LIVE: Trapped in Purgatory, A Human Object... Alive

It's been a good while since I last had a piece ready for Christmas Day, 2016's Demo Disc for Geisters: Fractions of the Earth to be exact, but I'm in the mood for doing one this year. The reason for that is because exactly 10 years ago, for Christmas 2015, I put out a review for Hareluya, the 1992 Shonen Jump manga by Haruto Umezawa (his first manga under his real name, as he previously used the pen name Masato Umezawa) that wound up only lasting 10 chapters before being quickly axed. However, said axing was seemingly because while the initial "Son of God" angle didn't appeal to readers the manga actually did start to find an audience once it transitioned into being more of a standard delinquent manga. Therefore, so as to not have the deific elements potentially cause problems later on down the line, Umezawa would end Hareluya early (though still giving it a proper finale) & instead reboot it as a pure delinquent manga later that same year, with the end result being (Hareluya II) BØY, a series that would reimagine the titular Hareluya Hibino as simply a (nigh-indestructible) human high schooler, while the friends "God Hareluya" made in the first manga would be reimagined as "BØY Hareluya's" friends. BØY would run all the way until early 1999 & last 296 chapters (including the initial one-shot, which is effectively Chapter 0) across 33 volumes, making it the seventh longest-running manga to debut during Jump's "Golden Age" (after JoJo Parts 1-5, Dragon Ball, Rokudenashi Blues, Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai, City Hunter, & Sakigake!! Otoko Juku, all of which were 300+ chapters), & the 27th longest-running manga in Jump's entire history (also the second-longest sub-300 chapter manga in Jump, after The Gutsy Frog, by only a single chapter). It was also one of the magazine's most popular manga of the 90s, with it being a consistent presence in the "Top 3 to 4" spots in most issues of Shonen Jump between 1993 & 1997, often seen alongside the likes of Dragon Ball, Slam Dunk, & Rurouni Kenshin.

Like many other iconic mangaka in Jump, though, Haruto Umezawa would have trouble trying to maintain anything remotely as successful in the magazine following BØY's finale. His follow-up series, 2000's Bremen (about a group of friends who want to become "rock gods"), would last a respectable 82 chapters across nine volumes before coming to an end in late 2001, but then 2002's Sword Breaker (a fantasy series with isekai/reincarnation elements) would last only a mere 17 chapters (including the original one-shot) before getting cancelled. Amusingly enough, Umezawa recently did return to the world of Sword Breaker when his 2021 manga Even in Another World Our Protagonist Isn't Afraid of Being Him!!! revealed late into its run that the lead was actually the reincarnation of Sword Breaker's hero; a clever way to revive a cancelled manga, in a sense. Anyway, after Sword Breaker's cancellation Umezawa would take a year off from making manga, seemingly to figure out what to do next, before returning in Issue #3 of Shonen Jump in 2004 with his next serialized manga for the magazine, LIVE (pronounced "Laiv", not "Liv"), which actually saw Umezawa sort of return to what he had done with the original Hareluya 12 years prior, only now the Son of God was replaced with a demon from Hell.

Unfortunately, LIVE would actually wind up lasting the same exact number of chapters as Hareluya did, a mere 10, before getting cancelled & ending in Issue #14, and this would actually mark the end of Haruto Umezawa's run with Shonen Jump, after 14 years (dating back to 1990's Shuten☆Doji, as Masato Umezawa). By the end of 2004 Umezawa would debut his next series, the Lamborghini-focused car manga Countach (technically pronounced "koon-tosh", but in Japanese is pronounced "cown-tahk"), in Issue #41 of Weekly Young Jump & it would wind up being Umezawa's second-longest serialization, running until Issue #41 of 2012 across 28 volumes; since then Umezawa hasn't had a serialization run longer than three volumes, max. So, to celebrate the 10th Anniversary of my Christmas Day review of Hareluya (i.e. the "start" of "Haruto" Umezawa's time in Shonen Jump), let's see how LIVE (i.e. the end of Haruto Umezawa's time in Shonen Jump) came out & if it's still worth reading today, as I feel that Hareluya is honestly an early cancellation that holds up rather well with time.

