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June 10, 2014

Anime Next 2014: Wrap

By omo

What do you do when ten guys and Luna Haruna want to take a picture together?

It is pretty funny because after the memorable photo op, one of the main promoter person wanted to see if we can help her promote Luna. I guess that’s not a problem, if people want to do the work. But it’s a little weird since the lot of us are DDs and we like the whole live aspect and the fact that Luna is pretty much textbook “small and cute” as far as appeals go. FWIW, Luna is very much the harajuku-style fashionista, but also otaku. She’s got this slightly dorky feel to it that comes off as endearing, but at the same time very professional about her fan interactions. I can see why clothes look good on her, but as mentioned by others, she’s no Ray.

Anime Next is in my proverbial back yard, so it was trivial to attend. To up the difficulty I decided to host a BBQ so that made extra work on my end. Not a big deal, other than hosting about 6 people in my place and we watched Chokaigi one night, and played MJ/OFA the other. And I think we watched episodes of Jojo and Mangaka and Assistant because, why not?

Season 1 Episode 7

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Leave a comment | posted in Modern Visual Culture

June 5, 2014

Serendipitous P

By omo

Reading Author’s anecdote is like seeing a scale from a fish that you were riding all year, as you look back fondly after you’ve gotten off it and went home from the adventure. Except this is someone else’s scale and you are pleasantly surprised as he was that he has it.

I say the scale of a fish because this thing crosses oceans and exists on an unimaginable scale. The problem here is that we can say, “maybe you should watch Madoka because spawned the top grossing late-night TV anime movie, as if you need another indication to know the magnitude of the thing” and it only lightly signifies the issues with your average east-meets-west situation when fans of “obscure” things collide. This tortured analogy for all the Producer-ness, Producer-hood, or whatever it is, is just a poor attempt to explain how amazing it is to find fans who flew to Canada to see Harami, or fans who flew to Saitama to see Harami (and others). It’s this crisscrossing of people who are doing rather irrational fan things yet find beauty within. I mean, in a nutshell, some folks flew overseas to attend events. That’s not too unusual these days. But that’s just a single fragment or patch in a mural that depicts the kind of CUTE COOL PASSION a stadium full of nerds with glowsticks that people do not see when they see a news report or a synopsis video. It’s the fan-iceberg beneath the surface. And it’s a pain in the butt to describe this iceberg in full.

It might be why I am playing Million Live, so when I run into a P I have something for show? Or why all P should make business cards?

In that sense, as someone who lives in a world where nobody knows IM@S (eg., the USA) and half of those who do only do so at an arm’s length, even those who like idol anime (and this is part of the “problem”) or whatever, that’s both good and bad in that it makes the chance encounters even more beautiful, but I lack the resistance. I mean in the end IM@S is no different than any other media mix franchise, something Japan does in bulk and all the time. Just because this one sticks, for all the (right) reasons, it doesn’t mean all that much beyond that we have bonded as friends. Does this mean every seiyuu from 765Pro visits the USA I’ll have to travel and attend an offkai? Ouch.

It’s doubly problematic because IM@S, comparatively, is also a very broad and wide fandom with a varied history and a lot of assets and entry angles for fans to latch on to. Just like those people who build shrines of characters, or the koebutas that chase after the voice talents behind the 2D, or just plain gamers (because as far as idol games go, IM@S is pretty deep), we are sort of all for one. Not to say other fandoms don’t have these problems, but let’s just say Love Livers have it easy.

If The World Is All One is the feverish dream of a victim from chuunibyou, then One For All is the reality marble that turns dream into 2.5D reality. It ends when you wake up, still, but at least now you can look up strategy guides for it.

It reminds me of that song from Sakura Wars 2.

It’s beautiful, in a way, because of the direction the franchise is taking. I am more interested in the characters from Million Live and Cinderella Girls. The voice talents behind them are very good, if ultimately a different type of talent than the ones from the main group. This is the kind of pivot that I can get behind, if you know what I’m saying.

1 comment | posted in Seiyuu, Idol, Pop

June 3, 2014

The Value of the IM@S Movie

By omo

Think of this as part two of my IM@S movie trip-down-memory-lane. Thanks to Aniplex for updating the official site with not just a really awesome sketch of Kotori and her 765 coworkers along with a thankful letter, both from Goripon, but the box office final numbers. 2ch did the math for us and that puts the IM@S movie as 6th all time for late-night TV anime spinoffs in the past 10 years. The list is below and I’ll just take this time to annotate how many times I’ve seen it in theaters LOL.

