June 2010 Archives

Alright everyone, I'm officially signing off for the next 4 days or so to attend the wonderful CONvergence Sci-Fi/Fantasy convention.  Whether or not I'll have any internet access at all is still up in the air, but I won't count on it. I hope everyone has a safe holiday weekend (if you're from the United States) and simply a fun, safe weekend otherwise.

Just as a warning: I'm preparing to attend a 4-day convention and will be leaving on Wednesday of this week to do so, so the site may be on a short hiatus until I get home, depending on if I can create a sufficient amount of pre-posted articles.  While there will be some limited internet access available, the hotel doesn't have free Wi-fi so I'm not going to have a chance to update. If you're wondering why posts have been kind of sparse the past week, blame convention prep.  And there's still a bunch of stuff left for me to do (even more so since the power went out Friday night for a while and I lost valuable work time).

If you're in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area and plan to attend CONvergence, I'll be hosting the Shiny New Anime panel at 12:30pm Friday in Atrium 6 (the multimedia room).  We'll be showing some clips and, my printer permitting, there'll be handouts to take home with you.  I'll be sure to upload the handout post-con so that those who weren't able to attend can get an idea of our recommendations, though most of them will be familiar to readers of this site.

In preparation for the panel (and because I've barely watched any of the anime I've been interested in for quite a while) I watched somewhere around 25 episodes of anime on Sunday.  I got up at 7am and stopped sometime after 5pm, taking breaks only to use the bathroom and do the dishes. I'm not usually one for marathoning long anime series, but breaking up long strings of episodes from one show by starting on another was a technique I found helpful and the only negative effect was that I felt like a total slug afterward.

Recent Posts:

• Mayoi Neko Overrun - First Episode Review
• Angel Beats - First Episode Review
• Katanagatari - First Episode Review
• Ikkitousen: Xtreme Xecutor - First Episode Review

Review Pipeline:

• The final Spring Review: House of Five Leaves

Recently Watched:

• Arakawa Under the Bridge episodes 1-7
• House of Five Leaves episodes 2-5
• The Tatami Galaxy episodes 3-8
• Rainbow episodes 1-7
• Giant Killing episode 4

Recently Purchased:

• Ooku: The Inner Chambers vol. 3
• Saturn Apartments vol. 1
• Children of the Sea vol. 1
• Moyashimon vol. 2

Ikkitousen: Xtreme Xecutor

Number of Episodes: 12

Production Company: TNK, ARMS

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Promo

Brief Overview: The characters of The Romance of the Three Kingdoms are once again reborn into the bodies of young, nubile women in the 4th season of the clothes-exploding ecchi fighting series.

Katanagatari

Number of Episodes: 12 1-hour episodes

Production Company: WHITE FOX

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Commercial

Brief Overview: Yasuri Shichika is the seventh head of the Kyotou-ryuu (Swordless style) martial arts school, and lives on an island with his sister, Nanami.  One day a girl named Togame arrives to ask a favor of Shichika - she needs help retrieving the 12 swords forged by a master swordsman.

Angel Beats

Number of Episodes: 13

Production Company: P.A. Works

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Promo

Brief Overview: In the afterlife, there are angels who rebel against the god who determined their destinies. Some angels utilize armed weaponry to fight against others who wield the power of magic.

Mayoi Neko Overrun

Number of Episodes: 12

Production Company: AIC

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Trailer

Brief Overview: Takumi lives with his older sister Otome, though the two aren't technically blood related.  Otome manages a confectionary shop called "Stray Cats" where orphans and other "stray" people tend to collect.

The Spring Reviews are so close to being done, I can almost taste it! Taking a peek at my Spring folder, it looks like I have... 4, plus a couple of OVAs that I might just file under "full reviews" since they're one-shots.  Anyway, it's just in time because the first episode of the Summer season, an early broadcast of the first episode of the new Sekirei, has already happened, and it's downloaded and waiting.  I'm considering flipping through a few episodes of Season 1 over at Funimation's video page for it, just to get a feel for what's going on (other than, say, a tired old story about a loser who happens to encounter a pretty girl with giant boobs), but that will depend on time.  I still haven't watched much of any of the series that I thought had potential from Spring, because I wanted to wait until I was done with first episode reviews, but obviously that's taken until this week to be in sight of completion.  I'm hoping that the relatively light Summer season will leave me a lot of room to catch up, and when Fall comes around things will be much easier.

