Is anime simply just ‘a cartoon made in Japan’

Lets do some imaginative work here. Imagine that the creators of D-Gray Man want to make a sequel. Let’s call this new anime ‘D-Gray Man Shippuden’. So the production team get together, hire all their old voice actors and get everything ready until BOOM! Their studio gets hit by an earthquake and all their equipment gets destroyed (this is not entirely unbelievable. There’s meant to be a giant earthquake about to hit Tokyo soon, at least according to Bones). So D-Gray Man Shippuden can’t be made.

But wait! Step in a Russian billionaire. Russia is a great place for billionaires. This guy is an otaku who is quite a fan of the D-Gray man manga. He heard of the terrible news and decided he really wanted to see the later chapters animated. So what does he do? Why, the only logical option is to build his own studio in Russia and hire the company to come over and animate the new season. Of course he owns the rights and gets a percentage of the profits but the anime is still in Japanese and gets aired of Japanese television in it’s old time slot. But this doesn’t get listed as an anime as it wasn’t made in Japan.

Something seems wrong here doesn’t it. Lets take a few more examples: The latest CLAMP manga gets animated by a french company because they offered them more money. CLAMP is pretty much definitive anime and yet this also wouldn’t count. Or how about South Parks studio moves over to Japan for a new season (or even better, the creators of Avatar move to Japan to create a new show with the exact same animation style). Do these suddenly count as anime? It’s not animation style either, otherwise Kaiba’s claim to be an anime gets changed to just being a funky Dr.Seass style cartoon.

So where does the wall end?

Hetalia Axis Powers episode 22

…doesn’t exist. I have vague recollections about an entire episode of Chibitalia but it was probably just a bad dream. Hopefully 23 will go back to actually being funny rather than that nightmare episode, that didn’t exist anyway so I don’t know why I’m talking about it. Here’s a picture of Casshern and his harem of lovely ladies instead.

See? Far better than softcore shotacon. bleargh

Hetalia Axis Powers episode 21

Ah back to blogging one episode at a time. You know it takes 5 times longer to write a post about Hetalia than it takes to actually watch the episode? Actually it took longer for this episode because of how much fun I had reading the history of Sealand.

Hetalia Axis Powers episodes 18-20

Right, with these episodes I’ve cleared my backlog and can get back to actually blogging this sporadically hilarious anime properly.

You mean I have to wait 6 months for the Eden of the East Movies!?!

Hetalia Axis Powers episodes 15-17

If you are one of those folk who were reading my Hetalia posts long after it’s finished airing, then sorry about sticking these episodes all together in one bundle. I had to take a break with VERY important exams and I only just finished them. However more than likely you’ll be reading this long after you’ve seen the episodes. But why not read on anyway, it might remind you of parts of the plot you’ve forgotten….*pfft* OK yeah, I’m kidding.

Me having some fun with photoshop

 

k-on! episode 11: crisis!

can the crisis be averted in time?

Ooohhh: what an episode. As the title explicitly states the girls find themselves in a bit of a predicament. The interesting part is that for nearly half the episode, you’re wondering what exactly the crisis is: Is it – as the previews suggest – the fact that Yui hasn’t maintained her guitar (affectionately named Giita or Gitah depending on which subbers you follow) since she purchased it and the service time might conflict with their upcoming performance? Or maybe that Ritsu forgot to hand in the auditorium usage form again? Or will it be something much more serious than that?

k-on! episode 10: another training camp

training camp is fun

With another school year for the girls of Sakura High, another summer vacation dawns in Episode 10, and much like the previous summer vacation, the Light Music Club organizes another training camp – and that means FUN. We spend another episode watching the girls clad in their cute swimsuits, playing on the beautiful beach under the shining sun, splashing around in the clear blue waters… Ironically enough, the only thing we may not see any of is actual PRACTICE; something that may not sit well with the disciplined Azu-nyan. But if you want to see how her very first Light Music Club Training Camp goes, you’ll have to read on!

Because Malaysia is an Otakuland!

Update: I got it all wrong. It was not “Don’t Bother None” and it wasn’t “Gotta Knock a Little Harder” as well. My bad. Either way, if you want the songs, just click on the provided links.

Driving is boring without some anime songs.

This happened 2 days ago, so I’m posting this kind of late but what happened remains to be a surprising revelation. It happened when I was driving on my way to work after I had my lunch when the radio DJ from the national English station, Traxx FM, began mutter out (I’m not exactly a radio listener but this one was too good to catch my attention) a very familiar name: Yoko Kanno. So the DJ continued as I quote:

Next up is a soundtrack from Yoko Kanno, used as the opening song for the animated movie, Cowboy Bebop. Here’s “Ask DNA”.

I went like “MAJI KA?” And yes, the DJ was not kidding. An anime song! Played on the national radio! On the airwaves! Listened by most Malaysians! I’m pretty sure I’m not the only otaku hyped out about this. So if you’re Malaysian, do tell if you had something similar of an encounter such as this one. Malaysia is indeed, truly OTAKU!

In case you’re wondering which Cowboy Bebop song I’m referring to, click here to play.