Category Archives: Kyoto Animation

Hatsune Miku Goes Global

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Hatsune Miku, Japan’s most popular virtual idol, will be making her first international “appearance” in concert at the Singapore Anime Festival Asia 2009. The act, known as Hatsune Miku LIVE! Performance, will use a projection screen to create a giant image of the Vocaloid singing and dancing. This same technique was used earlier this year in the Animelo Summer Live 2009 Re:bridge concert in Saitama, Japan, where it wooed 25,000 screaming fans. Hopefully, the reaction in Signapore will be just as enthusiastic.

Additionally, the main voice cast from K-On! will also be at AFA09. However, instead of singing, they will be dubbing a scene from the show live and taking pre-submitted questions. I’m don’t know why they’re hesitant to appear in concert, but I’m sure there’s a reason…

–Via ANN

Are You Excited About the Disappearance Movie?

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KyoAni obviously expected the announcement of their Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya film to generate lots of excitement and anticipation. However, the response thus far from the fan community has been underwhelming. Many fans have expressed concerns that the Disappearance arc is far too lengthy for a feature-length production. Other are merely apathetic towards Haruhi in general since the Endless Eight fiasco. However, there are also fans who are cautiously optimistic; they believe that KyoAni learned their lesson, and will produce a quality motion picture that does Haruhi justice.

So what do you think? Are you excited about the Disappearance movie? Let us know in the poll below, and join the discussion on our forums!

[poll id=”8″]

Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya Movie Announced For 2010!

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Today, the final episode of Suzumiya Haruhi No Yuutsu‘s ‘renewed airing’ was broadcast, and at the end, a very special announcement appeared.

The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya has been announced… and it’s going to be a theatrical film, opening in the spring of 2010! Aside from that, no further information on the film is available, although Haruhi’s official site will be updated with more details ‘at a later date’.

Fans are still debating whether this is a good or bad idea. However, for at least a little while, Haruhi seems to have recaptured the spotlight. For those of you wondering about the future of the Haruhi franchise, you now have your answer!

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Lucky Star Girls Destroy Mind With Macross Cosplay

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Sometimes in life an event just knocks you over, completely leveling all logical thought, leaving you babbling incoherently until you do something to alleviate the problem. This mental jaw-drop occurs for me whenever I see these new figures of the Lucky Star girls I adore cosplaying as characters from another favorite anime, Macross Frontier. Moe blindside delivered right to the eyes.

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Miku, K-On! and Good Smile Themes for Google Chrome!

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Google Chrome’s theme feature recently went live, and among the dozens of themes offered are some interesting otaku-related choices.

These Chrome themes join dozens of others available on Google’s website, including such geek-oriented choices as Super Monkey Ball, Ratchet and Clank and Bayonetta. It seems like the folks at Google are just as big of nerds as we are!

These themes can be activated simply by visiting the theme page in Chrome and clicking on the “Apply theme” button. Here are the relevant links.

Miku Theme

K-On! Theme

Good Smile Theme

Now if Google would only add live bookmarking and Rikaichan to Chrome, I would drop Firefox faster than a flaming vulpine.

–Via ANN, pics via Figure.fm

Endless Eight Sales Mediocre, But Not Disastrous

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The first Endless Eight Haruhi DVD sales figures are in, and the news isn’t good. In its first week, the first Endless Eight volume chalked up 14,104 sales. By comparison, the Bamboo Leaf Rhapsody DVD sold 26,265 copies in its first week, meaning Haruhi DVD sales have dropped by around 54% as a result of Endless Eight. Overall, this places Haruhi third on the DVD sales charts for this week, albeit against other weak contenders like Hetalia, Prince of Tennis and Queen’s Blade.

