Announcing Project Haruhi’s First Anniversary Contest!

One year ago today, Project Haruhi made the transition from generic Haruhi fansite to anime blog. Since then, we’ve expanded our focus from just Haruhi to anime in general, especially KyoAni’s works such as Lucky Star and K-ON!. However, many visitors to our site still believe us to be merely a Haruhi fansite. Since we have no plans to change our name, how can we let our readers know that we’re more than just Haruhi?

The solution is simple: we need a tagline.

Sadly, our staff isn’t very good at coming up with clever slogans. That’s why we’re turning to our loyal readers for help. We’d like for YOU to come up with a short, catchy tagline for us; something that lets visitors know we’re a fun, community-oriented anime blog dedicated to all things KyoAni.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a contest without a prize. Whoever submits the winning tagline will receive a $50 gift certificate to J-List.com, to spend on whatever you please! I recommend the Haruhi lemonade, but that’s just me.

Here are the contest rules:
1. If you are under 18 years of age, you must receive parental approval before entering this contest.
2. Submit your entry in the comments below. Remember, the tagline must be short, sweet and convey PH’s nature efficiently.
3. You may submit up to five taglines to the contest.
4. Entries with profanity or inappropriate content will be automatically disqualified, along with whoever submitted them.
5. Entries will be accepted until 11:59 PM Pacific Daylight Time on July 19th, one week from today. The winner will be announced a few days later.
6. The winner will receive one $50 J-List gift certificate, which can be delivered either electronically or by conventional mail.
7. Obviously, PH staff are forbidden from entering this contest.

Well, there you have it. Good luck!

New K-ON!! OP and ED

The latest episode of K-ON!! has brought with it an entirely new OP and ED, replacing the much-maligned Go! Go! Maniac and Listen!! with fresh songs and animation.

Utau yo Miracle

No, Thank You!

I’m not too keen on the new OP; it strikes me as bland and forgettable. As for the new ED, I think it has promise, but I’d like to hear the full song before passing final judgement. I’ll have to wait, though, since the singles don’t come out until August 4th.

K-ON! is licensed by Bandai

Are they laughing with Bandai… or at them?

I’m still in shock.

Despite their financial woes, Bandai Entertainment has just announced at Anime Expo that they’ve acquired the rights to K-ON!‘s first season. There’s no word yet if it will be dubbed or released on Blu-ray. Bandai also announced a series of live-action K-ON! marketing videos similar to the ASOS Brigade series for Haruhi. For these, they’ve cast Christina Vee as Mio, Karri Shirou as Yui, “Kix” as Tsumugi and “Briana” as Ritsu.

Hang on a second… Christina Vee as MIO? She’s got a great singing voice, but their personalities couldn’t be more different. This is going to be most interesting…

I think it’s likely that Bandai will give K-ON! a dub, probably recycling many of the cast members from the Haruhi and Lucky Star dubs. However, in my opinion, their English version of “God Knows” was ear-splittingly painful, especially when compared to the original Japanese song. Given how music-oriented K-ON! is, I’m hoping they can track down some voice actors who can actually sing. Of course, I’d also be perfectly happy with a sub-only release.

Oh, and Bandai? If you try to pull the same “no Japanese audio track” crap that you did with Kurokami, I’m not buying it. Period.

[Via ANN]

Trailer for K-ON! PSP game revealed

The rumors are true! Sega, the makers of the wildy popular PSP rhythm game Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA, are turning their musical talents towards making a K-ON! game. Check out the trailer below!

Like its Vocaloid-themed predecessor, K-ON! After School Live!! is basically a rhythm game set to the music of the hit anime. You can play as any of the five Houkago Tea Time band members, either solo or with up to four other friends. (Dibs on Ritsu!) The game is slated for a September 30th release in Japan, and priced at ¥6090 or approximately $68 USD. Sadly, there’s little chance of it being licensed in the English-speaking world, so us stateside K-ON! fans will have to import it.