Just as a couple of notes for people local to the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, Summer meetings of the University of Minnesota Manga Anime Society have begun, are free to attend and are open to the public.  The voting meeting was on Thursday the 17th, and the first proper meeting is this Thursday, the 24th.  The showings are:

• 6:30 - 7:00pm - Gosenzosama, Banbanzai!
• 7:00 - 8:00pm - Aoi Bungaku
• 8:00 - 9:00pm - Kaiba
• 9:00 - 9:59pm - Gokusen

There will be no meeting on Thursday, July 1st, because most of us will be attending CONvergence, our local sci-fi and fantasy convention.  You can see me at the Shiny New Anime panel, which is sometime on Friday in the multimedia room.  As usual, we'll be showing clips of new anime from the past year and there will probably be a nice handout to take home.

Here's the breakdown for this week:

Recent Posts:

• Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaoh - First Episode Review
• From Video Games to Anime - Chrono Trigger
• From Video Games to Anime - Animal Crossing
• Hime Chen! Otogi Chikku Idol Lilpri - First Episode Review
• From Video Games to Anime - Devil May Cry
• K-ON Season 2 - First Episode Review
• From Video Games to Anime - Final Fantasy 7: Last Order
• From Video Games to Anime - Super Mario Brothers
• Uragiri wa Boku no Namae wo Shitteru - First Episode Review
• SD Gundam: Legend of the Three Kingdoms Brave Battle Warriors - First Episode Review

Review Pipeline:

• Last 4 or so episodes from Spring.
• Get an early start on Sekirei.

Recently Watched:

• Nothing beyond first episodes, unfortunately.

Recently Purchased:

• Blue Drop, full series boxed set.
• The Skull Man, full series boxed set (hey, Rightstuf was having a sale on Sentai titles).

SD Gundam: Legend of the Three Kingdoms Brave Battle Warriors

Number of Episodes: TBA

Production Company: Sunrise

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Promo

Brief Overview: Tiny and cute super-deformed versions of the mobile suits from the Gundam franchise act out a retelling of the classic Chinese novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

Uragiri wa Boku no Namae wo Shitteru (Betrayal Knows my Name)

Number of Episodes: 24

Production Company: J.C. Staff

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Crunchyroll

Brief Overview: Sakurai Yuki was abandoned as a baby and now strives to be independent, not burdening anyone.  He has the strange ability to sense the emotions of others when he comes into physical contact with them.  One day, a mysterious man shows up claiming to be Yuki's brother.

For my last selection, I have something of an omake for you guys.  I'd venture to say that most people my age (nearing 30) are familiar with the Super Mario Brothers Super Show, an American show for kids that combined live-action segments with actors playing the Mario Brothers, with an animated episode with the bros in the Mushroom Kingdom.  Well, Japan had its own take on the Mario Brothers animation, and released an hour-long animated film in 1986 entitled Super Mario Brothers: The Great Mission to Rescue Princess Peach.  This movie is very hard to find, and the only copy I could dig up is in tiny, VHS-rip resolution with a subtitle track that's tragically mistranslated at times, but I was curious anyway.

I used to be a huge fan of the Final Fantasy video game franchise. I say "used to be" because I feel like each subsequent game (after Final Fantasy 6, my personal favorite) has delved even further into character melodrama, and that's not something I enjoy.  Final Fantasy 7 and its CG animated sequel Advent Children spent too much time focused on the character Cloud and his weepy emo-drama and so I've sort of disowned that game and its characters.  But I do acknowledge that it's extremely popular with fans and it's a phenomenon that's endured for over ten years, a mind-boggling amount of time in the short-attention-span world of popular video games.

For day 4, I wanted to take a look at the more traditionally-animated companion to Advent Children, the Last Order OVA.  I had never seen it before and thought that its focus on the pasts of the characters might be marginally more entertaining and interesting.

K-ON Season 2

Number of Episodes: TBA

Production Company: Kyoto Animation

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Trailer

Brief Overview: It's senior year for the members of the Light Music Club, excluding Azusa, a guitarist and a junior.  Between practice and scouting for new members, the group still has time for "After School Tea Time."

