Anime World Order Show # 58 – No, The Other DA BOMB

Finally, an actual episode again! Clarissa reviews Suzuka, and Daryl not only recounts his experience at Florida Supercon, but also reviews Barefoot Gen, which is a very important work indeed. Gerald’s Otakon report has been split off into a separate file.

We would like to thank everyone who inquired to ask whether the podcast was no more following PT Chapman’s vicious attack upon Daryl’s throat. Some wondered if perhaps he would need a voicebox to talk like Junjo from Return of the Street Fighter, but fear not: Daryl retaliated using a secret unblockable technique that does triple damage:

Introduction (0:00 – 33:25)
Clarissa clearly does not believe in the concept of stating your name at the start of each episode, but we may as well abide by SOME of the podcasting do’s, right? No emails this week, since Daryl’s got his much-overdue report of the most recent Florida Supercon, a sci-fi convention in South Florida whose attendees largely consist of people who don’t go to any other conventions throughout the state and don’t seem to have any sort of presence on the Internet whatsoever. There is an entire hidden underworld of anime fandom that is mostly invisible save for events such as this.

  • Risingsun.net is one of the largest cosplay picture sites around, and due to it being centered in Florida, we know a great deal of the featured people on this site. In fact, the cosplayer with the most pictures of all is Gerald’s neighbor. The “Boner Robin” pictures of Troy that Snacks mentioned originated from here, and there’s even pictures of us looking dumbfounded for those willing to investigate.
  • On the opposite site of the eternal Blood War, here’s the homepage for AssimilationCon, which is the week after AWA. Decide for yourselves which side is the Tanar’ri and which side is the Baatezu (we get to be the Yugoloths). Just to review: the day after AWA, Daryl has jury duty. The day after that, Halo 3 comes out. Then this convention happens. I bet we have Otaku USA deadlines around then too. Good thing we didn’t get conscripted to do panels at Assimilation, oh wait

Promo: Ninja Consultants (33:25 – 35:21)
Following a courtesy bump voicemail and an explanation that this is where Gerald’s Otakon report was originally, Daryl has created a special promo for Erin and Noah that’s all sunshine and rainbows as proof that he is not entirely negative despite being the Hunter Zolomon of podcasting.

As for the Otakon report, here’s a slideshow of the pictures you should totally look at while listening to Gerald’s Otakon report:

You might want to just click this link to view the full gallery at once. Captions by Gerald; no writing in to say “that’s Dr McNinja, dude!” since we already told him.

Here’s the doujin cover Gerald was talking about:
Review: Suzuka (35:21 – 54:45)
Following her highly demoralizing review of everyone’s favorite government crime investigation agent, Zaizen Jotaro, Clarissa really needed something to pick her out of that haze. That’s when Daryl told her to review Suzuka. Funimation has sent us three discs worth of this show. Clearly they hate us. Perhaps Clarissa can elaborate upon our feelings on this show in an upcoming issue of Otaku USA!

Promo: Otaku USA Magazine (54:45 – 56:11)
Did you see that freaking segue we just did? Daryl finally saw Issue 2 last week and was quite glad to see that clown pistols not only got mentioned in print, but the picture appeared as well. Journalistic aspirations: COMPLETED.

Review: Barefoot Gen (56:11 – 1:28:28)
Daryl may claim to be a serious anime fan who discusses serious subjects, but it was his decision to put in the Gap Band song, the sound effect for which made him laugh hysterically as a toddler…and also now. It’s too bad that it was used in GTA San Andreas. Regardless, this is an important work that everyone should at least see once, and it’s kind of annoying Grave of the Fireflies gets all the mainstream Roger Ebert-level praise while this story remains relatively unrecognized.

  • Buy Barefoot Gen: The Movies 1 & 2 (or anything else on the site), and I think we get a percentage if you do so by clicking that link!
  • Last Gasp Publishing, whose press releases seem to suggest that their editions of Barefoot Gen have sold out multiple printings of several thousand copies each. If that’s the case, then where’s the next six volumes? I think the recent volumes of Phoenix sold fewer than 100 copies (really, I’m not exaggerating), but those still come out eventually.
  • Here’s a link to Barefoot Gen Volume One: A Cartoon Story of Hiroshima, which is the first volume of the manga; volumes two, three, and four are all that’s out so far in the US, and it’s been a few years since the last one came out

