Topic: Anime World Report: Anime is happening! Let's get the ball Crunchyroll-ing!

[pokepal148]

So apparently there's an Anime version of Romeo and Juliet. Color me intrigued

for BNM

[Grimace the Minace]

I've been meaning to watch RxJ for a loooong time, but I've never gotten around to it - partially because I've heard it's not that great. But I always like to see anime adaptations of western properties.

[WindyMan]

…anime?

[broodwars]

Yeah, OK. I have dozens of unwatched anime BluRays on my shelf, and I rarely bother talking about it in the official TV thread since that's always dominated by one show or another. An anime-specific thread has merit.

[Adrock]

I feel like this is like the third anime thread we’ve had.

The anime ages up Juliet to an ancient 16 years old. I’m curious if Romeo and Juliet still cause six deaths in three days.

[TOPHATANT123]

Watched Neon Genesis Evangelion for the first time. At first I was unsure, as the fan service seemed to be at odds with the message the show was trying to put forward. However it gets more tasteful as it goes along, and the movie End of Evangelion is a spectacle that lives up to the hype.

[Order.RSS]

Watched Neon Genesis Evangelion for the first time. At first I was unsure, as the fan service seemed to be at odds with the message the show was trying to put forward. However it gets more tasteful as it goes along, and the movie End of Evangelion is a spectacle that lives up to the hype.

Yeah I watched this a while back and had a very similar reaction the first half of the show. Seemed kinda monster-of-the-weekish with a lot of seemingly unnecessary sexualisation solely for the audience. Was kinda steered away by that at first. Stuck with it because everyone said it would get better, plus I like that specific 90ies style of animation a lot, with the thick black and sharp linework.

The last third of the show and especially the End of Evangelion kinda wrecked me, really powerful stuff.
Ending spoilers: It's a devastating takedown of the genre tropes,  essentially positing that "hey you realise all these mech shows are about child soldiers right?" They break the characters in such sickening ways it feels outright cruel. Towards the end you really get the impression the makers of this show HATE humans and especially the otaku part of their audience -- the End of Evangelion even overlays shots of the audience with death threats the studio received over the previous ending. Especially in the light of the recent Kyoto Animation arson attack, that aspect arguably hits even harder now than it did during Evangelion's heyday.

Granted I'm not very well-versed in anime beyond the usual suspects (Ghibli films, Death Note, Cowboy Bebop, Gundam Wing, Akira, Ghost in the Shell), but Evangelion is a tremendous show and I would recommend anyone with a Netflix account to give it a shot.

Fair warning though, the show deals in heavy topics and is quite relentless in its nihilism. I watched this in a ~not super great time in my life~ and the final stretch hit me like a truck full of anvils. YMMV obviously, maybe I'm just over-sensitive... But I would imagine if you're prone to depressive bouts and go into this blind, it might be kinda triggering for some people.

[broodwars]

I'm surprised this story hasn't gained any traction over here, but Sony announced this morning that they will merge their various anime distribution companies together in the near future, including Funimation; Madman; and much-hated (and deservedly so) Aniplex. The merged group will retain the Funimation name. There is no indication what this will mean for Aniplex USA and its much-hated (and deservedly so) pricing structure.

In case I'm being too subtle, I hope this means that Aniplex USA and everyone responsible for the decision-making there is fired. If you know what Aniplex USA is and what it's done over the years, you'll understand why.

Here's hoping this leads to a new age of affordable anime BluRays,etc. and the end of Aniplex USA (may it burn in Hell). Here's hoping that this does NOT lead to Funimation titles sporting Aniplex pricing and release models, which doesn't seem likely given that Funimation is keeping its name.

https://comicbook.com/anime/2019/09/24/funimation-aniplex-merge-sony-entertainment-anime/

Unfortunately, there is also an additional rumor going around that Apple is about to buy Sony, and that is part of why this merger occurred: to get all of their anime streaming resources under one roof. This is also apparently only the 1st of many expected announcements in the near future with the Streaming Wars starting up.