For day 3, we've got a selection from 2007, based on the action video game Devil May Cry. If you're looking for a pretty-but-brainless anime companion with which to spend your time, this is a show that you might want to consider.

Hime Chen! Otogi Chikku Idol Lilpri

Number of Episodes: TBA

Production Company: Telecom Animation Film

ANN Encyclopedia MAL Crunchyroll

Brief Overview: The world of fairytales is in dire straights, and the worlds of princesses Kaguya-hime, Snow White and Cinderella are disappearing.  Three young girls are asked to transform into the princesses and spread happiness to humankind through song.

It's day 2 of the E3 trade show, and I'm trying to horn-in on the action by checking out some video-game-to-anime translations that I have just laying around here. This next one kind of surprised me by its very existence.

Animal Crossing is a charming video game that first made its appearance on the Nintendo Gamecube.  You play as a human character who travels to a town populated by animals, and you establish a homestead and run errands for the citizens there.  There truly is no plot; the fun of the game is turning it on daily, running errands, buying furniture to decorate your house, and digging for buried treasure and fossils around town.

It's not really the type of game that one would expect to spawn an anime, but an animated film was released in 2006 that tried to recapture the fun and simple charms of the game. In an unexpected turn of events, it actually does manage to incorporate many elements from the game, and imitates its lackadaisical pace without feeling boring.

This week my husband is attending the Electronic Entertainment Expo, otherwise known as E3, in Los Angeles CA. In celebration of this huge yearly event, and as an excuse to dig up some old DVDs and video files I had sitting around, I thought it might be fun to take a look at some of the video-game-to-anime adaptations that have come about.

Day 1 - The Chrono Trigger OVA

Chrono Trigger has endeared itself to many RPG fans because of its diverse cast of characters and complex storyline based around time-travel.  Many people might think that this iconic game's only real connection to anime and manga is the fact that Akira Toriyama provided its character designs, but most aren't aware that the game spawned a little-seen, 16-minute OVA episode in the mid-nineties.  The episode was created to be shown at the V-Jump festival (essentially a celebration based around the V-Jump manga anthology magazine) on July 31, 1996.  It was produced by Production I.G. and features music from the game.

Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaoh

Number of Episodes: 12

Production Company: Artland

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Crunchyroll

Brief Overview: Akuto Sai wants nothing more than to enter his country's highest order of magicians and uphold the values of society. Unfortunately, his magical aptitude test predicts his ideal future occupation as "Demon Lord."

So, guess who forgot to post this yesterday? I probably should change the date in the title, but I'm not going to. Anyway, most of the week was kind of a bust because I was fighting off fatigue and probably some of the illness that's been going around at work.  I ended up going to bed before 10pm most nights, which is not that conducive to watching much anime.  Hopefully this week will be a bit more productive.

Recent Posts:

• Short Animation - "She Loves the Cream - Global Astroliner"
• Ookiku Furikabutte Season 2 - First Episode Review
• Kaichou wa Maid-Sama - First Episode Review
• Arakawa Under the Bridge - First Episode Review
• Rainbow: Nisha Rokubou no Shichinin - First Episode Review
• Working!! - First Episode Review

Review Pipeline:

• Spring reviews, they never end...

Recently Watched:

• Asatte no Houkou episodes 1-4

Recently Purchased:

• Someday's Dreamers Vol. 1-3 (This series is out of print, but discs 1 and 3 can still be purchased new pretty easily and cheaply.  Disc 2 on the other hand... a new copy of that will run you $125 dollars on the Amazon marketplace for whatever reason.  Needless to say, I bought a used copy).

Working!!

Number of Episodes: 13

Production Company: A-1 Pictures

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Preview Video

Brief Overview: Takanashi Souta is the new hire at Wagnaria, a family restaurant in Hokkaido. He works part time alongside a group of weird co-workers, including a girl often mistaken for a middle-schooler and a manger who does little-to-no actual work.

Rainbow: Nisha Rokubou no Shichinin

Number of Episodes: TBA

Production Company: Madhouse

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Funimation Video

Brief Overview: In 1955, Seven Teenagers confined to the same hold in the Shio reformatory must learn to live together and help each-other survive while they suffer daily humiliation and abuse.

Arakawa Under the Bridge

Number of Episodes: 13

Production Company: SHAFT

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Commercial

Brief Overview: Kou is a successful executive who lives by his wealthy family's creed not to be indebted to anyone.  When his life is saved by a homeless woman named Nino, he asks how to repay her.  The price is simple, Kou just needs to become her boyfriend.