Closing (1:28:28 – 1:38:14)
People are actually THANKING us for tricking them into watching MD Geist. Must be some crazy variant of Stockholm Syndrome. The current contest is over, since we have entirely too many entries, but there’ll certainly be more contests to come. Next er…time, Daryl is going to talk about Robot Carnival like he was originally going to do this time around. In the weeks to come, he’ll be burning through a bunch of the stuff that Vertical Inc. has released over the last few months. Gerald managed to find one of the few things DMP publishes that isn’t gay porn, Project X: Cup Noodle, which has nothing to do with training chimps to be astronauts. Clarissa, after having been Zaizen’ed and Suzuka’ed, is feeling like murdering children, so it’s only fitting that she review When They Cry: Higurashi, which is one that’s been repeatedly requested of us. Hey, one of us has to review anime, right?

I think Suzuka’s the breaking point: from this point on we’ll try sticking to our original principles of reviewing series in their entirety whenever possible, so when we’ve got just Volume 1 of something, which is happening more and more, we’ll try and do mini-reviews that last something like 5 minutes instead. There’s no other way we’ll get through all of this stuff!

109 Replies to “Anime World Order Show # 58 – No, The Other DA BOMB”

  1. Yes there were a few typos in the first attempt. Apologies.

    Gerald – The AAA Concert was pretty packed and was pretty much filled to capacity with Video 1 being overflow if I remember right.

    As for how I got in, Tyler and I got special press treatment so we got front row right away. Felt like we were at an idol event with everybody rushing to get pictures during the first three songs.

    And god the schedule really was messed up. What made it worse was when the sign outside of Panels 3 went missing.

    And to add a note to that, BIG props to Brian from Otakon Press for seriously working his arse off. I thought that press has a one hour jump for the dealer’s room though?

    Speaking of that, in the final hours of the Dealer’s Room, they started doing the Lucky Star dance, completely hijacking the 24/7 Haruhi dance.

    …and you just HAD to include my attempt to jazz up the watch 😛

  2. Is it just me, or did Berserk suddenly turn into chick literature after volume 13? (I’m going by the DH release btw.)

  3. Wow, this show was as great as it was long. It was well worth it all the wait.
    I can’t wait to listen to Carnival of Robots and yes I got my Vol 1 of Phoenix and it says second edition on it 😀 . Now I have to return the one I got from my local library.

  4. Gerald, no mall cop can hassle you (legally) about taking a picture in a public place (which a mall’s hallway counts as) without a court order. They can work on getting you BANNINATED from the building and going back would make you guilty of trespassing, but taking a picture is no big deal. Mall cops are pretty much the lowest level of ‘law enforcement’ and usually the least educated about what they’re allowed to do.

    If a mall cop hassles you about taking a picture, tell them to come back with a court order. If you get thrown out of the mall, you’re probably better off for it anyway (unless you work there, in which case you’re pretty much fucked, but you’ve probably got bigger problems anyway).

  5. Great show once again AWO! Thoroughly enjoyed it and it was worth the wait! (I’m definitely in the camp for longer shows too!) I was a bit confused as to the availability of the Barefoot Gen manga. You mentioned that there are only 4 vol available here. Are those 4 equivalent to the original 10? Also, is the manga something easy to find online? Are there scanlations of it?

    Also, Gerald, what a lucky find! I’m a huge fan of Kiki’s (one of Miyazaki’s most underrated films in my opinion) and the combination of that and Batman looks great! Would it be too much to ask for a jpeg of some sample pages?

    Thanks!

  6. What happened with that whole situation concerning the Anime “professionals” and their “copyrighted” panel? Did this Florida convention follow the same regulations as AFO or did you seriously have to get permission to play/use the audio of their panel? Either way, the grounds for their objections sound unbelievably ridiculous. If possible, could you release the recording as a bonus episode or something like? I’m just sort intrigued by it all.

    L8er

  7. The no cameras rule was some weird staff thing, not 4chan’s. I think.

    They wanted everyone to put away their DSes too, just because they looked like cameras, but we negotiated that down on the spot.

  8. The no cameras rule was some weird staff thing, not 4chan’s. I think.

    That sounds very strange since, except for the concerts, and perhaps the Maki Murakami panel (neither of which I went to), there was no other panel that had any sort of restrictions on photography. And all of those were imposed by the people running the panel, so why would Otakon arbitrarily impose photography restrictions on a fan run panel when the panelists have no problem with it?

