Geneon to return with new distribution method - Summer 2008?

M

melonpan

Death Scythe
It has been several months since the President of Geneon USA, Eiji Orii,&nbsp;left his [PDF format]&nbsp;<a href="http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/images/cms/news/19784/geneonfanletter10_07.pdf">parting words</a> back in November 2007, and while there is still no official word on the situation, an industry insider and owner of the popular fan-orientated US anime distribution company "Robert's Anime Corner Store" has let out some carefully worded information on the current situation, which provides a very well deserved sigh of relief for the many thousands of anime fans who have been left in the cold since the last quater of 2007.
Robert writes in his weekly newsletter:

I'm still getting a half dozen e-mails each week from folks wondering when Geneon's old titles will be back on the market. Anime fans are consummate optimists. :) I actually do have an update of sorts,&nbsp;and I have not mentioned anything up until now because I didn't want to get anyone's hopes up - but what the heck, here goes. Geneon has been in serious talks with a major US home entertainment distributor for about the past three months to get their titles back on the street. I know exactly who it is, how far along they are, and the details that are going to make or break the deal. The trouble is I can't make any of that info public without jeopardizing our relationship with the new company, but perhaps it's helpful to let you guys know that there is something serious in the works. Whether the deal is completed or not remains to be seen, and I would advise everyone to&nbsp;not get their hopes up, but I will tell you this:

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<li>
If&nbsp;we don't hear anything by mid-summer we probably won't hear anything.
</li>
<li>
Even if a major deal is struck, it won't involve Geneon's entire catalog circa Sept 2007. The new company will cherry pick those releases like people at Ruby Tuesday pick over the salad bar.
</li>
<li>
The 'major distributor' they are in talks with&nbsp;is NOT one of the existing US Anime studios.
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</ul>
 
Well, hopefully this will come through. I'm finding myself more and more drawn to some of geneons titles....just to find that they arent fully released:/
 
Interesting news. I never did get round to collecting F/SN, and was planning on getting the R4s, but the shipping for them would've been immense. At least now (assuming this does happen and F/SN is one of the selected titles) I'll be able to get it much easier and cheaper.
 
I just hope that this means titles with obvious following like Black Lagoon, Rozen Maiden and Karin, are likely to be amongst the first to get a re-issue and/or continuation. From the way it is worded it could well be that the first things out are older complete series where box sets can be made available quickly without too much effort. For them the most effective initial releases will probably be box sets of series which were just completed before the backout of Geneon which had not yet had box sets, and are fetching good money on ebay for the individual discs.
 
Ryo Chan said:
bah if your going to die, please just do so

others wants the zero's Familiar licence you know :D
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There's a strong possibility that Media Blasters have it along with Nanoha as strongly hinted at by the MB owner, when he announced his rescue of Seirei no Moribito... I put that somewhere before...
 
melonpan said:
Ryo Chan said:
bah if your going to die, please just do so

others wants the zero's Familiar licence you know :D
Click to expand...

There's a strong possibility that Media Blasters have it along with Nanoha as strongly hinted at by the MB owner, when he announced his rescue of Seirei no Moribito... I put that somewhere before...
Click to expand...

i can only pray
 
melonpan said:
Ryo Chan said:
bah if your going to die, please just do so

others wants the zero's Familiar licence you know :D
Click to expand...

There's a strong possibility that Media Blasters have it along with Nanoha as strongly hinted at by the MB owner, when he announced his rescue of Seirei no Moribito... I put that somewhere before...
Click to expand...
Awesome. I've been anticipating a Nanoha release for a while. A Zero's Familiar release would also be nice.
 
Yes mate!!! fecking YESSSSS!!!

OK so I understand theres going to be some nit picky about what they chosse to release, BUT this makes do for the company going under.

I can only go with high hopes, because theres alot of VO that i would miss
 
So that's RightStuf, or MB, or FUNi. This has got to be one of the best kept secrets that nearly everybody already knew. BFD! It seems the only thing that has been holding it all back is who is willing to pay the fees Geneon still wants for the privilege, and the distributors are just waiting and watching how long Dentsu are willing to bear the pain and blood letting until they capitulate and go for the best offer. Pray it's not RightStuf, because if you want it dubbed, you'll be right stuffed. :wink:
 
Mohawk52 said:
So that's RightStuf, or MB, or FUNi. This has got to be one of the best kept secrets that nearly everybody already knew. BFD! Pray it's not RightStuf, because if you want it dubbed, you'll be right stuffed. :wink:
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but wait a minute aren't all these studios in America as well?
 
Otaku-san said:
Mohawk52 said:
So that's RightStuf, or MB, or FUNi. This has got to be one of the best kept secrets that nearly everybody already knew. BFD! Pray it's not RightStuf, because if you want it dubbed, you'll be right stuffed. :wink:
Click to expand...

but wait a minute aren't all these studios in America as well?
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Yes, and?
 
To be fair MB has released a fair number of sub-only series too, and Funimation has dropped series partway that didn't sell (which I can't blame them for at all. It's annoying though). With any of this sub-only situation I'm sure any company would love to release it with a dub later on if the sales look like they'd support it. So if Super Panty Samurai Nymph Moe-chan is a runaway epic-level success sub-only, I'd rate its chance of being rereleased with a dub pretty high. I think Bandai (BE) have some interesting plans with regards to this. On the other hand, I'm sure if the sub-only early releases of their experiement shows completely flop, the dub of that series will be in jeopardy too.

The problem is that these niche shows are niche shows, and I'd rather TRSI and co existed and released them then we never see them at all or face even more anime companies disappearing.

R
 
But this is only the Geneon licenses that they had for the US before they packed up and left. They are only looking for someone to complete those contracts and fill back orders. some, if not, all were dubbed to start, and a few were in the middle of that when Geneon pulled the plug, though they did vaguely state they "would try to continue" those dubs. So basically one would have the first few volumes with duel track language, but the rest sub only. This has nothng to do with any new license that Dentsu has, or hasn't , signed for since. Once those are done and everyone has completed their collections that's your lot.
 
I can't see TRSI/MB/Funimation not trying to grab the completed dubs where they exist unless Geneon for some reason makes it ridiculously hard to have them, so it's probably not worth worrying about that. Robert hinted though that it wasn't an anime company at all this time. If anything in that case the bigger worry might be no subs instead of no dubs depending on the company involved!

From the tone though I'd say he thinks the fans will be excited about it, which is always a good sign.

R
 
Rui said:
I can't see TRSI/MB/Funimation not trying to grab the completed dubs where they exist unless Geneon for some reason makes it ridiculously hard to have them, so it's probably not worth worrying about that. Robert hinted though that it wasn't an anime company at all this time. If anything in that case the bigger worry might be no subs instead of no dubs depending on the company involved!

From the tone though I'd say he thinks the fans will be excited about it, which is always a good sign.

R
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Then that could be Right Stuff as they are distributors who don't just do anime.
 
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