Scott Pilgrim/Mighty Fine Tee Contest!

Edit: Contest is closed. Thank you everyone for participating!

I am so excited, you guys! My first contest on this blog!!!

Here’s what’s going on: the super-awesome t-shirt company Mighty Fine has given me the chance to give you some of their awesome Scott Pilgrim tees to three lucky people!

Here’s the catch: You must defeat my seven evil exes! I mean, tell me your absolute favorite scene out of all six, super-awesome volumes of Scott Pilgrim and why that scene rocks your world. That’s going to be a tough decision, huh? The other catch is that Mighty Fine’s going to be keeping the prize tees a surprise, although all their Scott Pilgrim tees are fantastic and I want ALL OF THEM, so I think you guys should be just fine.

Here’s the rules: You have one week (until: 8/6) to leave a comment with your favorite scene below. After the week is over, I’ll pick my three favorites out of your answers and contact you so that Mighty Fine can send you prize! Be as passionate and descriptive as you can be when telling me about your fav!

As an example, let me describe my personal favorite: I am inexplicably in love with a scene from volume 2, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, just before The Clash at Demonhead plays and various characters are talking to each other. Kim Pine starts talking to her co-worker Hollie, who introduces her roommate Joseph. Hollie tells Kim that they’re only there because Joseph has a huge crush on The Clash’s bass player, Kim asks if he’s hot and Joseph responds with “He is as hot as the flames of the hell you bitches are going to.” WHAT AN EXCELLENT COMEBACK. I love it. It makes me laugh every time and I really want a chance for someone to ask me if some guy is hot so I can say that exact line. It’s definitely one of the most memorable lines for me and I feel it touches upon what makes Scott Pilgrim so great: these little moments of sheer genius character-related humor.

So leave me your favorite scene and win yourself a t-shirt! Go Go Gooooo!!! And thank you Mighty Fine for providing the prizes!

My San Diego Comic-Con 2010: Part 2

My this is late. Sorry everyone, I had to take care of a loopy boyfriend on Monday, Tuesday was just non-stop for me and last night I just forgot. (He had a medical procedure done that involved anesthesia. It was sort of fantastic to see him all wobbly and slurring his words. Best of all, he forgot a sock at the doctor’s office. Never mind the fact that he didn’t take his socks off during the procedure.)

Onward!

Friday: I started my day off with the Moto Hagio spotlight panel. (Horrendously under-attended, might I add.) Before I launch into an explanation of the panel, however, let me explain this: Moto Hagio is pretty much why I was at Comic-Con this year. I am not kidding. I was SO DEVASTATED to hear that she was coming and I wasn’t. And then I realized I could get a professional badge! Oh joyous day! I adore older manga and I was quite looking forward to seeing one of the Magnificent Forty Niners and a great mangaka talk about her career.

That being said, the spotlight panel was everything I could have ever hoped for!

Hagio-sensei launched into a short overview of her career, starting with her short stories and then with The Poe Clan, which was her first longer narrative about boys who are stuck as teenagers after being turned into vampires. The Poe Clan‘s first collected volume sold out on the first day, which allowed her to continue working on Heart of Thomas, which was considered unpopular by editors at the time. After that, she began working on They Were Eleven and Marginal, both scifi manga influenced by her love of Western scifi, a genre she read passionately as a child.

My favorite part of the panel, however, had to be Hagio-sensei’s discussion of the various issues surround her stories. Many of them were very personal, including her mother’s strong dislike of manga and criticism of her career. She also spoke about her interest in psychology and child abuse and how this lead to short stories such as Iguana Girl and Hanshin as well as longer narratives such as A Cruel God Reigns in Heaven. For her to share such personal details about her career takes a lot of courage, but it made everyone in the audience feel ten times closer to her than someone who feels the need to talk only about their stories and not the personal influences behind them. It made the panel much more interesting than any canned answer from a Hollywood exec in Hall H. (I will never venture there as long as I live, I think.)

Hagio-sensei was presented an Inkpot Award at the start of the panel and I believe she more than earned it by the time the panel was over when she generously donated all the manga she spoke about to Comic-Con for posterity. For more about Moto Hagio, check out Shaenon Garrity’s excellent interview.

