And… I’m back.
All of last week was pretty intense, and SPX more or less soaked up every remaining drop of energy, so I’ve been just resting and relaxing since Monday, catching up on some sleep, as well as some games. There’s literally a pile that’s accumulated over the past week or so that only now have I been able to tackle, though most of that mountain is courtesy of MTV and isn’t just games but numerous plastic guitars and drums; as somewhat previously mentioned, I never got my Rock Band 2 package as I was supposed to a few weeks back because of some mix-up, so once they got more gear in, a gigantic box was speedily sent over, though another mix-up resulted in four guitars and two drums sets plus nineteen copies of the game being inside (which I have to figure out some what to give away… been meaning to do contests for a while, so now might be the time). Anyway, that’s what I’ve been playing with Katie mostly; our band is called Hard Sudoku and both our characters are hot rocker chicks that I like to pretend make out after their shows. Plus there’s Silent Hill: Homecoming and like ten other games I’m supposed to review (in addition to how many others that I’ve been meaning to do since August), but before going any further about games (don’t even get me started about the TGS, which I’ve barely been keeping abreast of), how about I go pick up where I left off, since I’m such a completionist and all. I’ll go into SPX tomorrow, but first, back to the NY Anime Fest!
Day Two Continued
Where were we? Oh yes, Saturday: as day two marched on, the convention floor became even more jam-packed with crazy cosplayers, with increasingly elaborate outfits…
… And increasingly wackier antics…
Optimus Primes and Soundwaves are kinda becoming the norm at comic and anime show, so seeing my third favorite Transformers in the real was a real treat…
Anyone that frequents Nico Nico or Sankaku Complex will easily recognize this girl as the Vocaloid Miku…
Don’t ask me why, but I really dug this Haruko, if only for using the Wii Guitar Hero 3 controller…
Blanka!
Mudkips anyone?
Next panel up was the big one, at least for me: an hour with Yoshitaka Amano. Like so many others, I was first turned onto his work via his Final Fantasy illustrations back in the day (and to an extent Gatchaman/G-Force/Battle of the Planets, though I wouldn’t find out till years later that he was involved), but it was his awe-inspiring NYC one-man show at the Puck Building about ten years ago dubbed “Heroes” which cemented me as a diehard devotee for life. As expected, the hour was fun, which kicked off with Amano describing an idea a super hero called Octopus Man that he’s had kicking around for a while now who was a combination of a regular Earth kid and an octopus from outer space. Amano stated, via his translator: “[Octopus Man] would be an environmental warrior… plus his enemy would be Shark Man.” And then he demonstrated how he would walk up walls with his suctions cups, while not only mimicking the hand motions, but also making the suction noises. Funny guy!
Amano also explained another story he was working on, some kind of futuristic adventure/mystery yarn in which some fellow finds the gateway to another time or another world somewhere in Washington Square Park. The dude loves New York City, and noted that he gets much of inspiration from where he is at the moment. Another neat tidbit was how when he was a kid, he used to love American comics, but they were not easily accessible, though he did stumble across a used book store with a box of cheap comics. He was a major fan of Neil Adams, so whenever he came across a book with one of his covers, he’d go “SCORE!” and immediately nab it, though he immediately discovered that the person who did the covers did not always do the interior art, much to his chagrin. As for current projects, he has many: one is for Dark Horse called Shinjuku, a tale that connects that ward of Tokyo to Los Angeles somehow, involving Yakuza and subterranean monsters, though he said his deadline was in October to hand stuff in and that’s apparently “Not good at all!” And for this particular project, he’s working with another artist identified only as Minc. Hmmm.
… That there was a dude, a rather big, tough looking one, dressed as a Moogle, which you don’t see that much anymore. Anyhow, when asked what he thought of CGI, Amano stated he didn’t really like it in general (same here), and what he wishes he could do more of but can’t, the reply was more murals but feels that his techniques need work (though from what I recall, at his show ten years ago, I totally beg to differ). The topic of movies then came up; apparently the night before, his NY Salad was screened somewhere in the city (which I actually saw on Japanese television last year and didn’t know it was by him till I looked up on it just now… and you can see it here). Again, back to his ideas coming from whatever the heck he was doing at the moment, one night while he was staying in the Big Apple, he was making a salad and… thought one of the lettuce leaves looked like a fairy? Though the juiciest revelation is how he’s apparently directing a feature length film that’s a combination of animation and live action. There’s apparently 10 stories in the whole thing in total, and one of them, the 9th one I believe, will be done in CGI, but Lapis, which does the intros for video games in Japan (I believe they’ve done work for Square-Enix and Capcom… I want to say they were the ones behind the super excellent intro to Onimusha 3, though I could be totally wrong here).