So what does this mean for Haruhi’s future? Well, the franchise certainly isn’t dead; it is, however, a shadow of its former self. Sales figures from 2006 reveal that Haruhi DVDs used to sell between 28,000 and 38,000 copies in their first week; the E8 sales are less than half of that. It is almost certain that another Haruhi season will be animated; however without significant advertising or DVD sales revenue from the current “season”, this means Kyoani has less money to work with for future seasons. Unfortunately, this could mean that the next Haruhi’s production values will be significantly lower.

Back in 2006, Kadokawa marketing director Takafumi Ishibashi claimed that “Haruhi could become Kadokawa’s big pillar like Bandai’s Gundam series.” At this rate, that prediction very well might wind up being Haruhi’s famous last words.

–Via Cartoon Leap and the Anime News Service archives

Early Endless Eight Sales Indicators Poor

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Although official sales figures for the Endless Eight DVDs are still forthcoming, early indicators seem to reinforce Kadokawa’s pessimism about the much-reviled arc’s market potential. In particular, Akihabara’s various anime-oriented stores have seen low sales, with one employee describing them as “mortal”. Whether or not this will translate into poor sales overall remains to be seen; however, it’s not looking very good at this point.

Despite this, Akiba’s shops still feature a wide variety of colorful Haruhi promotional material, some of it emphasizing the fanservice aspects of the E8 arc. The variety of swimsuit designs featured throughout E8 seems to be a particularly potent selling point. Pictures of a few of these displays can be found below. For a peek inside the actual DVD set itself, check out this post over on Cartoon Leap.

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Sighs of Haruhi Suzumiya Ends

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With it’s fifth and final episode airing earlier today, the Sighs of Haruhi Suzumiya arc (episodes 20-24 of the Haruhi re-airing, and episodes 10-14 of the “second season”) has come to an end. This arc’s claim to fame (or lack thereof) was how unremarkable it was, at least compared to the huge storm of controversy that Endless Eight generated. Fortunately, Sighs has been well-received by the fans; especially in the case of the last two episodes where, by all accounts, the art improved to “near season-1 levels”.

Select screenshots from the episode are posted below.

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Lucky Star Figma Fever: Summer Vs Winter?

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You know that glowing feeling you revel in after going to an anime festival? Well that lasts only a month unless you have something real to show for it. In this case, I was happy to come home from Manifest with a few Good Smile Lucky Star Winter Version Figmas to complete my collection. Was not really my intention to buy them, but am sure glad I splurged. However, the lovely Good Smile Company has decided to release a new range of Lucky Star Figmas in order to continue tempting absolute fan boys like myself. Now that all the girls have been announced, the only thing holding me back from acquiring is my potentially fatal lack of money…

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Kadokawa Pessimistic About Endless Eight DVD Sales

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It’s no secret that the fan reaction to Endless Eight has been highly negative. A Project Haruhi poll found that 69% of our readers hold a negative opinion of E8 (with 16% classifying it as “an absolute disaster” and 24% saying they didn’t even bother to finish watching the arc). Fans were further disappointed by E8’s ludicrously exorbitant DVD releases, which were priced at ¥6,930 (approximately $72 USD) apiece upon release. As a result of this atrocious marketing strategy, the E8 DVD releases all have very low user ratings on Amazon Japan, averaging around 1.5 stars.  Now, Kadokawa seems to be acknowledging that fans may be hesitant to spend hundreds of dollars to purchase a substandard Haruhi filler arc. The following text comes from an interview between Men’s Cyzo and an employee of the “Kadokawa Media Bureau”.

“Even in the company hardly anyone knows why it took eight repeated episodes spread across 4 DVDs with two episodes each in order to unravel the mystery thoroughly. We are aware of the fan reaction, but…”

When asked if the E8 DVD sales could match those of Season 1:

“Well… All that can be said is that it would be nice if they sell, wouldn’t it?”

Given that E8 aired late at night (which ensured low ratings and less advertising revenue), the fiscal success of the new Haruhi season likely rests on these DVD sales. Unfortunately, it seems even Kadokawa does not think their prospects are very good.

–Via Sankaku Complex (NSFW)