A little while later, Yen Press had their industry panel, which was the only straight industry panel I was able to attend. (I skipped Bandai and FUNimation because I had heard most of their announcements at Anime Expo. Other panels I missed because I had to attend a wedding in Los Angeles on Saturday.) There, Yen Press announced new licenses including The Betrayal Knows My Name by Hotaru Odagiri, High School of the Dead by Daisuke Sato and Shoji Sato, Aron’s Absurd Armada by MiSun Kim and The Bride’s Stories by Kaoru Mori. They also licensed another arc of Higurashi When They Cry, but I don’t seem to have the exact title in my notes.

I am looking forward to The Bride’s Stories (Otoyome-Gatari) the most because I once pitched it (as a long shot) to TOKYOPOP. I was afraid the title would never come stateside due to the nature of the main couple (she is 18 or 20 and he is about 13, despite the fact that nothing happens between them and the manga is set over 100 years ago.)

Yen Press also gave us more information about the online edition of Yen Plus, their manga magazine that was recently taken out of print circulation. The viewer is not flash-based, which gives readers the ability to view it on their iPhone or iPad, and is region-free, which means readers around the world will be able to legally view the magazine’s contents. The month-to-month paypal payments cost $2.99 and also get you access to the previous month’s copy, in case you missed it. Not a bad deal!

My exhibit hall antics on Friday consisted of me and Gia Manry of Anime News Network storming around the exhibit hall looking for hard-to-find manga publishers after a nice chat with freelance translator William Flanagan. We met up with Ed Chavez of Vertical Inc. and met Felipe Smith, the creator of MBQ and Peepo Choo. Also, to our delight, Viz Kids had announced the licensing of an original Mameshiba graphic novel and there were Mameshiba toys for sale at the Toynami booth. There’s nothing like grown women plotting how to steal all the awesome Mameshiba products Toynami had on display, but not for sale. (Later on in the day, we met up with more grown women excited about the Mameshiba toys and we had a *moment* together. Good times.) I am overjoyed to hear that now I will be able to gorge myself on adorable dog/bean toys that make people uncomfortable with random trivia. Somewhere in there, I also managed to get Little Fluffy Gigolo Pelu signed by Junko Mizuno.

In the evening, Jason Thompson held his Future of Manga panel. While there was plenty of interesting factoids about manga magazine circulation and such in Jason’s presentation, I feel like he got a little side-tracked by the past and the present of manga. He failed to speak about the future except for a few rushed minutes of speaking about online manga distribution in Japan, denying panel attendees any really meaty discussion. I feel like Jason could have spoken for hours and hours on end about manga and still not have touched upon the future of it, so I will blame time constraints and the vast depth of his knowledge. Nothing that can’t be fixed by more careful presentation next year. I still enjoyed it because it gave me a lesson on a good chunk of manga history, but I wonder if other attendees might have found it boring.

Saturday: I didn’t attend any panels, so I’m afraid I don’t have many personal experiences that were interesting to recount. I tried to get a robot signed by Tom Siddell of Gunnerkrigg Court (a webcomic with a print version by Archaia) and failed because I had to return to L.A. I succeeded, however, in getting autographs from the creators of Avatar: the Last Airbender and two of the artists who have worked on Vertigo’s Madame Xanadu, Marley Zarcone and Amy Reeder. Then I meandered around the con and wound up having an excited discussion about Oishinbo: A La Carte (amongst other things) with freelance Viz editor Shaenon Garrity at her booth. (She is also the creator of two webcomics, Narbonic and Skin Horse.)

I, sadly, just missed a signing for Felipe Smith (but made up for that one on Monday as he had a signing at my local comic book store), the infamous Hall H stabbing and the TOKYOPOP panel where the company announced the licensing of Mr. Clean: Fully Equipped by Toya Tobina, Pavane for a Dead Girl by Koge Donbo and Sakura no Ichiban by Chibi Vampire creator Yuna Kagesaki. Drawn & Quarterly, fresh from their double Eisner win for Yoshihiro Tatsumi’s A Drifting Life, announced that they will be releasing Onward Towards Our Noble Deaths and NonNonBa by Shigeru Mizuki (of GeGeGe no Kitaro fame.)

Sunday: I wasn’t there. I totally just lazed around on my ass all day. (Except for writing my first SDCC 2010 post!)