Riot (of the World): Billy the Kid Versus Constant Hiatuses

Born on November 20, 1970 in Kasuga, Aichi, Satoshi Shiki seemingly knew that manga was what he wanted to do early on, as after graduating from Kyoei Private High he moved straight to Tokyo with some friends to make doujin manga. He would then make his professional debut in the August 1991 issue of Kadokawa Shoten's Comic GENKi magazine, a supplemental to Newtype Magazine, with the one-shot Tsumi to Batsu/Crime & Punishment, & over time Satoshi Shiki would find notoriety in the manga industry for his distinctive character design style & general versatility. While he created created original manga like Kami-Kaze & XBlade, more recently he's known for manga adaptations of other works, namely Persona×Detective Naoto (a non-canon sequel to Persona 4), Attack on Titan: Before the Fall (based on Ryu Suzukaze's light novel prequel of the hit manga), The Legend of Dororo & Hyakkimaru (a remake of Osamu Tezuka's iconic work from the 60s, which Shiki only recently finished up), & currently Casshan R (based on Tatsunoko's iconic cyborg superhero from 70s). Shiki has also provided artwork & character designs for titles like the Louie the Rune Soldier (the very first book, at least, before being replaced by Mamoru Yokota) & Sega's online TCG Sangokushi Taisen, while his art style was the visual identity for the tabletop RPG series Shadowrun throughout the 90s in Japan, even being used for the cover of the 1996 Mega-CD adaptation developed by Compile, which wound up being the final Sega/Mega-CD game ever officially released.

Before all of that, though, Satoshi Shiki first truly made his name with a manga that has a little bit of an interesting publication history to it, (originally) simply titled Riot.

Debuting in the supplemental issue of Comic GENKi that came with the November 1992 issue of Newtype, Riot would be serialized in both Comic GENKi & Newtype (mostly the former, but one or two chapters in the latter) before coming to an end in the May 1994 issue of Comic GENKi, five months before the magazine itself would end & be replaced with Comic Newtype in 1995, totaling two volumes. Despite the short length it still received some promotion & notoriety, most notably a "Kadokawa CD & Book" titled Riot: Yuuhi ni Ochiruboshi/The Star That Fell Into the Sunset that came out in October of 1994, around the same time Volume 2 saw release, & from what I can tell was an original story that could be experienced either via reading the included book or by listening to the included drama CD; Nobutoshi Canna (then Hayashi) & Akemi Okamura voiced the two main characters in it. There was also a Riot Image Album around the same time, which was really more of a collection of pre-existing songs by J-Rock band Brain Drive (plus one song each from M-Age & The Mad Capsule Markets), though Kaoru Wada (InuYasha, Ninja Scroll) was also involved in it, my guess being for the two in-character monologue tracks featuring Canna & Okamura. Someone actually uploaded the album over on NicoNico Douga, minus the monologues, & it's enjoyably 90s electronic rock & (sort of) industrial metal. However, Riot itself was never properly finished, instead merely stopping during a lull in the story. It looks to be that Shiki simply became preoccupied with other work during Riot's serialization, namely his stuff with Shadowrun & also doing work for Metal Hazard Mugen (a planned anime that wound up never making it past pre-production), & his next manga serialization wouldn't be until 1997 with Kami-Kaze for Kodansha's Monthly Afternoon magazine, which would run until 2003. While making Kami-Kaze, though, Shiki would decide to return to Riot in 1998, this time working with Shueisha to not only re-release the initial two volumes, now under the title Riot of the World, but also serialize new chapters that appeared in Ultra Jump magazine.

However, this revival was rather short lived, running between Issue #23 of 1998 & Issue #29 of 1999, with only one more volume of content getting made before the manga would go on hiatus for a second time, once again leaving the series unfinished to this very day. However, Satoshi Shiki actually did say in a random response to a quote tweet I made when he shared old artwork of it in 2018 that he would love to return to Riot of the World again one day. I should also note that there is a book out there titled Riot Versus the World that looks to have come out in mid-2001, after Volume 3 of Riot of the World's January 2000 release, but from what I can tell it was a self-published doujin by Shiki & his staff at Wrench Studio, so I have no idea what's actually in the book or if it's even a continuation of the story in any way; it could very be like Bastard!!: Unused・Revised Edition & contain exclusive bits of plot, for all I know. It is worth noting, though, that both the "Riot of the World" & "Versus the World" nomenclature first appeared in that 1994 Riot Image Album I mentioned as song titles, specifically the first monologue & last song; I just think that's neat. Anyway, prior to the manga's return as Riot of the World in 1998 Shiki's original two volumes of Riot saw release internationally, which included an English release by Viz, first via 13 "floppies" (traditional comic issue style, which was still considered the standard at the time) & then later re-released as two proper volumes. From what I can tell this was one of the last manga that had the late James D. Hudnall work on it from a translation adaptation perspective, which is notable as Hudnall was the man Viz had hired to adapt two of its very first releases back in 1987, Area 88 & Mai the Psychic Girl; Hudnall would later also do some lettering work for Viz, but adaptation work seemed to stop after the late 90s. Unfortunately, by the time that third volume of Riot of the World came out in Japan in early 2000 Viz was seemingly no longer interested in putting out more Riot in English, as they had "fully" released all of it by mid-1997. A similar thing would later happen with Beet the Vandel Buster, i.e. more came out long after Viz had "finished" it, so Riot's at least in good company.

