AnimeNation Anime News Blog

Bandai has officially delayed the domestic release of its The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya 2nd Season DVD collection from August 17 to September 14.

The seven American branches of Japan’s Kinokuniya Bookstore chain have ceased selling five Japanese “bishoujo” (pretty girl) anime and manga magazines as a “precautionary measure” related to fears that the content of the magazines could potentially be interpreted as “child pornography” violating US laws. Megami Magazine, Megami Magazine Deluxe, Nyantype, Dengeki Hime and Dengeki Moeoh are all mainstream Japanese periodicals that cover and serialize current “bishoujo” anime such as K-On, Lyrical Nanoha, Angel Beats, Amagami SS, and Black Rock Shooter. ASCII Media Works’ monthly Dengeki Hime magazine is an adult-only publication that covers Japanese erotic computer games. The other four periodicals do not publish explicit nudity or graphic sexual content.

Source: Sankaku Complex

Reportedly during the “Cultural Typhoon” academic conference held at Komazawa University earlier this month, Ergo Proxy & Wolf’s Rain screenwriter Dai Sato made a number of harsh, and seemingly self-contradictory, statements decrying the current state and direction of Japan’s anime production industry.

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This isn’t anime, but any anime fan that isn’t just a little bit intrigued by the first trailer for director Zac Snyder’s next picture, Sucker Punch, isn’t an anime fan.

To refresh your memory or introduce you to an interesting opening animation sequence, I offer the opening of the 1987 cooking boy television series Mister Ajikko. The theme song is “Renaissance Jounetsu,” sung by Wataru Kuniyasu.

Question:
Why do people keep calling Inception “original” when it’s clearly “inspired” by Paprika and, even if it wasn’t, has been done before in the cyberpunk genre, much like The Matrix before it? Are they that oblivious to the latter anime’s existence like they appeared to be with Ghost in the Shell? Or are they just too lazy to look for new stuff so they’re ready to slap that label on any flashy film they see?

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The G4 television network now hosts a streaming trailer for the Madhouse animated Iron Man anime television series, along with a confirmation that Madhouse’s television series adaptations of Iron Man, X-Men, Wolverine, and Blade will air on the network next year. The Iron-Man anime will premiere on Japan’s Animax television network on October 1.

Personally speaking, not impressed.

Source: Anime News Network

Tokyopop has announced its acquisition of domestic publication rights to Yuna Kagesaki’s Sakura’s Number One (Sakura no Ichiban), Koge Donbo’s Pavane for a Dead Girl (Naki Shoujo no Tame no Pavane), and Touya Tobina’s Mr. Clean: Fully Equipped (Keppeki Shounen Kanzen Soubi) manga series.

Source: Anime News Network

Drawn & Quarterly has announced its acquisition of publication rights to Shigeru Mizuki’s Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths (Soin Gyokusai Seyo!) and NonNonBa (Nonnonba to Ore) manga series.

Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths is Mizuki’s semi-autobiographical account of the desperate final weeks faced by a Japanese infantry unit before the end of WWII. The award winning NonNonBa manga is a historical fiction about a young boy in the 1930s introduced to classic Japanese ghosts and folklore by an old neighbor woman. Shigeru Mizuki is best known as the creator of Ge Ge Ge no Kitaro.

Source: The Comics Reporter

The head of the 5pb. game production company, Chiyomaru Shikura, has publicly announced that the 5pb & Nitroplus co-developed Xbox 360 “hypothetical science adventure” visual novel game Steins;Gate is getting an anime television series adaptation. The game revolves around teens in present day Akihabara, Tokyo that modify a microwave oven to send text messages to the past. The kids’ actions attract the dangerous attention of a mysterious organization also experimenting with time travel.

Hopefully this will turn out as a better anime than the rather awful adaptation of 5pb & Nitroplus’ first collaboration, Chaos;HEAd.

Source: Anime News Network

To refresh your memory or introduce you to an interesting opening animation sequence, I offer the opening (and ending) of the 1974 magical girl television series Majokko Meg-chan. The theme song is “Majokko Meg-chan,” sung by Yoko Maekawa.

Question:
I was a big anime fan a few years ago and I’m getting back into it now. I was wondering if there were any newer anime you could recommend that hearken back to the styles and themes of the late 80s/early 90s. For example, I have seen and enjoyed Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne, which I would consider reminiscent of that era.

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Beginning today, Crunchyroll will begin simulcasting new weekly episodes of the ongoing Mitsudomoe slapstick comedy anime television series. The series’ first three episodes will become available to viewers in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil and Portugal today. Future episodes will stream on Crunchyroll on the same day they air in Japan.

Bandai Entertainment, at the ongoing San Diego Comic Con, has announced its acquisition of the 1999 Turn A Gundam and 2008 Tales of the Abyss television series and Eri Takenashi’s Kannagi manga series.

I’m glad to see that there’s a lot of eagerness surrounding the Turn A license. Personally, I’ve never liked the show. I found it poorly constructed and uninvolving. But its reception has improved over the years, and any older license getting a lot of anticipation in the US is positive.

Source: Anime News Network

Top Shelf Productions, the American publisher of the AX: Alternative Manga anthology, has announced plans for an English language publication of the late Masahiko Matsumoto’s 2009 collection of vintage gekiga manga Cigarette Girl (Tobacco-ya no Musume). The manga is a collection of realistic, dramatic manga stories for mainstream adult readers originally published in the 1970s. Masahiko Matsumoto, a friend of gekiga pioneers Tatsumi Yoshihiro and Saito Takao, passed away on February 14, 2005 of stomach cancer.

Source: Anime News Network