ACen (Yeah yeah, a little late)

ACen was quite the interesting convention, I'll give it that, I felt the schedule was a little lacking, the only few panels I was interested in half I didn't get to go to, and the other half were not as good as I hoped they would be. I do have to give it up for their staff thought.

I had never been to ACen before this year, let alone anywhere near Chicago. I had to go to an industry meet & greet there and had no idea where the hotel was I was supposed to go to. One of their staff members ended up walking me over, which I thought was very nice of him. I have other stories about them going out of their way to help out a few other members of my party, one with some lost items, and I must say, that they just have a very good staff.

Good staff can really make or break a convention, and often good staff goes unrecognized. Usually all you hear about is horrible experiences between con-goers & staff, and trust me, we have all had our share.

I'm still working on a new website for this blog, I want to split it up between conventions, anime, and blogging information, just have yet to find the right layout yet. If anyone can suggest something good, I would appreciate it!

Who's Excited for a Deadman?

If there is one series I am geeking out about this season, it's hands-down Deadman's Wonderland. This show, premiering tomorrow is one of the best manga I have read in quite some time. A dark tale, it's hard to say anything without giving anything away. So very very mild episode 1 spoiler ahead.

Everyone dies.....it starts as a regular school day with the main character talking with his friends, and then everyone gets gory bloody killed, and that was just chapter 1. If you've seen the preview you already know this. I'm not a fan of movies like Saw or anything but I really enjoyed this manga, so I really am hopeful that they don't utterly destroy this. More report Sunday when I review this.

Tomorrow is about a new cute series A Channel, and what it's doing right!!

Also, sorry about the disappearance as of late, I kind of got distracted by a four-legged creature that has entered my life. I got a cat, and it seems to like to sleep in all the wrong places...also it's an evil, Mountain Dew stealing demon...meaning I love it dearly and it fits in perfectly at my house.

Oreimo, Beelzebub, and Japanese Politics...Oh My!

There are a few anime this season that I treat as real gems. Oreimo and Beelzebub are two of them. This week aired Oreimo's 13th episode also considered apart of the "True Ending." Although I am not a huge Kuroneko fan, this episode was worth watching just because of Saori & a certain boob grabbing scene followed by foolish fantasies. I've taken the pleasure of turning this scene into an animated gif.

Beelzebub I'm excited about still has 13 more episodes until it is finished. I'm happy because this has become quite a special gem to me. Although episode 11 was a little disappointing, it did have it's highlights. As a friend pointed out though it seems that they are censoring baby Beelzebub a bit more, could this have something to do with that new bill that has been passed in Japan? Otherwise I felt you could really see the relationship between Oga & his baby companion really seems to become visibly stronger in this episode. They have definitely become more in-sync with each other. All I can leave you with is two thumbs up for this series.

Finally I am working on a project to get a complete information guide together about Japanese Bill 156 which is banning different types of anime, and has raised concern about how vague the bill is written. I'm hopeful to get together enough information not only to post here, but to create a panel that I can take to different conventions to discuss.

Fireball Charming

The new series Fireball Charming coming out spring season on Disney Japan sparked my interest because the commercial didn't really give anything away about what the show was about. Wikipedia also did not have much information on it, but I finally found out more about this rather peculiar series.

First off, it's actually a squeal. The original series was a 13 episode series called just "Fireball" that originally aired 2008. The plot summary, according to Anime News Network was simply: "Random sketches during a war between robots and humans." Each episode is 2 minutes long.

I sat down and was able to find a torrent of it, and found it entertaining. I think my favorite would be episode 10 - Final Stop. Maids with stealth units for the win.

So after seeing this I am still excited for Fireball Charming. They will still be short 2 minute shows. It definitely shall be interesting.

