ComicCon 2007: news on FLAG, The Third, Haruhi Suzumiya

Paul

Paul

Ghost of Animes
Administrator
Leading into this past weekend's New York ComicCon 2007, we have seen a busy few days for the US anime industry come and go, during which a few anime licenses and interesting tidbits of news have been circulated.
  • In terms of new licenses, Bandai Entertainment announced the acquisition of the unconventional war drama "FLAG" (13 episodes from Gundam animators Sunrise) while Kadokawa Pictures USA and Right Stuf will collaborate on the US DVD release of sci-fi fantasy "The Third".
  • Presumably due to the prohibitive costs involved in dubbing an obscure and potentially poor selling show, Media Blaster's DVD release of the yuri-favourite TV series "Kashimashi ~ Girl Meets Girl" will be subtitled only (no English dub).
  • Meanwhile, Bandai's extremely complicated US DVD release of "The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya" took another twist as they named a controversially high price of $60+ for each individual special edition DVD volume (there will be four in total) and confirmed their plans to release the show in both Haruhi (Japanese DVD release) and Kyon (Japanese TV broadcast) episode order; though the "Kyon" episode order will be subtitled only and included only with the special edition DVD releases.
  • Lastly ICv2 have summarized the winners of the first annual American Anime Awards (which were held at ComicCon); the evening's biggest winner was Fullmetal Alchemist (including Asian Kung Fu Generation for their song "Rewrite" - the final OP of the popular shonen TV series).
 
Paul said:
  • In terms of new licenses, Bandai Entertainment announced the acquisition of the unconventional war drama "FLAG" (13 episodes from Gundam animators Sunrise) while Kadokawa Pictures USA and Right Stuf will collaborate on the US DVD release of sci-fi fantasy "The Third".
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Flag looked very realistic but very slow, seen a few episodes and it seemed to be very detailed and painstakingly thought out. Looked worth while, The Third however (if it is the one i think it is) is mindless fluff of the highest order. Lead character wins Mary Sue of anime award, as she can fight off kenshi with one hand, could negotiate a atomic bomb into not exploding, get away with breaking several laws because 'it's her' and has super powers no one else has because ... well it's cool to have super powers as well as befriending an effeminate friendly alien . While the style of plot was nice (overlapping arcs) it really lacked... well a point. It kinda drifted about gradually getting more and more OTT.
 
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Tempted by Haruhi, though not sure which version as I'm a bit baffled by the whole thing. I understand the extra price for some of the bonus material (cosplay hairband, CD and such, which looks lovely), but confused as to the two different versions of the episodes.

I know there are two different orders to the episodes (I've only watched the broadcast version), but once you have all four DVDs, then doesn't that mean you can watch all the episodes in either Haruhi or Kyon order (though wuth the bonus you get the previews), you just have to do it manually? Or is there some difference between the two versions that I'm missing? O___________o
 
I know there are two different orders to the episodes (I've only watched the broadcast version), but once you have all four DVDs, then doesn't that mean you can watch all the episodes in either Haruhi or Kyon order (though wuth the bonus you get the previews), you just have to do it manually? Or is there some difference between the two versions that I'm missing? O___________o
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Once you have all four volumes, if you bought the regular versions, you only have four discs, and you have to disc swap to get the "broadcast order". If you bought the special editions, you then have an additional three discs, with the episodes (sub only) in the broadcast order.
 
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