Anime World Order Show # 76b – BAOH HAS A LASER CANNON!

OH NO, THE BANDANA’S COME OFF! Here now is the second half of Show 76 containing the reviews of Shootfighter Tekken, Baoh, and Part 4 of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. Warning: this might melt your brain.

Review: Shootfighter Tekken (0:00 – 33:39)
Gerald reviews a fine masterpiece by Tetsuya Saruwatari, esteemed student of the mighty Kazuo Koike and creator of the grand masterpiece known as Violence Hero: Riki-Oh. A relatively short 3 part-OAV anime adapted from the very long-running manga series Koukou Tekken-den Tough that was partially released by Viz under the name Tough, Shootfighter Tekken was one of the last, if not THE last, new releases from Central Park Media. Nobody really seemed to care when it came out. Were they mistaken? Listen on and find out!

Promo: Ani-Gamers (33:39 – 34:33)
Evan assures us that this promo doesn’t have people who ultimately didn’t end up being on the podcast at all in it, which while beneficial isn’t always necessary. Heck, the reason our latest promo is so good is precisely because it has nothing to do with much of anything we said at all! Anyway, Ani-Gamers just released the second half of episode 11, so check them out. Just remember: UNCLE YO SEES ALL, except for the hentai clips that Gerald shows at anime conventions. He did the right thing and bolted out of there when those came on.

Review: Baoh (34:33 – 1:11:05)
Daryl gave strong consideration to just ripping the dub audio from Baoh–PERHAPS THE GREATEST SINGLE-LENGTH OAV EVER MADE–in its entirety and posting that as the review. Perhaps a future bonus installment of AWO could simply be entitled “Baoh: The Audio Drama” because aside from a few scenes, you actually don’t need to see what’s going on at any point whatsoever due to all the narration. Daryl always dreamed of just getting cosplayers to read the lines from Baoh, but this dream never came to fruition because if you think it’s hard to get a cosplayer you personally know to speak into a microphone, try getting them to say “there is! Such a power is contained WITHIN BAOH!” It’s not happening, folks.

Promo: Anime82 (1:11:05 – 1:11:49)
We suspect that Regan might have been impersonating the Macross II dub when recording this promo, but no matter: after a few months of hiatus he’s back with a new episode! Thanks to Regan and the rest of the guys at Box Fansubs for their work on Locke the Superman and Queen Millennia, the latter of which you can definitely expect Daryl to review in a future episode! Though it begs the question whether or not Queen Millennia should get priority over Violence Jack…

Review (manga): Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure Part 4 (1:11:49 – 1:49:34)
Daryl and Clarissa may never read them and Gerald may have given up reading them in disgust, but Bass_kat from the Fast Karate for the Gentleman forums calls in to relate to us all the tale of how she saw Wicked City back when she was 8 years old. A bizarre tale as that can only be placed prior to Clarissa’s review of a bizarre manga. This one is sort of the “Death Note + Hot Fuzz” portion of Jojo’s, and marks a definitive turning point as far as content and art style is concerned.

Meet the Jojo’s Part 4 gang! Clockwise from top left there’s Okuyasu, Josuke, Jotaro, Koichi (whose face is being eaten by Araki’s name) and Rohan. Josuke, of course, is easy to spot thanks to his kickin’ pompadour. Sadly, people tend to make fun of it because rather than being a real tough guy style, now it’s pretty much just worn by Yoyogi Park rockabilly dudes.
Of course, Josuke has his Stand Crazy Diamond, which valiantly continues the heart motif Araki loves so much.
And I couldn’t not devote time to that amazing Araki/Tezuka/Go Nagai hybrid Rohan. I mentioned he’s crazy IN THE NAME OF GREAT MANGA right?
If you were wondering, this is what Rohan’s Stand does to people. It’s much better in visuals than in the description.
True, there’s no Dio anymore. But just take a fucking look at Kira and Killer Queen. Top tier Stand design? I think so. (Hey Medicos, when you’re done with this year’s Stardust Crusaders blitz, could we maybe get a poseable Killer Queen and Kira? With bonus amputated hand girlfriend of course.)
But don’t get too down. Psychotic murderers and high body counts aside, remember: it’s Jojo’s so they’re all dorks. Inviiiiisible baaaaby.