    I would think that some 4chan staff at some point would have said “no photography”. Oh wait, there was also a sign up during the panel panel too. I’m just very confused as to why that has some of the most severe photography restrictions of a non-pro event.

  9. “Regardless, this is an important work that everyone should at least see once, and it’s kind of annoying Grave of the Fireflies gets all the mainstream Roger Ebert-level praise while this story remains relatively unrecognized.”

    It did get a mention in TIME a while back. But I’d imagine the reason it doesn’t get as much exposure is that most people have trouble sitting through it long enough without losing their lunches. The Geneon rep I talked to last year said this was one anime they didn’t license for the money.

    “Last Gasp Publishing, whose press releases seem to suggest that their editions of Barefoot Gen have sold out multiple printings of several thousand copies each. If that’s the case, then where’s the next six volumes? I think the recent volumes of Phoenix sold fewer than 100 copies (really, I’m not exaggerating), but those still come out eventually.”

    Phoenix sold so few copies, because Viz printed so few copies. Last Gasp is probably losing money, because most of their Barefoot Gen books are rotting on the shelves. I feel sorry for it, but it’s always been a tough sell.

    In the 80s, the Frank Miller crowd would have demanded “cool” violence which makes readers feel vindicated somehow, while Gen would make them question war, which wouldn’t fly
    with the Reagan children. In the 00s, it’s all about the moe and pointless violence, which means people think jerking off to Elfen Lied and Gantz is more intellectually-stimulating than Gen. Tough break for people who like stories with context, but
    the emo fucks have taken over, and only care about self-gratification.

    “Next er…time, Daryl is going to talk about Robot Carnival like he was originally going to do this time around. “

    It’s a shame STA can’t seem to get that out right now. I wonder if the sequel is still happening. I just hope Bandai Visual doesn’t suddenly get the rights and charge me $150 for it…

    “Gerald managed to find one of the few things DMP publishes that isn’t gay porn,”

    They actually have a number of non-yaoi titles. Hell, they publish Berserk, Trigun, and Hellsing faster than DH publishes Oh My Goddess and Shirow. (No offense to you, Carl, since you’re doing a good job. They just can’t seem to meet deadlines, though.)

  10. MD Geist fans and purists alike should track down the original version on vhs since Central Park Media only released the director’s cut on dvd which had certain scenes reanimated.

  11. Project X: Cup Noodle!! Why I just reread it this weekend. I can’t wait to hear that review! The Project X manga series is fantastic, though to be fair I’ve only read the Datsun one and the Cup Noodle one. We haven’t gotten the 7 Eleven one yet. I’d love to see more esoteric titles like those show up over here.

  12. It’s a shame STA can’t seem to get that out right now. I wonder if the sequel is still happening. I just hope Bandai Visual doesn’t suddenly get the rights and charge me $150 for it…

    STA don’t exist anymore. The company was run by (literally) one woman who is no longer with the Japanese parent company. Now if only someone would post DVD ISO’s of Sci-Fi Harry…

  13. Hey Gerald, Tyler here from Rangercast. Fun times at Otakon. Nice pics in the gallery.

    Regina Buenaobra ran Press Ops last year though IIRC Brian has done it in the past. And yes, he did a damn good job all things considered.

    Interviews were a clusterfuck this year. Mostly, I think, because the guests were more high-profile than usual. Half of the people there as press wanted to interview Seki, Noto, Kitamura. Though it would be great if all this stuff was sorted out from those pre-con emails, the people in press ops are basically flying by the seat of their pants with whatever Guest Relations hands them.

    And like Mike said, the AAA concert was VERY packed. I believe the plan in the first place was to use Video 1 as overflow. And yeah, we only got the first three songs for photos. A shame given their costume changes after that. I was originally going to just kind of take photos from my VERY nice front row seat, THEN I saw other press guys jumping over eachother for pics.

  14. Con guides that cause nosebleeds? That are hopelessly out of date the moment they’re printed? You would not BELIEVE the solution we’ve come up with for these two problems.

    In just a few weeks, all will be revealed and it’s genius!

  15. “I like the guy in the vest.”

    I like the guy with the clown pistol.

    My, I look tired, probably because I was, though that’s not why I didn’t stick around to chat. As I believe I posted before (and am redundantly repeating now), I wanted to get back to Video 4 to gauge members’ reactions to showing untranslated Ultraman Zearth.

