The Vile One's Dungeon: Anime Expo 2008 - Day 1
Posted by Jeffrey Harris on 07.04.2008
The Vile One's invasion of AX '08 begins.
Today was the opening day of the 2008 Anime Expo. Great times were had by all. There's lots more space in the Los Angeles Convention Center than Long Beach. Sorry Long Beach, but it's true. Still though, the con did a pretty poor job in the way they set up the Exhibit Hall line forcing people to walk around for blocks having no idea where they were or how to find the proper route to get in. You should not have to walk a mile to get into the dealer room.
Fansubs: The Death of Anime
Things started off today with a panel of industry representatives from companies such as Bandai, Funimation, Anime News Network, and The Anime Expo discussing the issue of fansubbing and their affect on the industry. A word constantly being used in this panel was "education". That is to say, educating fans on the issue of fansubbing and that is illegal and stealing will help reduce the fansub downloads. However, many on the panel noted that with the evolution of technology and fansubbing itself with bit torrent and p2p, you can can get rid of the ripped DVD episodes, the fansubbed episodes, or what not.
My problem with this whole issue is that the industry is so angry about fansub sites that have people pay to get in and watch illegal fansubs they never made. And this money the site is paid doesn't go to the Japanese producers or the American licensors. But Lance Heiskell, marketing director of Funimation, said if any of these sites are willing to "go legit" (as the former paid fansub site, Crunchy Roll, has), "we're on board." I feel to say these things really just opens up a can of worms for these sites to continue on and say, "we're going legit" while they still rake in money. Other ideas mentioned were working to get more anime episodes released in the states quicker, possibly with in subtitles only, as well as moving more toward digital media over hard storage like DVD.
I think there's definite merit in Funimation working out a deal with Google/YouTube and putting free streaming episodes there. More distributors need to try this. Sampling episodes online can give fans a better idea of what they are buying, instead of blind buying a show for $20-30 they know nothing about.
ADV Films Sneak Peek
Matt Greenfield, co-founder of ADV Films as well as an English ADR director for many years for shows such as Neon Genesis Evangelion, was the lone panelist in this slightly sad panel. Mr. Greenfield briefly touched on what's been going on with ADV lately. As of now, ADV is "slimming" back down to focus mainly on DVD's and broadcasting. They've recently lost some key licenses on big shows such as Gurren Lagann and Sgt. Frog. Mr. Greenfield said there more than likely would NOT be any big announcements this weekend, but he also added that at Anime Expo something could happen in the next few days. ADV Manga is still going, but from the sound of things, its future could be in question. Following the short QnA, Greenfield introduced a screening of 1 episode of the sci-fi/action anime, KIBA. In KIBA, a delinquent living in a smog-infested society that isn't LA that goes by the name of Zed, has a weird pattern showing up in his arm. He gets attacked by his teacher who turns out to be some sort of monster, and his mom who looked like she belonged in a lunatic asylum actually has special powers and is called a "Shard Caster." It was a decent first episode, but a little too cryptic. Animation was definitely nice.
Other Stuff Going on at AX
Over at the Funimation Entertainment booth, it was all about their new upcoming release of the Ouran Host Club anime. Funimation actually had a makeshift host club set up in their booth to help entertain and relax the con-goers this year. Ouran High School's English voice cast will be announced officially later on this weekend.
Voice Actor, Steven Blum
Voice Actor, Crispin Freeman
Over at the Bang Zoom Entertainment booth, the awesome veteran voice actors Steven Blum (Spike Spiegel in Cowboy Bebop, Wolverine in the upcoming Wolverine and The X-men. I tried to pick Blum's brain a little about the new X-men cartoon, but he said he's been sworn to secrecy. He did imply though that he's working on the new upcoming Marvel direct to DVD animated feature, Hulk vs. Wolverine. He said he's seen some of the animation for the movie which was done in Japan, and it looks fantastic. Sounds very exciting. For now, it looks like Blum will be the regular voice of animated/video game Wolverine for quite some time.
Also at the Bang Zoom Ent. booth, the long-awaited, highly anticipated Adventures In Voice Acting was finally available, being sold for $25. Any fan waiting in line for the autograph signings at their booth could get a front of line pass with purchase of the DVD. Adventures In Voice Acting is a project that's taken about several years to get released, and was promoted at the last two Anime Expos. Better late than never, I suppose. I just wonder what happened to cause all the delays.
IMAGI Entertainment was pushing the new animated, Astro Boy movie hard this year at the convention. IMAGI, in case you didn't remember, produced the TMNT animated movie released last year. According to the reps at the booth, Paul Dini (co-creator of the DC Animated Universe) is no longer on Gatchaman. And with former director, Kevin Munroe (director of TMNT), having moved on to Dead of Night, Gatchaman now apparently has no director. While the IMAGI reps did say they are focused on releasing Astro Boy right now, they did confirm that Jun Falkenstein, recently rumored as being the new director of Gatchaman, as being part of the current team on the project. The reps refused to answer concretely who the new director would be. Stills and some rough clips of Astro Boy along with t-shirts were being passed out at their booth. I dunno, an Astro Boy revival was attempted several years ago, and it was a pretty big failure. I'm not sure there is a mainstream market for Astro Boy right now.
That's about it for Day 1. Stay tuned otakus for Day 2 with more David Hayter, and hopefully the new EVA 1.0 movie, and much more.
