DAY 2
I had every kind of train problem in the world today but I STILL managed to make it in time for the first panel I wanted to go to, the Sentai Filmworks panel. THANK YOU ANIME GODS!
Caught the tail end of the Kodansha panel. I have no idea what they were peddling since I only showed up late and got there just in time for Q&A. Lots of interesting questions and answers though. Kodansha has discovered that readers who read manga digitally and those who read manga in print are completely different audiences. What does well in one format doesn’t always do well in another. Bit by bit the industry is figuring out how to approach both audiences.
Certain people asked about the differences on how manga in Japan comes shrink wrapped and in book jackets while ours do not. The shrink wrap is because in Japan the manga companies decide what the content is and in the US it’s the retailers. The retailers like the books to be open so people can thumb through them and decide if they want to buy. They do shrink wrap books if there’s adult content so children don’t see them. Also the books that don’t sell they can sell back to the publisher, which also doesn’t happen in Japan. Regarding book jackets, Japan is a lot smaller than the US so they can keep the books in good condition when shipping. But here they don’t travel well since they have to to go longer distances. They also rub against each other in boxes while being delivered and get banged up that way too. Kodansha says whatever material is in the book jackets in Japan such as comics and things like that they reprint and put in their books so you’re not missing any content.
Ha that all turned out to more interesting than Sentai’s panel, go fig. I thought they would bring out more sentai shows like they used to, like Gatchaman and Casshan, but nope none of that. Guess Sentai is just a name now sigh… They did show a bunch of shows and asked for people in the audience to cheer for their favorites. Food Wars got the loudest reaction. Oh and I was the only one who cheered for ClassicaLoid! Like really? I mean it’s the character designer from the Capcom game Sengoku Basara, Makoto Tsuchihayashi and this time he’s designing Beethoven, Mozart, etc. How can these people not watch this? THIS ANNOYING CAPCOM FANBOY HATES EVERYBODY HERE! Lol! Oh and they played a “Who’s That Pokemon” type game except it was “Who’s That Anime Character.” On screen they showed a Sentai Filmworks character in a black silhouette and if you guessed who they were you got a prize. One of them was the demon Tora from Ushio and Tora. The fan incorrectly guessed Blanka of Street Fighter fame OH SNAP! Ha of course he was wrong but THIS ANNOYING CAPCOM FANBOY DOESN’T HATE THAT GUY! 
Aniplex panel! They talked a lot about the Fate/Grand Order cellphone game and also the Fate/stay Night Heaven’s Feel movie. Which I’m going to see on Monday IN A MOVIE THEATER OH SNAP! This isn’t connected to the con or anything, I just got my ticket a long time ago cuz THAT’S HOW I DO! One funny moment at the panel was they showed and image of Rin, Sakura and Saber. They asked people to cheer for their favorite and Saber won. They said Saber always wins. BEST WAIFU! Who obviously became famous after the Capcom peoduced PSP game Fate/Unlimited Codes because no one knew who Saber was before that. Not even Saber herself yup yup! Oh and the women at the panel joked that Saber, Rin and Sakura were the Femme Fate-al. Get it? Fate? In their words “These are the jokes people!” Yes no one laughed at the dad joke. THAT’S HOW THEY DO… or DID!
At the Infini-T Force with the Japanese producer of the show. And he speaks English hooray! He said that a lot of people know about the characters from Capcom vs. Tatsunoko and the crowd cheered! CAPCOM MENTIONED AT THE CON HELL YEAH! He did say it wrong though. It’s Tatsunoko vs. Capcom and not the other way around. It’s cool if you want to say Capcom’s name first though. ~_^
We all got FREE posters and we saw a trailer for the Infiniti-T Force movie, the same trailer that’s online now. They announced that it will be in movie theaters in the US! I’m sure it will be a limited run, like on Sunday morning or Monday night only like we tend to get these anime movies… blarg… but still cool. We also saw a clip from episode 9 which hasn’t even aired yet. Two villains were fighting each other! The smart money is on one villain defeating the other villain. I’VE SAID TOO MUCH!
Speaking of the baddies, this is something I never even thought about while watching the show. The show has four heroes and that’s why there are four villains, and each of them is a contrast to an individual hero. Guess I never gave it much thought but that makes sense.
There was some talk about how Tatsunoko wanted to do something special for their 55th anniversary and that’s why it’s CGI instead of hand drawn. So the show is storyboarded in Tatsunoko, then it’s sent to Digital Frontier and they animate it, then it goes back to Tatsunoko and they add the voices and music. They mentioned other things that Digital Fronteir has worked on. They did the Appleseed movies and also the Resident Evil CGI movies. CAPCOM REPRESENTING AGAIN! #AnnoyingFanboyReportingYos
LeSean Thomas panel! He’s from New York originally, born and raised in South Bronx. So he was happy to come to a big anime con since we haven’t had a big anime con in years. And naturally thrilled to be a guest of honor! He worked on Boondocks and Black Dynamite. He also created Children of Ether for Crunchyroll. No word from him when / if more episodes of Children of Ether are coming. But he is turning his Cannon Buster comic book into an animated series on Netflix! Making moves!
At the Gundam Thunderbolt panel! The main composer was there! He said he’s been playing Jazz for 40 years. He’s not into manga, anime or video games himself. So it’s quite surprising that something like Gundam made him visit New York for the first time ever and not his musical carreer ha ha! Tomorrow we will see the premiere of the dub for the Gundam Thunderbolt sequel, Bandit Flower. And his band will perform music for the movie while we watch it! A GUNDAM CONCERT! I’ve been to a concert like that for the first Lord of The Rings movie where an orchestra played the music while the movie played. It was so much fun! Tomorrow’s gonna rule!
Swung by Artist Alley really quick. They were doing some cool stuff having drawings of characters on T-Shirts and caps! My broke ass almost brought something. Almost! Put a Capcom character on one of those and my wallet is DONE SON!
More Gundam! At the Iron Blooded Orphans panel (another FREE poster WORD) with the producer and Robbie Daymond who voices Gaelio! Robbie Daymond also voices Spider-Man in Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite! I guess he voices Spider-Man for the new Spider-Man cartoon, but that’s horrible don’t watch that. Definitely play Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite though. That’s your only homework assignment for today yup yup!
The producer said that when the mecha pilots piloted the Gundams shirtless, fans in Japan thought they were just trying to show off beefcake. No, they were just trying to show that the kids were poor. The studio was surprised that the audience misunderstood the intent.
There was a fun moment when they asked the panel what mecha everyone at the panel would pilot if they could in real life. Robbie picked the Tequila Gundam from Mobile Fighter G ROFL! Eren’s voice actor picked Sandrock from Gundam Wing. The producer picked Barbaros from Iron Blooded Orphans. I forget which one but one of the female voice actresses picked the Nobel Gundam from Mobile Fighter G since it was all pretty and Sailor Moon like ROFL!
Attended two more panels. One about women in Gundam, particularly the original series and how the director Tomino was not as sexist as some people claim. There was another panel discussing dystopian works that compared Attack on Titan to The Walking Dead comic book and the prose book Farenheight 451. All very interesting but I’m super hungry and can’t be funny about it so I’ll end my coverage here. Quick reader insert a dad joke or something STAT! “These are the jokes people!” Now off to eat at Arby’s.
Day 3 coming up!