    Speaking of Video 4: Gerald, was that you reacting when I san Daryl’s lyrics to the Tranzoooorrrrr Zeeeeeeee theme?

    Gerald, no mall cop can hassle you (legally) about taking a picture in a public place (which a mall’s hallway counts as) without a court order.

    I thought the guy was a real cop. Maybe I need to re-listen to the episode?

    Now the big question: Who wants to tell Gerald the alternate name for creamed chipped beef on toast?

    E. Bernhard Warg
    Anime’s Frank
    Otakon Classic Track

  16. So Super Techno Arts now seize to exist? I hope this isn’t true because they’ve been promising a US dvd release of Robot Carnival every year I’ve emailed them.

  17. So Super Techno Arts now seize to exist?

    No, they now cease to exist. Super Techno Arts was literally a one-person (specifically a woman named Cindy) sub-division of Studio APPP and their US sales office. APPP, for the uninitiated, got their start on a little film called Project A-Ko. Anyways, according to reliable sources, she is no longer with the company, therefore there is no more Super Techno Arts.

    And really, all this for Robot Carnival? Perhaps the most boring of all the anthology films? I mean, I love me some mecha goodness, but I’d be hard pressed to even remember what half of the segments were (other than the awesome samurai segment). Still, the R2 (and I believe somewhere made an R3) is available and it’s not like you need a translation for 90% of it.

    Now where’s my HD remaster of Manie Manie? The one ADV will fuck up by unnecessarily interlacing it…

  18. exedore: “Super Techno Arts was literally a one-person (specifically a woman named Cindy) sub-division of Studio APPP and their US sales office.”

    It wasn’t just one person, although Cindy was the one in charge. From what I heard on the AOD forums, it STA’s status has been hindered by internal problems at A.P.P.P.

    “And really, all this for Robot Carnival? Perhaps the most boring of all the anthology films?”

    Yeah, why can’t it have more child rape like Kite? But, anyway, if the hooded mech is good enough for Revenge of the Sith, it’s good enough for the casual anime fan. If you really wanna be bored, though, sit through Tekkon Kinkreet.

    “Still, the R2 (and I believe somewhere made an R3) is available and it’s not like you need a translation for 90% of it.”

    Yeah, just $80. (Not including S+H.)

  19. Gerald, one of your photos has the caption “I’m not sure who this guy was dressed as.” It’s Dr. McNinja, a webcomic at…surprisingly… drmcninja.com.

    The author’s an SA Forums goon, which makes him immediately a cooler person than most.

    Robot Carnival, eh..? Has this episode been recorded yet? I only ask for…my edification (rushes to get episode 7 done so I can plow through production of episode 8).

  20. “Tir Na Nog? As in Egg Nog? Nope, it’s pronounced like the word LOGAN. Shame on you Gerald for this dialect faux-pas! This brought to you by a Irishman who is far too anal for his own good.

  21. There was a movie back in 1980 called Torso that featured a serial killer who went after women with the ideal body parts. It was pretty decent, with some well done gore, and a scene where a cornered victim visibly pisses herself when cornered by the chainsaw-wielding maniac. The very last minute of the movie is very crazy.

  22. Regarding the bit about how some people get autographs just so they can eBay them: Here’s a more despicable variation.

    E. Bernhard Warg
    (fixing my vest)

  23. And really, all this for Robot Carnival? Perhaps the most boring of all the anthology films? I mean, I love me some mecha goodness, but I’d be hard pressed to even remember what half of the segments were (other than the awesome samurai segment). Still, the R2 (and I believe somewhere made an R3) is available and it’s not like you need a translation for 90% of it.

    Well, I made a cool BitTorrent presentation for the film I could stick up on Demonoid if need be (having it on Karagarga for the moment).

  24. Christian is right Gerald. You had every right to take that picture and the security guy (or even a cop) was wrong to make you delete it. Happens all the time, but they can’t legally make you stop taking photos in a public place nor can they confiscate your film or make you delete the picture. As Christian said, they CAN ban you from the site then if you persist they’ll arrest you for trespassing, but not photography. I get this all the time while doing projects so I started carrying this in my camera bag: http://www.krages.com/phoright.htm
    It even work sometimes…

  25. I just re-watched Barefoot Gen to make sure of some things:

    Mr. Pak is replaced by a Japanese next door neighbor named Mr. Boku who only appears in three scenes: Inadvertantly giving Gen and Shinji the idea of stealing a carp (which they overheard from another character in the manga), giving Gen’s family some of his rice (not quite as big a deal, since their ostracization by the rest of the town was barely visible in the film) and carrying Gen’s hysterical mother to safety when the rest of the family dies in the fire.

