Archive for 'Manga' Category

The world’s first Hello Kitty’s dental clinic open

“Hearts Dental Clinic”(http://www.hearts-dental.jp/), which is featured with Hello Kitty, a worldwide super popular kitty character of Sanrio(http://www.sanrio.co.jp/english/index.html) was open on Jan.10th in Koto ward Tokyo.

The clinic is fully supporetd by Sanrio, and Hello Kitty is adopted as its official mascot. The clinic’s building is coverned with a lot of  Hello Kitty’s pictures and its other designs.   The clinic has a basic policy of “full of smiles with bright and pleasant atomosphere”, wiping away a generally negative image of scary and bad dental clinics, and had drastically remodelled since last November.

This is the very first clinic with Hello Kitty as its mascot in the world, and plans to host introductory tours on this Jan. 13,14,and 15th.

 

The 2nd “MOE GUEEN” Grand Prix

The 2nd “Moe Queen” contest final was held in Akihabara, the mecca of “Moe”(sprouting passion or stimulus attractiveness of a character) culture on this Jan. 7th.  Among the 13 finalists who performed singing, dancing, or other kinds of performances, the Grand Prix was given to “Chiu”, a popular “maid” of  Furatto Maid, a Akihabara guide shop. http://f-maid.com/

The primary of the contest whose purpose is to choose “Moe-type cute or beauiful girls” started on Sep.1st 2011 and Chiu says, she is so happy to have achieved such a glorious goal because she had started making intensive efforts for the contest for about two years since the last contest, having been supported by a lot of her fans. Chiu says, “Though I look innocent but actually I like Japanese sake and have tastes of those of middle-age men”.

Chiu was awarded sub-prize money of 100,000 yen and  a right to debut as a singer to produce CDs.  Takuro Morinaga, a currently famous and popular TV commentator who is known as a enthusiastic figures collector as well, made a remark about her, saying, she is overwhelmingly Akiba-like, and so, she  has successfully caught the heart of  Akiba-type geeks”.

Kyoto Manga Museum Exhibits Manga-Inspired N. American Artists

The Kyoto International Manga Museum (京都国際マンガミュージアム) will display works by three North American manga-inspired artists from January 5 to February 5. This is the first time art from North America will feature in an exhibit at the museum. Admission to the “Manga Style ― North America” exhibition will be free, however, a general admission ticket for the museum will be required.

(マンガスタイル・ノースアメリカ展―これもマンガ？北米で活躍するマンガ家たち)
© TOKYOPOP Inc. and Svetlana Chmakova
© Felipe Smith
© CAPCOM CO., LTD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

The exhibit will showcase comics and text panels that illustrate the development of manga-style art in North America. The exhibition asks guests to consider the question: “Is this manga too?”

スヴェトラーナ・シマコヴァ「DRAMACON」
© TOKYOPOP Inc. and Svetlana Chmakova

“Manga Style ― North America” will include about 80 works by the superhero comics artist Takeshi Miyazawa, young men’s manga-style artist Felipe Smith, and the shojo genre artist Svetlana Chmakova.

フェリーペ・スミス 「PEEPO CHOO」
© Felipe Smith

Several color panels and about 24 black-and-white pages for each author will feature with other materials in the exhibit. Miyazawa and Smith, both current residents of Japan, will also participate in a discussion about manga and manga-style works produced in Japan and North America.

Kyoto International Manga Museum (京都国際マンガミュージアム)

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Japan Anime Festival in Shanghai

“Japan Anime Festival” was hosted jointly by the Japanese and Chinese governments Nov.23(Beijing) and 25(Shanghai)-29 in Beijing and Shanghai China.http://www.anifes.com.cn/anifes/index.jsp?lan=jp

The event was a part of a series of  cross cultural  collaboration events of Japan and China which started in this June with Japanese movies introduced to China and Chinese movies and anime introduced to Japan in this October.

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One Piece manga sets record for most volumes sold in 1 year

The marketing survey firm Oricon reported that Eiichiro Oda’s (尾田栄一郎）One Piece pirate manga set a record for the most volumes of manga sold in one year since Oricon began posting its ranking charts in 2008. During the period of November 22, 2010 to November 20, 2011, One Piece sold 37,996,373 copies.

One Piece manga Vol.1 & Vol.61
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“K-ON!” live event in USJ Osaka

A special live performance event of a popular anime series “K-ON!” (http://www.tbs.co.jp/anime/k-on/)was held at USJ  (Unversal Studios Japan http://www.usj.co.jp/e/)  in Osaka on this Nov.27th. The five popular voice actors,namely, Aki Toyosaki,Yoko Hikasa, Satomi Sato,Minako Kotobuki,and Ayana Taketatsu, playing the parts of the five main characters of the work appeared wearing the characters’ costumes on the open-air stage in front of the zealous audience of more than 5,000 most of whom were huge fans of the work or the actors.

