Adorable image by PantsDancingly
Happy Canada Day from the Kuriousity-folk! Hope all fellow Canadians are enjoying another yearly ritual of wearing our pride under a sea of brightly coloured fireworks, among other festivities your own local area is throwing to celebrate our country’s 143rd birthday. I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else – I adore my country… even if they did just raise taxes on Canada Day – but even so!
In Canadian anime/manga news today – Fan Expo has opened it’s registration for the August convention and Animinitime, a single-day convention coming up mid-July, closes it’s pre-registration today along with some prize giveaway draws.
Looking for some fun Canadian content for this special day? Be sure you have a copy of Svetlana Chmakova’s DramaCon on your shelf, Faith Erin Hick’s upcoming Brain Camp on order and Bryan Lee O’Malley’s upcoming final volume of Scott Pilgrim etched firmly in the ‘does-want-now’ part of your brain – to name a very short few.
Now if you’ll excuse me, there’re some good books to read, friends to see and fireworks to ogle at like a 5 year old and love it. Happy Canada Day!
After a good night’s sleep, day two of Anime North officially began. The registration lines began to form fairly early but paled in comparison to the line for the dealer’s room which stretched on hundreds of people down the sunny parking lot. A pleasant change from yesterday, a portion of the parking/line-up area had now been sectioned off from traffic meaning that cars were no longer able to drive inbetween groups of con-goers. Yay for minimizing the risk of getting run over!
And so – day two! (watch out, it’s a long one)
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Day one of Anime North has been survived! Mostly anyway. I will admit to unfortunately being careless to my two hours of sleep, limited food sources and sorching-in-the-sun heat that rendered me incompasetated by the evening. But a long nap followed by a hopefully full night’s sleep (pending the airplanes taking a halt on the constant very-close-over-head flying) and all shall be right as rain and ready for day two!
But how was day one you ask?
(Photos will be included in a future post as current server problems aren’t allowing me to upload them – sorry!)
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Good morning blogsphere – it’s 6:29am and I’m no doubt one of many currently waiting to board a plane and head over to Toronto for Anime North 2010!
Fellow Kuriousity reviewer Marsha is joining me on what is her second time at the yearly event and my first – being a Canadian anime fan for over fourteen years, it seems about time that I give AN a go.
Expect some recaps, photos and the first edition of a new Kuriousity feature over the weekend as we share our experience at Canada’s largest anime-theme convention! Curious or attending? You can check out Anime North’s website for the complete programming schedule.
So doom may be a little grim a word but it’s a rampant sort of tone recently with all that’s going on in the English manga-industry. I popped in on this week’s ANNCast to share some of my thoughts on recent events, in particular DC’s announcement regarding CMX and the disappearance of Go!Comi.
I’m starting to feel like all my efforts to promote CMX are being intentionally smited somehow though – first CMX’s shutdown is announced mere days after we here at Kuriousity make the decision to push out a bunch of CMX reviews (since the site’s been sadly lacking them!) and then here in the ANNCast I tell everyone to go check out CMX’s site and look through the books they have – only to have DC Comics, for some inexplicable reason, strip down CMX’s website today. Yikes. And triple-boo on you, DC Comics. What the heck is going through your corporate mind over there?
Also on the ANNCast this week is a guest sharing her thoughts on the difference between Canadian and American anime conventions. Interesting ideas there. As someone who’s been staff helping run a convention and holding panels more than an attendee of any, I don’t have all that much to go on pertaining to the concept. Comparatively I’ve been to San Diego Comic Con and Fan Expo, which are ‘very’ similar in their target-audience but different in obvious ways because, well, SDCC is in California and Fan Expo is not. I am heading to Anime North next week and New York Anime Fest in October however, so for pondering’s sake, I’ll keep the concept of difference in mind. The discussion about the semi-thankless nature of running an anime convention is interesting too. Super-duper hard work but worth it for all the thank yous and happy fans? Yup!