    I’d like to think the replacement was because it was felt that if there wasn’t enough time to do Mr. Pak properly it was better not to do him at all. That’s what I’d like to think, anyway.

    Another omission is that in the manga Gen has two older brothers: Akira, who was evacuated to the countryside, and Kouji, who joined the navy to stop people from calling his family cowards and traitors. While it’s understandable, it does create a slight implausibility: In the manga, the older brothers return after the war, and the family (eventually) lives in a shack that, to quote Gen, “We worked hard to build.” In the anime, Gen apparently builds the shack himself (I suppose his mother helped, but she’s taking care of a newborn baby and so malnourished she can barely-when at all-give milk). The shack isn’t as (relatively) nice as in the manga, but still…

    Incidentally, the books have had at least three American publishers. As far as my own copies go, the first two are by Penguin, the third by Last Gasp, and the fourth by New Society Publishers (with a sticker on the back cover replacing the New Society info with Last Gasp info-I guess when they got the rights they bought out New Society’s stock and rebranded it?). Somewhat amusingly, the Last Gasp on is the only one without the Spiegelman introduction (though judging by their website, subsequent printings do).

    Incidentally, Clarissa, I realize you were probably just using Best Buy as an example, but I love to be nit-picky, so I wanted to point out that Gen (at least this release) does not appear to have ever been available on their shelves. Available for special order or the website, yes, but never available at their stores. The reason I know this is that I kept track of the availability date and planned to stop by BB on my way to work. Imagine my surprise when I couldn’t find it on the shelf. Imagine my further surprise when I checked their website and saw “Store Pickup: Not Available”

    Fortunately I found the film on sale at Suncoast shortly thereafter, but I’ve checked the Best Buy site periodically since then, and it always said the same. Tilt-and-scan DBZ? Sure! Got plenty of those on the shelf! An important serious film in its original Academy ratio? Nah!

    E. Bernhard Warg
    (the vest has an umbrella in it…)

  26. EBW:

    The only time I found the Barefoot Gen anime on store shelves was when it belonged to Streamline and Image Video. The only “violent” anime I’ve seen at Best Buy includes Elfen Lied and Gantz. I’d imagine if GenDV could spin it as a Faces of Death laugh-a-thon like the insensitive fucks at http://youtube.com/watch?v=VPpolLyU6J4&mode=related&search=
    , Gen would get more attention-albeit for the wrong reasons.

    As for the previous comment on why Grave is more “popular” than Gen, I think it’s because it connects with you more on an emotional level, while Gen doesn’t have that same resonance. It might help if the author didn’t make the characters
    so easy-going, because it hurts the realism of the situation.

  27. Man I sure hope y’all keep cramming tired internet memes into Otaku USA! When I see them, I think “haha, that’s from the internet, and *I* use the internet! This magazine is really the one for me!”

    Please figure out a way to work “all your base” into the next issue!

  28. About the whole “1st manga published in america” thing…

    The story I keep hearing is that in the early 80s, Fred Schodt translated a few volumes of The Rose Of Versailles to teach English to native Japanese speakers, and that was the first manga published in America. I’m pretty sure you didn’t mention that on your show so I just thought I’d tell you.

    Oh yeah, Clarissa, thanks a lot for that review of Suzuka. I was actually considering picking up the 1st DVD because I thought it was going to be a sports show, but now I can see that it’s just more garbage from The Vile Spectre Of Moe. Thanks for saving me $20.

    I still have yet to listen to Gerald’s Otakon segment, but that picture of the doujinshi is extremely interesting. I was going to start on my homework, but after seeing that, I think my priorities have shifted :).

  29. So, wait, I’m seen as a full time hater now? Daryl is surprised I’ve not said something negitive about Tekkaman Blade?

    Geeze o Pete guys…

    OK, fine, what’s wrong with MB’s release of Tekkaman Blade:

    Mediablasters did SUCK ASS publicity on this title. Except for the release announcements on Anime on DVD, I can’t recall seeing a SINGLE FUCKING AD for this. Maybe I’m not reading the right magazines or something.