Then came the give-away. Amano had ultra limited edition Vampire Hunger D and Final Fantasy shirts to pass out, with his artwork blazoned on them, and I knew that I absolutely had to have one. Knowing what great luck Hilary had the night before when it came to getting prizes, I crossed my fingers and hoped that a bit of her mojo might rub off on me for this one moment. First you had to make a statement about his work, and I mentioned how none of the CGI in the world has ever come close to Amano’s mastery of the pen and paper, nor will it ever in the foreseeable future. Hey, what a way to kiss ass, but I meant it, and most importantly, the sentiment got me into the semifinals. Then, once enough people were selected, it was everyone against Amano in the most tense game of rock, paper, scissor I’ve ever been part of. Round after round after round people were eliminated, but I managed to stick around, by following my gut instinct and stick with scissors. And to the victor, the spoils…
K, back to the show floor; here’s a trio of Castle Crashers!
Another personal favorite of mine from the weekend was this combination Daisy, from Super Mario Sluggers, and Farrah Fawcett…
Then you had this mermaid, who like the two girls in very fancy dresses from before, just sat there on the floor the whole time, just smiling and occasionally posing with some fat/creepy dude that wants his picture taken with a girl…
… Obviously some girl who wants to get into modeling and using anime dorks as an easy in. Not pictured was her mom who stood by her the entire time, keeping an eye out, I suppose.
A couple of Street Fighters…
And some more (and the only SF4 cosplayer I saw the entire time)…
Some more Gurren Lagann…
Just some sexy maid, who also looked like a real ass-kicker…
When I got separated with Hilary, she noted that I had missed the girl whose dress was made out of Pokemon cards. Well, eventually, I found her!
Devil May Cry everyone…
It’s the Pedo Bear!
And the Juggernaut!
I already posted a pic of some Sonic cosplay before, but I just love the look on the girl playing Knuckles…
When Hilary and I spotted this kid, we just knew that a picture was in order…
It was around this moment that I decided to check out a panel on fan-fiction writing, with a focus on Mary Sues (that’s when someone places themselves in their literary/film/anime/video game universe, and they become the center of that world… like if some girl wrote herself in the Harry Potter universe as the newest student at Hogwarts, and next thing you know, Harry, Ron, and Snape are all trying their best to bang her, which apparently is a scenario that is played out a lot), while Hilary went to check out the AMV contest. The fan-fic panel at ICON was a glorious train-wreck and I was hoping for the same this time around. Though all excitement immediately faded away when I saw the same folks from the homophobic Kingdom Hearts panel, the dudes from Disorganization 13, on-stage. Yet within the first ten seconds it was clear that crowd was pretty much insane, hence why I still stuck around. Though I was less than thrilled when the same Lenny-esque guy from before, who during anime parliament went “I wanna be plushie-fied!” yet during the aforementioned Kingdom Hearts debacle screamed “Death to gays!” was once again present. He btw also stated that all gays should die for this one, even though the subject matter of homosexuality was never once touched upon, and I also feel the need to point out how he was dressed up as Squall from Final Fantasy 8 from head to toe, and was also carrying around a small plushie version of the character. But anyway… You also had your standard fare crazy, like the one guy that sits way up front who wouldn’t shut the hell up and had something to say about EVERYTHING. This particular guy who knew a thing or ten about writing because he had a book published! Though I’m willing to bet about a thousand dollars that he went to one of those print on demand places and made them himself, but that doesn’t matter, he’s proof that if you just follow your dreams, anything can happen! Also, this person had a very bad haircut, also par of the course, and was profusely sweating.