Lots of dramatic poses through the series, and it really makes you wish they would actually delve deeper into this slight skimmed back-story of what is going on in the series. (IE the war against the humans, who her father is, ect)

It was never licensed in the USA, so here is the link to the torrent I found of it:
http://www.torrentreactor.net/torrents/2817907/DATS-Fireball-01-13-h264

April Fools Day & Actual Real News

Photo From Japanator

Some of the anime world decided to grace us with their attempts at gag's this year for April Fools day. Tokyopop announced this afternoon Lady Gaga is doing a live action Sailor Moon. Japanator replaced all their news stories today with hand drawn images. Youmacon's site boasted a change in direction to You-Ma-Con a convention dedicated to moms, complete with My Little Ponies & the promise of daycare.

Honoring tradition AnimeCons.com released no news today. Good marketing practice if you ask me. It relieves the angst of gag-press releases.

In something that I wish was a joke, FUNimation now has it's own channel (on Demand) with Charter. It's $6.99 a month. But the real kicker is that it promises "Up to 50 hours of new programming each month." Hmmm....so in an average 30 day month, there is 720 hours. With FUNimation you get 50 hours of new stuff, and you get 670 hours of the same crud you have probably already seen. Thats if there is 24 hour programming and it turns out not to be just an "on demand" channel. So you do the math. I would think it wouldn't be that worth it. But then again I'm someone who doesn't usually watch dubbs of anime, because I'm usually watching it as it comes out in Japan.

I can only assume that a majority of their programming is going to be dubbs. And you know it's going to be chock full of all the "regular" stuff. Meaning you are going to have One Piece, FMA, Ouran, and the such.

Spring Anime Season

Here is the list of anime I shall be checking out this spring season:

30-sai no Hoken Taiiku: A Thirty-Year Old's Health and Physical Education

This just sounds hilarious....when I read the plot for it I know I have to find a fansubber for it. Plot: "A guide book teaching shy men around 30 how to date and have sex with women."

Fireball Charming

Not much is known about this anime as of yet. The trailer is kinda confusing, but gonna check it out anyway.

Deadman Wonderland

OMG, this is the series I am fangirl squealing about this time around. I love the manga so I'm excited to see what this has in store.

Oretachi ni Tsubasa wa Nai: Under the Innocent Sky

Meh, its pased off of a Eroge, my favorite subber is doing it, so I'll check it out. I'm opening my horizons to Eroge since playing My Girlfriend is the President to America.

Astarotte no Omocha!: Astarotte's Toy

Sounds like it's gonna be one of those fanservice type shows. There's a magical land, harems a succubus.

...and of course I will be continuing Beelzebub (words can't even describe how awesome this series is) with another 12 episodes rounding out the series at 24 episodes, and trying to get caught up with Bleach. (Ha, that's a laugh, I'm on what, Ep. 66 of 315.)

Lilpri - Every Girl is a Princess

I'm always sad when a series ends, specially if it was a good one that really pulled me in.

Despited being marketed as a children's anime Lilpri was an adorable story that really captured my heart. I have to say the ending left me crying. It was cute, sad, and not till the very last second made you happy.

Their final song was adorable, and reminded every girl that she was a princess and that you can live up to your dreams.

The whole series is available now on Crunchyroll. I know it will most likely never receive an American release, so other than fansubs it's the only way to watch it!

Shutocon

I'm tired, so very very tired. But that's a sign of a good convention. I went to Shutocon for their first year in Lansing, Michigan this year. As Friday and Saturday convention it was a little weird, I mean I understand the theory behind it, a lot of people don't stick around for Sunday for a convention, but it sucks to have to jump in the car for a 4 hour car ride at 8 at night when the artist/dealers room closes, and head back home. And to explain, I worked a booth in the artist/dealers room, so we took off right after that closed obviously.

Overall though it was a great convention.

Pros:

Great Artist Ally: large selection, spent a lot of money there.

Staff: Well organized, a few hiccups involving our badges and an issue being able to get back in the artist/dealer room due to being issued 2 day badges instead of artist/dealer badges. But the chairwoman signed our badges then it wasn't an issue anymore.

