo of his podcast made per Daryl’s insistence, and so we play it here. This podcast is about reviewing the “best” movies ever, such as Red Sonja, Alien vs Predator, Underworld, and American Ninja. Of course, much of the opinions and personal preferences expressed in this program are completely wrong, particularly if it’s his girlfriend talking about how Alien vs Predator was enjoyable, but them’s the breaks. We have been promised reviews of Ghosts of Mars and The Chronicles of Riddick, with the latter being the only film that he will temporarily rename the podcast to “The Worst Movie EVER! Podcast.”

Often Overlooked: Puss ‘n Boots (38:36 – 53:58)
Daryl continues the tried and true AWO tradition of reviewing Discotek Media’s classic anime releases that nobody else outside of this podcast’s listenership gives a crap about. This time around, it’s Toei Animation’s 1969 adaptation of the classic Mother Goose fairy tale, which is still used as Toei Animation’s mascot to this very day. As a correction to what was said in the episode, Charles Perrault was not actually Mother Goose, but he did edit the very first collection of Mother Goose stories. Unless of course, Wikipedia is full of it.

Review: Goshogun The Time Etranger (53:58 – 1:10:40)
Gerald tells us about this theatrical film that’s a followup to a giant robot series which was never quite released in the US, only this movie contains no giant robots at all. Don’t get this confused with “Toki no Tabibito – Time Stranger” which is another movie that came out a year after this and was done by Madhouse (the studio responsible for Ninja Scroll, Card Captor Sakura and other works that go so well together). FEEL THE POWER as Daryl can’t help but sing yet another of Haim Saban and Shuki Levy’s greatest hits. We’re all kicking ourselves for never having the courage to contact the porn company that doubled as the Just For Kids outfit. THIS IS WHERE YOU COME IN, DEAR LISTENERS! Also for anyone out there who has all of Macron 1 or Goshogun raw, contact us since we need these. Payment will be provided in the form of photographs of Daryl’s porno shoot (picture not exactly work safe), once someone finds and sends us the rest of those photos. Mind you, no woman actually likes Daryl enough to physically touch him in any capacity even for the sake of beating him senseless, so that’s a celebrity lookalike.

Review: CLAMP Campus Detectives (1:10:40 – 1:26:31)
Clarissa reviews a title that’s currently not available on DVD in the US despite the fact that it’s a creation of the most beloved pedophiles in manga, CLAMP. Or maybe their fanbase consists largely of pedophiles and people who will grow up to be pedophiles. 4Chan is a fair and accurate representation of fandom, right?

Promo: R5 Central (1:26:31 – 1:26:50)
The first part of Mike’s Anime Central 2006 audio coverage is up, but it’s more like a one hour personal audio log rather than a TRUTH report. Marvel at how Carl Horn totally delayed his Ultraman panel by about an hour, thus making it such that everyone was off screaming “ANIME WORLD ORDER” in unison during Anime Hell instead. Oh yeah, and Daryl did the most recent Three Minute Recommend! So um, if you like Daryl a lot, check it out!

Closing (1:26:50 – 1:30:03)
Next time, Gerald will make a feeble attempt to review something RECENT for a change by reviewing Fantastic Children, which just came out on DVD in the US. That counts, right? Or does it only count if it aired last week in Japan? Clarissa will tell everyone about the Often Overlooked smorgasborg of sex, violence, philosophy, and thoughtbirds known as A Wind Named Amnesia. Finally, Daryl’s foray into the depths of insanity resumes, because next time he continues his search for THE TRUTH behind the modern anime fandom with Part Two of The Japanese Animation Convention is Decadent and Depraved.

Time remaining until Anime Festival Orlando: about two weeks. Total number of panels at AFO that Daryl is on: 2. Total he has prepared for: 0. Gerald, like Daryl hasn’t yet started on his giant robot panel and it’s likely that Clarissa hasn’t started on hers either, so that hiatus may be after the next show. Or not.

31 Replies to “Anime World Order Show # 27 – Beware of Clown Pistols and Cat Musketeers”

  1. I used to have that godawful Puss’N Boots game as a kid. Even back then we knew it was bad. We played that crap anyway. One of the things we decided while playing it was that even though that last boss LOOKED impossible, the designers had to be able to beat it, because how else could they put it in the game? The videogame industry has since proven me wrong. I want to see that movie to see the good thing that a Nintendo game ruined for me.