I will admit that the main dude from Disorganization 13 that had gotten on my nerves so much previously for not having much to say and just hogging the spotlight actually had some fairly interesting things to say about the subject at hand. Not that I agreed with much of it. He first pointed out that Neil Gaiman was a prominent fan-fiction artist, who won a Hugo award for his short story Study In Emerald, which has Sherlock Holmes in the world of Cthulhu. Going back even further, this person also equated Bardic traditions to basically being fan-fiction, and even drew comparisons between Shakespeare to your average fan-fic writer because he was reinterpreting old stories from all over Europe for his audience (okay, that’s a stretch right there). Works like Don Quixote, Dracula, and even Sherlock Holmes are all supposedly fan-fiction as well, which led to him segueing to the fan-fic panel from last year where one of the moderators stated that fan-fic was not a valid form of writing or something to that extent, which apparently got that person fired (given the source of information, that statement has to be taken with a grain of salt, though I do agree with the “Hey, a good story is a good stroy” statement 100%). Bonus points for bragging about how he personally got someone axed for being “stupid” and disparaging the good name of the craft. He also had the bitter nerd shtick going strong, which is something that seriously needs to be stamped out across the board pronto, but back to the panel…
Truth be told, the moderator did bring up some really valid points, such as how setting alone is not good enough to be the plot alone and that self insertion (again, Mary Sues) is never a good thing because “You people are not interesting as is, even with super powers” (which hilariously enough got a LOT of people in audience upset). He also brought up the need for more criticism, because too many are afraid to say anything negative (while those that do complain often do so in a less than constructive manner), which actually touches upon the real reason why fan-fic writers really rub me off the wrong way, at least those into the scene as articulated by fanfiction.net. Aside from the fact that I simply find the spending of so much time and energy toiling away on tales featuring characters and worlds one has not created to be such a tremendous and absurd waste of time and energy (even though I am willing to admit that there is some practical applications to such a pursuit; not only is it a decent writing exercise, to a certain extent, but I would have to imagine writing a bunch of fake Star Trek stories might help one get a job with Paramount of they’re looking for people who understand the universe and all its associated junk), what really drives me up the f’n wall is how closed off the entire world is from everyone else, how its participants are so unwilling to reach out and receive feedback from the outside. The only way a writer can improve and succeed is to recieve as much input as possible, and the way everyone goes about business is, in a word, masturbatory. I sympathize with the need for a creative outlet, and writing some goofy tale about what would happen if They Might Be Giants were to perform a special performance at Hogwarts when all of a sudden Voltron appeared is not gonna hurt anybody, but as soon as that author tries to get on their soapbox and tell everyone else to how to go about their business, that’s when I call shenanigans or roll my eyes.
Anyway, by this point, the show floor was coming to a close. The energy level was quite high, and pretty weird to be honest. One of the bigger scenes was at the maid cafe, where a bunch of maids decided to play Twister, which attracted a huge gaggle of pervs looking on. Though that completely paled in comparison to the frenzy a bunch of Death Note cosplayers stirred up; it started out all innocent enough, two kids doing a live action re-enactment of a scene from the manga and anime…
… Next thing you know, two more kids also in Death Note appear and all four of them start making out…
… Driving the crowd wild. It felt like that scene from Requiem From A Dream, if you catch my drift. With the weirdest part being that that some of the participants were no older than 14.
Once the show floor was finally closed for the day, Hilary went off to some friend’s party, but I decided to stick around for the cosplay masquerade ball, which was the definite hot ticket of the night. Basically, a bunch of cosplayers hit the stage to perform skits for the audience… imagine Showtime at the Apollo, but for animu dorks. Things kicked off with a brief set with J-pop star Rie Tanaka, who did a bunch of anime themes that she’s known for, while wearing pink cats ears and a long pink cat tail…
Afterwards were the skits, which were mostly fine. Most were kinda awkward, but its hard to hate an any of the participants since everyone was so young and trying their best to have fun and entertain. So I okay, it?s like Showtime at the Apollo Kids, where no one really boos or heckles. The main issue was accessibility; if you weren’t familiar with the anime or manga they were lampooning, you were kinda in the dark. Though most in the audience seemed to get all the references of course. Naturally, I didn’t mind the two girls who did a Soul Calibur sketch. Points do go out for the group that managed to Rickroll everyone. And bonus points to the two girls that were all about Kiss (as seen in pervious fest report); it was like the two white guys who dance on the Apollo stage proper. Meaning much silence and confusion.
The whole thing was like three hours and I got bored after the 45-minute mark, so I decided to see what else was going on. Stumbled into the hentai dubbing workshop with zero expectations, which would turn out to be the best thing of the entire show. Mostly because the folks who ran things knew exactly what they were doing…
The man in charge was from Trip Wire Productions, a loud and enthusiastic fellow with long hair that sounded like he hailed from either the south or Brooklyn. He kicked things off with a music video that demonstrated what his firm was all about, which was simply one anime money shot after another, after another, after another, with hard, throbbing techno music providing the proper audio backdrop. Immediately afterwards was a mocumentary on the making of Future Tentacle Demon Hell Beat #6: The Final Battle, featuring assorted folks from Trip Wire, mostly talking about their previous films (like Leather Cheerio The Musical, which thinking back is perhaps a better fake band name than Hard Sudoku… maybe the side project then) and how they got involved in the business. This segued into a demonstration on how they create the audio for sex scenes, which I would have to believe was the real part of the presentation; to re-create the sound of a large anime penis lightly teasing a small yet moist anime vagina, they use a fork to mess around a dish of tuna casserole…
… As for the sound of anime bodies pounding, they fist a bowl of cottage cheese. Anyhow, the audience in unison all went “EWWW!” which prompted our MC to proclaim “Gentlemen! This is not yaoi!” Next it was onto business; a brief clip from one of the shows that they do voice over and foley work was played in its final form, and then two people from the audience, a man and woman, was chosen to provide the audio. They could follow the script that was provided, or simply make up what they wanted. The reason why this particular panel worked was that the MC chose the right people: folks who looked as if they were actually versed in the ways of lovemaking. My fave would have to be the dude who liked like Mr T in the audience, though I’m pretty sure he wasn’t coplaying as him. Or the dude that called himself “Sheldon Slug” (everyone had to pick porn aliases, of course). Though overall, it was the women who were, unsurprisingly, the most creative and the dirtiest. The source material also helped tremendously; one scene had a teacher trying to coax his student into urinating, then initiating sex since he obviously got off on the scent of pee, with our MC amazed by the audience’s lack of disgust (he shows the same clip at other cons, and everyone else apparently loses it completely)…
… The dialog provided by Trip Wire was also pretty brilliant, needing very little improvement. Such as one guy’s response to his girlfriend?s blowjob: “You’re going at it like Oprah attacks baked ham.” Or how one man described his tool as “My constant lightsaber.” Best was a male demanding his mate to imitate all sorts of farm animals during mid-coitus, when you know that the original Japanese dialogue is not nearly as inventive. Those folks at Trip Wire clearly LOVE their jobs. So yeah, the panel was an absolute blast!