Hotel: OMG the hotel was one of the best I ever stayed at. The Radisson Hotel in Lansing is one of the best hotels I have ever stayed in!! Their staff was amazing, the valet parking was great and cheap, the elevators all worked and were not crowded, and just the staff was just so nice. They were just too amazing.

Cons:

Dealers Room: Kinda lacking. There were some great vendors, but there were only a handful of em. I know the convention was aimed more towards the artists, but I felt some logistical moves could have allowed for both more artists & dealers. Dealers are a big draw for a lot of people, I'm disappointed I wasn't able to get anything off my shopping list this con except a new figurine. No poster dealer, only wall scrolls, I wasn't really expecting to see the Morning Rescue, but no bento boxes either. But there was a great figurine dealer, and a local shop there that specialized in snacks, that I fell in love with, I'll be going over that later in the week actually about new Japanese snacks I have discovered.

Signage: Rooms were not clearly marked, but nothing a better sign couldn't fix.

Otherwise no complaints, for a first year convention the turnout was great, and they did so many things right, its hard to even criticize them for anything.

Unfortunately my major downfalling was that I bought figurines...yes plural...figurines. I usually try to limit myself to 1 figurine a convention. I walked away with 7. But, in my defense, 5 of them were bought "as a set." I was only going to buy 1 Fruits Basket figurine for $20.00 but there was an amazing deal that I could buy all 5 for $35. Pretty hard to pass up. They are numbered figurines, some of them look a little derpy. But Tohru is a little derpy anyway so I let it pass. I was originally going to buy a Shigure figurines but the whole set came with Shigure, Tohru, a bust of Tohru, Kyo, and Yuki.

More information about my swag from Shutocon coming through the week!!

Convention Season Ahoy!!!

So this Friday marks the beginning of this convention season for me. I will be attending Shutocon down in Lansing, MI.

Shuto runs Fri & Sat March 25th & 26th. I am very excited for this convention, not only is it their first run, but the first one I get to attend this season!

I'm more excited for the dealer's room, which I really hope does not disappointed, I have a shopping list size amount of items to buy. (how many people go to conventions with shopping lists? I would be curious to hear what's on yours.)

My Shopping List.

1. Morning Rescue

2. New Bento Box

3. New Figurine (My 1 per con limit, lets see if I actually follow it this time)

4. Posters to frame for my new studio apartment

5. New indie Comics ( I love the artist alley to find some good undiscovered comic)

Also I'll be running around with my camera to get pics to do up a full convention report when I get back!! Look for me wearing a yellow bandanna around my head and pigtails, make sure to say hi!!

Oh Brother - Update on Brotherly Love

So apparently Oniichan no Koto Nanka Zenzen Suki Janain Dakara ne-!! The Anime I reviewed yesterday. Is apparently guilty of an interesting little blunder that I was made aware of today.
It was airing an episode in Japan when the tsunami came in. Not really a crime right? Well apparently there was a tsunami in the episode.
I've included the screen shot below, complete with the tsunami warning posted. Wonder how many people thought it was apart of the anime?

You know they say life imitates art...but I think this is going a bit far...

Brotherly Love

Hey guys! It's been hard to write about things with what is going on in Japan. My whole sleep schedule has been messed up for the past week trying to help with information regarding the power plant, unfortunately it has gotten to a point where I have to take meds to get to sleep. But alas you did not come to hear about my issues. Lets talk anime.

It seems like I've taken a notice to more brotherly love animes have graced our televisions. Things like Oreimo hint a brotherly love, without coming out and being blatant about it.

Since most of my anime is delayed, and I don't blame them for being so, I decided to take a look through some other anime premiering this season that I normally wouldn't look at.

That's where I came across the gem Oniichan no Koto Nanka Zenzen Suki Janain Dakara ne.

In this series the sister really just wants to get with her brother and plays a tug-of-war with emotions first tempting him, them calling him out as a pervert. Also at one point she early in the series she goes to clean out his entire collection of porn magazines except of ones containing incest.

