Anime Apolyton

[Wraith]

Zenryaku,

Lots of people have extra time around the holidays (and some people have none), so I thought I'd post another one of these.

No one posted anything about Evangelion, so just in case the dub has scared you off, the Platinum Complete collection is available for quite cheap, and includes the remastered audio/video and the Director's Cut episodes. There's also been some translation rework on the subtitles, although so far I haven't noticed anything dramatic other than the opening theme (I'm watching in pace with the TV broadcast).

Further with Cartoon Network, Naruto seems to be burning up the charts. Not just the anime, the manga as well, it's steadily topping the sales charts, even the older issues. One Piece, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be doing at all well on TV, which is hardly a surprise given what was done to it. Unfortunately, it has been confirmed that they will absolutely NOT be doing uncut DVDs for the series.

More disappointing US DVD news is that Hare+Guu has been delayed, this time to February. I don't remember the exact reason, but it was production issues with either the box or the chest-hair wig (don't ask). The release for later discs have, of course, also been pushed back slightly.

In brighter news, Hikaru no Go is about to start its DVD release in the US. It's not all good news, though, as Viz has a really odd release schedule for the series, and is only going to be releasing four discs a year... for a 75 episode series. Even if they are doing 5 episodes per disc, that's a four year span for the release.

ADV has finally continued their Princess Tutu release, putting disc 2 out. They've also moved ahead with Kaleido Star, starting the second season release next month.

Genshiken was recently fully released. It's a short series, though, so it hasn't exactly had a long run. The same goes for Jubei-chan 2. A longer series, Scrapped Princess, will be finishing up next month, and Stellvia finished out this month.

For mecha fans, the classis Armored Trooper Votoms is being rereleased by CPM. You can pre-order the entire set (four seasons) for $100, which is $50 below the SRP. This is still sub-only, but unlike the original US release these are soft subs, and the video has been remastered.

For Ghibli fans, the next phase of the US releases happen in May. These are currently scheduled to be My Neighbor Totoro, Howl's Moving Castle, and (finally) Whisper of the Heart.

On the manga side, things have fallen off a lot for some publishers. ADV isn't putting out too much, but is doing a very good job with Yotsuba&. Unfortunately, their reps are pretty much giving the "no comment" treatment when asked about other series at cons.

There's a lot more I could probably comment on in the manga market, but I really haven't been following it that closely. I would like to note that Tokyopop evidentily has the Read or Die manga licensed, but that the manga has been panned by pretty much everyone who's read it, and most people would have rather had the novels.

On the Japanese side, there's been confirmation of another season of Ah, My Goddess TV. This wasn't really expected, as it sounded like the ratings for the show weren't that high. They've been rearranging things from the manga appearances, but hopefully the second season will include the real reason for the franchise; namely, the fourth goddess, Peorth.

There's yet another Tenchi spinoff coming, this time another Pretty Sammy outing. The character designs are... very Not Tenchi. No real details that I've seen about the story yet, except that it looks like Pixy Misa will be in it, and Funky Connie probably will be. Which means I'll have to check it out, at the least.

Big news on the movie side is that Studio Ghibli's next movie has been announced. It's to be directed by Goro Miyazaki, Hayao Miyazaki's son. It's to be titled Gedo Senki (Gedo War History) and is based on Ursula K Le Guin's "A Wizard of Earthsea" (Gedo being about as close to Ged as you can get in Japanese). Which is somewhat surprising, given her reaction to the Sci-Fi Channel butchery. One has to wonder just how much creative control she's hanging onto for this one, although more is probably good.

More recently, Kamichu has finished up the telivised releases, but I think the DVD extra epsiodes still have some that haven't been released. One of a rather large list of "want it to be licensed but it probably won't ever be" titles of late.
Add to this list Glass Mask (the manga for this should be, at least; shoujo manga has been selling pretty good), as I've been watching the recent remake. It goes far beyond where the earlier one did.
One that probably will end up on this list is Mushishi, sort of a supernatural detective story that's very well done.

There was probably more I wanted to post about, but this is all I can remember right now. Ah well, I can always add more later.

Wraith
"Commanders sitting far from the front lose touch with the battle that's being fought. They become too optimistic, decisions are made that have no bearing on what the facts might be. This is even more true when the war is being lost."
-- Captain Goto ("Patlabor The Movie 2")

[Seeker]

LOL the universities' Anime Western club has been shut down for copyright violations...we had been watching downloaded eps on the big screen. They said we could only watch things that were 'public domain' or the publisher had consented to in writing....which meant that by the next meeting it had become the 'anime drawing club' and then broke up (without refunds).

But we were about halfway through 'Ah My Goddess'.

[Seeker]

And whatever that new rip-off of Laputa Castle in the Sky is (steampunk, steamboy, something like that)

[Wraith]

--"They said we could only watch things that were 'public domain' or the publisher had consented to in writing...."

A lot of US distributors have club programs where they'll send out DVDs for free. Here are links to Bandai's and Funimation's programs. You might want to check and see if any of the European distributors (like MVM) do the same.

Wraith
"It's a man dressed as a priest, who plays the violin so badly the sky cries."
-- Machika ("Immortal Rain")

[DinoDoc]

---One Piece, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be doing at all well on TV, which is hardly a surprise given what was done to it.

How butchered was it?

[Wraith]

--"How butchered was it?"

Is it, you mean. They've got a lot of episodes to go before they'll catch up.