    MB didn’t help things with their ‘mystery release’ pattern, where they would announce a date, change the date, ship the product to street on the ORIGINAL date, so you’ve got some folks picking up their copies on or near the originally soclicitated street date and others waiting the extra months…

    And then there’s the fact it took SO LONG for the second and third sets to ship. Way to build momentum, guys. Nothing says loving like 4 months between volumes.

    What’s the deal with the Teknoman bullshit names partnered with the Tekkaman Blade names in the credits roll?

    Why do they bury the production credits for the release? Are they ashamed?

    Liner notes. This release really needed liner notes, most of all to discuss the genesis of the ‘bonus episodes’..I’m sure there’s people out there who watched those and shouted “WTF?!”.

    It should have been dubbed as its own release. Tekkaman Blade had the potential to reach a broader market (fangirls in particular, the Takaya/Shinya dynamic alone is fraught with Yaoi undertones), and sadly there’s just too many people out there who WILL NOT watch a sub only release, which makes no sense at all given the folks who dote on fansubs. Is there a divide between the CN otaku and the fansub otaku that I’ve missed?

    OK, enough. I loved the release. The packaging is classy, the price/episode ratio was just right, I give them props for including the bonus animation (it would have been easy not to), the transfer seems fine, I can’t recall any obvious spelling screwups (altho the sub font is small and really needed to have that ‘drop shadow’ behind it for better clarity), it did get a little annoying with people’s names at times (using one name for the sub while the chara was clearly saying a different name, such as Aki shouting ‘D Boy’ and the sub said Takaya) but overall I’d call it a 4 1/2 stars release (minus a half for lack of much needed liner notes).

    As to John S. being surprised by Tekkaman Blade selling better than Teknoman, well DUH…I’ve only seen like ONE volume of Teknoman show up ANYWHERE and that’s at FYE, while Tekkaman Blade hit the shelf at Best Buy in quantity. At their sell price of $19.99 per set it’s a killer deal.

    But, ya know, it wouldn’t have hurt to PROMOTE IT, guys….sheesh. And the MB website SUCKS.

    I hope MB does as good a job with GoLion. I KNOW that the Voltron fans who pick that up will be PUNCHED IN THE GUT by it, they’re not expecting the truth at all, not at all…(that being the show is both insanely violent yet really really dumb too)

    And where’s my Latitude Zero? Screw all that other stuff, it’s time for the Bath of Immunity!

  30. My only complaint about the MB’s Tekkaman Blade release is that that packaging inexplicably says “Star Knight” instead of “Space Knight,” though I guess I also have to agree with Steve about the lack of publicity. I knew Media Blasters planned to release the series at some point, but was surprised when I saw volumes 1 and 2 on sale at Suncoast. I bought both, and then kept an eye on the release date for volume 3 (which I also bought at Suncoast…stupid local Best Buys…)

    E. Bernhard Warg
    “Kamen no shita no namida o nugue”

  31. tj: “The story I keep hearing is that in the early 80s, Fred Schodt translated a few volumes of The Rose Of Versailles to teach English to native Japanese speakers, and that was the first manga published in America. I’m pretty sure you didn’t mention that on your show so I just thought I’d tell you.”

    I’m guessing he probably
    translated it, but it never got published.

    “Oh yeah, Clarissa, thanks a lot for that review of Suzuka. I was actually considering picking up the 1st DVD because I thought it was going to be a sports show, but now I can see that it’s just more garbage from The Vile Spectre Of Moe. Thanks for saving me $20.”

    Eyeshield will eventually be on dvd, but instead of moe, its content(i.e. music) is emo. Think you can handle it?

    steve: “Mediablasters did SUCK ASS publicity on this title. Except for the release announcements on Anime on DVD, I can’t recall seeing a SINGLE FUCKING AD for this. Maybe I’m not reading the right magazines or something.”

    If you wanna be fair, they haven’t done much promoting lately in general. They were bitching about the first season of Ah My Goddess doing poorly for them, but, other than some print ads, they didn’t put up an official site for it or even take advantage of MySpace like Sony’s done with Paprika. They also skipped last year’s AX, which makes me wonder where they’re headed in the future.

    “It should have been dubbed as its own release. Tekkaman Blade had the potential to reach a broader market (fangirls in particular, the Takaya/Shinya dynamic alone is fraught with Yaoi undertones),”

    I disagree there. Tekkaman wasn’t a chick show then, and it wouldn’t be one now. Though I think it might have helped if they had said something like “From the studio which gave you “Karas” on the cover.