[pokepal148]

I'm surprised this story hasn't gained any traction over here, but Sony announced this morning that they will merge their various anime distribution companies together in the near future, including Funimation; Madman; and much-hated (and deservedly so) Aniplex. The merged group will retain the Funimation name. There is no indication what this will mean for Aniplex USA and its much-hated (and deservedly so) pricing structure.

In case I'm being too subtle, I hope this means that Aniplex USA and everyone responsible for the decision-making there is fired. If you know what Aniplex USA is and what it's done over the years, you'll understand why.

Well, here we go again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4XZCtNflEE

[ShyGuy]

Nope

[nickmitch]

Is there a video of Aniplex and their evils?  My only familiarity with them is hearing the name after some animes.  I don't subscribe to any anime-specific streaming services and mostly just feed on the scraps from Hulu and Netflix.

[broodwars]

Is there a video of Aniplex and their evils?  My only familiarity with them is hearing the name after some animes.  I don't subscribe to any anime-specific streaming services and mostly just feed on the scraps from Hulu and Netflix.

Not an easy to reference one, I'm afraid. I'll write up an explanation of Aniplex USA later (when I have more than 5 minutes and access to a keyboard), but the short version is that Aniplex USA (like Bandai Visual before them) was created with the explicit purpose of killing the American anime market in order to protect the domestic Japanese home video market's obscene pricing & release structure. The Japanese Animation Publishers have never stopped bitching about the US & Japan sharing the same BluRay region, when they had separate DVD regions.

[broodwars]

Alright, let's get a few things defined from the start that'll be important later:

1. During the DVD years, North America and Japan had different region codes, meaning that Japanese discs would not play on an unmodified North American DVD player, and vice-versa. However, when Sony announced the BluRay format, North America and Japan ended up in the same region, so each's players can play each other's discs.

2. Anime DVDs/BluRays have an absolutely insane pricing and release system in Japan, as Japanese companies are focused on appealing to essentially the "whales" of the anime otaku market. For the sake of an example, I'm going to use Goblin Slayer since it's a relatively new anime that's available on home video right now in Japan and soon in America.

In Japan, this 12 episode series was released in what appears to be three 14,040 yen limited edition BluRay sets, roughly $130.29 each (not including discounts). That's $390.87 for the whole series, presumably. It's hard to tell, even on the translated Amazon Japan.

https://www.amazon.co.jp/s?k=goblin+slayer+blu+ray&ref=nb_sb_noss_2

By comparison, Funimation's upcoming Goblin Slayer Limited Edition BluRay box set releasing in October is...$84.98 retail, currently $64.99 discounted.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07TJKCFPZ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

3. In the anime boom era of the late 90s -> mid 2000s, it was common for complete North American 24-26 episode anime collections to release as 3-5 episode singles for $25-$30 a disc at around 6-8 discs total. Buying an entire series would cost you around $150 - $240.

This release structure (among other things) led to the collapse of the North American anime market in the mid-2000s.

Nowadays, as you can see the current trend is to release 12-13 episode BluRay sets at $50-$80 a pop. This is what is currently sustainable in the NA market.

Bear this price discrepancy in mind. I'll break the rest of the explanation into a separate post.

[broodwars]

So, towards the mid-2000s and the rise of BluRay (such as it was), anime distributors in Japan started seeing a curious thing: Japanese consumers started importing the North American releases of various series & movies more than they were purchasing the Japanese domestic, expensive releases.

This is the process commonly known in anime fandom as "reverse importation". And the Japanese anime companies lost their goddamn minds. A common tactic to fight this "scourge" was to deliberately sabotage the North American releases by providing the NA distributors with faulty video & audio masters. Another popular one would be to license a show out to a NA distributor early, but then withhold the master materials from that distributor for several years (Hello, EVERYTHING Funimation "license rescued" from Sunrise!).

Bandai Visual and Aniplex USA, though, were the 3rd tactic: establish a Japanese distributor in the States with deep pockets that could out-bid the struggling NA companies for the latest hit shows, and then distribute the titles in America using the Japanese pricing and release model.

Hey! Did you like Gurren Lagann or Kill la Kill on DVD? Then you'll LOVE re-buying them all over again in 5 disc singles for $60 a pop! Similar pricing for Sword Art Online, too. Did you like Fate/Stay Night? Well, you'll love even MORE buying HALF of Fate/Zero for $500!

