Month: October 2010

Two Cons in One! NYCC/NYAF 2010 Plans

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hisuiconThis is the first year we have an amalgam New York Comic Con and New York Anime Festival and is has as busy a schedule as you would expect. Fears that the Anime Festival section would be a mostly forgotten red-headed step child of its older brother seem to have gone unfounded. There is are Japanese and American anime guests, several bands, premier shows, and a constant track of anime and manga programming and panels. In fact there are SO many anime premiers that we cannot go to them. This also means we miss out on many of the cool Comic Con premieres at the same time. Still there is always something to do and see at this convention. More than ever I will be very curious to see other people’s con reports to see what are all the things I missed out on. Plus as always NYCC/NYAF has all its programming ending at 10PM so I expect debauchery and decadence to occur every night of the convention especially with the Ard Rí na hÉireann Eeeper in town. I hope to chat at least a bit with everyone who attends so if you see me stop and say hello.

This combo convention will certainly be the biggest I’ve attended so far. Of course it is no surprise that the tentative schedule is jam-packed and even with that I am missing a few things. Oh, how nice it would be to be able to clone oneself! The most enticing things are premieres this time around, many anime ones to my delight. Even though this is an anime blog you can expect us to be gallivanting all around the con from comics to books and beyond. I’m really looking forward to how this new scheme goes, our own little SDCC here on the east coast, but I expect it to be back next year.

Friday
Why Graphic Novels Should Be In Your Library panel
Ban ’em, Burn ’em, Steal ’em! A Fan’s Guide to Graphic Novel Censorship panel
NYAF Opening Ceremony
Will Eisner’s New York panel
Minori Chihara Spotlight
MARVEL: Welcome to the X-Man panel
Extending Conversations about Graphic Novels panel
First Look! Upcoming DC Universe Animated Original Films & Shorts panel
Anime in Academia panel
Sengoku Basara Screening and Panel
Aniplex panel
A Geek’s Guide to Podcasting and Blogging panel
Mardock Scramble Premiere with Tow Ubukata
Anime You Never Thought You’d Like panel
The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya with Minori Chihara

Saturday
Corey Feldman Offers a Glimpse of Lost Boys: The Thirst panel
The History of Superhero Movies- Past, Present, and Future panel
K.JOE’S Ultimate Tips: How to Get More Japanese Artists to Perform in America panel
Star Driver Premiere
Jim Lee and ICONS: The DC Comics and Wildstorm Art of Jim Lee panel
Crunchyroll Fall Season Announcements panel
Yen Press panel
MARVEL: Cup O Joe panel
MARVEL Television Presents MARVEL Anime panel
Yoshiki and Stan Lee panel
Minori Chihara Concert
Disney Epic Mickey panel
Unusual Manga Genres panel

Sunday
The Sons of Liberty, a Graphic Novel: The New World of Historical Fiction panel
Hipra Premiere
Oni Press panel
Gundam 00 Movie Premiere
Anime Recruitment panel

Calling bloggers for Secret Santa!

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This cross-blogging game was a blast year, so it is back again!

Here: Just in case someone does not know what traditional Secret Santa is.

The idea of this project is for everyone who participates to be reviewing a show that they might not normally watch or might have overlooked. Everyone will get someone else in the project to review a series of their choice and in return review something picked by one of their fellow bloggers. The goal is threefold for everyone involved:

  1. Mixing up what you watch and review on your blog.
  2. Getting other people to watch things you feel deserve more attention.
  3. A way to interact with other bloggers thus creating possibilities for cross blog readership, also it fosters an environment to try other cross blog experiments.

Here is how this little experiment will work: If you want to participate send us your Name, Blog, and My Anime List (or some other equivalent listing) page via e-mail (reversethieves [at] gmail.com) subject: Secret Santa Participant. Due by Wednesday, October 13th. Make sure that your MAL is updated as much as possible before you submit it. Also, if you are uncomfortable with watching certain types of shows or will not watch fan-subs mention that in the e-mail, too.

We will then make a circular list of everyone involved in the project that only we will know the order of. The order of the list will be made completely at random. Everyone will then receive the name, blog, and My Anime List of the person they are the Secret Santa for. You will then suggested three shows for the person all of which must be 26 episodes or less (yes, you can suggest movies, too). The shows must be subtitled in some fashion. Remember that you are picking shows that you hope the other person will like and give an honest chance. Look over their My Anime List and their restrictions then try to pick out something good but unexpected.

Once we get everyone’s lists we will then pass on the shows to the recipients. No one except us will know the names of the person who gave you your choices. You then pick the show your are going to watch. Everyone is responsible for getting their own material for the review. If for some reason you absolutely cannot abide any of the shows you are given, we will allow 1 and only 1 mulligan.

You then have until late December to watch the show you were assigned and write a review. On the week of Christmas everyone will post their reviews for the Secret Santa Project. We would prefer you post your review on Christmas Eve but you can alter it as to the schedule of your blog. On the Christmas Day we will reveal the name of who had who as a Secret Santa along with a small post about the project.

Again: If you want to participate send us your Name, Blog, and My Anime List (or some other equivalent listing) page via e-mail (reversethieves [at] gmail.com) subject: Secret Santa Participant. Due by Wednesday, October 13th.

October’s Final Denouement: The Lies 90′s Anime Fans Told

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*I am aware that much of the anime we enjoyed in the 90’s was produced in the 80’s. But this is about what I thought anime was in 90’s, what was available in the 90’s that shaped that view, not what was produced at the time.

I started watching anime, at least what I knew to count among anime, in the summer of 1995 with the infamous Ninja Scroll. I followed that with Akira, Ghost in the Shell, Demon City Shinjuku, and more from the few local video places my friends and I frequented. If you had asked me back then, and people frequently did, just what was this anime we were gobbling up, I probably, no in fact I know, I would have said some thing about anime’s maturity, perhaps its dark or adult themes, and maybe some violence for good measure. And I probably would have thrown in some jabs at western works, too.

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