So check out the podcast if you so feel inclined – it always makes for interesting listening! And beware my voice, which you may be doomed to hear in your mind each time you read one of my reviews from now on ;)
In a press release this week, Canadian television station Super Channel announced that they’ll be played the anime series of Naoki Urasawa’s Monster. The first episode of the 74 episode series will play on March 15 at 10pm and continue playing each Monday evening at the same time. The episodes will be available on both Super Channel’s standard channel and in high definition. (Source: AnimeNewsNetwork)
Super Channel is a specialty channel available through most digital cable services across the country. Along with the pay-to-view channel, they also provide a subscription feature that allows viewers to watch episodes and movies previously played on the channel at their leisure. This also isn’t the first time Super Channel has added anime to its line-up. It currently has Descendants of Darkness and Gurren Lagann on its programming schedule.
After last week’s disheartening news regarding YTV’s removal of Bleach and Naruto, it’s great to see that Canadian TV still has room for anime on its digital-waves. Though I haven’t seen the Monster anime myself, I have read the manga and it was fantastic so I look forward to the opportunity to watch the series on a weekly basis on Super Channel.
Click here for full promotional poster
A little plugging for my hometown event – as a part of our Animinitime convention in Halifax, Nova Scotia, we’re excited to announce that we’re now selling tickets for a special midnight showing of Cowboy Bebop The Movie: Knockin’ On Heavens’ Door.
The movie will be played on the big screen at downtown’s Parklane Theatres on the evening of April 24. The showing falls between the two events planned for that weekend – one is a picnic the day before while the convention itself follows the day after. Each ticket is on sale for $5 (taxes included). You can currently buy tickets for the movie event at Strange Adventures and upcoming Anime@Large (a local anime club) events.
According to YTV’s website, Canadians will no longer have episodes – new or old – of Naruto and Bleach to look forward to on cable TV. Both anime series have been removed not only from the channel’s daily schedule but also entirely from their show database. (Source: AnimeNewsNetwork)
Their website section AnimeMaster, where information and blog-style posts were shared from their resident of the same name has also been removed. Both these changes came without advance warning from the station.
YTV has seen a distinct drop in the amount of animated shows it plays in recent years, in favour of playing a line-up of predomiantly live-action comedies and dramas aimed at a younger teen audience. Anime on the station has been in decline for some time and its shaky future on the channel had the final nail in the coffin for most fans when their evening Bionix line-up was moved from its primetime slot on Friday to Saturday mid 2009.
YTV’s OnDemand service, a special feature available on digital cable stations, has also removed episodes of Naruto and Pokemon while limiting the available episodes of Nickelodeon’s Avatar the Last Airbender.
Canadian television in general is a far cry for anime from what it was only five years ago when there were over 15 different anime series playing on television at a time. This included the beginning of YTV’s Bionix line-up which at the time played weekly episodes of many newly English broadcasting series including Inu-Yasha, Naruto, Fullmetal Alchemist, Witch Hunter Robin, Gundam Seed and Bleach. At one point the station was even in talks over an anime-only channel, which though approved at the time, was never launched.
Anime currently still playing on YTV is Dinosaur King, Pokemon and the more recently added Pretty Cure. Teletoon, another Canadian station, currently plays episodes of Bakugan and Domo-kun and Friends. Some digital cable users in Canada also have access to the subscription-based AnimeNetwork service which allows subscribers to watch weekly updated lists of anime series at their leisure.
Last night was the first of two showings across Canada of Evangelion 1.0, part one of a four-part retelling of the popular Neon Genesis Evangelion anime series, revamped with new scenes and new graphics for an old, an undeniably well-loved, story.
I went to the showing in Halifax, Nova Scotia, along with over 200 fellow fans – not only did the show almost entirely sell out but we also made up the biggest turn-out across the entire country! Way to come out and show your support, Haligonians – you guys rock! Winning moments include a fun pre-show with lots of prizes and trivia and an impromptu light show during the film’s closing credits where everyone took out their cell phones and swayed them to the lovely Utada Hikaru song.
