Hey, Answerman! - I'm Sorry I Wasn't Here Last Week Edition This week! Hey Answerman apologizes for his sudden absence last week, and plans to make up for it with questions and stuff about light novels, dubbing animal noises, and production costs! All that and a new Flake and Hey Answerfans!
2009-08-28
ANNCast - Bricken the House Writer and world-famous blogger Rob Bricken joins the ANNCast for a hurricane of jaded, cynical fun! This week: Bluray, plus the R1 industry's biggest and most hilariously misbegotten licenses. It's gripetastic!
2009-08-28
Buried Treasure - One Pound Gospel As someone who enjoys food way too much, Justin can totally relate to the main character of One Pound Gospel.
2009-08-27
Yoshiyuki Tomino - You be the Interviewer Yoshiyuki Tomino will be at New York Anime Festival, and Anime News Network readers have the exclusive opportunity to submit the questions for his official Q&A; panel.
2009-08-26
The X Button - The Ninja's Share We chat with the producer of Naruto Shippuden: Ninja Destiny 2! Then it's on to Fate/Unlimited Codes, Muramasa, Square Enix RPGs, and a game many thought they'd never see in English.
2009-08-26
St. Dragon Girl GN 2-4 St. Dragon Tail might actually have been improved if it were doing something blatantly and ridiculously “wrong”…'cause as banal shoujo puffery, it just isn't doing much of anything right. Don't give it a second thought.
Yokai Doctor GN 2 Some of the stories achieve enough depth to break the mold (or at least, make the best use of the mold), but otherwise, this volume of Yokai Doctor fails to reach its potential.
Hayate the Combat Butler Sub.DVD Part 1 If you're hunting the market for a low-investment comedy that keeps the chuckles coming and never overreaches itself, then Hayate is your man; particularly if your anime trivia is up to snuff.
Moribito DVD 4 Though the story drags a bit through this run of three filler episodes, the series still looks great, offers another amazing action scene, and does its job well in world-building and character development departments. That should be enough to sustain fans until the meat of the main story returns.
Black Lagoon GN 7 Bigger isn't always better, and setting up a massive, all-encompassing storyline sometimes has a way of backfiring on itself.
Madlax DVD Complete Collection It's an excruciatingly slow narrative striptease; a long and leisurely mystery in which nebulous conspiracies, paranormal bonds and ancient, evil tongues coalesce into something ambitious, messy and absorbingly atmospheric.
Skip Beat! GN 17 Although this is the weakest volume to be published so far, Skip Beat! remains one of the best contemporary shoujo manga series—hands down—that Viz Media is currently releasing in English. It is simply not to be missed…especially if you have a weakness for showbiz stories spiced up with a heroine's epic quest for vengeance.
Gantz GN 4-5 Gore and violence rule the day, Kei gets his heroic moment, and the big-breasted hot girl still appears once per chapter even though she accomplishes absolutely nothing.
xxxHolic DVD Box Set (Hyb) DVD There may be moments of genuine supernatural wonder in this show, but they're too often drowned out by moments of genuine mediocrity.
Jyu-Oh-Sei GN 1-3 Jyu-Oh-Sei, now fully available in well-adapted (if questionably edited) English, is one of the best manga series to see publication this year. The story, developed over the course of a decade from start to finish, is an operatic example of social science fiction, set in a far future where humanity has taken to the stars and colonized other solar systems.
eX-Driver the Movie DVD First-rate artwork and animation, but everything else after that falls a bit short ... Kosuke Fujishima is still the master artist of pretty girls and awesome cars.