My San Diego Comic-Con 2010: Part 1

Wow, Comic-Con was a blast! I was trying to think of any complaints, but I honestly could not think of any that were actually con-related other than my poor aching feet, which I rested today. I only got to stay through part of Saturday, but I got a lot packed in. Here’s the highlights of what I did:

Preview Night: My night was a little relaxed. I met up with friends at the hotel, got our badges, headed into the dealers hall and bought things that people wanted me to buy before heading out to dinner. In more exciting news than what I ate for dinner, Vertical Inc. announced their license of Lychee Light Club by Usamaru Furuya. If you remember that name, CMX was set to license Furuya’s 51 Ways to Save Her before their sad and sudden closure and Viz has licensed Furuya’s Genkaku Picasso.

Thursday: I started my day with Top Shelf’s Manga For Grownups: Gekiga, Garo, Ax and the alternative manga revolution panel. Comic book writer Sean Michael Wilson and manga scholar Ryan Holmberg led the panel along with Top Shelf’s Leigh Walton. They talked about the beginnings of gekiga back in the 1950’s as an alternative to manga (in other words, the word gekiga replaces the word manga) and how this lead to the famous alternative manga mag Garo and it’s replacement Ax, an English version of which is out this month by Top Shelf. (Here’s my review.) They were also pleased to announce Cigarette Girl by Masahiko Matsumoto will be released by Top Shelf sometime in 2011.

A little while later, I stopped by the Fantagraphics booth to get my copy of A Drunken Dream signed by Moto Hagio. It has to be the most beautiful book I’ve bought in the last few years and I haven’t even gotten a chance to really read it yet. Please, please, please buy this book and let it be known to publishers that we want this kind of quality and these kinds of amazing mangaka on our bookshelves!

Next came the Best and Worst of Manga panel, led by Tom Spurgeon of The Comics Reporter. The panel was a fantastic splash of excellent manga, god-awful manga (including one I worked on, Red Hot Chili Samurai *sob*) and a wishlist of manga the panelists would love to see. (And later in the con, there was wish fulfillment!)+ Unfortunately I was too busy being a fan girl to remember everyone on the panel or take notes, but the panelists included Deb Aoki of About.com, editor Shaenon Garrity of Viz and Jason Thompson of Suvudu.com. It was an excellent panel that filled the room instantly, so if you plan to go next year (which I recommend) make sure you get their early and hopefully it will be in a much larger room. EDIT: Here’s the list of the best and worst manga of this year in it’s entirety.

Right afterward was the Lost in Translation panel run by freelance translator and former Viz editor-in-chief William Flanagan. Panelists included Shaenon Garrity and Jason Thompson again, as well as many other manga industry freelancers. They opened up the floor to questions and gave a lot of helpful advice to people looking to break into the industry and opinions on the future of the industry, translating and scanlations.

That night I attended an anime and manga blogger meet-up at Analog Bar where I did way too much karaoke with Gia Manry of ANN and met awesome people such as Vertical Inc.’s Ed Chavez. If you want to get up close and personal with manga industry people, being a blogger helps a lot!

For brevity, I’m going to stop here and continue on my experiences at SDCC tomorrow. There’s just too much to put in one post!

Oishinbo: Rated D for Delicious

With the Eisner’s coming up next week, Kristin of ComicAttack.net invited a number of bloggers to do reviews of Eisner nominees leading up til the awards ceremony on Friday night. Today, my review of Oishinbo: A La Carte went up. You can read the full post here, but I’ve included two paragraphs for your enjoyment with Kristin’s permission.

“Since there are seven volumes of Oishinbo, but no set order in which read them, I am going to suggest most readers start with The Joy of Rice. The volume starts out on a good foot, introducing Kyogoku, a significant secondary character and giving us a background on Yamaoka and Kurita before their relationship starts. The first chapter in The Joy of Rice also introduces us to Yamaoka’s rivalry with his father in absentia, but we get to see a battle between the two at the end of the book. In between are less dramatic stories than the Yamaoka vs. Kaibara battles involving coworkers, new acquaintances or friends, which I personally enjoy a lot more than the big rivalry ones.
I also greatly enjoyed the Vegetables, Ramen and Gyoza and Japanese Cuisine volumes to the point where I was having trouble recommending a good place to start. Even though I don’t have the remaining three volumes, Izakaya–Pub Food, Sake and Fish, Sushi and Sashimi, I wouldn’t hesitate to buy them if I came across them with a spare $12 + tax handy. If my recommendation and an Eisner nomination (soon to be win?) isn’t enough, even famous chefs and major foodie magazines are talking about Oishinbo. With crossover appeal like that, what are you waiting for? Go pick up a volume and let Viz know that we want more awesome volumes of Oishinbo: A La Carte, but for the love of all that is delicious, DON’T READ IT RIGHT BEFORE YOU EAT.*
*I totally just made that mistake.”