Closing (1:49:34 – 1:53:58)
Next time on AWO, it’s SHOW TIME because our special guest once again is Mike Toole! Last heard from about two years ago, Mike’s since capitalized on his knowledge that audio is for suckers to become a sporadic streaming video sensation, but he’s still keeping it real! Daryl will be reviewing his favorite series of 2007, Baccano! (warning: don’t read the Wikipedia page or the ANN encyclopedia entry or especially the ANN review of volume 1), Gerald is reviewing the former crown jewel of the anime laserdisc empire known as Five Star Stories, and Clarissa does what we should have done the first time we had Mike on: review freakin’ Big O! This entire episode was recorded about a month ago, and we still haven’t started editing it because…well…sowwwhy! We had done tol’ Craig and ‘dem that we was gon’ kick it wit’ ‘dem. Gotta go; see you when we see you!

Anime World Order Show # 76a – A Disgrace to the Anime Punditocracy

Here’s the first half of Show 76, containing the “general chat” portions of the show; reading emails and responding to recent anime news developments. Show 76b will contain the actual reviews.

Introduction (0:00 – 26:51)
All the podcast gurus state you should save emails for the end of the show, which is why we read them at the beginning! Current emails in Inbox: 345. We lament the continued non-licensing of Ippatsu Kikimusume, and Gerald clarifies his stance on Dirty Pair Flash which was probably initially brought up when he reviewed Project E.D.E.N. way back when. Daryl takes the time to update the list of People In His Sights before trying to remember some anime titles with particularly noteworthy narrators. We can’t help but think that we forgot something terribly important. And given the attendance levels for the Providence Anime Conference, are anime fandom gatherings geared towards non-teenagers viable?

Let’s News! (26:51 – 1:03:09)
There were some regrettable deaths in the world of Gatchaman and O-DIIIIIIIIIIIIN, and we suspect Baoh as the cause of the death. Bandai Entertainment is joining FUNimation, ADV Films, and Tokyopop at the layoff party, and Diamond is upping their minimum order price by $1000. Dave Merrill’s Livejournal is where the party was for that discussion: our favorite comment exchange was “GOSH WHY CAN’T WE GET WOMEN AND KIDS INTO THE COMIC BOOK SHOPS OF AMERICA? BECAUSE MY VAGINA IS HAUNTED!” Be sure to read those comments so you too may have the covers to the next three Grant Morrison projects. PS: all comicbook writers from the British Isles are awful no matter how much TRUE BELIEVERS claim otherwise. PPS: laserdiscs are finally no longer being made. You remember laserdiscs, right? Oh, huh. Well, we don’t either.

Based on the amount of people in a previous poll who correctly identified the right answer, about 100+ people reading this will be glad to know that Discotek Media will be releasing the remastered Fist of the North Star theatrical animated movie on DVD later this year. In other “wow, someone licensed that?” news, The Roots of Japanese Anime Until the End of World War II is coming out in the US as well. It won’t be cheap, but spare no expense for DVD quality copies of Momotaro’s Divine Sea Warriors, the very first feature-length Japanese animated film which is also incredibly jingoistic Japanese WW2 propaganda. On the newer side of things, Toei now has Space Pirate Captain Harlock and Galaxy Express 999 available to view in streaming form, and iTunes has a whole bunch of anime songs up for purchase. Oh yeah, remember all that stuff about Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, Part 3? Looks like it’s been worked out. You know what hasn’t been worked out? The fact that people don’t seem to realize that anime voice actors are perpetually out of work and/or make very little money.

But enough about THE INDUSTRY: the Reverse Thieves have begun the Otaku Diaries project, an anonymous survey about the social lives or lack thereof of self-proclaimed otaku. You’ve got two months to complete the survey, and at about 150 short answer/essay questions you’ll probably need it. Daryl’s signed up for it, and hopefully so will everyone else. Let’s see how deep the pit goes, shall we? If all that writing gets you in a mode, we recommend contributing to the proposed Anime Confessions archive, a would-be repository for all manners of fandom soapbox diatribes. So far they don’t really have very many submissions. Perhaps YOU can help! Finally, Ben and Matt over at For Tax Reasons have released yet another short, which at nearly 8000 views is proof positive that they don’t really need the rub from us. Too bad; they’re getting it anyway!

Promo: Pop Rocks and Soda (1:03:09 – 1:04:28)
All the podcast gurus state you should make your promos about 30 seconds long, so we’re playing this one that’s about 90. Bonus points for no bongo drums this time!

We’ll post the second half of this on Tuesday or Wednesday or so. It’s actually done. We could post it now. BUT WE AREN’T. You know why? Because even though we shipped out nearly all of the T-shirts and hoodies, we didn’t yet ship out the international orders. It turns out that shipping for hoodies is more like $8.75 than $5, and we shudder to think how much more expensive the international shipping will be. Anyway, if YOU want AWO t-shirts or hoodies, email us for the details. Here’s Aaron from the WARP Anime Podcast (Go Recursive Acronym GO!) stylin’ and profilin’: