Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 31, 2008 in
Star Wars 
Not to get snarky about it but I feel like Star Wars has been sort of run into the ground by Lucas, so it’s somewhat fitting that this latest bit of official merchandise deals with balls hitting the dirt:
Tee Off With Star Wars Golf Gear from Japan
“Sculpted art or sporting good? We’ll let you decide which best describes Bridgestone Sports’ new pair of Star Wars golf bags, each highly stylized in the guise of Darth Vader or a stormtrooper. These amazing golf bags from Japan will soon be available for a suggested retail price of 50,000 JPY, or about $500. Also down range are three golf club covers sporting Vader, stormtrooper, and TIE fighter designs, as well as Star Wars-themed ball markers.”
…for that amount of money the least they could have done would be to include golf balls decorated to look like the Death Star.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 31, 2008 in
Hobbies and Collections 
I can’t go a day without my daily fix of lolcats, and one of my favorite in-jokes are the constant references to the mysterious creature known as ceiling cat. In honor of this net meme tubbypaws has created a papercraft kit so every household can now sport ceiling cat!
Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 30, 2008 in
Animation 
Exhibit A: Manga Entertainment offers only four anime series on iTunes, and it’s $50 for a season pass for 26 episodes of Ghost in the Shell — which you can watch for free on your DVR. I’d prefer the latest offerings from Japan in real time, and yes I don’t mind spelling errors in the subtitles.
The one thing entertainment companies never seem to get is the concept of “not invented here” which is the kiss of death in the tech business. This isn’t limited the ghetto of anime here in the United States, in fact a good example of this boneheaded behavior is when you see Viacom suing YouTube/Google. So while reading this Variety article on Funimation, this quote leaped off the page at me:
“Fukunaga is also confident in the company’s pay-per-download system, which is basically an HTML-based iTunes, but for anime. “There were a lot of rights issues, and we couldn’t monetize it fast enough last year,” he says apologetically — anime sites that don’t bother with copyright laws, like the recently reformed Crunchyroll.com, have become must-visit web destinations for anime fans. Now that Funimation is getting back its piece of that action, Fukunaga predicts that the download sales will soon exceed the company’s second-biggest asset, merchandising.”
Instead of reinventing the wheel why doesn’t Funimation focus on iTunes? If they priced each episode at $1 and put their entire catalog online I’d bet they increase their revenues. Now to be fair Gen Fukunaga has to negotiate each of those series with the Japanese, but I think the Anime studios have to understand that the market is in a bit of a glut and that their target audience has grown up with Napster. Or maybe Funimation and the Japanese studios should cozy up to Crunchyroll a bit more?
I’ve seen the other side and it isn’t pretty — Hulu was just launched by the networks and I have to say that the site just doesn’t do it for me. I’ve visited it only a few times, while I still find myself visiting YouTube and DailyMotion several times a day. Although it’s a different culture showbiz should embrace rather than emulate the techies.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 30, 2008 in
Star Trek 
Ah yes the “good old days” of primitive 20th Century Earth! Back then before them there internets it was a strange world when Starship Captains were played by real men of grit and action like the Shat and we had quaint customs like buying our New Year’s calendars in December. But now things are much better: We can order our New Year’s calendars before Memorial Day!
Any way I do hope that William Shatner is getting a cut of the above Star Trek: 2009 Wall Calendar (because God knows he won’t be getting any sort of pay check from the upcoming film from J.J. Abrams who claims to not be able to figure out a plot device like a cameo to include Bill — but no I’m not bitter about it). Shown below is the Star Trek: Ships of the Line: 2009 Wall Calendar
for you hardware fanboys:
Read more…
Posted by Guest Author on Mar 29, 2008 in
Comix 
If you’re into anime at all, you’ve probably heard of its most famous manga creators Shirow Masamune (Ghost in the Shell), CLAMP (Magic Knight Rayearth, X, Tsubasa Chronicle), and Rumiko Takahashi (Ranma 1/2, InuYasha). You may even know Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball Z), Ken Akamatsu (Love Hina), and the godfather of manga himself, Osamu Tezuka (Astroboy, Black Jack). But these are only the most famous few drops in a sea of manga creators: Here is one of picks for the ten mangaka you really need to know— and keep an eye on:
Matsuri Hino
The first volume of Matsuri Hino’s Vampire Knight was released in January, 2007. By the end of 2007 only three volumes were out— but the series made it to ICv2’s top manga properties for 2007. It was #7 on the list, beating out heavy hitters like Fullmetal Alchemist and Loveless. Now the manga has an anime adaptation starting in April in Japan, which is only likely to increase the franchise’s popularity.
The series follows a young girl named Yuki Cross, who attends the Cross Academy. She is one of the school guardians, who ensures that the Day Class and the Night Class don’t have any troublesome interactions. See, Yuki knows the school’s biggest secret: the Night Class consists entirely of vampires. Yuki herself is the victim of a vampire, her parents having been killed by them many years before. Now she fights for peace between the two races…even if she has to fight against the other school guardian, the vampire hunter Zero Kiryu.
Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 29, 2008 in
Hobbies and Collections 
Takeji Nakagawa is a Japanese craftsman who makes his futuristic toys out of our types of wood: keyaki (a Japanese tree of the genus Zelkova), teak, walnut and white ash. There’s an interesting article on him at coolhunting.com, and his website is take-g.com.
Read more…
Posted by Guest Author on Mar 28, 2008 in
Comix 
If you’re into anime at all, you’ve probably heard of its most famous manga creators Shirow Masamune (Ghost in the Shell), CLAMP (Magic Knight Rayearth, X, Tsubasa Chronicle), and Rumiko Takahashi (Ranma 1/2, InuYasha). You may even know Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball Z), Ken Akamatsu (Love Hina), and the godfather of manga himself, Osamu Tezuka (Astroboy, Black Jack). But these are only the most famous few drops in a sea of manga creators: Here is one of picks for the ten mangaka you really need to know— and keep an eye on:
Takeshi Obata
Takeshi Obata is an odd member of this list: the only one who has never written a hit manga (in fact, he’s only written one manga, period). And yet, he’s also one of the most well-known and well-loved creators in my 10some. Why? Because he is the artist behind the phenomenal hit Death Note, as well as the popular board game shounen series Hikaru no Go and the upcoming shounen action series Blue Dragon, based on a popular game.
Obata is a rare sort of shounen artist: his style is very heavy on the details, whether on facial expressions, in backgrounds, or on clothing. His drawings are also more fashion-conscious than your average Naruto issue, often featuring recent trends in clothing and accessories.
But whether the art is for a go tournament in Hikaru or a shinigami consulting with a human in Death Note, Obata’s art is always extraordinarily attractive and, to put it simply, just plain cool.
Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 28, 2008 in
Games 
I’m so burned out when it comes to seeing yet another cool gamer themed t-shirt which is why the Pac-Man Maze Hoodie above caught my eye. ‘Cause I’ve got Pac-Man fever…
Found via likecool.com.
Posted by Guest Author on Mar 27, 2008 in
Comix 
If you’re into anime at all, you’ve probably heard of its most famous manga creators Shirow Masamune (Ghost in the Shell), CLAMP (Magic Knight Rayearth, X, Tsubasa Chronicle), and Rumiko Takahashi (Ranma 1/2, InuYasha). You may even know Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball Z), Ken Akamatsu (Love Hina), and the godfather of manga himself, Osamu Tezuka (Astroboy, Black Jack). But these are only the most famous few drops in a sea of manga creators: Here is one of picks for the ten mangaka you really need to know— and keep an eye on:
Peach-Pit
This twosome has long been a hit amongst hardcore anime fans for their cult series Rozen Maiden, about a collection of living dolls that have to fight to become “Alice.” The series has proven to be extremely viral, and its characters are arguably more popular than the actual series itself.
Unfortunately for Rozen Maiden fans, a dispute between Peach-Pit and the editors at Rozen Maiden’s magazine, Monthly Comic Birz, led to the series getting a sudden an anticlimactic ending. Fans hope that the dynamic duo will continue the series elsewhere, but there is no news.
Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 27, 2008 in
Hobbies and Collections 
I’ve always admired art from clutter! And these robots are quite charming at that:
Guy Robot
“Each Guy Robot is a one-of-a-kind handmade creation. The piece parts that go into each Guy Robot flow from a range of industrial tributaries: aerospace and avionics surplus suppliers, automotive salvage yards, long-haul microwave equipment recyclers, decommissioned plumbing and refrigeration remnants, vintage hand-tool swap-meet winnings. And, yes, truth be told, sometimes the perfect Guy Robot find is that gem that is spotted and rescued from among the flotsam hauled to the curb by the neighbors and otherwise destined for final disposal.”
Shown above are Shock who urges you to spay or neuter your pets, and Euclid who remains shy about discussing his special surveillance capablities.
Posted by Guest Author on Mar 26, 2008 in
Comix 
If you’re into anime at all, you’ve probably heard of its most famous manga creators Shirow Masamune (Ghost in the Shell), CLAMP (Magic Knight Rayearth, X, Tsubasa Chronicle), and Rumiko Takahashi (Ranma 1/2, InuYasha). You may even know Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball Z), Ken Akamatsu (Love Hina), and the godfather of manga himself, Osamu Tezuka (Astroboy, Black Jack). But these are only the most famous few drops in a sea of manga creators: Here is one of picks for the ten mangaka you really need to know— and keep an eye on:
Tachibana Higuchi
You may not have heard of Tachibana Higuchi or her manga Gakuen Alice just yet, but TOKYOPOP is guaranteeing that you will. They’re positioning it to be the new shoujo hit, to replace the uber-popular Fruits Basket when it ends in 2009.
The series features Mikan, a young girl whose best friend, the uber-intelligent Hotaru, leaves town to go to an exclusive school. Mikan, desolate without her friend, runs away to attend the same school: Gakuen Alice. At the school, she learns that “Alice” isn’t just a name, it’s a magic power— one that every student at Gakuen Alice has, but its form varies with each student.
Gakuen Alice isn’t Higuchi’s first manga, but it’s her first to be released in English, and is being positioned to be a big hit in the U.S. if TOKYOPOP gets its way. With fun characterizations, an interesting plot surrounding a mysterious school and its student bodies, and Higuchi’s cute art, the odds are certainly in its favor.
Gia Manry is a Portland, OR-based professional writer specializing in pop culture/entertainment writing. Read up on more of her work at giapet.net or hire her at GiaManry.com.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Mar 26, 2008 in
Fandom 
I admit it, this story is somewhat lackluster — but that photo above was just sooooo cute that I had to blog it:
Free Train Rides For Ninjas In Mie Prefecture
“Passengers dressed in ninja costumes will be given free travel along the Iga Tetsudo line from April 1 to May 6 to mark the city’s popular ninja festival, railroad officials said. Iga Tetsudo, which took over the running of the old Kintetsu Iga Line in October last year, is making the offer as part of the Iga Ueno Ninja Festa, a festival that celebrates the Mie Prefecture city’s links with the ancient stealth art of ninjutsu.”