But... how much time to you have? ^_^ Granted, I couldn't stand it enough to watch much of it, but the fact that they used about 60 episodes worth of material out of the 100 they had should be a first clue. They're not dropping entire episodes or storylines, they're just chopping out just about anything to do with blood (which is strange, since this is a shounen action series, which means lots of fights). Of course, they do the typical CN changes like new, completely inappropriate, opening theme.

They got a lot further, though. They overlay guns with slingshots or cork guns, cover the big "MARINE" signs with "Navy" (and do a poor job of it), turn Sanji's perpetual cigarette into a lollypop... well, you get the idea. Then there's the script, which generally has almost nothing to do with the original lines, but have largely been turned into a bunch of lame pirate-related gags that wouldn't amuse even a concussed six year old. Which is the biggest pity, since the character interaction was what makes it such a fun series.

What makes it really bad is that Viz has stupidly gone along with some of their changes in the manga, doing things like changing Zoro's name to Zolo and changing Luffy's main attack from "Gum-gum Pistol" to "Gum-gum Bullet". Both of which are minor annoyances, but the changes are just so meaningless they grate.

Considering all the changes, including visual, they've made, it probably would have been cheaper for 4kids to have just created their own series.
Stranger is that Toei was the production company, and they tend to be really tight-fisted with their titles. I'm surprised they'd agree to this level of modification unless they were being paranoid about reverse-importation.

Wraith
"I'm not the kind of fool who hunts rabbits with a cannon."
-- "Hawk Eye" Mihawk ("One Piece")

[DinoDoc]

Reverse-importation?

[Wraith]

--"Reverse-importation?"

The US and Japan both use the NTSC standard for television. There's some minor differences, but nothing to prevent playback (in contrast to the NTSC/PAL differences between the US and Europe). So all the Japanese need to play US DVDs is a region-free or region one player, which is easy enough to get.
Anime in the US is significantly cheaper than it is in Japan. The US will typically have 4-5 episodes per disc for a standard length series, and will street under $20 each. Japan will typically have 2-3 episodes per disc for the same series, and will street around $40-$50 each. Since the US releases (almost always) contain the Japanese audio, they can save a lot of money if they're willing to wait the year or three it takes to be released here, if it does get licensed.

There's plenty of reasons not to, mind. US releases typically have lower audio and video quality, fewer and less interesting extras, and so on. Anime series also tend to be transient. There aren't many series that stay popular for years and years, so anyone interested isn't too likely to want to wait.

None of that has ever stopped the Japanese companies from being paranoid about it, though. As the MPAA and RIAA shows, guys in this business don't place logic too highly on their list of personal strengths.
Toei in particular has a bad rep for purposely screwing over the US licensing companies.

Wraith
"Being saved by my first bounty is slightly embarrassing."
-- Machika ("Immortal Rain")

[DinoDoc]

Anything you might recommend I look into? Here's a list of the stuff I've liked so far if it would make it easier: Inuyasha, Naruto, Lupin III, and Stand Alone Complex.

[DaShi]

That's great about Totoro, it's definitely the best of Miyazaki, imo.

[:) Smiley]

Originally posted by Seeker
LOL the universities' Anime Western club has been shut down for copyright violations...we had been watching downloaded eps on the big screen. They said we could only watch things that were 'public domain' or the publisher had consented to in writing....which meant that by the next meeting it had become the 'anime drawing club' and then broke up (without refunds).

Hmm, your university needs more anime fans... when an "anime drawing" club was started at mine, about 90 people packed a 30-person room.

[Wraith]

--"Here's a list of the stuff I've liked so far if it would make it easier:"

Yeah, the more you can name the better I can suggest. From that list, I don't think our tastes are very similar, so I don't know how much help I'll be.

Since you like Inu Yasha, a good place to start would probably be other Rumiko Takahashi works, like Urusei Yatsura and Maison Ikkoku. Since you also list Naruto, Ranma 1/2 might be the best one to start with. It's got lots of over-the-top martial arts action as well, since several of the main characters belong to the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts.

Naruto is squarely in the shounen action genre, and to be honest I've never figured out why it gets so much more attention than most of those titles. I'm not a huge fan of the genre, so I'm not sure what's available in the US other than the Dragonball titles, but if you're willing to try manga, then Bleach or Hunter X Hunter would be along the same lines.

Lupin... well, depends which, I guess. There was a lot of variation in that franchise. Probaby something like Cowboy Bebop would be a fairly recent series in somewhat the same vein, maybe City Hunter for an older one.

With Stand Alone Complex, it depends what you liked about it. If it was the sci-fi elements, then probably Crest of the Stars. If it was more the investigation side, maybe Patlabor or You're Under Arrest, although those are more like Hill Street Blues. Between that and Lupin, you might also want to check out Master Keaton.

--"That's great about Totoro, it's definitely the best of Miyazaki, imo."

There's been a version out for a while from Fox, but it doesn't have a very good dub, I think it's dubtitled, and it's pan and scan. The Disney release will hopefully follow their other Ghibli titles and at least be OAR.

Porco Rosso's been my favorite Miyazaki movie since I saw it, though.

Wraith
"If you don't give Akane back, you'll all die... from her terrible cooking!"
-- Ranma

[pchang]

Do you know the airships that Angelina Jolie captained in "Sky Captain and the Wolrd of Tomorrow"?. I saw an episode of an anime like that a long time ago, but don't know the name and have been unable to find it since.

[:) Smiley]

It might be "Last Exile" though airships are quite common in anime nowadays.

[DaShi]

Turner Classic Movies will be doing a spotlight of Miyazaki's films. Each thurs night in Jan they will play 2-3 movies in English dub followed by the same movies in Japanese. So if you haven't seen them here's a good chance.

http://www.turnerclassicmovies.com