Month: January 2008

Komatsu Nana

I’d like to do a plug for Nana, an anime that has been around for a while, and is now in licensing limbo, in that it has been licensed in the US by Viz Media, but no release date is set. The Nana manga is by Ai Yazawa, who also wrote Gokinjo Monogatari and Paradise Kiss. All three manga feature young adult characters in the world of art school and fashion, and in the case of Nana, rock music. In each, the story concentrates on the love lives of the characters and their “adult relationships”.

The first episode of Nana has ditzy Komatsu Nana meeting punk Osaki Nana on an express train to Tokyo. Komatsu Nana meets her boyfriend, and sleeps with him at his flat, but is shocked when he makes it clear that he has no intention of letting her live with him. While flat-hunting, Komatsu Nana meets Osaki Nana again, and to save money they agree to share a flat in an old building. The opening credit music is Osaki Nana performing with her band.

All this turns out to be just a trailer for the rest of the anime. The next several episodes are flashbacks which show where these two girls came from, and by episode six or so we catch up with them at their shared flat. We also meet the other members of the two bands, Blast and Trapnest, and a few other minor Tokyo characters.

Some months ago I had watched only the first episode and while I liked it, I didn’t realise what a fascinating anime this was. There are a lot of interesting characters who do interesting things, and an insight into their world of bars, gigs, art school and music gigs. In short, a refreshing and welcome change from the production line of anime with school-student characters. Though they become friends, the two Nanas are very different. Komatsu Nana (“Hatchi”) doesn’t know what to do with herself and seems unable to manage without a boyfriend, while streetwise Osaki Nana is fixed on the goal of making a success of her band Blast.

Hikari

This shoujo sports anime dates from 1986, and is an example of what you can find on the web if you dig around. Only 3 episodes were ever fansubbed. It wasn’t a hit even at the time, but it still has a certain period charm.

Hikari, the pretty heroine, is rather good at rhythmic gymnastics. In the first episodes she shows just how good she is, defeating a sullen rival and being one of two girls from the school selected for the national championships. The other girl is Azuki, a talented senior whom Hikari admires. Hikari is encouraged by Ooshi, an older boy who is a national gymnastics champion. Hikari becomes interested in him, but he has a romantic interest in Azuki. Another friend of Hikari is Mao-kun, a rather punkish boy interested in pop music, who produces a tape of music for Hikari’s performance.

Anime Central UK is looking healthier than the late Anime Network. They’ve been running a series of marathons over Xmas (currently it’s “Bleach”), and when that ends they promise more goodies:

… the 5th of January 2008 will see a fresh line-up of shows introduced on the channel including first runs of Mobile Suit Gundam Seed, s-Cry-ed and Witch Hunter Robin.

However nobody has been in over the holidays to update the programme times on the website http://www.animecentral.com/whatson/, and the Sky EPG for this coming Saturday still has the show titles as for December.

The last new material was broadcast on Saturday 29 Dec (4x episodes of Poni Puni Dash). A repeat of “shounen” programming was shown on the Sunday, then no more. The Sky EPG shows the details of short films and British animation being shown by Propeller in this slot for the next several days. Series screening of Azumanga Daioh, Poni Puni, and the several “shounen” series is completed, but Kurau Phantom Memory remains uncompleted, with only 16 out of 24 episodes shown, so fans of this will have to wait for the DVD releases.
Meanwhile, nobody from the management has had the courtesy to make any announcement.