Every once in a while I try to review something so obscure and youthful that it is impossible to obtain in its original Japanese with English subtitles (oops). Today that show will be Duel Masters.
This anime (the manga runs in the monthy CoroCoro Comic magazine) is about a boy named Shobu Kirifuda who plays a game called “Duel Masters” (in the early manga, he plays Magic: The Gathering). In Shobu’s world, the players can bring the monsters to life using a fictional martial art called “kaijudo” (actually a marketing term created to sell the game in America). Shobu aims to become a “Kaijudo master” like his father, Shori Kirifuda. Shobu fights opponents from the evil temple run by the mysterious Master in Season One. In the American created Season Two, Shobu battles the evil organization P.L.O.O.P. and their plans to use monsters from the Civilization Realms to take over Earth. The Japanese version has a separate second season entitled Duel Masters Charge, which is based on more of the manga and features characters that do not appear in the American second season, including a character named “Great Baketsuman”. It is unknown when or if the Japanese 2nd season will air in America. If the Japanese second season were to be broadcast in America, it would have to be changed to accommodate the American 2nd season – it is also unknown why a separate 2nd season was created for America in the first place.
To contibute links for this page – I couldn’t find any other than the site for the Rockman.EXE/Duel Masters double feature movie – please comment!
Source: Wikipedia
Sorry for the slow stretch! As promised, there’s more info on the new Fullmetal Alchemist OAV set, thanks to Anime News Network. Titled the “Premium Collection,” it will contain the movie that has been featured at Universal Studios Japan (the Hagaren-themed ride, I am told, is the first anime – well, non-Universal animation – attraction to be featured there, by the way) as well as three new, short OAVs. It will retail for 3990 yen and releases on March 29th.
Source: Jbooks
I’m here in Columbus now and this weekend’s Ohayocon report will be forthcoming!
In the meantime, I have a tidbit of news that is not yet confirmed, but I heard during the Q&A at the Fullmetal Alchemist new dub episodes premiere yesterday evening. It’s rumoured that 4 OAVs have been announced for later this year! I’ll report more on it when we have details and confirmation, so stay tuned and I’ll see you all when I get back home!
An anime based on popular video game Xenosaga, titled Xenosaga: The Animation, premiered on TV Asahi in Japan on January 5, 2005. The anime itself follows the story of Xenosaga closely, albeit removing several scenes and adding others, and some scenes were entirely re-written for the show’s purposes. It is the year T.C. 4767, and mankind exists on distant planets and artificial colonies. Earth is seemingly gone; it has been erased from all known starmaps and renamed “Lost Jerusalem”. The capital of all known space is Fifth Jerusalem, where the Galaxy Federation supposedly keeps watch over mankind.
For the last ten years, a mysterious enemy known as the Gnosis has begun to attack man’s colonies seemingly indiscriminately. It is largely believed that the Gnosis were brought into the universe by a scientist named Joachim Mizrahi during the Miltian Conflict of T.C. 4753, but there is more to that story than the public really knows.
The pacing has the viewer running through the first ten to fifteen hours of gameplay of Episode I in the first five episodes. Jin Uzuki, Shion’s brother and a major character in Episode II, can be seen early on in episode eight of The Animation. Given the nature of the anime, it works best as a suppliment to Episode I; some points that the game explained poorly or didn’t explain at all are brought to light in the anime. Despite the changes, many fans prefer The Animation over the movie DVD of Episode I given with pre-orders of Episode II, saying that the DVD was a poorly assembled group of cutscenes; the quality of the DVD is significantly lower than that of the orginal PlayStation 2 cutscenes.
Source: Wikipedia
Official Website
MOON PHASE has reported news of an upcoming third Gundam SEED series, sourcing the February issue of Comic Gum. Considering how popular SEED/DESTINY were (just look at the listing of the Top Anime Theme Songs of 2005!) it probably shouldn’t be much of a surprise, but as far as I know it’s the first Gundam show to score this many sequels.