I don’t know about you guys, but I’m kind rooting for Oishinbo to win so Viz will put out more volumes. ^_~

Interning in the Manga Industry: My Advice

A few weeks ago, Kate Dacy posted at her blog The Manga Critic about some intern positions opening up at Viz for the summer and mentioned my blog. After reading her post, it occurred to me that while I’ve been posting about my experiences as a comic-book editor, I haven’t posted that much on how my internship experience was. Well kids, tie your shoes tight because this post is going to be a roller coaster of advice that’ll get your hopes up and then sink them to hell. I hope you get something good out of it.

1. Just because you’re interning for them doesn’t mean they’re going to publish your manga– I think this is pretty self-explanatory. You’re not there to draw manga, you’re there to work on the publishing side of manga. While the fact that people at the company will know who you are works in your favor if you ever pitch an idea to them, it does not mean they are just going to make you a star.  (Let’s face it, interning *IS* free labor.)  Now that that’s out of the way…

2. Don’t be afraid to go for it, even if you major in bio-physics– I’ve met a number of interns who were doing something at TOKYOPOP that had NOTHING to do with their college majors. Why did they go for it? Because they had a vested interest in what they were interning in and some skill at it too. Does that mean you should go for it too? If you have that interest and a basic grasp on the tasks you will be asked to do, yes. Everything else is just learning how to adapt to the demands of your job, which I dare say is an ability you want in any work environment. I was totally terrified that I wouldn’t know what to do when I first started too, but then I realized my journalism degree had taught me the skills needed to do my work well even though I wasn’t doing journalism! If your major is comp sci and you want to do a design internship because you like to draw on the side. DO IT! *EDIT* My friend and fellow TP intern, Sumana, added some more great advice in the comments section, the choicest piece being: “be prepared to explain yourself! Because my major isn’t seen often in this industry, one of the first questions during my interview was “why are you here?” I don’t suggest saying “I <3 manga” as your only answer.”

3. Be knowledgeable and care about manga and the industry– During my interview, I was asked what my favorite manga series was. Knowing this question was coming, I went through my library of TOKYOPOP manga and picked out my favorite. I added it in along with my absolute favorite manga of all time and this showed that I knew the manga industry better than most fans (both were kind of off-the-beaten-path manga.) I also told them the truth: I read scanlations, but I preferred having a physical copy. I’ll admit I wasn’t the most informed person at the time, but I showed them that I cared enough about manga to explore less popular releases and that I wanted to learn more about the industry.

4. Work your ass off once you get in-Even if they give you manga to work on that you absolutely HATE, think of it as a learning experience. After all, you are gaining experience by working on it, if nothing else. I got thrown random research projects with the nastiest manga ever, but I read them and I survived. And now I even have some funny stories to tell! I also decided not to get a part-time job for six months and intern for 40+ hours a week at TOKYOPOP. Not because I wanted to be poor or because I was trying to get hired, (OK, I was, but it wasn’t part of the decision process here) but because I really really wanted to be at TOKYOPOP every single day and not to miss a thing while I was there. I was, perhaps, the only one who was crazy enough to do this, but I wanted to milk the experience for all that it was worth. (And hey, I got a job out of it! Yay!) Also, work your hardest to do better than you were before. I asked my mentors every few weeks to give me an overall constructive criticism. It helped me figure out what I was missing in my editing so I could learn and improve on my existing skills.

5. Know your way around social media– I am trying to think of an internship at TOKYOPOP that doesn’t require knowing basic social media skills. There isn’t one. From day one, having a Twitter account was important to my internship. That’s where Stu Levy found me complaining how TOKYOPOP hadn’t gotten back to me yet and directed me to the right person. When other people found out I was tweeting about stuff I was working on, they ENCOURAGED me to keep doing it. (Word of mouth is important to publishers.)  When I started this blog, they not only loved it, but occasionally passed me news to break before anyone else could. If they know you can do this whole Twitter business, they will ask you to tweet on the official Twitter account sometimes. If I didn’t have Twitter and my blog, I don’t think I would have met Ysabet MacFarlene or Athena and Alethea Nibley, who also freelance for TOKYOPOP, or many other industry people I have the pleasure of being acquainted with now. Manga is a community, not just an industry, and social media is where you can get in touch with a lot of these people.