When I was first really getting into manga in the mid-00s, after having become an anime fan, I was lucky that some of these flipped trade paperbacks of the 90s were still relatively cheap (they've now generally become more valued with time), so Riot was one of those manga that I read early on in my time as a manga reader & I remember really enjoying it, despite its unfinished nature. Does that remain true for me 20 or so years later? Was that third volume really worth the wait? Is there any reason to go back to Riot & hope that Satoshi Shiki might one day bring it back again? Only one way to find out!

ObscusionMania XV: The Märchen of Wasure Works

Man, has it really been five years since I wrote something for the blog's 10th Anniversary? Yeah, after 10 straight years I decided that I'd only do more of these every five years, and that time has come. The last time I did one of these I was 34 years old, and now I'm half a year away from hitting 40. That sure is wild to think about, since I was 24 when I decided to ditch making (extremely poor quality) YouTube videos & go to the written word, a medium that has sadly only become (seemingly) more & more irrelevant to the masses over time, though there are plenty who continue to put in the good work in this field. Over the course of these 15 years I have seen the rise of talented people, the fall (or, at least, disgrace) of those who were once big, the sudden stops of those who were once on the rise (especially over in the "AniTube" community), and the continued existence of others who are simply in it for the love of the game (both figuratively & literally), and if there's one thing I can say without a shadow of doubt when it comes to my place in all of this... it's this:

I will have contributed little to nothing in the grand scheme of things.

Get it? Because a 15th Anniversary is represented by crystal?
Also, I finally read all of Sailor Moon (& Sailor V) this year.

I know that's something that some do not want to read, hear, or see others say about themselves, but it is a simple truth of the matter... and I'm absolutely fine & content with that. Back in the 10th Anniversary piece I wrote about the concept of "legacy", and how there really won't be much of one at all for The Land of Obscusion, when all is said & done. That's not to say that there's been no value at all in what I've done by writing about obscure & forgotten anime/manga/gaming/media/etc., & the occasional bit of history that others would never focus on, as I have had people (both those who I've never met & those who I have the utmost respect for) tell me that they enjoy what I've written & that I do provide something that is sometimes clearly needed, i.e. a unique alternative to what's usually focused on. However, at the same time, the moment I finally decide to put my figurative pen down & leave this blog as nothing more than a time capsule of an era in my life I know that nothing I'll have done here will have made any real, true impact on English anime fandom. My writings here will live on, at least until Google ever kills off Blogspot/Blogger wholesale (but there's always the Wayback Machine, to some extent), but there's really nothing that any of what I wrote about will have changed fandom, overall. As I've stated before in prior anniversary posts, I'm more or less just posting into the void; plus, I'd rather come off as self-denigrating than act as though I'm doing anything even remotely groundbreaking.

Galactic Patrol Lensman: Ghetto (SF) Supastar (That Is What You Are?)

Previously in the SF Shin Seiki Lensman Review:

"Taking aside all of the hubbub & hullabaloo when it comes to the production of this film, & the apparent major headache it gave E.E. 'Doc' Smith's family (that seemingly continues on to this very day), SF Shin Seiki Lensman is not a bad film by any means. Is it accurate to the original Lensman stories in anything beyond the most basic of ways? Not at all, and it's easy to see why the Smith family hated it for that reason, but when taken as its own thing it is a good time to be had... However...this movie wasn't the only bit of Lensman anime that was put into production, and for the longest time that other side of the coin was effectively (but maybe not literally) a 'lost' production..."