    I’ve actually just been starting to watch the Hokuto no Ken TV series (that is, outside of say Showtime), and I’m really amused by the ways Toei chose to lighten the mood. It’s not just the puppy. There’s this episode where Ken fights a guy whose specific branch of Nanto entails RINGING A BELL THAT MAKES PEOPLE SPLIT IN HALF. At night he makes the villagers turn into zombies. Ken beats him by crucifying him.

    Also, similar acronym, so Daryl: your thoughts on NHK anime plz thx.

    Man, I’m more interested in those Comic-Con guests than I am in Otakon’s entire lineup. I do really like Hirano though!

  2. Scott from GeekNights here with a few quick bits.

    Are you sure about the attendance numbers for Anime Expo? I was under the impression that AX counted dealers, guests and staff as part of their attendance. I also was told that they count a four-day membership as four people. Otakon only counts actual paid members. I could be wrong, please check on this.

    I agree that Newtype is very positive. However, I don’t see Newtype as a review magazine. It is more of an art, news, advertising and culture magazine. They aren’t reviewing shows and giving them scores or anything, so their positive attitude doesn’t matter. And yeah, Newtype is mostly for the pictures.

    Interesting fact you have have overlooked. IIRC from high school Spanish Class, perro is the Spanish word for dog. You have to roll the rrrrrs.

    Also, Aladdin did not take place in India. wtf! Aladdin clearly takes place in ancient Persia. And I know for a fact that Mediterranean women are teh hotness.

  3. I don’t know man, those filler episodes of HnK are pretty awful. That whole bit where Ken’s jacket tears off is supposed to be a relatively rare happening in the manga, whereas they reused that animation in every single one of those lame throwaway episodes in the initial…third of the series.

    The NHK anime: I checked out the first episode and I get this sort of Paradise Kiss/Excel Saga vibe from the visuals. They’ve really gone and made Satou a much more sympathetic character than his manga counterpart: gone is the drug use and suicide attempts, replaced instead with the strong suggestion that he’s suffering from chronic schizophrenia a la Wesley Willis. First episode seemed like the show had promise, but that’s true for most every Gonzo production. Time will tell.

    No idea on the AX thing, though I hate when cons practice the “count one person multiple times / include staff et al among attendance” garbage that, while probably a valid accounting tactic (don’t get me started on how accountants have fooled people into thinking that the majority of what they do is math), is a bunch of BS to me. I say con attendances should be counted by actual paid members across the board, but the differences in philosophy among con staffers on this matter is why the major Florida conventions no longer publicize their attendance numbers at all.

    It’s probably best to think of Newtype as an “advertising” magazine, but the question to be asked is “does the majority of people who read Newtype think that way as well?” I would hazard a guess and say no.

    “Perro,” that’s a TOTALLY different word than “pero”! Maybe they wanted to mean the cat’s name was “but”! Also, I was duped about the Aladdin thing when I was 12 because the only Princess Jasmine lookalikes I knew were Indian girls, but before you say anything they were all like, my cousins or whatever, and I honestly can say that I have never once had the thought “man, my cousin sure is hot!” cross my mind.

    Mediterranean women are the hotness? Hmm. I know one Iranian girl, but if I said “she’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen,” she’d find out I said that here and then her explosive temper would boil over, leaving me with barely five minutes to give my death speech/life story after the knife was embedded into my brain. The same result would happen if I said “and your postulate is incorrect” so the best way to avoid getting knifed in the head is to say nothing either way. Then you just get punched in the shoulder.

  4. I agree that Newtype is very positive. However, I don’t see Newtype as a review magazine. It is more of an art, news, advertising and culture magazine. They aren’t reviewing shows and giving them scores or anything, so their positive attitude doesn’t matter. And yeah, Newtype is mostly for the pictures.

    Newtype has a “Review” section in the back of the magazine and on their website (at least they had it in the magazine when I first subscribed the first year they came out). Now whether or not it’s supposed to be an advertising/whatever magazine, if they have a segment for reviews that they don’t really intend on reviewing critically, then they shouldn’t call them reviews. Maybe something like “Glorified Press Releases” would be more appropriate :).

    Also if the magazine is basically an advertising spiel, then shouldn’t we be paying little to nothing instead of the $80 price tag?

    Also about AX. Their official press release says “With over 41,000 unique attendees…”, so while there’s no government regulation on what “unique attendees” means, it seemed like it was per person and not per day (hell, all I know they could mean “unique attendees per day”, whatever that could mean). The jump of 8,000 people from the previous year is really expected in my opinion because of the prima donnas that were CLAMP, but I don’t know if they’ll see that same jump next year, in fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the numbers next year are lower since they probably won’t get CLAMP two years in a row and there’s not really anyone bigger besides, say, Miyazaki. And since Miyazaki’s work isn’t have overtly peppered with perversions like CLAMP’s, his work doesn’t inspire the same fanatic devotion from fans that the CLAMP work does.

