Anime World Order

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Even though TimeHealsAllWoundsButWeSTILLAskWHYYYY, through a combination of its thirty year anniversary as well as upcoming new announcements, Daryl is reviewing the Patient Zero of fighting game anime that is the original Fatal Fury anime trilogy: the OVAs and the 1994 motion picture. In an age of scientific wonders, the human body is still the world’s most dangerous machine. Especially when it can fire ki bullets. Unless the scientific wonder in question is Mai Shiranui because she’s cutting diamond and putting out eyes with those things.

Intro (0:00 – 40:32)
Gerald and Clarissa have been doing a lot of work adding to their Otaku Archive collection, a catalog of American anime fandom’s past consisting of newsletters, zines, catalogs, con guides, interviews, and other print relics that have largely been lost to time thanks to the advent of the digital age. If you have materials or wish to otherwise contribute to the Otaku Archive cataloging efforts, the fastest way to reach them and get a response is through Bluesky: Gerald is @geraldawo.bsky.social and Clarissa is @clarissag.bsky.social. With Anime Festival Orlando happening right now, Gerald is presenting a panel related to the preservation of American anime fandom’s history, and since Otakon rejected that one he’ll perhaps be doing a virtual panel presentation of it over on the Anime World Order Discord, which you can post to if you back us on Patreon at any tier (but is free to just lurk and read, and we’ll probably let anyone watch the panel as well).

The preorders for Macross Plus on Blu-Ray are now open, and as we hinted at last episode, it is not cheap: $190 (though you can save 10-15% depending on your Crunchyroll membership level). This will be sold exclusively on the Crunchyroll Store and is limited to 5000 units (which is a whole lot of copies such that we’re not in any way concerned that it’ll sell out quickly, and that’s before you consider the expense). Disclosure: that’s an affiliate link where we’ll get a small commission if you choose to make the purchase from that link. If you want to bookmark the CR Store with our affiliate link, it’s https://crunchyrollstore.sjv.io/animeworldorder (which is also on the sidebar). Though, as the recent Discotek Media sale has demonstrated, we have quite a few issues with the CR Store, especially as it compared to Right Stuf which it replaced by way of a Sony buyout.

As of Summer 2024, the Crunchyroll Store packaging is officially not on the level of what Right Stuf’s was.

We also go over some news items. Gainax is officially no more, GoHands is still going strong, Sony has bought the Alamo Drafthouse (in a move that once upon a time, long before any of us were born, would have been prevented by federal laws and oversight agencies), and Toru Furuya has been dropped from his current roles after all.

Review: Fatal Fury: The OVAs and Motion Picture (40:32 – 2:05:04)
The announcement that Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui will be coming to Street Fighter 6 along with the release of a new Fatal Fury videogame, City of the Wolves, means that awareness of the series is the highest it’s been in years. As 2024 marks the 30 year anniversary of the Masami Obari-est anime to have ever been, 1994’s Fatal Fury: The Motion Picture, Daryl has elected to talk about the original two TV specials/OVAs as well as the film here. Join us for a reminiscence of what SNK and the Neo Geo even was–don’t think we forgot how you Smash Brothers people reacted to the addition of Terry Bogard to Ultimate back in 2020!–as well as an overview of the anime titles in question, which you can now purchase on Blu-Ray high definition courtesy of Discotek Media. Don’t worry, if you use the Pause feature here you stand no risk of wearing out your VCR heads!

(You see, in nearly every shot that consists of the fighting ladies in the motion picture making a quick movement, their breasts, buttocks, and possibly labia pop out either for extended periods or single frames such that you would frame by frame advance through these sequences to see them. Many of these shots made it through not only to the VHS previews, but also the Sci-Fi Channel television broadcasts. Like this one! Note the picture is flipped 180 degrees and audio playback rate is slightly sped up to fool the DRM bots.)

There are a handful of cameo appearances by other SNK characters in these productions, be it Samurai Shodown, Art of Fighting, etc.

Everyone else has scene to scene wardrobe changes that’d make Andy Sidaris proud. EXCEPT TERRY.

This is a truly HALF-ASSED outfit design, but at least you get fan service. Get it? She got hit by a FAN thrown at high velocity!

Look, I’m not ONLY frame by framing it for the sake of cartoon tiddy; there are actual Easter Eggs too, okay?! Check out Bean Bandit et al. in the club.

Peter Chung would be proud. Maybe the Alexander the Great in question came from Alexander Senki aka Reign the Conqueror…

Podcast: Download (61.9MB)

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It’s finally time. As a result of us reaching over 250 Patrons, we’re reviewing what you’ve voted “the worst anime of all time”: Hand Shakers from 2017. But maybe it’s NOT actually the worst, since we can name at least one show that was much worse than it…

Introduction (0:00 – 29:44)
Follow-ups from last episode: as an update to the Macross situation in North America, preorders for Macross Plus Blu-Rays will open up next week, as a Crunchyroll Store exclusive. It…won’t be cheap, from the looks of things. Gerald saw the French animated film Mars Express, which we alluded to seeing the trailer of last episode. He highly recommends it, and you should be able to see it for yourself in a few days since the theatrical run was extremely limited and short. Also, thanks to your support, our Otaku Archive is now an official collection on Archive.org! Thanks so very much!

That’s about it for the good news. We then talk about the whole Toru Furuya situation, which is…extremely awful, but hey. Can’t NOT talk about it.

Review: Hand Shakers (29:44 – 1:24:28)
It’s notorious online. It made the name “GoHands” instantly infamous. But just how bad is 2017’s Hand Shakers? Does it still have that same impact? Have things gotten worse since then? Do we not live in an era where some of the most beloved anime titles utilize comparable animation techniques and story beats?

Have you ever wanted to get God’s attention so bad that you use your sub big hooter girlfriend to power your CG chains? I’m Todd McFarlane, creator of Spawn:

This is not nearly as cool as a bunch of producers looking at a piece of concept art in a boardroom thought it would be, but dangit they’re going to try and convince you it is.

This is the sort of GoHands camerawork and direction now synonymous with their name. Unlike their subsequent shows, Hand Shakers keeps this up for its duration. Everyone who said it didn’t HAS LIED TO YOU.

Review: W’z (1:24:28 – 2:12:19)
We’re going the extra mile and reviewing the far less popular STEALTH SEQUEL to Hand Shakers from 2019. We’re pretty sure the people who made this heard of the term “DJ” and maybe saw a picture or short clip of one in action without actually knowing what it is they DO.