Kaichou wa Maid-Sama

Number of Episodes: TBA

Production Company: J.C. Staff

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia 

Brief Overview: Misaki Ayuzawa is the female student council president at a formerly all-male school. While she generally despises the male student body for their collective slovenliness, her rough demeanor disguises the fact that she works part time after school at a maid cafe.

Ookiku Furikabutte Season 2

Number of Episodes: TBA

Production Company: A-1 Pictures

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Trailer

Brief Overview: Picking up where the first season left off, the second season of Oofuri follows the newly-formed Nishiura High School baseball team as they reach to attain their goal of playing at the finals at Koshien Stadium.

To distract everyone from the fact that I've been out of the house for about three days, I figured I'd share a piece of animation that I enjoy.  This particular animation is taken from a longer segment of a short called "Global Astroliner," animated by Studio 4�C and set to the song "She Loves the Cream" by M-flo with Doping Panda, from the album Cosmicolor.

The goal this week has been to try and get through as many Spring reviews as possible.  I've been plugging away at about one per day this past week, which is about the best I could hope for.  I was hoping to get some pre-posting done this weekend, but I was gone much of the time so unfortunately I didn't meet that goal.  I'm going to put all full reviews on hold for the time being to focus on the rest of the Spring first episode reviews until I finish them.  I can't wait until I actually get some free time again to catch up with some of the anime I really want to watch!

Recent Posts:

• Dance in the Vampire Bund - First Episode Review
• Nodame Cantabile Finale - First Episode Review
• Funimation Gets Shopped Around; UK Gets Some Choice Licenses
• B Gata H Kei - First Episode Review
• The Manga Critic's "Manga Moveable Feast" - To Terra
• What Does Lady Gaga have to do With Anime?
• Heroman - First Episode Review
• But the Keys are Right Next to Each-Other!
• Shin Koihime Musou: Otome Tairan - First Episode Review
• The Tatami Galaxy (Yojou-han Shinwa Taikei) - First Episode Review
• A Woman's Conflicted Feelings about Queen's Blade
• Jewelpet Tinkle - First Episode Review
• What in the World is "Iyashikei"?

Review Pipeline:

• Spring reviews only, until caught-up.

Recently Watched:

• Kimi ni Todoke episode 25 (completed)
• Giant Killing episode 3
• Tentai Senshi Sunred 2 episode 16
• The Tatami Galaxy episode 2

Recently Purchased:

• Mechademia Vol 4: War/Time
• The Astro Boy Essays: Osamu Tezuka, Mighty Atom, and the Manga/Anime Revolution
• Not Love But Delicious Foods (manga)
• Spice and Wolf Novel 2
• Spice and Wolf Novel 3 (pre-order)

Japanese animation as a medium is known to tackle many genres that animation from the United States generally steers clear of.  In addition to family comedies and children's series, anime also delves into more mature genres like drama and horror.  But anime can also tread ground mostly unfamiliar to those of us in the West. One genre that seems to be particularly unfamiliar is called iyashikei.

The term iyashikei comes from the root verb iyasu, which has various meanings including "to heal" or "to relieve (pain)," and refers to anime, manga and other things (including idols and comedians) which embody these properties.  There are very few anime and manga titles which genuinely and completely fall into this genre; the classification is rather subjective based on personal experience and there is a lot of crossover into other genres.  In short, your mileage may vary.  The genre also seems to be fairly unpopular in the West because it goes against the common expectation that anime be flashy, bombastic and action-oriented, but I tend to like these shows for their simple, relaxing qualities.  Here are some examples of titles which are either generally considered to fit well within the iyashikei genre, or which strike me as crossing into that genre from time-to-time:

Jewelpet Tinkle

Number of Episodes: 52

Production Company: Studio Comet

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Opening Ending 

Brief Overview: In Jewel Land, the Jewelpets live in harmony with witches and other magic users.  Ruby, a white hare, travels to the human world in search of her magical partner, who turns out to be a young girl named Akari.