Story wise it relies heavily on fanserices....although in the on-air versions it is heavily censored with penguins. My biggest issue with this anime is that the art style just doesn't seem to match up with the story they are telling. The art, reminds me of Super Gals or Kare Kano. The style seems to childish and bright for the weight of the subject. It would fit if the story was more humorous, or meant as a comedy. I think it was supposed to be this way, but the humor just seemed kind of empty to me. It wasn't that it was dry (trust me, I get dry comedy, I love British television) its like that greeting card classified under almost funny, not serious but not enough to make you laugh.

The most interesting part was how hard it was to find a fansub of this. And, despite my rantings about it, something about it will probably keep me watching it. It's more of a curiosity at this point to see how it will develop.

Magical Girl Week - Wha!? Postponed?!?

Sorry guys, I have been too glued to the news sources over the nuclear power plant and worrying about my friends in Japan to do a once a day post over my favorite magical girl series. So they will be a little staggered. Heck let's just call it Magical Girl Month!!

That's right amongst everything else I will just do magical girl anime review all month, while doing my regular rambling.

Magical Girl Week - First Up Lilpri!

This week for our anime club we are doing a magical girl theme, so I think it is only appropriate if I spend the week reviewing different magical girl series, from the generic to the epic, and what you should be watching.

This week I'm starting out with Hime Chen! Otogi Chikku Idol Lilpri, or Lilpri for short.

This show interestingly enough is based off of an arcade card game in Japan. Yes you heard me right, an arcade card game. You have these cards and you put them in the machine to play. (I'm actually trying to locate some of these cards if anyone knows how to get your hands on some I would appreciate it)

So the anime goes, three girls who are obsessed with an Idol are suddenly given the powers to grow up into princesses with the use of magical cards, and with the help of their magical pets, or MaPets as they are called must save Fairyland through song.

This is definitely a child's anime. And I will be honest, when I first watched this, I was saying why am I watching this...this is so stupid. And now that I am 49 episodes into it, I'm waiting weekly for the release.

I admit it does have it's flaws. During the dancing scenes it switches to a 3D digital animation that is recycled with different outfits. Which really takes away from it's production values, but otherwise it has a cute, easy to follow story based on both English & Japanese fairy tails.

You can watch this anime on Crunchyroll if you would like to see it.

Tonight My Heart Is With Japan

Today is a very sad day. I've been up the past 24 hours trying to help people find out about the areas effected, and trying myself to get a hold of my own friends in Japan in the wake of the earthquake.

The most devastating thing if not the most fascinating thing about social media, is that you can follow what is going on in real time with people just like you.

I felt helpless as I watched. I felt the least I could do is keep a watchful eye, and help where I could, spreading important information as I got it specially from Yokoso News.

I watched as the tsunami came ashore, destroying everything in it's path. And I'll admit, that I cried as I watched this happen.

Although I did my best at work to keep a happy face, it was devastating. Talking about it to my club today I almost started crying. Sleep deprived, tired, and feeling helpless, I don't know what I can do for Japan, but I want to help so badly.

This goes beyond figurines and anime, when you see a natural disaster on television you go "oh well, that sucks" and it doesn't really effect you. But when you're watching it happen, and talking and watching these people as see their emotions, and truly grasp what is going on your so connected to the situation it's like it happened in your own back yard.

Help wise, the best I can do right now is give you guys this from the Red Cross:

Looking to help Japan? Those who want to help can go to www.redcross.org and donate to Japan Earthquake and Pacific Tsunami. People can also text REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation to help those affected by the earthquake in Japan and tsunami throughout the Pacific.

Tonight my heart is with Japan.

A Tale of Two Zombies

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Nope, it's a cross-dressing zombie/magical girl.

Sometimes, late at night, I get this irrational fear of zombies are gonna attack, an irrational fear yes, but this is coming from a person who got a fortune once saying she was gonna die by ninja attack when I least expect it.