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Today’s AnimeNewsNetwork has posted its list of winners for the recently held Canadian-exclusive contest for tickets to Evangelion 1.0. Congrats to all the winners!
And as another reminder, the first showing of Evangelion 1.0 hits Canadian theatres across the country September 30th (next Wednesday!). The Empire Theatres’ website has information on participating locations including word that each theatre will again be holding cosplay contests for attendees with prizes and goodies for the winners on the premiere night!
I’ll be attending the Halifax showing as both a fan and promoter for 2010′s Animinitime events, so I hope to see lots of friendly and familiar faces there :)
Reusing the above graphic because it’s cool and relevant. AnimeNewsNetwork is holding a contest giving away tickets to 67 showings of the upcoming Evangelion 1.0 film, coming soon to Canadian theatres. ANN is giving away 310 tickets in total and it’s one ticket per location per winner. The giveaway ends on September 19th so head on over for a quick and easy chance to see the movie compliments of ANN and Eleven Arts Inc.
Canada’s Empire Theatres recently put up a landing page for the upcoming special event screenings of Evangelion 1.0. The threatres and dates were announced by Funimation earlier in the summer but Empire Theatre’s page has a few additional locations and times than those originally listed from ET (including two locations now playing it in Halifax, yay!).
Two times are now listed for the showings as well: Wednesday, September 30th and Saturday, October 3rd. The movie itself will be dubbed and will not have any special featurettes playing before or after it (unless specifically added by the individual threatres).
Along with this new information, you can also now pre-order your tickets for Empire Theatre showings, something worth doing in the near future thanks to the notority of large anime screenings selling out. Most theatres will also be hosting cosplay contests in connection with the film and will have some goodies on hand for prizes and freebies, including posters and postcards, and even a few surprises.
Empire Theatres will also be playing Studio Ghibli/Disney’s Ponyo in select theatres across Canada later in the summer with final showtimes and any-applicable special event information coming soon.
Another fantastic year of being both Canadian and incapable of being any prouder! A big Happy Canada Day to my fellow Canadians and birthday-wishes to our beautiful country.
I hope everyone gets our there and enjoys all the festivities across the country. I’ll be spending the day meeting new people, hanging out with old friends, watching a flurry of culture in Halifax’s Tattoo parade and concert, checking out the Canada Day deals at our local Canadian-comics icon Strange Adventures and then keeping my fingers crossed that Mother Nature allows us a short enough respite from the rain to allow the fireworks finale I always look forward to so much! Have a wonderful day everyone :)
It comes as little surprise anymore when us Canadians get the short end of the theatrical anime-stick. Those of us who don’t live in the big cities of Vancouver and Toronto, and occassionally Montreal, can usually count ourselves out of many big Japanese animated film releases. However, in a news release from Funimation, it seems that Canadians are getting the good end of the stick this time.
On September 30, 2009, the first of four Evangelion remake films, Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone, will be playing across Canada in 67 different theatres. The film, rated PG-13, will sport a dub bringing back many of the voice talents from the original Evangelion series’ dub.
You can watch a trailer for the movie on Funimation’s Eva 1.0 website, and see the full list of Canadian theatres under the post cut.
News Source: AnimeNewsNetwork (FUNI Press Release)
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For my fellow Canadian Maritimers out there, the 2010 Animinitime site went live last night, outlining the set-up for CanCon East’s first one-day event! Most of you are likely more familiar with its parent-convention, Animaritime, the 3-day convention that is currently on one-year break until 2011 for planning purposes.
“We at CanCon East are excited to announce the official launch of the Animinitime 2010 website! Along with this we have exciting news to share about our 2010 one-day event: Animinitime 2010 will consist of two events celebrating fans’ love of anime and gaming across the Maritimes!
For the first time since Animaritime began seven years ago, CanCon East is holding an event in Halifax, Nova Scotia along with our classic New Brunswick event.”
Yay for an event in Halifax! Long time coming, no? I hope others are as excited to attend the events as I am about running them :) Hard to believe they’re a year away though, but that just means more time to prepare and anticipate, right?