6. Be sure you can live wherever your internship is– I promise, this is not impossible despite the fact that most internships are in expensive cities (LA, SF, NYC.) I was lucky enough to have a ton of people I could impose on when I got my TOKYOPOP internship, but I was apparently very close to interning at Viz. San Francisco has a higher cost of living than L.A and I don’t have family there. Still, there are many interns who came to TOKYOPOP from the far reaches of the country, relocating a short period of time. Some of them have family here, but most haven’t and are working part-time jobs or relying on scholarships. Basically, don’t do what I did because I had people to fall back on. You most likely don’t, so get a cheap apartment and a job while you intern, if your school gives you an intern stipend, take it.If it’s too expensive for you still, try taking the internship class at a community college to cut down on tuition costs.

7. Intern in the right department– Every time I tell someone interning at TOKYOPOP that I work in editorial, they say they want my job. Understandable because editorial is totally awesome, but also kind of sad because more than a few of those interns aren’t having a good experience in their department. Did they make the wrong choice or is it just a matter of having a tough time with the work given to them? I don’t know, but at least if it’s the latter it’ll be a learning experience for them, even if they only learn that they don’t want to work in publishing. I learned this lesson by not getting an internship at Viz. When I applied there, I asked if I could apply for both the Magazine and Editorial internship. They made me choose and I chose Magazine. I should have chosen the Editorial one, I probably would have made a better impression on them and gotten the internship! (Ah, but would I be where I am now if I’d gone to Viz?) Choose wisely. Just because the job market is tough doesn’t mean you can’t be a little picky about an unpaid internship.

8. Not everyone is a fan– That’s right, not everyone in the industry is a fan of anime and manga.  Hopefully, all the important people are. I know the people in my department are, but  not everyone in accounting or design are. And that’s OK. A job is a job and hopefully they’re enjoying the work they do anyway. Just don’t assume everyone’s a fan and go fan-crazy. You can be enthusiastic and passionate about manga without scaring people, I promise, and being restrained and professional isn’t going to hurt you.

9. For the love of CLAMP, enjoy yourself– If you’ve gotten yourself a internship,  you’re doing it to learn something. And yes, learning can be SO BORING if you’re in a class you hate. Don’t let that be this class. Make this the one class you take your entire college career that allows you to experiment with something you think you might want to do for the rest of your life. Even if you have convince your advisor that an internship involving graphic novels does not mean you’re dabbling in illustrated porn, (true story.) Do it because this sounds like the most fantastic idea ever and you just also happen to need an internship to graduate! Do it because you live and breathe manga in a totally not creepy way! Do it because you want to have a job you’ll just adore because you get to work with manga ALL THE TIME.

10. Don’t expect a job to fall into your lap– I was extremely lucky that TOKYOPOP hired me. Other interns did not get hired, the majority of them, in fact. If you want that internship to turn into a job in this industry, you have to be exceptional and prove to them that you are worth paying. I can promise you, every company in this industry is keeping a tight grip on their purse right now. You are going to need to work your ass off and have a little luck on your side. I honestly don’t think you can get a job like this without it.

I hope this has helped some of you to take the step to intern in the manga industry. Despite all the negative points I’ve highlighted in this post, I want to say that my internship in manga was fantastic and worth every sacrifice and every mental scar that happened along the way. Obviously, I had the -IDEAL- experience, and you might not have that, but you won’t know that if you go in there thinking to yourself that this internship is going to suck. Go get ’em, everyone!

If you have any burning questions about doing this kind of an internship, I’d  love to answer them. :)

Edit: In case you want a little more, one of Viz’s summer interns posted about her experience at Viz on their Shonen Sunday Blog.

My Manga Birthday Wishlist

As I’m sure none of you know, my birthday is fast approaching and I looooove getting presents. (I can be so spoiled, I know.) But instead of getting me things I’m just going to get myself eventually like a nice, long massage or a puppy, I’d rather get people get me something both easily obtainable and relatively cheap: MANGA!

Now, this July is shaping up to be an excellent month of fantastic manga releases, so why don’t we start with some of the hottest titles about to hit shelves?