Otonashi Kotori

Column 1 is total box office (hundred million yen), column 2 is opening weekend (hundred million yen), third column is yy/mm of release. To give you an idea, 20.8å„„yen is about 20.8 million USD if we go by 1 USD to 100 JPY. This means IM@s grossed 6.7 million USD or so, and K-ON the movie made more money in Japan than a lot of movies in the US??

Again, this chart only lists “late-night anime” movies in the past 10 years. Your Lupins and Gundams and Ghiblis are on a different scale altogether.

20.8億　4.00億　13/10　Madoka Rebellion – US screening, probably didn’t count
19.0億　3.16億　11/12　K-ON – Missed this one ;_; Just on home video.
10.4億　1.98億　13/08　Anohana – US screening, probably didn’t count
*8.5億　0.89億　10/02　Haruhi – US screening at a con, definitely didn’t count
*7.0億　1.18億　11/02　Macross F part 2 – Missed this one completely (even on home video…)
*6.7億　1.40億　14/01　THE IDOLM@STER – 5 times!
*6.1億　1.30億　14/02　Tiger & Bunny R – Missed this one completely
*6.0億　1.18億　12/09　Tiger & Bunny B – Missed this one completely
*5.9億　1.39億　12/10　Madoka Beginnings – US screening, probably didn’t count
*5.7億　1.72億　12/10　Madoka Eternal – US screening, probably didn’t count
*5.6億　0.87億　13/04　Steins;Gate – Once, JP screening. Waiting for a US screening when, FUNi?
*5.5億　1.23億　12/07　Nanoha 2nd A’s – Only on home video
*5.0億　1.01億　13/02　Index – Didn’t even wanna.
*3.8億　0.61億　10/01　Nanoha 1st – Only on home video
*3.1億　0.52億　11/06　BASARA – Nope
*2.8億　0.38億　10/01　FateUBW – Only home video
*2.3億　0.40億　12/03　Strike Witches – Only on home video
*2.2億　0.56億　13/09　Chuu2Koi – I wish
*2.0億　0.39億　12/06　Library Wars – Nope
*1.4億　0.30億　14/04　Tamako Love Story – I wish
*1.0億　0.32億　12/06　BLOOD-C – Nope
*1.0億　*.**億　13/03　Hanasaku Iroha – Once in Japan, once in US at a con.
*1.0億　0.22億　11/06　SoraOto – Only home video
*0.8億　0.12億　10/12　Fafner – Nope
*0.7億　*.**億　10/04　Trigun – At a con, didn’t count
*.**億　*0.2億　14/02　Mouretsu Pirates – Once in Japan
*0,1億　*0,1億　13/01　Wake Up Girls!  – At a con, didn’t count; plus streaming (!)

Questions and comments–

How does the tokutens factor? I already mentioned that IM@S movie has some wicked tokuten and that definitely got people to go see the movie more. This goes hand-in-hand with my second question, how does the SSA live, OFA, Puchim@s and general revival(?) of the IM@S franchise the past few years matter? I mean I go watch IM@S for the feels more so than anything, and those feels are in large parts due to non-anime-related factors.

The “same” question is also asked in a different way: how many people in those box office counts repeat customers? Would it be fair to take the post-opening weekend numbers and cut it down on a per-theater basis? And compare movies that had a lot of tokutens and those that didn’t? Not sure if that works or is meaningful. Maybe someone good with stats can give me a hand here.

Others commented on that how the IM@S movie preorders aren’t going as hotly as the box office would indicate, which is partly why I think ultimately IM@S movie’s box office numbers are largely inflated (by some value of largely that is totally debatable) by repeated viewers, many who probably won’t buy multiple copies of the movie. Yours truly included. So that effect is more pronounced. To put it into perspective, when I went to those 8:30 AM showings at Shinjuku back in Feburary, the movie has been out for about 3-4 weeks already, and I count 40+ attendees the two times I went. That week the bonus goods were the Goripon 765Pro shikishi that you get randomly out of 5, which is probably the second most expensive tokuten during the movie run (what was the most expensive one is now the bonus of IM@S manga #3, which is chapter 00 of the manga).

Another obvious difficulty is the lack of numbers. Aniplex has been very forward with the box office numbers, as seen here. We have the numbers from when the movie finished its main run back in March and went ninja for its road show, at about 6.45M. So that gives you an idea. But we have no other movie to compare it with? Anyone knows another movie where the numbers are out at the various points?