Source: Gunota Headlines
Several anime features were among the top 20 highest-earning movies of 2005, with Miyazaki’s Howl’s Moving Castle ranking at #1. Anime News Network has compiled a full list, with plans to update at a later date with the top 10 Japanese movies of 2005 and the top ten anime of 2005.
Check out their report here!
The Newtype BB Animation Music Download service has recently debuted in Japan, having gone live on December 21st. Starting at about 150 yen per song, 400 selections of anime-related music files are now up for download. Check out the site here!
Cowboy Bebop (カウボーイビバップ, but most often written in English, even in Japan) is an anime series directed by Shinichiro Watanabe that initially ran starting in 1998. The show was quite popular there and has also been widely popular in the United States, often credited with significantly broadening the popularity of anime in North America. Bandai licensed Cowboy Bebop in the United States. Two manga series were created based on the TV show, one titled Cowboy Bebop by Hajime Yatate and Yutaka Nanten and a second entitled Cowboy Bebop Shooting Star by Cain Kuga; TOKYOPOP publishes both the first and second series in English. Both were published in Japan by Kadokawa Shoten.
In the year 2071, the crew of the ship, Bebop, travel around the solar system, trying to catch “bounty-heads.” In the slang of the era, “cowboys” are bounty hunters, hence the name of the series. Each member of the Bebop crew contribute their own unique abilities to help catch bounty heads. Most episodes revolve around a bounty; however the real focus of the show concerns the pasts of each character, which unravel and connect as the series progresses.
The main plot line focuses on Spike Spiegel, whose syndicate past begins to catch up with him three years after he left. The secondary plot deals with Faye Valentine, a woman whose past is a mystery to even herself. She too, must deal with her past, as well as her debt-ridden present.
The show was widely respected for its multiple layers and deep characters, combined with a very free-flowing feel to the story itself (heavily influenced by American culture, especially the jazz movements of the 1940s, hence “bebop”) and a large number of well-choreographed action sequences (from space battles to hand-to-hand combat).
Links:
CowboyBebop.org
The-Bebop
The Jazz Messengers
Somewhere Down the Crazy River
Source: Wikipedia
So sorry about the lack of posts this week! I hope everyone is having a great holiday, for those of you who celebrate it.
I personally was thrilled by an announcement about Little Nemo spotted on Anime News Service. (I played the Nintendo/Famicom game way back when.) It’s great to see it get a full DVD release! Check out ANS’ article below:
Bandai Visual will release the animated film Little Nemo to DVD for the first time in Japan on December 23 at a 8,190 Yen retail. After 6 years of production, the film was made for 5.3 billion Yen. It opened theatrically in 1989 in Japan and 1991 in the USA. About 2 million copies were sold in the US in 1994 upon home video release. The character was created by American Windsor Mckay in the early 20th century. The work has been spoken highly of by such creators as Osamu Tezuka and George Lucas. Directors on the project included Masami Hata and William T. Hurtz. Writing credits included Ray Bradbury, Chris Columbus, Yutaka Fujioka, Jean Giraud, Richard Outten and Edward Summer. The film runs 95 minutes, 38 minutes worth of bonus footage will be added including the original 1987 pilot film. Other extras such as storyboards etc.. are on disc. R2 Importers will note the inclusion of Japanese and English audio. Japanese subtitles can be selected as well.
Continuing in the vein of my last post.
It seems as though nearly all of the titles on the list (compiled by Anime News Service) have some anime/manga influence, or are animations, as you can see!
1. Howl’s Moving Castle (Toho) 19.6 billion yen
2. Pokemon Advance Generation: Myuu to Hadou no Yuusha (Toho) 4.3 billion yen
3. Koushou Nin Mashita Seigi (Toho) 4.2 billion yen
4. NANA (Toho) 4.03 billion yen
5. Yougisha Muroi Shin Tsugi (Toho) 3.83 billion yen
6. Densha Otoko (Toho) 3.7 billion yen
7. Kita No Rei Nen (Toei) 2.7 billion yen
8. Always -Sunset on Third Street- (Toho) 2.5 billion yen
9. Lorelei (Toho) 2.4 billion yen
10. Hoshi Ninatta Shounen (Toho) 2.3 billion yen
Impressive!
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