Oct
30
Anime DVD release schedule for UK
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Reported anime recent and forthcoming releases in the UK:
1 October: Red Garden V1 (ADV), Shadow Skill V3 (ADV) Black cat V1 (MVM), Robotech Complete Collection (Manga), Ninja Scroll: Tin Set (MVM) Tokko: Box set (Manga), Basilisk V3 (MVM), Ergo Proxy (V2) (MVM), Ah! My Goddess V5, (MVM), Azumanga Daioh Collection (ADV), Speed Grapher (V4) (MVM.
15 October: Oban Star-racers V2 (Liberation), Chrono Crusade Complete Collection (ADV), 009-1 (vol.1) (ADV), Afro Samurai (Studio Gonzo)
22 October: Moon Phase V3 (Revelation) Mushi-shi (V1) (Revelation), Noein Complete Collection (Manga), Suzuka V1 (Revelation), Negima V5 (Revelation)
24 October: KARAS V2 (Manga), KARAS double pack (Manga)
29 October: Brave Story (Optimum)
5 November: FullMetal Panic! Complete Collection (ADV), Elemental Gelade V4 (MVM), Innocent Venus V2 (ADV), Triity Blood V3 (MVM), Samurai 7: Complete Collection (MVM), Sayuki Reload V6 (MVM), Kurau Phantom Memory V2 (ADV), Naruto the Movie, Ninja Clash in the Land of Snow (Manga), Berserk V2 (MVM)
19 November: Poni Poni Dash! V3 (ADV), BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad v2 (Revelation), Peach Girl v3 (Revelation, Tsubasa Reservoir Chronichle V2 (Revelation), .hack/roots V4 (BEEZ), Mushi-shi V2 (Revelation), Le Cevalier D’eon V4 (ADV)
26 November: Tales from Earthsea (Optimum)
1 December: Planetes Box Set (Beez)
V = Volume.
Phew! British anime fans needn’t complain there isn’t anything to buy…
Oct
29
Two new anime TV channels in the UK
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With little fanfare, two new channels broadcasting anime in the UK have recently launched:
Anime Network: Sky channel 195, two hours from 8pm daily. Details here: http://www.animenetwork.co.uk/index.php?nps=y. Currently showing Coyote Ragtime, Evangeleon, Guyver, and Elfen Leid. Also, on different days, a more shoujo-ish programme whose titles I haven’t to hand. (all dub)
Anime Central: Sky channel 199, nine hours from 9pm (with repeats, only 6 different shows) Episode numbers advance daily. Details here: http://www.animecentral.com/whatson/index.aspx?dte=30/10/2007
Includes GitS SAC, Planetes, Escaflowne, Fullmetal Alchemist, Bleach and Transformers Masterforce (all dub).
If nothing else, a chance to preview anime you can buy in the UK on sub/dub DVD.
Oct
23
Autumn New Season Anime
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Hasegawa returns
Moyashimon (Tales of Agriculture) Two young men from the country, Sawaki and Yuuki, enrol in an agricultural college in the fringes of Tokyo. Sawaki has a most unusual talent in that he is literally able to see microbes and mold spores! Their first day at college is rather disrupted by a police search for a missing student, Miss Haswgawa. In the college grounds Sawaki follows a trail of microbes and a bad smell to a grave-like hole in the ground, and alerts the authorities. However the person to seize a shovel and excavate the grave is an elderly tutor, who unearths a very dead seal stuffed with rotting seagulls, and explains that this is an Inuit delicacy known as “Kiviak”. (complete with details about vitamins)
At this point Miss Hasegawa herself shows up and complains about the tutor digging up her experiment.
One thing one can say about this anime is that it is different. How many others can you name that are set in an agricultural college, or have screen captions about yeasts, or inform you about revolting Inuit foods? Or have a character who can see microbes? (Not to mention Hasegawa, who is definitely a babe.)
Shugo Chara puts a fresh spin on a very familiar magical-girl theme. Schoolgirl Hinamori Amu has a reputation as a cool and rebellious girl, feared by bullies and school principals, and admired for her style by her classmates. However secretly she yearns to be ordinary. After making a wish she finds three brightly coloured eggs in her bed. After a moment of bewilderment and wondering if she has given birth to them (I am female, after all, she muses), she puts them in her schoolbag.
Soon she encounters the School Guardians, developing a crush on one of them, and discovers that one of the eggs hatches into a fairy, and that Amu herself can both transform and fly.
Shugo Chara is very funny and achieves the remarkable feat of giving a fresh twist to a very familiar set-up.
Shion no Ou is a much darker tale, about Shion, a schoolgirl orphan who is skilled in the Japanese board game of Shogi. Both her parents were brutally killed, and Shion, threatened by the killer, lost the power of speech. She enters a shogi tournament for women, and does quite well. However the player who beat her is revealed not to be what she appears to be, and at the end of the episode a stalker grabs Shion.
This is quite good and I want to see what happens in episode 2.
Oct
7
Twelve Kingdoms
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I recently bought Box 1 and Box 2 of the budget US release of 12 Kingdoms. I don’t think the world really needs yet another review of this anime, which was licensed several years ago, so I’ll just describe the two versions of the box-set. The full price one costs about $100 for each of the two boxes, while the budget one costs $50 for each of the two boxes.
So what’s the difference? Apparently the DVDs are the same in both variants, so the difference is in the packaging. The budget box has one DVD mounted inside the front, two mounted (overlapping) on a swinging carrier, and two mounted (overlapping) inside the back. And that’s it. So, less artwork, fewer boxes, less convenience in handling. And for the extra hundred bucks I assume you get a box for each DVD and more artwork and synopsis text. Your choice.
I’ve also read the first of the original novels (Shadow of the Moon, a Sea of Shadows, by Fuyumi Ono) in translation. This is a curious experience, as it’s rather like reading a pared-down version of the anime story. As some will already know, two characters (Sugimoto, who appears only fleetingly in the novel) and Asano, who doesn’t exist at all in the novel) were added to the anime to facilitate the adaptation. Seems that a number of scenes I remember from the anime are just not there. The novel is told from Youko’s point of view, and it’s very hard to put it aside and stop reading. It’s an intense experience watching her change from cringing schoolgirl, to prisoner, to refugee, to a competent street-person who actually enjoys chopping up youma.
By the way, I think I have seen the 12K series described as “light novels”, which seems a bit derogatory, but apparently this Japanese term means that they are shelved with sci-fi, movie novelisations and romantic novels and not with highbrow literary novels, Booker prize winners and suchlike.