  32. …it did get a little annoying with people’s names at times (using one name for the sub while the chara was clearly saying a different name, such as Aki shouting ‘D Boy’ and the sub said Takaya)

    That bothered me a little bit, but fortunately it wasn’t one like, say, G Gundam, where there’s great importance attached to whether or not Domon Kasshu addresses his older brother as “Big Brother” (“Niisan”) or his given name (“Kyo[u]ji”), but the subs almost invariably say “Kyoji.”

    I’d better switch topics before I go on about how the intro should be “I would like, if I may, to…” and not “I would like to, if I may, …”

    I’m guessing [Fred Schodt] probably
    translated [Rose of Versailles], but it never got published.

    Actually, he translated it twice. First he translated it so it could be adapted into an English language live action film. He didn’t make a copy for himself, so a few years later when the publisher Sanyusha decided do publish an English translation of the manga to teach English to native Japanese speakers, Schodt had to translate it a second time (he told the story in an article in Mangajin issue 12 entitled “A Tale of Two Translations”). Two volumes were published in Japan, and while there doesn’t appear to have been a US publisher, copies were imported to the US, and an excerpt from the first volume was printed in Manga! Manga! with different lettering and a few very minor textual changes.

    E. Bernhard Warg
    “Oscaaaaaaaarrrrrr!!!”

  33. What I know about Suzuka is that whatever the story eventually did with itself, I have never seen so many fans so consistently, deeply angry over the plotline of a manga. I remember a year back or so, a thread would pop up on 4chan every week, and without fail, this deep and intense hatred would pour on in for 30 or so posts. It was as though Suzuka had told Anonymous that while she really likes him, you know, as a friend, like a brother, that he’s just not her type, and she hopes he understands.

  34. SUPERCON:

    Maybe the organization was a sort of underhanded way to make people pay attention to the other guests. It sounds like just about everyone was there to get signatures from Kevin Conroy; so they cleverly set things up so that the huge line for that would go right past all the other guests. Everyone would be FORCED to at least notice the other guests; as opposed to sticking them off in some room by themselves where they’d be totally ignored.

    SUZUKA:

    The problem with the show is that it just sounds so completely generic; like the writers just took flash-cards and put them all together.

    You make a good point about how the only really good “shounen romance” (i.e. harem) show is Tenchi Muyo. The problem is that the genre, in recent years, has gone into this navel-gazing spiral of fan-reinforcement; so either you have crashingly dull cliche-fest harem shows, or sickeningly cute moe stuff.

    OTAKON:

    So from the sound of things, if somebody made an actual anime out of the anime-podcasting scene, Erin would be the tsundere.

  35. halojones: “You make a good point about how the only really good “shounen romance” (i.e. harem) show is Tenchi Muyo.”

    You mean UY, right? And how come no mention of KOR?

  36. I guess I tend to think of UY as more of a comedy show than “shounen romance.”

    Also, I’ll admit to the fact that I haven’t actually watched KOR. I know what it’s about and who the main characters are from hearing people talk about it and seeing clips, but I’ve just never gotten around to it. I guess there’s too many other shows that I want to watch more, that I still need to catch up on.

  37. Holy shit!

    I’m sure you guys will talk about this regardless of notifications, but iTunes just put up Black Jack, Phoenix, and the 80s Astro Boy series!

  38. It’s the OAVs which were released by CPM. Those and the movie are the only thing licensed, sadly. I hope the 2 new series and the new movie (Kirikoooo~) get picked up.

  39. I only just started listening to this episode today but had to comment on the Cream Chipped Beef on Toast (yum!)…

    My Dad makes this splendidly and although I am sure it’s bad for you in at least a dozen ways (like most tasty things) it really is good. He points out though that when he was in the Army in the early 60s it was a frequent staple, but the common name for it among the grunts was “SOS” (for “Shit on Shingles”)!

  40. On the Itunes store right now in the upper right hand cornor there is a big picutre of Astro Boy and it says: Classic Anime just added from Tezuka productions. They have 13 episodes of Phoenix for 9.99. They also have Astro Boy and Black Jack. WOW

  41. To add to the Tezuka-Itunes thing…

    Apparently Itunes is also now, along with Phoenix and what not, carrying many of Tezuka’s experimental shorts, including Tales Of A Street Corner (the 1st anime produced by Mushi Productions). I have to research this further, but if this is in fact true, then it’s a great day for American anime fandom!

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