And no, that is not EBay pricing. This is MSRP:

https://www.rightstufanime.com/Fate-Zero-Blu-ray-Box-1-S-Import-US-Customers

Aniplex USA is reviled for scooping up the licenses to the most popular shows of the season, and then making them completely unaffordable in North America because if even 1 or 2 people buy it, it's turned a profit. And what do they care, since they have Sony's money to play with and everyone is equally screwed.

And to make matters worse, since Aniplex USA's parent company held the rights to a lot of popular titles that managed to get saved by Funimation or Sentai Filmworks first, Aniplex also pushed to revert those rights back ahead of schedule so they could release their own overpriced Aniplex USA versions. Hey, who wants to pay $200 for Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood!

https://www.rightstufanime.com/category/Blu~ray?keywords=fullmetal

[broodwars]

Now, to be fair Aniplex USA has gotten better over the years when it comes to their pricing. They've started issuing "budget" versions of their shows on BluRay at a dramatically lower cost, such as $190 for the complete Gurren Lagann series ($150 on discount). I actually own this set, mainly because it's Gurren Lagann and it's going out of print.

https://www.rightstufanime.com/Gurren-Lagann-Complete-Box-Set-Blu-ray

Fate/Zero's getting a "budget" set in October.

https://www.rightstufanime.com/Fate-Zero-Complete-Box-Set-Blu-ray

Kill la Kill's getting a similar set in December.

https://www.rightstufanime.com/KILL-la-KILL-Complete-Box-Set-Blu-ray

I say "budget", of course, because these are all still ludicrously expensive, especially with no bonus features.

I will also say that, despite their price, Aniplex USA does put out quality work. That Gurren Lagann BluRay set is gorgeous, and their main releases are notorious for having tons of Japanese extras and viewing options. Aniplex is also extremely good about getting their titles out on streaming services, if you're into watching a show with compression issues & lag.

What pisses me off about Aniplex USA is that they have a business model that, as an alternative to the cheap-but-extras-barren US releases, could have been perfectly fine as a boutique publisher. Instead, they went out of their way to attempt to withhold popular titles from mass market distribution in an attempt to protect a bad, shrinking business model back home. They were determined to not only be a boutique option, but the ONLY option for some of the most popular shows coming out of Japan.

This concludes this rant.

[ThePerm]

I'm so out of the loop on anime. It reminds me of how out of the loop I am on new music.

[broodwars]

I'm so out of the loop on anime. It reminds me of how out of the loop I am on new music.

Honestly, so am I. Most of my anime are older titles, though I probably have around 2 dozen anime BluRays for various newer series I've just never gotten around to watching. I got out of anime around when it started getting into its "loli phase", and have only recently started watching it again with the likes of Attack of Titan and My Hero Academia. Even then, I'm only watching a handful of series. I can't imagine actually trying to keep up with the anime streaming wars every season.

[ThePerm]

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/forums/index.php?topic=11768.msg154082#msg154082

I was getting out of the loop at that point, but was firmly out of the loop by 2009. I started university in 2005 and didn't have time for **** besides school, getting drunk, and board games.

[ShyGuy]

I liked Vampire Hunter D and Fist of the North Star and Castle of Cagliostro

[nickmitch]

Oh, wow! Thanks for the posts, Broodwars!  They were very informative.  I'm honestly shocked such prices are sustainable when piracy is an option.

[broodwars]

Oh, wow! Thanks for the posts, Broodwars!  They were very informative.  I'm honestly shocked such prices are sustainable when piracy is an option.

No problem. Glad you found them informative. You have to lay down a lot of groundwork to explain Aniplex USA properly.

I've been hearing conflicting things about this Funimation/Aniplex/Madman merger. There's an infamous Reddit post called "The Thing You Call Funimation No Longer Exists" that came out after the merger that I can't find right now, but basically an insider was saying that Funimation's marketing and artistic staff got completely wiped out in this merger. It's not looking like the entity that will arise from this merger will still look like Funimation. I'm concerned that it also won't act like Funimation anymore, either.