Locked Out of the Shonen Jump Vault? Part 3: Forgotten & Abandoned

In the past two parts of this look at Jump manga Viz Media released that currently isn't in the Shonen Jump Vault section of the label's year-old subscription service, I've occasionally brought up the idea of "manga that Shueisha forced Viz to release". This has actually been admitted by people like Jason Thompson, who used to work freelance for Viz as an editor, and it really isn't all that surprising. Most of the English manga publishers that exist today are actually owned (either partially or completely) by a Japanese conglomerate of some sort, and that means that there is always the possibility that said owner will want to make sure a specific title sees release. Sometimes it works out & the manga sells well abroad, but other times the manga will be a bomb, and it could leave the possibility that the publisher will be forced to continue releasing a title that only loses more money with each release. If you ever wondered why some manga releases slow down to a trickle, & hasn't simply caught up to Japan, that's why; it's an attempt to stem the flow. Back around 2010, Viz was able to put a stop to some Shueisha manga that just were not selling, but had been obligated to release on behalf of its co-owner, but some are guessing that this doesn't apply to fellow co-owner Shogakukan. For example, while Case Closed has managed to maintain a seasonal release ever since 2010, Hayate the Combat Butler went down to twice a year in 2011, while Kaze Hikaru (which will be ending early next year) has only seen one new volume a year ever since 2011; at this rate, Viz won't be done with Kaze Hikaru until at least 2037!

Still, not every entry in this final third fits this description, but all of them do share this fact: None of them are mentioned in any way on Viz's website, even though all but one of them were indeed published under the Shonen Jump (or Shonen Jump Advanced) label. I call these the... Forgotten & Abandoned!

Let's start things with what is easily the most interesting & unique situation there is when it comes to a Shonen Jump manga that Viz has released "all of" in the past... Sort of.... Technically... At the time. Riku Sanjo has been a writer in the entertainment business ever since the mid-80s (from M.D. Geist to Gaiking: Legend of Daiku-Maryu to both Kamen Rider W & Drive), & in late 1989 teamed up with artist Koji Inada to debut Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai, a Shonen Jump manga based on Yuji Horii & Enix's Dragon Quest RPG series; it wasn't based on any specific entry, but rather utilized elements to create an original story. It was a massive hit, running for 37 volumes until late 1996 & even seeing a TV anime adaptation & trio of movies by Toei in the early 90s. Following that, Sanjo & Inada made Dragon Quest IV Gaiden: The Labyrinth of Hell, a single-volume spin-off of that particular game, for Monthly Shonen Jump in 2001, and in early 2002 the duo returned to Monthly Jump with an original series, Beet the Vandel Buster (also known as Bouken-Oh/Adventure King Beet). It tells the story of Beet, a young teen who wishes to bring an end to the "Dark Ages" that the monsters known as Vandels have brought upon the world, especially after the Zenon Warriors, five men who were Beet's idols, seemingly sacrificed their lives to protect Beet by infusing him with their Saiga, weapons brought about by the user's very soul & life force.

Locked Out of the Shonen Jump Vault? Part 2: Acknowledged, But Unloved

For those wondering how exactly I gathered together the series for this three-part list of Shonen Jump manga, I simply looked at the manga listed on Viz Media's ANN Encyclopedia page, since it lists (just about) every single manga that Viz has ever licensed, & compared that to what's listed on the Shonen Jump app itself (plus a double-check on the website, because otherwise I would have erroneously included Fire Punch, Platinum End, & Ral Ω Grad, which are only available on the website). Through that, I was able to reduce the massive list to just 22 series, each of which I searched through Viz Media's own website, in order to determine what were already being sold digitally, & what were not. Here's where things get very interesting now, because while Viz has been very diligent on getting as many of its various manga re-released digitally (like Firefighter!: Daigo of Fire Company M, which you should definitely read, because it's excellent), not every single manga that Viz has released physically has seen a digital release. Considering that Viz has re-released notoriously low-selling manga digitally, like Basara, Saint Seiya, & the aforementioned Daigo, and has even given numerous lesser-known series previously licensed by TokyoPop new digital-only releases via Viz Selects (but never continued those that were left unfinished), there must obviously be reasons for why I was able to find five Shonen Jump manga that Viz has fully(-ish) released, but to this day remain without any sort of digital release.

