Here is some great information for those of you who love combinations that span centuries; like the true story of the brave YuGiOh and his friends in ancient Egypt. Yoshitaka Amano will be lending his artistic powers on an anime adaptation of The Magic Flute, a two act opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. You might remember Amano from your favorite Final Fantasy game. He’s the guy who creates the art behind the series, including box art and instruction booklet art.
This tasty bit of information was found at Radical Comics’ official website, in the description for the English adaptation of Amano’s The Magic Flute art book. That’s all we know about this upcoming project so far; so we have no idea whether this will be a movie or an actual series at this point in time. Though I can’t imagine it being a long 50 episode plus series. I love Amano’s lanky characters and water colors he is known for; hopefully he can bring this art style to life just as beautifully as his paintings.
Happy Mothers' day! Contrary to popular thought, we Japanator editors are actually human. Our hearts hold only affection for the Matron's who birthed us, even if they understand so little about our common affections. Actually, I think I love them more for understanding so little about it. In my case, if I actually could talk to my mother about Anime, I'd be a little scared.
How about the listeners, do your mother approve/are even aware of your Japanese fetish? Do they snuggle warmly into the couch when you pop in your favorite DVD, or are they relegated to snack duty as you watch your fansubs in the lair like abode you live in. This question isn't limited to those who live with their parents. I don't live with mine, but I visited and gave her a gift (Professor Layton and the Curious Village.) What about you all? Did you even remember the woman who suffered for you all those years!?!?
Forbes magazine has recently compiled a list of Japan's 40 wealthiest individuals. The winner? None other than 80-year-old Hiroshi Yamauchi, the outspoken ex-president of Nintendo and owner of the Seattle Mariners. While he's longer in any position of leadership at the firm, his 10% stake in the business sets his net worth at about $7.8 billion USD - certainly more than enough so that he doesn't have to worry about doing anything but playing his beloved Go for the rest of his life. His wealth has surged recently due to the success of the Wii and the DS, up over $3 billion from last year.
Recently displaced from the top spot was real estate mogul Akira Mori (age 71), whose net worth is only slightly below Yamauchi's at $7.7 billion. Rounding out the top three is Kunio Busujima (age 83), chairman of pachinko machine maker Sankyo Company, at a net worth of $5.4 billion. With the pachinko industry facing some rough times, however, it remains to be seen wether he'll hold his third-place position in the future. But hell, if I made it on the top 40 list, I wouldn't be complaining too much about where I ranked, I'd just thank my lucky stars that I was filthy stinkin' rich!
Much like Japan in general, a sizable percentage of the individuals on this list are well into their golden years. One notable exception to the rule is 32-year-old Kenji Kasahara, founder of Japan's massively popular Mixi social networking serivce, at a net worth of $740 million. And he's single, ladies! With more and more hot internet companies setting the Japanese market on fire (as well as the inevitable mortality of some of the older individuals on the list), however, it's very likely that more fresh faces like Kenji will make the list in the near future.
The full list and commentary by Forbes writers can be found here.
Your mother might be the one that carried you for nine months (19 in my case), but that doesn’t mean she is entertaining. Your mother is boring, and that is a fact, no a scientific law; but what isn’t boring is Weekend Japanatainment. However, if you mother is the chick from Witchblade, then she isn’t boring; in fact I’m going to celebrate Mother’s day at your house.
This week I have more of your favorite videos of random Japanese entertainment straight from the bowels of Youtube. Dragon Ball Z gets a cute new opening that should melt all your hearts, as well as a new automatic Mario stage that will be sure to set your otaku soul ablaze. No time for talking, entertainment is afoot (after the jump).
This is the stuff we have all been waiting for. This is no rehash project; in fact I doesn’t even want to be related to the original anime series. The Gurren Lagann Music Clip Project is basically a professionally done AMV using brand new Gurren Lagann footage with music straight from the original soundtrack; all with a conscious effort not to follow the original story. Gainex names this process “Parallel works”, which means they will be messing around with this story from every angle.
One of the best parts about this news is that these music videos will be posted online starting this June, so no need to fansub anything! You can watch the official trailer here, but be warned that you need an up-to-date internet explorer and Windows Media Player. Which means that once again, I am left in the dark; sad God Len is sad.
Let's get right to it: I really like Toto! The Wonderful Adventure. It's been awhile since I've been so taken with the first volume of a manga.
Forget about what you think the name means for a bit while I set up the story for you: Kakashi longs to get away from his boring island village. Don't we all? This small town boy has a greater excuse than us: it's in his blood. Kakashi's father isn't around, but his journal of world travels is. Our protagonist reads this journal daily, in between failed attempts to get off his island. It's what keeps him going.
One day, the opportunity of a lifetime falls from the sky -- literally. A massive luxury airship lands right in front of him on his island's beach, and quickly realizes that sneaking on this this ship may be his ticket to see the world. What really sucks for Kakashi is that he isn't the only stowaway on this ship.
Hit the jump to read more on Toto! The Wonderful Adventure.
Golden Week is now over. As sad as that is, you can now remember what it was like to live through it with Podtoid-san 57. A week of nothing: doesn’t that sound nice? The only thing that this is like in the west is Podtoid-san. Yes, we are the concentrated version of a week off, simply stuck within an hour of your time.
This week we talk about new news regarding some of last week’s licenses, and some new information about the Gurren Lagann movie. We have our own Otaku Debate regarding the never-ending battle between big swords vs. big breasts. Finally, we talk about the 78th most influential person of this year, and sadly it isn’t the Over 9000 guy. Enjoy!