This news is certainly exciting, but I’m still holding out hope for a DS K-ON! game. In my opinion, Nintendo’s handheld system is more suited to rhythm-based musical gameplay. Plus, just think of the possibilities with the touchscreen…

Ew, not like that. Perverts. >_<

Bakacast 6 – Robots in Hell

That’s right, it’s the episode everyone I have been waiting for… we finally review Casshern Sins. But because even we can’t fill up an hour with Casshern discussion, we also review Venus Wars and tackle some important issues with the help of special guest Chris (aka Kagami on Project Haruhi): manga aggregationabsurd Haruhi DVD pricesthe “loli bill”, Japan’s search for new creative talent and—of course—beards.

Truly, we are the pinnacle of moe- and beard-related content. And if my script for a new slice-of-life show about lumberjacks gets green-lit, we may finally get to combine our passions!

As always, you can download the episode directly, follow our RSS feed or subscribe to us through iTunes. Head on over to our forums to discuss this episode in detail!

The music at the end is “ROBOTS” by Dan Mangan and is available for digital download on Amazon.

Railgun OVA Announced!

Mai waifu!

Those of you who have been reading this site for a while know that I’m a huge fan of A Certain Scientific Railgun, as well as its leading lady Mikoto Misaka. I’ve been hoping for more Railgun ever since the first season ended, and now it looks like I’m getting my wish! Hooray!

The latest preview issue of the Railgun manga included an advertisement for a new OVA, which will be released on October 29th. More details about this OVA will be revealed in the upcoming August edition of Dengeki Daioh, which according to ANN ships on Saturday. This announcement is apparently unrelated to the “Certain Beach Video Extra” filler episode that’s bundled with the upcoming Railgun Official Visual Book, due for release this Thursday.

Hopefully this new OVA will adapt more of the manga’s storyline instead of giving us more of that pointless filler that plagued the first season. Ah, who am I kidding… I’ll just be happy to see my waifu Mikoto again.

Continue reading

Haruhi Season 2 DVD Details Revealed

Image unrelated but awesome.

How much would you pay for Endless Eight?

Bandai has just released detailed information about The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Season 2 DVD boxset.This release will contain 14 episodes, both dubbed and subbed. Also included are various special features such as “location scouting videos”, “Behind The Scenes of Aya Hirano’s Music Video”, “Endless Eight Prologue”,  and a “special event video”, as well as CD tracks for “Super Driver” and “Tomare.” Oh, and don’t forget the exciting “interactive menus!” Oh boy!

And the best part: this all-frills boxset can be yours for the low, low price of $64.98!

Wait a minute… sixty-five dollars? Bandai wants to charge me sixty-five dollars for fourteen episodes of Haruhi? Worse, eight of those are the same friggin’ episode! GO TO HELL, BANDAI!

Sorry, I know I shouldn’t be so pissed. After all, the Japanese had to pay over five times as much for their Season 2 DVDs. Still, charging sixty-five bucks for less than six hours of anime seems a bit extreme, especially when the anime industry (not to mention the entire economy) is in a state of decline.

So, yeah… I think I’ll wait for the Anime Legends boxset. How about you, dear readers? Are you willing to dish out the big bucks for Haruhi S2? Let us know in the poll below, then discuss the issue further in our forums!

[poll id=”11″]

Bandai Announces English “Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya” DVD Release

That’s right, True Believers! Bandai has released an English-subtitled trailer for The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya which promises the film will be “Coming soon to DVD.”

Mikuru looks great in that skimpy Santa outfit! *drool*

The DVD will come with both subtitles and a dub. However, if you just can’t wait to see Disappearance, it’s showing for one night only on June 24th at the Laemmel Sunset 5 cinema in Los Angles.

While you’re here, why not check out a sneak preview of the latest Ghibli film The Borrower Arrietty?

Excelsior!

Bakacast 5 – Project K-ON!

Hey, guess what’s back! Ritsu, Shamisen and I finally got enough free time to put together another Bakacast. And…uh…this one is a bit of a doozy.

As always, you can download the episode directly, subscribe to the RSS feed or follow us on iTunes.

We start out easy with a short discussion on the possibility of J-Rock bands making their way to Rock Band before launching into a much more involved (and tangential) look at some recent poll results about Cool Japan. Oh, and I guess there’s something about a new Kyoto Animation series.

For the reviews segment, we wonder what the hell is up with Project A-Ko; and if you’ve read Ritsu’s post on the subject, you’ll have a good idea of where that conversation goes (he totally stole my Commando comparison). Also, we weigh in on the merits of K-ON!