Day Three: Today Is Lolita Day!
The final day of the NY Anime Fest was as expected somewhat low key, but still had PLENTY of people roaming the con floor and in panels, even in the morning. As if it wasn’t clear already, the show had finally found it audience, and its future was more than certain. NY and anime can go together! Too bad the same can’t be said about video games, but that’s for another time… Day three was actually unofficially Lolita Day, and I started mine out by attending Lolita: Looking Glass Luxury, which I thought was going to be a general introduction to the wild, weird world, but was instead more technically focused, such as a look at its roots, its historical influences, the prominent brands that makes the scene, regional differences, as well categorical ones, its cultural impact and vice versa, dos & don’ts, and a slew of other topics….
… I was really hoping that any of the girls who were moderating the discussion, all of whom are apparently prominent Lolitas in various walks of life, would at least touch upon the sexual connotations of the lifestyle, but none would go near it, and I kinda didn’t feel like saying something, lest I want everyone to throw their morning coffees at me, which were no doubt still very much warm. I’m also willing to bet that I if I had brought up the book Lolita, someone would have gone “never heard of it.” Though here’s something: dudes that are into the scene are called Brolitas. And here’s one now…
Back on the show floor, here’s a girl representing Toilet Ink…
… Basically they create these decals to put on toilets as part of some potty training system. The better a child does in terms of using it, the more the parent will decorate the thing. So if Tommy is a good boy, the bowl will eventually have ears and will be holding a carrot. But next time he shits himself, I’m going to take away a paw. WIth her was the main dude behind the company (which is based in Staten Island), who was there trying to sign up artists to do designs at the show, especially since he was going to some big, international toilet conference. Funny.
Here’s a look at one booth that had plenty of figures for sale. Though sadly, no mecha musumes…
And here we have the Japanese equivalent to Tiger Beat…
… As for stuff I personally picked up, not much. Aside from a pair of sketchbooks from Ryusuke Hamamoto, also got an art book collecting illustrations from Transformers, Generation One. But that was about it.
I spotted this girl on the floor and knew I had to take a pic, since I’m a big fan of King of Fighters cosplay…
… Thing was, she wasn’t dressed as Iori Yagami, this is how she normally looks! She also noted that someone else said that she looks like a video game character, but had no idea of what KOF thing was.
Here’s another girl whose get-up really caught my eye…
… And when I asked where she was from, again, this is how she normally looks.
Anonymous was out in full force, with a pretty niffty looking banner (you can barely see him, but Optimus Prime with was part of the gang, lending audio support)…
These three are from The World Ends With You, or TWEWY as the kids apparently call it…
Another Lolita panel, one that was supposed to be an open mike affair, where I’d get the chance to ask hardball questions, ended up getting swapped with some Lolita fashion show. It was sponsored by one of the prominent lines and was intended to show off their upcoming catalogue. Only caught the last part of it, the pirate portion of their line…
… That second person btw is a guy. And here’s the final catwalk…
As much as I wanted to know more about the lifestyle, I was at this point all Lolita-ed out, so instead I watched a performance by Byakokan Dojo, which is a Japanese sword-acting troupe. They performed a 45-minute play that took place in Feudal Japan and was more or less very excellent…
Afterwards was one last stroll around the show…
… Knowing that it wasn’t gonna get any better than the girl dressed as Jazz, I decided to call it a day. So yeah, it sum it up, the NY Anime Fest 08 was a rip-roaring time! Aside from a few low points (again, that HORRIBLE Kingdom Hearts panel), a good time was had by all.
Next stop, SPX.