I (jokingly) call these the Acknowledged, But Unloved. Of course, like last time, let's just start with the most obvious one of them all...

In the annals of Shonen Jump history, there have only been four manga that have received the holy grail of veneration: The Full-Color Final Chapter. Many manga that are seen as successes will receive the first few pages in full-color, i.e. like it was a Western comic book, for their final chapters, as a way to pay respect to its legacy, but only four had their final chapters done in full-color for their entire lengths. The first, Ring ni Kakero by Masami Kurumada, will NEVER see an official English release of any sort; hell, it can't even get an unofficial English scanlation of any sort of actual length or dedication! The second & fourth, Dragon Ball by Akira Toriyama & Naruto by Masashi Kishimoto, are two of the most iconic manga ever in North America. Meanwhile, the third series, Slam Dunk by Takehiko Inoue, has had a bumpy road to a full, official, English release. At first, Gutsoon! Entertainment, the US division of Coamix (founded by former Jump editor Nobuhiko Horie & City Hunter's Tsukasa Hojo), gave it a go, serializing it in Raijin Comics, which was essentially the rival magazine to Viz's Shonen Jump, & five compiled volumes would see release from 2003 to 2004, before Gutsoon called it quits. Combined with Toei's own botched DVD release of the anime the next year, it seemed as if one of the most iconic & popular manga in history, one that literally made the entire sport of basketball popular in Japan throughout the 90s, would never see a proper, complete release in North America.

Locked Out of the Shonen Jump Vault? Part 1: Simply Waiting for Their Turns

On December 20, 2018, Viz Media did something simultaneously insane & brilliant. It ended the digital Weekly Shonen Jump magazine, which itself replaced the physical Shonen Jump magazine that ran monthly for years, & in its place was a brand new subscription model. For just $1.99/month, readers would gain access to every single Jump manga that Viz was "simulpublishing" on a weekly basis, just like the digital magazine, but unlike before you weren't at the mercy of back-issues that you had to otherwise purchase separately, if you weren't subscribing from the very beginning. Instead, every chapter of every simulpublished manga was made available on a new Shonen Jump app, so new subscribers could easily catch up; you could also read them online at Viz's website. But what exactly was "insane" about this new endeavor?

Hmmm, maybe the fact that Viz was also offering nearly every single Shonen Jump manga it had ever published on the app as well!

A snazzy new logo, done in the style of the Japanese logo, was also introduced.

Yes, for just $24/year, one has access to not only brand new, weekly chapters of currently-running manga, but can also read the entire runs of over 50 different manga from the past, in what Viz calls the "Shonen Jump Vault", with the only restriction being that you can only read up to 100 chapters each day; for most, that's immensely more than reasonable. However, the keyword there is "nearly", because Viz didn't instantly make all of its currently-published Jump manga available on the app right away. In fact, some series, like Fire Punch, Platinum End, & Ral Ω Grad, are only available via the website, likely due to content that wouldn't fly on an app that's (technically) for all ages. Still, when this new program launched, Viz did promise that other manga would get added over time. So, over this past year, there have been the occasional "new" additions to the SJ Vault, regardless of whether they're from Weekly Shonen Jump or not, like One-Punch Man (which is Shonen Jump-adjacent, as volumes are published under the "Jump Comics" label in Japan), JoJo's Bizarre Adventure (all the way up to the current release of Diamond is Unbreakable), Boys Over Flowers (which isn't a Jump manga, but the currently-running sequel is serialized over at Jump+, so Viz tossed both in), & even Golden Kamuy from Young Jump (though, due to its mature content, it's only available on the website, not via the app).

However, the people at Viz did also indicate that their overall goal is to, ideally, make available ANY manga that ever got published under the Shonen Jump (& Shonen Jump Advanced) label on the app; naturally, achieving this would likely require negotiating new licenses for older titles. Of course, it's obvious that Viz will not eventually put up literally every Jump-related manga it has ever published in its 33-year history. For example, the Vault will never see those old releases of Space Adventure Cobra, Baoh, or Fist of the North Star that Viz released during the late 80s & early 90s, because they were done in the old "flipped" format, and two of them weren't even finished. However, there are still 22 different Jump manga that Viz has published in the past, in "unflipped" format, that are not currently on the app, so I just want to go over each of those & see what could, theoretically, still get added to the Shonen Jump Vault.