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The first cosplay nationwide contest in Russia held

The first nationwide contest of cosplay of Japanese subculture in Russia was held  on Nov. 20-21 and a girl group of 23-year-old girl and 25-year-old girl won the grand prix.  This event was a program of  “J-FEST”, a promotion event of  various aspects of contemporary popculture of Japan, such as music, anime, fashion,and so forth hosted by the Japan Embassy in Russia.http://www.j-fest.org/

More than enrusiastic 800 people visited the J-FEST ,which was beyond the capacity of the venue in Moscow. At the cosplay event , 30 groups that had passed the preliminary contest out of 80 groups showed their Japanese popculture-related costumes. The winners were given tickets to take a travel to Japan, which made them quite happy and excited as they are interested in the anime and its related  cosplay culture’s “mecca” in Japan.

Coldplay Does “Uchu Kyodai” Film Theme

The British rock band Coldplay is contributing the song “Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall” as the theme song for the live-action film adaptation of Uchu Kyodai ((宇宙兄弟 Space Brothers) manga. Coldplay Uchu Kyodai is a Japanese manga series by Chuya Koyama (小山宙哉) which won the award for best general manga at the 56th Shogakukan Manga Awards and the Kodansha Manga Award. br> Uchu Kyodai manga Read the rest of this entry »

Sailor Moon Tops October Graphic Novels in U.S. Bookstores

 

 

The first volume of Sailor Moon manga stayed at NO.1 for a second month in a row on Nielsen BookScan’s top 20 graphic novels in American bookstores for October. The first volume of Takeuchi’s Codename: Sailor V manga dropped from #2 to #6.

Cover of Sailor Moon manga

 

Sailor Moon, known as Bishojo Senshi Sailor Moon (美少女戦士セーラームーン), is a media franchise created by Naoko Takeuchi (武内直子).

The story of the various metaseries revolves around the reborn defenders of a kingdom that once spanned the solar system, and around the evil forces that they battle. The major characters ― the Sailor Senshi, teenage girls ― can transform into heroines named for the moon and planets (Sailor Moon, Sailor Mercury, Sailor Mars, etc.).

Sailor Moon cosplayer

The use of “Sailor” comes from a style of girls’ school uniform popular in Japan, the” Sailor Outfit”, on which Takeuchi modeled the Sailor Senshi’s uniforms. The elements of fantasy in the series are heavily symbolic and often based on mythology.

 

EVANGELION STORE opening in Harajuku

“NEON GENESIS EVANGELION”, one of the most popular anime work series both in Japan and the world, is going to open its first “real ” or “physical” store of related items, “EVANGELION STORE” in Harajuku Tokyo on this Nov.23rd. http://www.evastore.jp/real/index.html

So far, that store chain has widely and successfully developed popular items and goods related to the anime work and prosperous as an online store chain. http://www.evastore.jp/pc/

The name of the new real store is “EVANGELION STORE TOKYO-01 ” , jointly operated by GroundWorks (http://gworks.biz/) and MOVIC (http://www.movic.jp/index.html), both of which operate the online store chain as well.

The location of the new store (1-8-23, Jingumae, Shibuya-ku,Tokyo) is in the quite popular and well-known area of  cosplay and subcultural fashions as well as a traditional Japanese culture where Meiji Shrine, one of the most popular Shinto shrines is located.  The area is popular the young and old or even foreign tourists with interesting harmonized atmosphere of  old and new aspects of Japanese culture.

This first real Evangelion Store is to be two-storied, whose first floor is featured with apparel an fashion sorts, and second floor is of  various kinds of Eva’s items expected to meet  requirements of  both ordinary fans and great lovers of the anime work series. The first floor also includes an event hall where various events of Eva series are to be hosted, such as some special events to promote the new anime movie “Evangelion new theatrical version:Q” which is planned to released in autumn 2012.

The management say they intend to enhance  more firsthand communications with fans and expect the fans to view and touch the items to feel the attractions more intensively. The store plans to host special presale events of related items  occasionally.

 

Animate Girls Festival 2011

Animate Girls Festival (AGF) is going to be held on September 24 and 25 at Ikebukuro in Tokyo.

(C) yura ©AGF2011

AGF is an event for “Otome girls (乙女ガールズ）”who love anime and manga. Most of them are teenage girls or young women, and they enjoy imagining what it would be like if male characters from manga and anime, and occasionally real-life male performers as well, loved each other.