Since the first DVD of the series was just released in the US, and both Anime News Network and Serdar have shared their feelings on it, I thought that it might be time to put into words the very odd, conflicted feelings I have about this franchise. I wouldn't consider this a review by any means; in order to write a "formal" review I think I would have to go back and watch the show again and, to be honest, I don't really have any desire to do that.  I'm also not writing this so that others can attempt to pull me in one direction or another.  In short, this isn't a debate, just some thoughts about how something that's in poor taste isn't necessarily without merit, although those merits don't absolve it of its transgressions, either.

It will probably surprise a lot of you to know that I did eventually watch the entire Queen's Blade saga.  I didn't even really intend to watch the first season, but it was one of those cases where my curiosity regarding the depths to which the show would dive overrode my initial revulsion towards some of the content.  My husband and I watched a few of the episodes together and had some good laughs; the concept of a character who shoots acid from her breasts was just way too bizarre to leave alone (what can I say? Our collective sense of humor resides squarely in the gutter most of the time).  I watched the majority of the episodes on my own, however. It was one of the few series that I felt compelled to download the second a fansub became available, and the only reason I can come up with as to why is that I just couldn't help but find out what sort of ridiculous thing was going to happen that week.  My curiosity was getting the best of me, and I didn't feel very good about it. I didn't intend to watch the second season, but eventually I succumbed to that urge as well.  What I came to realize afterward is that the show as a whole, while deplorable in many respects, also includes many positive aspects that I couldn't simply deny.

The Tatami Galaxy

Number of Episodes: 11

Production Company: Madhouse

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Funimation Video

Brief Overview: A college dropout stops for a late-night meal at a mysterious ramen stand and happens to meet a god of matchmaking.  This starts a series of flashbacks during which the protagonist relives his past where a fateful meeting with a devilish classmate named Ozu turns him from a hopeless romantic into a "black cupid" bent on destroying others' happiness.

Shin Koihime Musou: Otome Tairan

Number of Episodes: 12

Production Company: Dogakobo, BaseSon

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Crunchyroll

Brief Overview: In the third installment of the bishoujo reimagining of the �Romance of the Three Kingdoms� Chinese epic, high court General Kasshin swallows a cursed pill that slowly begins to turn her into a cat, and Kan�u�s group is entrusted with the task of finding her an antidote.

I didn't really want to post anything else about this, but the resolution was just too ridiculous not to talk about.  So remember my previous posts regarding the tempestuous love triangle between Bandai, Section 23 and the anime Sola? Turns out that the whole debacle was due to a "clerical error."

Seriously?

I guess my question is, did no one bother to check up on the licensing status of the show independently before signing a deal?  Did no one at either company bother to do a quick search via Google or ANN just to confirm that the show was available?  It seems like a lot of very basic steps weren't taken, and now someone is probably going to get the axe because of the mistake.

On the upside, it does seem to suggest that Bandai isn't in an out-of-control downward spiral towards bankruptcy, which is certainly good news.

Heroman

Number of Episodes: TBA

Production Company: Studio BONES

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Crunchyroll

Brief Overview: This co-production between Marvel's Stan Lee and Studio BONES features a young American boy named Joey who finds and repairs a toy robot.  The robot gets wet and is struck by lightning, transforming it into a giant robot Joey names Heroman.

Directly, not much.  But I did encounter an interesting similarity today while browsing the web after getting home from work. I usually check out a few news websites so that I'm not completely out of the loop in regards to important world events, and at the CNN website there was a clip from Larry King's interview with pop superstar Lady Gaga.  It wasn't the content of the interview that's important so much as the accompanying comment thread.  With almost anything that's popular, there are plenty of people who are very willing to let everyone know that this new current sensation is nothing but a "flash-in-the-pan," that it doesn't hold up to comparison with more beloved items from the past and that they think it sucks.  The thread connected to the video was no different, with people claiming that music used to be better, and that Lady Gaga was selling a lot of albums because all modern music is crap anyway. And then they yelled at the young whipper-snappers to get off of their damn lawn.