First we’ll start off with the manga-influenced Scott Pilgrim’s Finest Hour, which hits stores July 20th. Actually, I’m just going to pin this one on my boyfriend since he so lovingly got me the first five volumes as my Valentine’s Day gift two years ago. Tamar, I’m expecting a copy of Scott Pilgrim and a pair of tickets for the movie adaption with a nice dinner to accompany it. (Don’t ever say I don’t tell you what I want!)

Next up on the list is a bunch of stuff from Vertical, which has a whole BUNCH of awesome manga, including the ones coming out this month. Peepo Choo comes out this month, but I’m probably going to get it for myself so Felipe Smith can sign it at Comic-Con, so skip that and head onto Chi’s Sweet Home and Twin Spica (vol. 1 & 2 because I haven’t gotten to pick up volume 1 yet!) If you really love me, then you’ll throw in a copy Buddha vol. 2 as well.

The next manga publisher that will automatically get me to love your birthday present to me is CMX. I spent a whole day at Anime Expo looking for From Eroica With Love volumes 12 and 13, despite the fact that I had 14 and 15. I’d also love a copy of Stolen Hearts vol. 2, My Darling, Miss Bancho and the first two volumes of The Name of the Flower. There are some other titles that I’d love certain volumes of, but that would make the list too  complicated! (Apothecarius Argentum volume 9!)

Other than that, I’ve been into collecting old TOKYOPOP series like Beck, Planetes and Queen’s Knight (volumes 2, 2 and 11, respectively.) I’ve also been collecting copies of Nextworld (Dark Horse Manga, volume 3, please), Club 9 (Also Dark Horse Manga, volume 2) and Chicago (Viz, volume 2 as well.)

If that doesn’t give you an idea what to get me, then just go find a Borders and hook me up with a nice gift card.

Giving me a birthday gift really is as simple as that.

Oops! I forgot about Mushishi vol. 8! Definitely looking forward to that one!

Anime Expo 2010: Days 3 & 4

Phew, I’m feeling a little bit better than yesterday, but more importantly, I have more time to write this post than I thought I did! Always a good thing!

Saturday:

Viz’s industry panel started off the morning by telling shonen fans everywhere that Shonen Jump‘s subscription price has dropped to $26.95 and, in case you are a Los Angeles anime fan, Stan Lee is having an Ultimo-only signing at the Grove Barnes & Noble on July 16th. (I think I’ll skip that one.)

New licenses included Mistress Fortune and Sakura Hime Kaden by Arina Tanemura, Oresama Teacher by Izumi Tsubaki and Ai Ore by Mayu Shinju.

Viz also announced the simulcast of Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan starting this week on their website. You can already watch the first episode.

The Production I.G. panel was switched from Sunday to Saturday, allowing Production I.G. a better time slot, albeit fewer attendees. They announced the license of Loups=Garous, Broken Blade and (mistakenly announced) that Nozomi Entertainment had the license to the Revolutionary Girl Utena movie.

I attended the live recording of the ANN Cast, which you can listen to here. I didn’t have any good questions to ask, but you can hear me yell at the guy gunning for Princess Knight anime and manga releases that he may have been confusing the popularity of the Tezuka manga with the international fame of Riyoko Ikeda’s The Rose of Versailles. Guy hadn’t even heard of Vertical Inc. and their spectacular Tezuka line-up. What a shame.

Then the day was over, I had bought too much manga, and wound up attending an industry party that was a lot of fun. But I did manage to snap some cute pictures of cosplayers from the first two series I edited: Zone-00 and Sgt Frog! (Here’s another one.) New volumes of both those manga are due out this month, in case you are interested in my work.

Sunday:

Sunday was much more laid back. No big industry panels, still lots of people in the dealer’s hall because it was a weekend and my last round of manga buying. I was rather sad that I left without From Eroica With Love volumes 12 and 13, which I had sworn I’d seen on sale somewhere the day before, but I managed to buy volumes 14 & 15 instead.

It was a fantastic con for me, although I kept hearing whispers of low dealer registration for next year’s con and grumbles from the dealers themselves. I wonder how future Anime Expos are going to turn out if dealers do not want to return, but I hope the SPJA can do something to bring them back before that even happens.

Anime Expo 2010: Day Two!

Phew! I’m a little behind on my AX reports, as you can tell. It was such a crazy-busy weekend for me that it couldn’t be helped and now I’m sick as a dog. (I’m sure it’s the Fourth of July’s fault, not the con’s. Stupid America day. Haha.)