This will be split across three parts, and first up is what I call Simply Waiting for Their Turns, as all of these Jump manga are currently being offered digitally already by Viz, but are just not available as part of the subscription.

To Live & Die in Obscusion: A Memoir of the 9th Anniversary

Why does one do the things that they do? I guess that question is rather vague & broad, but when I first started The Land of Obscusion back in 2010, I had a simple justification in mind: "I want to write about the stuff that no one else wants to." Now, nine years later, after nearly an entire decade, I wonder if that justification still holds any worth to it. Now, sure, there's merit in it to those who actually read this blog, and I am always thankful that people find it a worthy distraction from a real world that's honestly only getting more & more hectic, & an online one that seems to focus more on spite & hateful discourse, but like anything one does, there has to be that feeling that you yourself are getting something noteworthy out of it... Right?

This April I took the entire month off, after consistently writing for the blog for 100 months straight ever since I started it up. To be perfectly honest, I really enjoyed the break, & it was something I honestly should have done a while ago. At the same time, though, during that entire month I wasn't exactly anticipating returning to the blog; I wasn't dreading it by any means, but it wasn't like I was missing it, either. Since then, every single remaining month of this year only saw two or three articles from me, except for October, which simply was a case of things all coming together at the same time & me wanting to cover two anime to celebrate Halloween. Really, though, taking the month off, combined with the slower pace, made me think back to an idea I had years ago that I never put much stock into: Calling it quits after 10 years.

As I've mentioned in some previous anniversary pieces, hitting just one year felt like an accomplishment, so I just continued doing it, not really thinking about how it'd feel to hit another year. Then the second year came & went, followed by the third, then the fourth, which was then succeeded by the fifth, which predated the sixth, and before I knew it I had reached the seventh & eighth anniversaries of the blog. During all those years, a little thought would sometimes pop into my head, "Wouldn't it be fitting to end after 10 years?", in a sort of romanticized or poetic feel. After all, a decade is a long time, and in a niche world like that of anime, manga, or even gaming only the most dedicated actually wind up even hitting that number, let alone continue well beyond it. Not just that, but who in their right mind would be willing to put in that much time, effort, & even money into something, only to never receive a single, solitary thing in return? After all, think about any notable anime & manga writer or site, some of which I'm personally friends with, and they've all made that jump at some point, for a variety of reasons. In that case, shouldn't I do so, as well? After all, getting that translation for the Gundoh Musashi tell-all interview last year wasn't exactly "cheap".

Obscusion B-Side: "Getta Bloomin' Move On" for 50 Years: The Italian Job's Golden (Bullion) Anniversary

This month I finally achieved a dream I've had for a long while: Owning a Mini. While I know I'll be literally paying for that decision for the next few years (it was a great deal, at the very least), until I decide to get a different car, this decision just also happened to occur on a special year. You see, 2019 marks the 50th Anniversary of The Italian Job, an iconic British heist film from 1969 directed by the late Peter Collinson & starring the incomparable Sir Michael Caine. My appreciation & fandom for the British Motor Corporation's iconic economy car, now owned & produced by BMW, came from this very film, which I was introduced to via its video game adaptation on the PlayStation from 2001, and was only reinforced when a Hollywood-produced remake came out in 2003. So, to celebrate both my own vehicular purchase as well as the original film's Golden Anniversary, join me as I go over the original 1969 film, the 2001 video game adaptation, the 2003 Hollywood remake, the video game adaptation of said remake, & finally the 2012 Bollywood remake of the remake!

So hurry up, mate; we don't wanna be late. And, by the way... How's your father?

The Italian Job from 1969 is one of those cases of a film under-performing (or outright bombing, in the case of the US), only to slowly gain a following & become an icon of British film making after the fact. In particular, director Peter Collinson sadly died in 1980 of lung cancer, at age 44, never getting to see the impact his fourth (& most iconic) film would have on the rest of the world. Michael Caine blames the film's tepid reception in the States on how it was advertised, particularly towards the infamously misleading poster that Paramount used, which made the film seem to be more focused on sex & the mafia, rather than it being the comedy that it really was; at the very least, it did get nominated for a Golden Globe Award for "Best English-Language Foreign Film". Over the past 30 years, however, the film has been referenced, paid homage to, & respected through various other works.

The third episode of the original 1985 MacGuyver series, "Thief of Budapest", features a car chase utilizing three Minis, meant to reference the film's iconic chase through Turin, Italy. In late 1990, a charity event named after the film started up, where people would run their cars from the UK to northern Italy & back, and became a yearly event that is still run to this day, having made over £2.5 million since it started, with all of it going to children's charities. In 1999, Welsh rock band Stereophonics released the song "Pick a Part That's New", with the music video parodying the film. In 2003, playwright Malachi Bogdanov wrote Bill Shakespeare's "The Italian Job", a play that told the film's plot using lines from Shakespeare. In 2005, Season 17 of The Simpsons had the episode "The Italian Bob", which made references to the film. For the closing ceremony of the 2012 Summer Olympics held in London, a famous scene from the film was paid homage to. Finally, the celebrate the 50th Anniversary this summer, Mini recreated some scenes from the film at its Oxford factory.

Still, this is about the movies & accompanying games, so how should we start? Hang on a minute lads, I've got a great idea...!

Theory Musing: The Heart, Mind, Body, & Soul of Shonen Manga

Last month I celebrated the 25th Anniversary of Kadokawa Shoten's Monthly Shonen Ace magazine, but 2019 also marks notable anniversaries for three other shonen manga magazines, all of which are much more relevant to the history & evolution of shonen manga to how we define it today. First, back on March 17, eternal friendly rival publishers Kodansha & Shogakukan celebrated the 60th Anniversary of their respective shonen manga magazines, Weekly Shonen Magazine & Weekly Shonen Sunday, which both launched in 1959; yes, they launched on the same exact day & year, because that's what rivals do. Then, on July 15, Akita Shoten celebrated the 50th Anniversary of its shonen manga magazine, Weekly Shonen Champion, which launched in 1969. Meanwhile, on July 11, Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump magazine, which launched in 1968, turned 51 years old. I bring these four magazines up primarily because I feel that they have since gone on to embody the four major aspects of shonen manga, in general. What are those aspects, you ask? Well, you should have read the title of this theory musing, but fine:

The Heart, Mind, Body, & Soul.

Trust me, putting Shonen Champion in the crotch
will make sense later on. I promise.

On a cursory glance, one might assume that all shonen manga, especially those of the more action-y ilk, are pretty much "all the same", but if you start digging deeper & really look at things, you'll notice that there are notable differences, especially between magazines. For a hypothetical example, if Jyoji Morikawa was to have tried debuting Hajime no Ippo in Shonen Sunday back in the 80s, it would have wound up completely different than what it actually is to this day in Shonen Magazine. For an real example, Masami Kurumada originally debuted Ring ni Kakero in Shonen Jump in the late 70s as a direct homage to Ashita no Joe, which ran in Shonen Magazine, but eventually realized that he'd have to change things up, not just to prove himself as more than simply an imitator but also because Jump started to prioritize other types of stories. The end result was him changing things from a more realistic portrayal of boxing into an over-the-top & super-powered style, inspired by prior Jump manga Astro Kyudan (a hyper-over-the-top baseball manga), which in turn resulted in Kurumada establishing a standard that most action manga in Jump still follow to this very day, i.e. the "Jump Style". So, to celebrate this year's (major) triple-anniversary, one Golden & two Diamond, allow me to ruminate why I feel that Shonen Sunday, Magazine, Champion, & Jump embody the Heart, Mind, Body, & Soul of shonen manga, respectively.

Guilstein: The Monstrous Abel to Gundoh Musashi's Incompetent Cain?!

Naoyuki Sakai is a Japanese writer best known for working on J-Drama, but has also thrown his hat into the rings of tokusatsu (Tokusou Robo Janperson, Hyakujuu Sentai Gaoranger), anime (Nessa no Haoh Gandalla, Street Fighter II V), & even video games (Onimusha: Warlords, The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons/Ages). This also applies to manga, one of which being Juuseiki/Record of Beast Star Guilstein, which was drawn by Hisao Tamaki (Star Wars: A New Hope's manga adaptation, Dirty Pair's 2010 manga reboot) & ran in Shogakukan's Monthly Sunday GX (short for "Gene-X") magazine from mid-2000 to late 2002 for four volumes; the word "Guilstein" is a portmanteau of "Guilty" & "Frankenstein". It tells the story of how various children start turning into monsters once they hit the age of 15, with the populace calling them "Guilstein", & how young Iori Takigawa tries to use his recent transformation into a Guilstein to help save humanity, rather than destroy it. If you are curious, it actually saw English release digitally by Wowmax Media back in 2010 under the title Teen Apocalypse: Guilstein, & is still available for purchase over at Amazon for $5, though only the first volume ever saw release.