This is also true within the anime fandom, where there's a very heavy sentiment of nostalgia towards a few specific shows.  Lurking on forums I hear a lot of claims that anime nowadays is all junk compared to [insert name of series here that came out in the 1990's] (usually Evangelion or Cowboy Bebop or something similar). What gets ignored is that there were many other shows that were released at that same time that were all junk, the same as today, it's just that due to technological constraints we as Westerners didn't have the complete access to every single anime series then that we do now, and the ones that we actually did get were more likely to be god-tier. I would also venture to say that the extreme staying power of Cowboy Bebop or Evangelion wasn't something that could have been predicted at the time of their release - heck, who would think that fifteen years later, Eva would not only still be selling, but would have spawned a series of highly-successful film remakes?  And I'll bet you that there were plenty of people back in the day calling it melodramatic, transitory entertainment. Who would have predicted that Code Geass would be as popular as it is now? Or that Fullmetal Alchemist would have a similarly-successful remake? Who's to say that the next major perennially-successful anime hit isn't staring us right in the face this very moment?  For all we know, in fifteen years we may be rabidly anticipating the new Kiss x Sis theatrical film.

*crickets chirp*

So to all those people who are disparaging Lady Gaga's recent success, I guess I would say that no one could have predicted that The Beatles or Madonna would still be popular and relevant today back when both of them were releasing easily-digestible pop tunes.  You don't have to like something to appreciate its potential staying power, and no one can predict the future (otherwise I'd be a rich woman).

For those of you who watched (and hopefully even enjoyed) Toward the Terra, the manga version was in the spotlight this month at The Manga Critic. What is a "Manga Movable Feast" you ask?  In essence, a group of critics from across the vast Internet read a particular manga and offer their thoughts on the text in whatever form they wish.  This time, there were opinions regarding not only the text in question, but also some of the Keiko Takemiya's other manga (including Andromeda Stories) and also comparisons to the work of one of her contemporaries, Moto Hagio.

Check out the round-up of all related posts here (and be aware that links may still be added in the coming days).

I don't know about how other people operate, but for me stuff like this is a great way to get my bearings and help hone my own opinion.  Though in this case I already had a pretty good idea of my feelings about the source material (in short: I love it!).

B Gata H Kei

Number of Episodes: 12

Production Company: Hal Film Maker

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Trailer

Brief Overview: Yamada is a high school student focused on one goal - she wants to have sex with 100 guys.  Unfortunately, her status as an insecure virgin causes her to reject any guy who makes a pass at her, until she turns her attentions to average, unassuming co-virgin, Takashi Kosuda.

No, those two subject may not be directly related, but both have been fairly big news within the last week. 

It was reported last Thursday that Navarre, Funimation's current owner, is in the process of looking for a buyer for Funimation by the end of the first quarter fiscal year 2011.  Cue the requisite doom-and-gloom talk from the peanut gallery, but a timely interview with Funimation President Gen Fukunada helps to clear up the situation somewhat (Dear Bandai, you could take a cue from this guy - he actually helped to clear up the situation rather than befuddle everyone even more).

In case anyone is link-phobic, the gist of the situation is that Funimation is branching more and more into digital distribution (via their various streaming channels and download-to-own episodes) as well as some upcoming, to-be-named co-productions with Japanese studios, an area where Navarre doesn't focus their expertise (they're mostly involved with distribution and publishing).  So it's not an angry divorce, more like a mutually-beneficial separation.

The other major news of the week came from across the pond in the UK, where the British arm of Namco Bandai, Beez, announced that they had licensed the popular Winter 2010 series Durarara!  This is sort of a shocker because, as far as official news goes, Durarara! doesn't have a US DVD distribution deal, and it's considered fairly uncommon for the UK to make the first grab for titles (not that they shouldn't, good for them!).  Of course this opened a can of worms, with many complaints raised about the length of Funimation's release cycle (it seems as though Funimation's dubbing materials are often used in subsequent UK releases of series), and the potential for the series to be released in the US with subtitles-only (there are rumors to that effect which involve Aniplex's new release strategy of offering the titles it produces directly rather than licensing them out).

While I don't really have any major opinions on what this current licensing deal might mean for those of us in the States, I will say that I'm curious and a bit excited to see some new licensing strategies coming about, and the normal way of going about things being questioned.  I think that there's still a lot of vitality in this industry, and perhaps in the next couple of years there might be some exciting results.

Nodame Cantabile Finale

Number of Episodes 11 plus 2 DVD specials

Production Company: J.C. Staff

ANN Encyclopedia Wikipedia Trailer

Brief Overview: The saga of music school sweethearts Nodame and Chiaki concludes in this final anime series.  The two must deal with their busy lives which put a lot of stress on their love life, while still striving to do their best through music.