I started the day off with the TOKYOPOP panel, run by my mentors  Lillian Diaz-Przybyl and Cindy Suzuki, as well as an intern. They had a few announcements such as the new Zinio online catalog, TP on OverDrive for library systems, the first two volumes of Demon Sacred being priced at $5.99 each. New license announcements included: Kirameki Gingacho Shotengai (The Stellar Six of Gingacho) by Yuuki Fujimoto, Eensy Weensy Monster by Masami Tsuda (the creator of Kare Kano), Sorairo Kaigen by Nanpei Yamada, Gakuen Heaven Endo ~Calling You~ and Gakuen Heaven Shichijo ~SWEET SWEET DARLING!~ by You Higuri, Stray Cat by Halco, Cabin in the Woods: Land of the Rising Terror written by TP editor Troy Lewter, Warau Kanako-sama (The Secrets of Lady Kanako) by Ririko Tsujita and Lives by Masayuki Taguchi.

Lillian also revealed while answering a fan’s question that she knows who has the license to the former TOKYOPOP title Sailor Moon, but cannot reveal who it is or any more details. Good news for anyone who’s a fan of Sailor Moon, I’m sure.

While walking around the dealer’s room with Cindy after the panel and gawking at tons of cute things, I bought myself this adorable Hetalia t-shirt. (The caption says I’m the Hetalia editor, but I’d just like to say that information’s incorrect. Oops!)

The Right Stuf/Nozomi Entertainment panel was next and fans were excited to hear that the company was releasing El Hazard: The Wanderers,  Gravitation, The Dirty Pair TV series, Antique Bakery, Sora no Woto, and The Revolutionary Girl Utena TV series (and it was accidentally revealed in another panel on Saturday that they have the Utena movie as well.) Whoo! A lot of the re-releases were either had video or audio remastering done for the new releases, so if you want crisper pictures and clearer audio, check them out!

The Anime News Network panel revealed that the news site is planning on streaming over 150 episodes of anime starting this week. Since anime and manga fans seem to like free goodies, I would suggest checking them out so that they’ll bring even more streaming anime to the site.

The FUNimation panel started off with a bit of interesting information: Dubs were more popular than subtitles for them and the largest group online were 13-17 year olds, putting anime fandom squarely in an age group that most likely doesn’t have solid sources of income yet. FUNi went on to announce the licensing of Master of the Martial Hearts (Looks very funny and fan service-y, like a funnier version of Ikkitousen), rescues of pretty much every Tenchi Muyo series ever made, Darker Than Black season two, Shakugan no Shana season two, Black Lagoon season three, Hellsing Ultimate and Trigun: Badlands Rumble. Simulcasts of the Moyashimon live action TV series, Shiki, Black Butler season two and Sekirei season two.

After the panel, a bunch of anime and manga bloggers and I headed over to L.A. Live for dinner, schmoozing and some beautiful atmosphere, which was a great way to end the busy day.

If time (and my cold) permits, I’ll try to get my day 3 & 4 review up tomorrow. ^_^

Correction: I am not the editor of Hetalia afterall

Oops.

After sharing my joyous news with the world and bragging way too much about it, I found out that I am *not* the editor of Hetalia. There had been a misunderstanding on my part when the news was passed to me. Man, do I feel dumb.

If you’ve already congratulated me, thank you again. I’ll still be working on part of the editorial process for the next volume of Hetalia and, from what I heard, it was a tough decision for Tokyopop Editor Cindy Suzuki. The fact that I was chosen at all means I did a great job when I worked on the first volume and getting the second volume is, therefore, my reward.  I actually have to thank Cindy for giving me the opportunity to work on Hetalia and the many other opportunities she’s given me over the months we’ve been working together.

I am a little sad, but I’m still excited I get to work on the next volume of Hetalia. ^_^

Anime Expo 2010: Day One

Whoooo! Anime Expo time! Anime Expo is my home con, the one I’ve been going to through thick or through thin since I started going to cons, so I’m pretty used to the landscape. Although it just seems to me that the dealer’s room just gets bigger and bigger each year…

I was only at the con a short time today due to a night class I’m taking and needing to do important things this morning, but here are my highlights of the day.