Anyways, this movie is truly a product of a lot of passion and you can see it unfold. I hope we all can see it soon.

Leave a comment | posted in Idolmaster

May 30, 2014

Con Season 2014

By omo

I just want to make some notes before my scrambled thoughts leak out of one ear as OFA and LLSIF cram down my other. First of all, this past week I did something that would be unthinkable if you talked to me 8  years ago: back-to-back anime conventions. Why? Because there are guests I wanted to see, who came from Japan.

It’s a sort of vindictive kind of a feeling. It’s like when your favorite anime gets licensed and you buy it. Except this is like the “Better than Aniplex” version where the cost is less and the product is even better than the Japanese version. This is why Hanamaru Cluster mobilized; you simply get opportunities that you can’t get with the guests anywhere else, that these Japanese fans would “reverse-import” the experience by going abroad. Anyway, you see it and you buy it. You buy it hard. You image macro Fry throwing money on the screen. You pre-order as soon as you can. You get excited about it. That’s what happens.

Of course, what’s also amazing is the meeting-of-fandom aspect. I’m not huge on fandom but I recognize the effect it has on me, my habits, and what I do. I helped do a WUG dinner with Japanese WUGners, and you can read about the two dinners we had at Anime North over at Exciel’s. I should drop a big shoutout to him for organizing and putting all those Anime North things together. It’s thankless, kind of like how ACEN and Anime North themselves are huge labors of love that’s largely thankless but are powerful enablers.

Dang, the WUG-chans are sure cute.

There aren’t really any conventions like American/Canadian cons in Japan. This is possibly why when I read Kelt’s Japanamerica book it resonated a lot; this is sort of cultural appropriation and mutation that go back and forth. What that means, at least in a practical way, is that we can improve on what other countries do and everyone can share in every which new form that this culture gets reorganized or rearranged. It’s like I can fly to Japan to watch a badass concert, or Babymetal can tour with the best of metal in the UK and Canada. Or Japan Expo can branch into other European destinations and the US. I don’t know, it’s all weird.

Just like how a bunch of North American Ps can talk to Mari Nakamura (the gothloli clothing designer quoted in Exciel’s blog post) who then talk to us about producer culture, and this is not just Canadian or oversea producer culture, but all producer culture.

One thing the guys behind the Anime North nonsense (HPT) worry about is that as ocean-hopping wotas we probably skew their perceptions of US/CAN fans. And no doubt I played a role in that too. I am pretty sure I needlessly impressed one particular WUGner because I said I recognized that Tomo Sakurai has a sister that is also a seiyuu; this is super vague recollection I’m working on. It already is a weird year for cons for me. I will attend my fifth anime con next week with Anime Next; I think I aim to attend 5 cons at most last year, and barely broke into 6. For 2014, after AnimeNext I am scheduled for at least AX, Otakon and AWA. And I went to Japan earlier this year too. That’s nuts. If I drop an AUSA or NYCC in there, that would blow my mind again. And that feels too close, too much like punishment. It’s great punishment but nonetheless.

Maybe I should go work for a company that sends people to anime cons…

Leave a comment | posted in Modern Visual Culture

May 28, 2014

Anime North 2014: Wrap

By omo

Day Three of Anime North is just like Day Two, just minus the brunch and more casual. Most of the JP Ps went back to their hotels after closing ceremony was over; Harami and Mai both attended that event, and that ended at 7pm. Most cons don’t end this late, for a weekend-type con. We ended up eating at a tex mex place down the road and it turned out a lot more affordable and about as delicious. It was also a little bit of an acrobatic act; originally it was a dinner with just some local Ps and the HPT guys, but some JP guys wanted to tag along so the party size changed from 13 to 26 and back to 16. I again tipped well.

Did I mention that on Saturday’s off-kai at the local steakhouse chain (it’s not as upscale as, say, Ruth Chris’s) we did RE@DY? We were able to get a whole corner of the place to ourselves and a few JP Ps went off on it.

After hanging out with all these new-found Ps, it was kind of moving. By day three we were sufficiently bonded with some JP Producers that we had a tough goodbye at the parking lot. We came back to the hotel and did more calls and lightstick waving. Hacked the hotel TV so we can watch 8th live. Remember the glamours AI LIKE HAMBURGER routine.

And this is how Anime North feels like a 4-day con even if it’s just 3 days long. On Monday we got up at a reasonable hour and walked around Niagara Falls. It’s always fun to see the largest watering hole on earth.

Yukari puppet

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1 comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts