It’s time to finally end my Fuuma no Kojirou reviews with the final anime, a 50-minute production that, while not perfect, still stands tall as an enjoyable and consicive ending to the Kojirou saga. Now if only there was an English translation…
Enjoy!
JManga’s sheer amount of potential support is its biggest asset: 39 different manga publishers are supporting the online manga portal, & I take a look at thirteen of them, as well as a title that I personally would love to see from each company on the site. I dub them:
The JManga 13!
Enjoy!
[quote=“LordGeo” post=112632]JManga’s sheer amount of potential support is its biggest asset: 39 different manga publishers are supporting the online manga portal, & I take a look at thirteen of them, as well as a title that I personally would love to see from each company on the site. I dub them:
The JManga 13!
Enjoy![/quote]
lol, Woman Explorer Ray had a Manga? Awesome.
Naikaku Kenryoku Hanzai Kyousei Torishimarikan Zaizen Jotaro is infamous for its horrific first episode as well as its very limited animation. The animation in particular is so infamous that when the show received a DVD boxset release in 2007 Trans-Arts went back and fixed the animation. Admittedly, the show is still limited in animation, but it does look much better. Also, episode 1 received such an overhaul in a couple of scenes that the original “TV O.A./On-Air” version of the episode was included on a “bonus disc”. So who does the show compare between its TV and DVD versions and can improved animation help a horrible first episode? Well, now you can see!
Zaizen Jotaro TV vs. DVD:
As much as anime fans would question a company’s logic in doing so, I’d love to see Zaizen Jotaro get licensed one day, and the DVD-quality video combined with the fixes and changes to the animation might hopefully help give the show a little more respect… As long as they skip the first episode, because it just sucks from a storytelling perspective; thankfully it’s a standalone story that has nothing to do with the actual story arc the anime tells.
At the end of last year I brought up a hypothetical question: What would I license if I had my own licensing company? Well, here’s another hypothetical: What if my company survived that onslaught? What if I could get package deals from two companies, and can choose what I want? Well here it is!
“12 More (+1)” Animes I Would License: Package Deals, Dead Ahead!
Enjoy, and remember that this is all hypothetical. But, if you agree with any of these choices, then make your voice heard!
Leave it to me to find an obscure entry in a popular anime series, and this month every review will be like this! So let’s start it off with a big name: Fullmetal Alchemist, specifically the original 2003-2004 anime series. Amazingly enough, FUNimation actually missed licensing one FMA production, a 2005 PPV special… And since this series is pretty important to me being a big anime fan, I felt that I had to review this special as a great way of saying “Thanks” to this series.
Up Next: Obscure Entries in Legend of the Galactic Heroes. Enjoy!
[quote=“LordGeo” post=115638]Leave it to me to find an obscure entry in a popular anime series, and this month every review will be like this! So let’s start it off with a big name: Fullmetal Alchemist, specifically the original 2003-2004 anime series. Amazingly enough, FUNimation actually missed licensing one FMA production, a 2005 PPV special… And since this series is pretty important to me being a big anime fan, I felt that I had to review this special as a great way of saying “Thanks” to this series.
Up Next: Obscure Entries in Legend of the Galactic Heroes. Enjoy![/quote]
Wow, thanks for this, I had no idea.
Now, of course, I want to see this. I’m truly jealous that you have.
My anime collection is small but growing steadily. It’s folks like you that help it along!
Legend of the Galactic Heroes is one of the true anime “epics” & “masterpieces”, but normally when this title is brought up it’s specifically the 110-episode OVA series. But this series does have some newcomer-friendly entries, including the very first LOGH production, a 60-minute movie that actually is the first part of the story that newcomers should watch, anyway.
I appreciate the kind words I get on this topic and, as always, enjoy!
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P.S. http://youtu.be/AADs8tCoVzA is truly epic…
The Legend of the Galactic Heroes reviews return with the second movie, which effectively replaces the first two episodes of the main OVA series and surpasses the first movie in quality… Which is no easy thing to do.
This leaves one more stand-along LOGH production that I can review, but apparently this third stand-alone actually isn’t that great. Anyway, enjoy!
Finishing up the LOGH reviews is the last standalone production, released December of 1992. Though it tells a neat prequel story for Reinhard & Kircheis, this is definitely not one of the franchise’s better productions. It’s not bad, but it’s far from being the greatness that LOGH is generally known for.
Enjoy! Also, if anyone is going to AnimeNEXT next week, be sure to stop by Panel Room 4 on Sunday, June 10, from 11 AM to 12 PM, as I’ll be doing my very first panel at that time! What’s the panel, you ask? It’s a little something I call “25 Years of Burning Blood: Masami Kurumada Animes”.
My panel at AnimeNEXT went really well, and I had a fair crowd when all was said and done. But you know what’s been missing from the blog for a while? License Rescues. i haven’t done a license rescue list in nearly a year, so I decided to rectify that, and I think I chose some really nice titles for this renaissance.
Fukkatsu! The Renaissance of Twelve Older Animes That Deserve License Rescues
To be honest, I usually wait until I’m done with multi-part posts before listing them here, but Part 1 had so many views in the first 24 hours that I thought about putting Part 1 here on its own, since I felt like I was keeping you guys from seeing something that, apparently, resonated with a number of people. But I think getting them together is always the better choice, so I waited.
Anyway, as always, enjoy!
I have EYES of Mars on VHS. It was one of the first anime films I ever saw, back on Sci-Fi in the 90’s with Vampire Hunter D. It’s definitely a classic, though a rewatch a couple of years ago showed me that it doesn’t hold up as well as some others.
Anyone ever watch Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future? Well this past December it got it’s very first DVD boxset release, but even though it has a brand-new Making-of documentary, commentary tracks, & even a detailed look at the unproduced Season 2 there’s one bit of Captain Power that’s missing: The VHS “Training” tapes that featured animation done by anime studio ARTMIC with the help of the likes of Kenji Kawai & Shinji Aramaki!
Enjoy!
I had one of the fighters and a VHS when I was a kid. It took me years to even figure out what the name was. However, I have to disagree with your claim that it helped “introduce syndication to broadcasters.”. There were many animated shows that were syndicated before Captain Power and many were much more successful.
Fair enough. I just remember reading that, so felt that it was worth bringing up in the review.
Isn’t it generally agreed that Ninja Warrior is the only truly good “G4 Original”? Well, there’s an anime out there based on the show that spawned Sasuke/Ninja Warrior, Kinniku Banzuke (a.k.a. Unbeatable Banzuke)! It’s admittedly nothing special, outside of the crazy idea of having kids compete in “death matches”, but I think it’s perfectly fine to watch an anime that is the epitome of “what you see is what you get”, and also comes off like eating a spoonful of sugar. Saccharine entertainment is still entertainment, afterall.
Enjoy!
Late night anime is essentially the way we get seemingly most of the anime that people love to talk about every season… But do you really know how it got its start and what titles they owe their precious time slots to? Well, TV Tokyo was the first to do late night anime as an “infomercial” for the later home video release, which is what late night anime is generally about, so I decided to take a look at the first two years (roughly 1997-1998) of late night anime on TV Tokyo. The result? We got every single title except one!
The Early Days of Late Night Anime:
Really, someone should give Hareluya II BØY a try & license it… Too bad it’s never been given a DVD release, so the best quality would be from laserdisc masters. Admittedly, though, it would still be better than the raws that are out there for the show right now.
Anyway, enjoy!
Tetsuya Saruwatari is ending his manga Tough soon, huh? Well then let’s take a look at the only anime adaptation of his original Tough manga, Koukou Tekken-den Tough… Or Shootfighter Tekken, as CPM called it. Great action, excellent animation, & the fact that it still holds up great ten years later is all you need to know, but if you want to know more here’s the review:
Enjoy!
Masanori Morita is likely the biggest name from the pages of Shonen Jump that most North American anime & manga fans have likely never heard of. But his debut work, the delinquent/sports manga Rokudenashi BLUES, lasted roughly 9 years and ran for 42 volumes, lasting most of Jump’s “Golden Age” and even surviving for a year after that era’s end. Also, with JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure finally getting a TV anime this October, Rokudenashi BLUES now becomes the longest Shonen Jump manga to never receive a TV anime (I can’t say for sure if it’s the longest manga in general, but it’s definitely the longest Jump manga)… But it did get two anime movies. Unfortunately, the 1992 movie is pretty hard to find, so I have to skip it and review the second movie, a feature-length production that adapts the Kansai arc from the first quarter of the manga. If you’re the adventurous type (i.e. you’re okay with watching raws & enjoy hunting down rare anime) then this is definitely something to look for, though.
Hey, Sentai! You want more old-school Toei animes? Why not license both Rokudenashi BLUES movies and release them in a double-pack? It would only total at about 2 hours and it would mark the first time both movies ever received a DVD release. Anyway, enjoy!
Leave it to me to be able to find a way to talk about One Piece on a blog about obscure & forgotten anime & manga! Made in 1998 for the Jump Super Anime Tour, the One Piece pilot pre-dates Toei’s still-running TV series, was made by a different animation studio, features a completely different cast, and is even a completely original story… Also, it’s the only time One Piece & Norio Wakamoto have ever crossed paths! How is it possible that he’s never voiced a character in the TV series?!
Enjoy!