HIGHLIGHTS:
Bandai Industry Panel- The big news here is that Bandai Entertainment has licensed K-On!, the anime about a musical group of adorable high school girls. I’m sure you’ve heard of it. Bandai is also forming a group of voice actresses/singers to make up the “After School Tea Time” band in the show, much like they did with the ASOS Brigade for their release of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Yeah.

Attendees were also treated to clips of The Melancholy of Haruhi-chan and Nyoro~n Churuya-san, trailers of Bandai’s various Gundam anime and other anime. We also got to hear Christina Vee sing two songs. I’ve personally never heard her sing before, but I figured she must have been sick or something because I wasn’t impressed.

DMP Industry Panel- I was only expecting to go for half of the DMP panel because of my class, but I decided to stay all the way through and it was worth it! They announced a slew of new licenses and gave us some new insight into Emanga.com, their supposed crowdsourcing manga project and a collaboration with Viz.

Their new licenses include:  Gochisosama by CJ Michalski, Boku no Shiru Anata no Hanashi by Tsuta Suzuki, Sabaku no Oujisama by Shushushu Sakurai, Houou Gakuen Misoragumi by Aki Arata, Border and Kusatta Kyo Shino Houteishiki by Kazuma Kodaka, Demon City Shinjuku by Hideyuki Kikuchi, Coundown 7 Days and Replica by Kemuri Karakara

Emanga.com has increased it’s rental times from three days to seven, bringing in gift cards (if you’ve got some yaoi-loving friends… what a perfect gift!), adding at least 30 new titles and including ten titles that will be in both Korean and Chinese! How cool! -Edit: I forgot to include (being rather tired last night) that Nao Yazawa, the creator of Wedding Peach, is creating an exclusive manga for Emanga.com called Mizuki. There is also another manga in the early development stages called Moon & Blood. You can catch Yazawa on her Twitter. She speaks English very very well.-

DMP also announced that they’ll be distributing limited edition Naruto animation cels. But wait, you say, isn’t Naruto animated digitally? Doesn’t Viz own the U.S. rights to Naruto? Like I said earlier, Viz (and Studio Pierrot) are allowing DMP to sell these hand-painted cels. They’re extremely limited in quality so if you are a rabid Naruto fan who MUST have these, catch the DMP booth at Anime Expo or the Viz booth at San Diego Comic-Con.

During the panel, Gia Manry of Anime News Network asked whether the representatives present could elaborate more on a project that would utilize scanlators to crowdsource the manga translation process and add 1000+ manga online legally. Michelle Mauk explained that the project was a massive undertaking, which was still in the planning stages, and that the concept had been mistaken by many bloggers and news sites. Mauk said that DMP was currently talking with their translators and other staff in order to see what could be done.  It seems to me much like Stu Levy’s comments on a December 2009 TOKYOPOP Insider webcast stating that he would work with scanlators, an idea that was quickly forgotten about and tossed out the window.

-Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa visits Anime Expo- DMP’s head of sales caught this image of Villaraigosa entering the exhibit hall (DMP’s booth is right at the front.) I wasn’t there at the time, but I certainly don’t envy anyone who was. Villaraigosa has a sort of sordid past and, well, the dealer’s room was already crowded enough without him and all the entourage/paparazzi/gawkers making it worse. Many who saw the mayor or pictures of him at the con wondered if the SPJA charged him admission and if he used tax-payer money to get in.

-If you looking for good deals on manga, there’s plenty of dealers that are selling manga for $5, including DMP and the newly-formed Manga Factory. I personally liberated quite a few CMX manga and some old Deux and Aurora titles before they disappeared from the racks completely. I also managed to find volume 1 of TOKYOPOP’s Beck manga, a license that was lost to Kodansha.

-I also saw this hilarious Hetalia shirt, which will give me the opportunity to share some excellent personal news with you. After contributing to TOKYOPOP’s upcoming release of Axis Powers: Hetalia, I have been declared the editor of the next volume! In the office that usually means I’ll be editor in perpetuity of the title until I’m no longer working for TP or the series is over. -EDIT: I AM A DUMB BUTT. There was a misunderstanding and I’m not the official editor of Hetalia, I am just working on PART of the editorial process again. DURHUR. I am little bit sad that I’m not the editor, but I know Cindy Suzuki will do an excellent job. Sorry for being a dork and bragging about it left and right! The next sentence is still valid however.- I am personally excited because I just *LOVE* Hetalia. I can’t wait to work on it again!