As was established in Review #299, while the exact details of what happened may be obscured with time & a bunch of games of telephone, the basic concept was that Kodansha had the rights to publish the Lensman books in Japan during the 80s, via a license made through then-current English publisher Berkley Publishing Corporation. Through a mix of simple assumptions made by Kodansha, & what was more-than-likely vague terminology in the contract (see: All of the madness that came about from the initial licensing of Tetris & what defined a "computer"), an anime film adaptation was put into production without the family & literary estate of original creator E.E. "Doc" Smith's knowledge, which in turn seemingly killed a Hollywood deal that was all but finalized. Since the film was already well into production the Smith family decided to give it their blessing & let it see completion, with it debuting in Japanese theaters on July 7, 1984. That much seems to be generally agreed upon when it comes to the production of the film, but aside from later licensing history nowhere near as much is really known about why what came next, production-wise.

A mere three months after SF Shin Seiki Lensman debuted in theaters in Japan the first episode of a brand new Lensman anime debuted on TV Asahi on October 6, 1984 at 7:00 pm. It was titled Galactic Patrol Lensman & would run for 25 episodes, but aside from some returning staff & a smattering of returning voice actors (plus once again being co-produced by Kodansha & MK Company) it wasn't treated as a continuation of the film. Instead, this TV anime was a complete redo that seemingly intended to be more accurate to the books than the film was, complete with characters who weren't in the film now being here. If I had to make a guess, when considering pre-production lead times & the like, I'd say that Galactic Patrol Lensman was likely Kodansha's way of appeasing the Smith family during the film's production. I'm sure it was plain to see (even prior to release) how little SF Shin Seiki Lensman actually resembled "Doc" Smith's books, so offering to produce a more "accurate" TV series was likely an attempt to make nice with the people who actually owned the Lensman IP itself. However, it seems as though the Smith family was still not pleased with how Galactic Patrol Lensman came out, and after the show fully aired in Japan only the first six episodes ever saw a home video release on VHS & LD over there. There was also a "Lensman Video Special" offered as a bonus VHS tape for anyone who could provide proof of purchase of all six VHS tapes, with the special apparently being two extra episodes that never aired on TV. Unfortunately, the Lensman Video Special looks to have become lost with time, or at least highly inaccessible (because who knows if Kodansha still has the masters), as I imagine few bothered to actually send in their proofs of purchase for it, and while I've seen some state online that they've watched "Episodes 26 & 27", there's never been any visual proof of it.

As mentioned in the last review, after Galactic Patrol Lensman finished up in Japan the Smith family apparently hoped to let all of this be forgotten with time, and they'd never have to think about these two anime ever again... until around 1988 or 1989, that is. Somehow (whether it was through Kodansha or MK Company isn't fully clear) the company Harmony Gold managed to license both Lensman anime & had produced two edited, English dubbed, made-for-TV movies, with the one for the TV anime (titled Lensman: Power of the Lens) using footage from five of the first six episodes, i.e. the ones that saw home video release in Japan; the copyright for this dub says 1987, but it likely didn't air until 1988/1989. A lawsuit was alleged to have been made, though there's no proof of one actually being filed, but in the end Harmony Gold's license for both anime was seemingly made null & void, while Streamline Pictures wound up being allowed to license the Lensman film... and only the film. Streamline's Carl Macek, though, did state during a panel at Anime America in 1993 that he had intentions of licensing Galactic Patrol Lensman, dubbing it, & airing it on the Sci-Fi Channel, but that obviously never came to pass. The claim is that the Smith estate has since barred any & all licensing of either Lensman anime following Streamline's license, but a Catalan dub for the entire show (well, the 25 episodes that were shown on TV, at least) was broadcast via TV3 in Catalonia, Spain in 1994, well after Streamline got the license to only the film, so go figure.

For the longest time having access to all 25 episodes of Galactic Patrol Lensman was considered a bit of an anime holy grail, as while everything beyond Episode 6 was no doubt recorded by people in Japan back in the day the chances of any such recordings surfacing was considered highly unlikely, and especially for the entire show. However, back in 2016 a group of anime fans within the fansubbing scene (which was now focused mainly on older titles, due to simulcasting removing the need for fansubbing new shows) were actually able to collect complete footage of Episodes 7 to 25, and alongside LD captures of the first six episodes started working on fansubbing Galactic Patrol Lensman into English. They relied on mostly Betamax recordings, with some VHS recordings, including a multi-gen VHS source for Episode 15... and, somehow, a 16mm film print for Episode 23, with film preservation group Kineko Video being hired to scan the film into HD, before finally having the entire series subbed into English at the end of 2024. In fact, the last two episodes' video was apparently so rough that they had to sync the Japanese audio to rips of the TV3 Catalan dub footage just to for them to look good enough to release. Without a doubt, the rescuing of Galactic Patrol Lensman from the deepest depths of inaccessibility is an amazing achievement that was only really possible by the fan community, since it's still stuck in legal limbo officially. However, with all that out of the way... is this series even any good? So, for Review #300, it's time to see how Galactic Patrol Lensman came out, both in its original Japanese form as well as that compilation movie edit from Harmony Gold.