Cosplayers will also gather at this event

Since the latter half of the 1980s there have been Animate and Animepolis anime goods stores in the vicinity of Ikebukuro Station. Anime goods sales skew towards women, and Ikebukuro is a comparatively better environment for attracting female customers than Akihabara or Nakano Broadway.

Animate Girls Festival 2011

When: Sep. 23 and 24, 2011 (10:00 ~ 17:00)

Place: Ikebukuro Sunshine City

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“Suzuki Sensei” won the best TV Drama Award of NAB AWARDS 2011

 NAB(The National Association of Commercial Broadcasters in Japan ) (http://www.nab.or.jp/index.php?What%20is%20NAB%3F) announced the winners of  NAB Awards 2011 on this Sep.15th.  “Suzuki Sensei” (/鈴木先生, A Teacher Suzuki)  (http://www.tv-tokyo.co.jp/suzukisensei/) aired this April-June won the Best TV Drama Award of  NAB Awards this year.

The story of the TV work is about a young teacher at a junior-high school who suffers from daily common troubles caused by his students ,and how he makes efforts and solve the problems using his ideas and passions. Suzuki is no hero and quite a banal guy but has  unique approaches of education over his students and settles things steadily one by one.  Suzuki’s ideas and thoughts at scenes are explained by his own monologue,which makes this work a unique one with sepcial atmosphere.

“Suzuki Sensei” originally is a popular manga work of  Kenji Taketomi having been serialized in a manga magazine “Manga Action” since 2005, and won an excellent manga work award of  Japan Media Arts Festival held by the Agency for Cultural Affairs in 2007.

Tokyo Game Show 2011

Visitors crowd the Makuhari Messe convention complex near Tokyo, on Sep. 15, 2011 as the four-day Tokyo Game Show kicks off.

Tokyo Game Show 2011

The major gaming event features hands-on demonstrations of PlayStation Vita, a new portable game console from Sony Corp.’s game unit, and more titles for Android-based smartphones.

Tokyo Game Show 2011

One of the highlights was ComiPo! software application that allows anyone to make high quality comics and manga.

Tokyo Game Show 2011

Users can easily create their own unique stories and situations simply by choosing and posing one of the 3D characters included with ComiPo!.

ComiPo!

The program also offers over 100 unique body poses and facial expressions to choose from, along with many background images, items, sound effects, word balloons
Comi Po!

Dragon Quest Ⅰ,Ⅱ,and Ⅲ are put in one game software of Wii to be released on Sep.15th

 “Dragon Quest”, one of the most prevalent and popular video RPG series now is celebrating its 25th anniversary, and in one of the relevant momorial events, Nintendo will release “reprinted editions” of the first three games- Ⅰ，Ⅱ,and Ⅲ in one game software of  Nintendo Wii on this Sep.15th.   http://www.dragonquest.jp/25th/

 The original Dragon Quest Ⅰwas released as a Nintendo Famicon(FC) games in 1986 and Ⅱwas in 1987,and Ⅲwas in 1988. And Those three games were also released as reprinted editions of Nintendo SuperFamicon(SFC) game softwares in 1993 (ⅠandⅡ) and 1996 (Ⅲ).  Most of the game series’ works have been reprinted in several game machines even other than SFC, such as MSX, PlayStation and so forth.  

This newest “Wii edition” of  Ⅰ,Ⅱ, andⅢ in token of the 25th anniversary includes  both the three games of the original FC editon’s design and those of the SFC edition’s design.  The  original FC editons of Ⅰand Ⅱ 24-25 years ago did not have the saving system of the game data and they had so-called “the Spell of Rebirth/魔法の呪文”(password) to resume playing the game  after a switch-off.  However, a player can choose either the password system or the game data saving system with this Wii editon. And You could use even an old, old password 25 years ago, which will stimulate the nostalgic emotion full of  zeal of the huge fans who led their childhoods in those days and now are adults.  　

The Wii edition will also include reprinted edition of  a set of guidebooks that totally sum up to 130 pages , and only for the first pressing ones- a “Small Medal/ちいさなメダル”（a special small token coin）in its real scale. 

Yokohama exhibition features world animation stamps

A stamp exhibition began Thursday in Yokohama featuring a collection of the world’s manga and animation stamps including those of Japan’s Hello Kitty, Spider-Man of the United States and Moomin from Finland.

The Japan World Stamp Exhibition 2011 is showing more than 500,000 stamps from around the world at the Pacifico Yokohama convention center through Aug. 2.

Visitors also have a chance to meet and take photos with animation characters at the venue, and can also listen to a Bhutanese record stamp that plays music to when placed on a player, or try the vanilla ice-cream taste of a Portuguese stamp.


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