So in honor of this irrational fear, I am reviewing two relatively new zombie anime that have sprung up.

Kore wa Zombie desu ka? & High school of the Dead

One, a lighthearted look at the life of a zombie, and the other a more serious & traditional zombie killing spree.

Kore wa Zombie desu Ka:

At first I thought this was going to be more of a slice of life anime, around the hijinks of a zombie and the trouble of trying to live an everyday life. Then suddenly there's a magical girl, and before I know it the Zombie has turned into a cross-dressing magical girl who destroys a giant crustacean with a chainsaw....some serious wtf going on here. Overall it's cute & funny, and I will be adding it to my "to watch" list.

High school of the Dead:

WTF FANSERVICE?!?!!? Ok, so I can handle some fanservice. I understand it sells, Kore wa Zombie, had fanservice in it, but seriously, this is a gory bloody zombie killing anime, and it is ruined by all the unneeded fanservice. This series would be over-the-top epic and awesome if it wasn't for the fanservice. It had such promise it was looking pretty awesome, and then bam...fanservice fanservice fanservice. This makes me sad.

So there we go, to completely different zombie anime, so now if you excuse me, I'm going to go board up my windows and hide in the fetal position in my tub till morning.

Bleach - It Ate My Soul & Squid Girl Figurines

So I only said I was going to watch 3 episodes. Only three, and somehow I ended up watching all of season 1 in one sitting. When asking my dear friend who gave me this to watch I asked him why I did that. To which his response was: "That's the epic power of Bleach." So needless to say, I'm already hooked. I find it to be a great mixture of both comedy, with a strong story line & great fight scenes, but no so heavy. It's very easy to watch, but then again this is stuff you all probably already know specially seeing it's over 300 episodes long.

My next exciting news is some Squid Girl figurines I have had my eye on are finally being released.The are so adorable, I really hope I find them at the next convention. You can buy a box of 8 for 4000 yen, or about 48 dollars, but my issue with that is they are blind boxes, and you can get duplicates. I would rather just spend 12 dollars at a con on each and only buy one or two. I'm a big fan of Chizuru, and I'm excited that they have announced a second season of Squid Girl, it's completely pointless, but what the heck right? It's good fun.
Speaking of conventions, my next one will be at Shutocon March 25th & 26th. Hopefully I can pick up a figurine there!!

Power-Watching Anime is Bad for my Health

Ok, so where have I been for the past while? Trying to power-watch my way through Dragonball, on top of all the other anime I have been watching as of late. And somewhere along the lines I won a video game from Japanator.com, and now for some reason have been talked into power-watching Bleach.

Dragonball & Bleach were two series when they came out that I felt were "dumb" and didn't feel like watching. Dragonball was because I was a fledgling in the anime world and was too tied up watching Sailor Moon, and Tenchi. Bleach unfortunately never got a fair chance from me only because of a past boyfriend blew off something rather important to watch a new episode of Bleach instead, placing it in an unfair position.

So now that I am having a "lull" in things to do, I've decided to undertake watching both of them. Unfortunately, I was dumb enough to undertake trying to watch both of them, starting within a month of each other. Expect some more anime reviews soon, as well as I have decided to branch out and start talking about my life as an otaku. And my really interesting relationship with figurines.

Moetan

An anime about a severely underdeveloped high-school student who wants nothing more than to get into college with her crush, falls into the world of magical girls with the aid of a magician turned duck.

The storyline itself is ok in this. It's a little lacking and tends to ride on the coattails of the panty shots and pervert jokes that run rampant in it. There are some great parts in the anime though. Dandy, the very Lupin like character is one of my favorites. Saving all the "pretty girls" he is definitely not only a comedic relief, but an actually well developed character.

One flaw of this anime is that it should have ended with episode 10. The other three episodes do nothing for the series, and are like afterthought filler.

Overall an ok anime. The characters are cute but it dosen't leave a real lasting impression.