Obscusion B-Side: The Short (But Memorable) Life of Fresh Games

While it's not necessarily as readily provable today, especially since the sheer amount of "indie" games has diluted that feeling to a large amount, there's always been a belief that if you want to look for the more unique, experimental, & "weird" video games then one should look at what comes from Japan, and especially the stuff that doesn't get localized outside of that country. This was seemingly most true between the mid-90s & the mid-00s, i.e. from the launch of the PS1 & Saturn to (at latest) the early days of HD gaming on the PS3 & Xbox 360, and especially on Sony's consoles due to both the PS1 & PS2 having massive catalogs of titles (~4,074 on PS1, ~4,344 on PS2) that even the original Switch hasn't quite surpassed yet (though it's currently close to the PS1's). Because of that there were many games released that would normally never see international release due to a variety of reasons, one of which would simply be "they're too weird/bizarre" & wouldn't appeal to international audiences.

However, in the early 00s one video game publisher decided to seemingly try their hand at localizing some of these "weird" or "bizarre" Japan-developed games... and failed, but the attempt is still remembered by many to this very day. So, for the 100th Obscusion B-Side (including B-Lists), let's go over the life & titles of Fresh Games.

Not quite a "wonton font", but not too far off, either.

Originally founded in 1984, Domark was a European video game publisher that made its name publishing titles for PC & later game consoles, even establishing a US division in 1993, but by 1994 was in some financial trouble. In September of 1995 Domark would be formally acquired by Eidos, a video compression company, resulting in the formation of Eidos Interactive, and via both the acquisition of other companies (Core Design, Crystal Dynamics, a majority share of Ion Storm, etc.) & some good publishing deals the company would slowly make a name for itself with franchises like Tomb Raider, Legacy of Kain, Hitman, Deus Ex, & Fear Effect. This success seemingly allowed some at Eidos to expand their horizons a bit with what the publisher could potentially put out, and the decision was made to launch a new label for something a bit more... "fresh". So, in late January of 2002, Eidos Interactive announced the launch of Fresh Games, which Eidos CEO Mike McGarvey stated was "a boutique label, created solely to expose gamers to unique and captivating gameplay experiences that traditionally have been unavailable outside of Japan." The person leading Fresh Games itself was Kevin Gill, then a global brand & product manager for Eidos, who in an interview with Gaming Age later that February went into more detail regarding the creation of the label.

In the interview Gill explained that Fresh Games was launched as a way for "hardcore gamers everywhere to be able to buy ['Quirky' or 'Odd' games with a lot of polish & attention to detail] at their local store without having to deal with mod-chips and exorbitant costs", i.e. importing, & that they "wanted to break some rules, and break some of the barriers that exist in this industry in regards to 'What type of games do people really want to play?'" Also, the reason for not simply publishing them under the Eidos name was because "they have their own unique heritage and they needed a label to represent that, a label that represents a standard of excellence in gaming, a label that represents something new and groundbreaking" & that the titles published under Fresh Games were "something out of the ordinary". While three PS2 titles (all originally published in Japan by SCEJ) were announced alongside the label that January, the plan was to be platform (& licensor) agnostic, and while Gill was open to all genres, he did say that Fresh Games likely wouldn't publish "a character based sequel, a license, or a [sic] extreme sports game". Unfortunately, after those initial three titles came out throughout the Spring & Fall of 2002, only one more game (which came from another company) would come out shortly afterwards before Fresh Games became a dead brand by the end of the same exact year it launched. The label would be revived for one last release in early 2004, but beyond that Fresh Games was seemingly just too weird/bizarre/quirky/odd/etc. to continue to stick around... but was it because of the games themselves, or was Fresh Games maybe just too ahead of its time? Let's go over each of the five games released under the Fresh Games branding & find out!