  5. One of the reasons why Time Stranger/Etranger stands out in my mind is because it’s one of those rare anime where the female lead has a fully formed nose.

    That, and it was a pretty strange movie. That scene with the wolf was kinda freaky 10 years ago…

  6. That, and it was a pretty strange movie. That scene with the wolf was kinda freaky 10 years ago…

    That is a really freaky scene and what makes it so freaky to me is the attention they paid to the sound effects. While they probably weren’t the most realistic “flesh ripping”, “organ tearing”, and bone snapping sound effects, they seemed to make the scene so much worse than, you know, a normal scene of a girl being eating alive, slowly, by a wolf.

  7. I should clarify the way in which the HNK fillers are amusing; I smirk while I fast-forward through them.

    This is only tangentially related, but the leading Japanese games magazine, Famitsu, is widely regarded as having zero credibility. It’s understood by everybody (except the reader of course!) that they run what the companies pay them to run. I wouldn’t be surprised if Newtype (and by default Newtype USA) were the same way.

  8. MMD here. Lol I am one joke man. However if I stop using this joke I get complaints…as to being not funny well you can just eat it. Jeff, its all good fun (not sure if I should be offended about “how you went there”). However, Jeff can you talk any longer? I mean come on don’t you have stuff to do.

  9. No, Daryl. Keiji Nakazawa actually put “I Saw It”, the comic you mention as one of the first translated manga, before Barefoot Gen. The autobiographical story of “I Saw It” is completely contained in it’s 30 page length, and tells the story of Kenji Nakazawa from the Bomb to his adult years and his mother’s death, which led to him making Barefoot Gen.

  10. Interesting. I had always thought Barefoot Gen was initially brought out in the US around the late 70s (1976 or so I was thinking) with I Saw It being released around 1982 (although I know it was written first), but as I check my recent edition of Gen, it states that it was first published in 1987, which is much later than I’d always pegged it.

    And while I’ve got the book open: in the foreword to the recent edition, Art Spiegelman mentioned that he’d first read Barefoot Gen when he was just getting started on Maus back in the late 70s. He mentioned being sick with the flu and terribly feverish as he was reading it. If I were to read that without having read the publishing information first, that would actually jive with my initial idea that he read the initial English language release. I guess I just wasn’t banking on the idea that he’d have been able to acquire something that wasn’t in English, let alone be willing to read through in the state he was in.

    I find it kind of hard to believe that an organization founded in 1976 with the express purpose of releasing Barefoot Gen (named “Project Gen” no less) would take 11 years to actually produce something (being beaten to the punch on I Saw It by… what, Eclipse Comics?), and that they’d release something else first. I can only conclude that this 1987 release is a revised translation of whatever was originally put out since the fine print specifically states “this English translation in book form” was first published in 1987.

  11. Hey MMD, glad to hear you are taking all of this in good fun because I did enjoy this as well as the next one I’ve got going.

    What did I mean by “I went there”? Hell, I don’t know. Just don’t go -there-, because that’s bat country.

  12. I haven’t found my copy of I Saw It yet, but I know it’s with a lot of stuff I packed up in my move last year. I’d like to say it was early than ’82, but can’t be too sure. I know that it was put out by some publisher named Edu-comics or some such. I’ll be able to give you more details when I actually find the book.

  13. What? You can go there Jeff and I (the MMD) can’t…this is clearly racism (i’m kidding don’t cry). As for bat country , well that doesn’t scare me unless they are those weird giant south american bats (those things are huge).

  14. That is a really freaky scene and what makes it so freaky to me is the attention they paid to the sound effects. While they probably weren’t the most realistic “flesh ripping”, “organ tearing”, and bone snapping sound effects, they seemed to make the scene so much worse than, you know, a normal scene of a girl being eating alive, slowly, by a wolf.

    Yeah, I just revisited that scene and those sound effects were pretty sickening. Not wholly realistic, I’d say, but the point of sound effects is to be evocative, not necessarily realistic.

    But really, pain and horror are in the details. I don’t think much of the violence in crap like Angel Cop or Elfen Lied because it’s all spectacle: viscera with no real visceral connection. They may as well be water balloons filled with ketchup.