Funimation sues 1337 Users

In a sense of a lot of irony, FUNimation is suing 1,337 BitTorrent users for downloading, & distributing the 481 Episode of One Piece. I don't know what is more ironic, that they are suing 1337 people, or that it is a show about pirates.

This has also arisen a new wave of controversy over pirating anime. Being a person in the anime world, has left me disdained from pirating anime that is already licensed in the USA. But, as a person who wants to keep up to date on on the anime scene, I feel there is a need to download fan-dubbs of up-and-coming shows.

I think there is a line though. I won't buy an anime without watching at least a few episodes of it. These companies realize this and are trying to make more of their stuff available on their website so people can do just that.

How do you feel about the too download vs not to download situation

Animation Runner Kuromi

Animation Runner Kuromi is a two part OVA about Kuromi, a fresh graduate out of animation school has just joined her first production company only to be thrown into the chaos of the anime world when the production manager becomes suddenly ill and leaves her in charge, and this is just her first day!!

This OVA despite being made in 2001, has a very classic art apperance in it, and boasts a large amount of animators that worked on it. It was a great parody of the production of the animation world, compared with the ability of being able to see it for free on A.N.N, I recommend watching it.

Animation Runner Kuromi pt1 runs 40 minutes, and pt 2 runs 45 minuets.

Oreimo Ep. 5-12

First off, I am so glad this anime "didn't go there." What I mean is, it was hinted to thought the whole anime that the sister might have a crush on the main character.

Some good things I want to point out about this anime. The end credits song is different in every episode. My favorite was episode 4's ending. A song by Hayami Saori, called White Heart.

The storyline was engaging, after getting over Kirino's (the sister of the main character) annoying behavior. It gets better past episode 5.
I honestly planned to watch the last 8 episodes split between two days, but once you started watching it, it was hard to shut off the computer and call it a night.

This is going to be one of those anime's that I make it a point to go back and try to find the manga for. There were a lot of unanswered questions I had. Especially about Bagina Saori, one of Kirino's Otaku friends. Standing out from her regular otaku appearance, it is hinted at in one scene that she my be quite rich, and beautiful.

This whole anime is available on Anime News Network to watch for free.
[Link Here]

Shinryaku! Ika Musume (Invasion! Squid Girl)

This 12 episode anime was quite refreshing and funny. Being ill lately I had the opportunity to watch it completely.

In this extremely light-hearted anime you follow Squid Girl in her plan to concur the surface world while working in a seaside cafe. But life is not easy for this little squid, as she torments one of the other employees that are afraid of her, is chased by a love-obsessed girl, and is mistaken for an alien.

The loose storyline and humor go well together, and the whole series is wrapped up nicely. The entire series can be watched for free on CrunchyRoll's website.

This is an anime I recommend for anyone that is looking for something quirky and casual.....plus the OP is very addictive!!

Oreimo Ep 1-4

So far, I think this anime has a really cute story to it. The seemingly perfect girl has the hidden secret, the brother finds out, and decides to help her. It reminds me of His and Her Circumstances. I find the brother's intentions bold, where despite his poor relationship with his sister, he bends over backwards to help her.

My largest issue with this, is Kirino, the little sister that the main character is working so hard to help. Originally bearable, her antics of talking down, degrading, and overly displeasing attitude to her brother by episode 4 has gotten annoying. This is a guy who lies for her to their father, tries to protect her secret from being found out, and goes out of his way for her, only to be treated like crap. It has just really gotten annoying.

I have a feeling Kirino is going to end up the Tsundere type, and will eventually warm up to him, (hopefully be nicer to him at least) Hopefully still keep some of that bratty little sister charm, but a little less over the top.

As for my prediction for the rest of the anime, I plan to finish watching it in the next two days, so I will reserve my conclusions until after it happens. Seeing that it is a anime about a girl who is obsessed with "little sister" games, I hope it doesn't go in the certain direction it could go in.