    But the wolf scene in Time Stranger or the first episode of Haibane Renmei…stuff like that makes me wince. These scenes aren’t particularly violent by comparison, but that scream in the first episode of Haibane has stayed with me ever since the first time I saw it…

  15. Fred Schodt’s Dreamland Japan has a pretty clear history of Barefoot Gen/I Saw It. I just re-read that part the other day, but I can’t remember the details like the dates. I’m of the mind that I Saw It was published after Barefoot Gen, though. I’ll see if I can’t remember to look it up at some point after I get home tonight.

  16. (Steve)

    FWIW, ‘Pero’ is also the sound effect for licking something.

    Also, Pero is often shorthand for ‘Pierrot’

    Just throwing that out there.

  17. (Steve)

    Ummm….Ummmmm….boy, I feel bad, but I have to school Gerald a little on GoShogun…

    GoShogun was a ‘serio/comic’ show produced by Ashi Pro, in the vein of Acrobunch or Daltanius, where while there’s serious angst is going on (“My best friend is now my enemy! One of us must DIE!” and they have a duel in a GRAVEYARD!IN THE RAIN!) there’ll be stuff like an ad for ‘Kernagal Fried Chicken’

    The movie ‘Time Stranger'(actually *just* Etranger as the English title in Japan, no ‘time’) has as much to do with the series as the ‘Lost in Space’ movie has with that TV series. (and yes, Time Stranger was a theatrical release, not an OAV.)

    Here is what GoShogun is about, taken from the English crawl at the start of GoShogun the Motion Picture:

    “In the early part of the 21st Century, the Earth is under the arbitrary control of the huge malicious organization called ‘Docooga’.

    Nevertheless there solely exists a group which bravely rises against the enormous power of ‘Docooga’.

    The name of the group is ‘Good Thunder’ The commander of the group is Mr. Sabarath.”

    *whew*

    What I get is that Good Thunder is a team of good guys fighting in a world where crime rules. Mr. Sabarath is a bald guy in aviator sunglasses and a nehru jacket.

    Yes, there’s an annoying small child (Kenta) and robot mascot (OVA).

    The one advantage Good Thunder seems to have, besides the f’king giant robot of death GoShogun, is that the Good Thunder Mobile Base has instant teleportation.

    Our heros fly around in three oddly shaped craft that can combine and form a large robot, but when Ass needs to be WHUPPED they seperate and dock with GoShogun, Shingo in the chest, Remy and Killy one each per leg.

    Bundol is a hoot. He’ll sometimes stop whatever he’s doing to comment on the beauty and perfection of the explosions while a battle is going on. Beauty is his thing.

    GoShogun is a really off kilter show, trying to dance along the lines of classic super robot, new style ‘real’ robot, comedy, drama and so on. I wish I had more than one episode. I Believe it only ran 26 episodes.

    And Remy NEVER used a S & W model 29 .44 magnum in the TV series. Everyone had zappy guns.

    I hope this helps 🙂

  18. (Steve)

    Oh, I forgot to mention, GoShogun comes across as a less edgy, more kid friendly version of Bryger.

  19. Dreamland Japan mentioned Barefoot Gen as being available ‘by 1980’ and I Saw It as being published in 1983. Project Gen was indeed credited as forming in 1976.

  20. I have in fact seen a complete raw torrent of GoShogun on one of those finding stuff for free on the Internet sites, so I’m sure someone has it. Maybe it’s on RH?

    Also there’s no such thing as “Gunbuster 2” it’s called “Aim for the Top! 2 Diebuster” ARGH

  21. I have two Macron 1 VHS tapes and I’m seeing 5 total listed on AllMovie.

    Macron 1: Battle for the Universe (1988)
    Macron 1: Dark Star’s Revenge (1987)
    Macron 1: Dark Discovery in a New World (1986)
    Macron 1: Fighting for Truth & Justice (1987)
    Macron 1: Flight of the Battle Robots (1987)

    I think I have the third and fourth ones, but I’d need to dig them out of the box they’re in. There aren’t any cover images of the other ones, so I’m wondering if they ever came out or not.

    Not exactly what you were looking for, but still some (awful) fun.

    There was some information I found on littleman.com (should be Wee-Man, amirite) about these 5 tapes (as well as everything Celebrity’s Just For Kids line). The OOP date is listed as 2003.10.16, but everything else is, too, so I don’t know how much that’s worth.

  22. I laughed pretty hard at those search referrers, especially at the quoted one. Earned me some funny looks from my co-workers…

    Speaking of work…I’m in the search industry, so I can totally relate to the situation with the bizarre search referrers. I can honestly say that I see weirder ones than those on a daily basis. One of the few aspects of my job that doesn’t make my head melt from boredom. 😛

    ~Kamon

  23. You bastards. I had the Macron 1 theme stuck in my head all last night at work, and had to get “You’ve Got the Touch” from the Transformers movie stuck in its place to keep me from shouting “FEEL THE POWEEEEEEEER!” God help us all if you get all the music from Kidd Video.

  24. I too have the Macron-1 theme stuck in my head, where it vies for dominance with various power ballads by Journey and the Crystal Lite(TM) jingle.

    Actually, the only thing that was able to dislodge the Macron-1 theme from my brain was the opening theme for Kujibiki Unbalance. I had to fight evil with evil, but now my brain is completely corrupt. Curse you! Curse you all!

    P.S. Thanks for playing my promo. I greatly appreciate it.

  25. Thanks for slamming me! 🙂

    I might have to pick up “Puss ‘n Boots” from eBay since I tend to fair better there than any other online do-hickey. Shame my Best Buy didn’t bother getting it in either (I even had to ask the rep there at the day it was to be released if it even came in, I just don’t want to go to the trouble of special ordering it if it came to that, but most of these locations don’t even do that anymore).

    On other things, I wish I could help you on the Goshogun quest. I had to spot a torrent out there for the TV series that was 6 gigs big, but since it was put out nearly a year ago, it already outlived it’s welcome, and there’s some 6 or 7 leechers with no pulse to keep that one alive (and I haven’t joined up the tracker, so I don’t have a say in their affairs or could PM the guy who had the torrent up). The only consolation I could give is for anyone of the 100 who managed to get it completely should give AWO a ring!

    The best I have were several of the Macron 1 compilations I had probably booted to DVD now, but most “Just for Kids” releases were horribly duplicated in the cruddy EP speed that never works on older models and the sound is like shit if the Hi-Fi tracks’ screwed. Sometimes you could be lucky, and find a tape that is in SP mode, which means you hold on to that sucker!

    Funny that I had to read that Saban had to go and buy up Univision like that. Too bad I never had Univsion or Telemundo back when these classics aired on them!

    Treasure Island: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuKiPTySumg
    Time Bokan: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bqxTIKVMI0
    Gekko Kamen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gT8nU5y1A-k
    Captain Tsubasa: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HL_TqAUPoAI

    Could’ve been worse, Saban could try to get Espanol editions of “Teknoman” and “Eagle Riders” up on Univision if he bothered (those were so horrible)! 🙂

    Let’s just be thankful his company never licensed the Goshogun movie, or we’d never hear the end of it (not that a Macron-1 flick isn’t out of the question, but it probably wouldn’t have made any more sense than the movie had been)!

    I loved listening to Gerald talk about the problems with American and Japanese companies when it comes to licensing anything these days. I wish things could be simpler myself. A close pal of mine for nearly a decade just got himself the entire KOR material AnimEigo’s selling off due to losing the license to that series in a few weeks. Makes me wonder how much could getting the license to that series might be now that it’s open (if possible). Would suck if it’s as much as I think it would be.

    Love to hear a review of Barefoot Gen myself, having saw the first movie already, and couldn’t help but really felt emotional over it.

    Also thanks to Clarissa’s review of Clamp Campus Detectives, I’ve only read the first volume of that, and yeah, it’s pretty much all she had to say about it. The anime sounds like something I wouldn’t mind sticking up on my schedule if I owned a TV network (especially on Saturday Morning if I could get away with it). Kinda lame Bandai didn’t put it out on DVD though.

    Similarly, I only wish VIZ would bother releaseing the Galaxy Express 999 movies to DVD as well, but they’ll probably never get to that at all (and me having to download a rip of a Korean DVD with VIZ’s subtitle script apparently used).

    Anyway, thanks again for another great podcast, I think you’re getting better everytime!

  26. RightStuf just had a Media Blasters sale, so I was able to pick up the Giant Robo box for about $13.50.

    Life is good.

    ~Kamon

  27. RightStuf just had a Media Blasters sale, so I was able to pick up the Giant Robo box for about $13.50.

    By “had” I suppose you mean, no longer active? If that’s not the case do you have the details of the sale since many of the major outlets don’t seem to be carrying it for some reason.

  28. By “had” I suppose you mean, no longer active? If that’s not the case do you have the details of the sale since many of the major outlets don’t seem to be carrying it for some reason.

    The Media Blasters sale ended yesterday.

    As for other places that are selling the GR box, DVDPriceSearch has a list of vendors here. Most of the prices seem to vary between $16 and $23.

  29. Yeah, sorry. I only just barely made my order on time myself. I would have posted it here sooner had I known about it.

    ~Kamon

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