Along with making that manga, though, Sakai also helped bring the concept to animation, with the end result being the movie Guilstein, a 2D/CG hybrid film that debuted in Japanese theaters on June 15, 2002... Maybe. You see, the film was actually finished back in 2001, and according to Amazon Japan the OST came out in March 2001, while the DVD release was in 2003, so I can't truly tell when the film debuted in Japanese theaters. Regardless, aside from having a similar basic concept behind it, the film has pretty much nothing to do with the manga. The film was produced by ACC Production, which had recently opened a new studio founded by Nobuyuki Sugaya, a director of photography-turned-producer who'd been around since the 60s, & the legendary mangaka Kazuhiko "Money Punch" Kato, both of whom have since passed away.

Wait a minute... ACC Pro? Monkey Punch? Nobuyuki Sugaya?!
This is from the people that gave the world
Gundoh Musashi?!

Yes, it is indeed the same exact studio & producer, though this movie came first. In fact, Sugaya & Monkey Punch even held a panel at San Diego Comic Con in 2001 (even though neither seemed to be there as guests, oddly enough), alongside John O'Donnell & Christopher Couch of Central Park Media, where they actually hyped up the Guilstein movie & talked as if a North American release was in the works (the third link is about that, in particular). From what I could tell, which included asking former employee (& former Answerman for ANN) Justin Sevakis, CPM never actually licensed the movie, so why O'Donnell & Couch were a part of that panel is beyond me. About a year ago or so I made a visit to the Book-Off store in New York City, and I actually came across the Japanese DVD release for Guilstein over there for a couple of bucks, so I think taking a look at a horror-ish anime movie produced by the studio that would give us "The Disaster Anime" itself a few years later is a perfect way to celebrate Halloween!

The Heart-B't of Monthly Shonen Ace, 25 Years Later

Kadokawa Corporation is one of the largest media conglomerates in Japan, and all book publishing is done through its Kadokawa Future Publishing arm. One of the divisions of that arm is Kadokawa Shoten, and on October 26, 1994 that division debuted a new manga anthology magazine, Monthly Shonen Ace. This year marks the 25th Anniversary of that magazine &, in turn, the 25th Anniversary of every single manga that made their debuts in that original issue. Rather than try to cover the 25-year history of this magazine, as its heavily cross-promotional nature makes it tricky to really detail what would be considered "major hits" of its own, I instead want to look at what notable (mostly) original works came out during the run of the manga that graced the cover of Shonen Ace's very first issue, B't X by Masami Kurumada. Admittedly, I did originally just want to celebrate that manga's 25th, but there is worth in celebrating the entire magazine's debut, especially with what's actually a rather strong & interesting debuting roster of manga.

Before that, though, let me explain how exactly Monthly Shonen Ace came about... Because it's a bit of a doozy.

Though published in October, Shonen Ace
lists its issues as two months later,
hence why it's the December issue.

Prior to the original magazine to carry the "Ace" moniker, Kadokawa Shoten already had other magazines, like shojo manga-focused Asuka &, relevant to this article, Comptiq. Debuting in 1983 to help promote computer software (though it'd eventually start serializing some manga), Comptiq would see its own spin-off manga magazine in 1988, Monthly Comic Comp, but in 1992 things got bad, & all because of familial blood. You see, Kadokawa Shoten was founded by Genyoshi Kadokawa, and after he passed away in 1975, his son Haruki became president. Haruki, though, had a younger brother, Tsuguhiko, and in the early 90s ousted his own sibling from the company in favor of his son, Taro. The younger Kadokawa, however, got revenge for his brother's actions by leading an exodus consisting of various editors & mangaka that worked with Comic Comp, with everyone moving over to Tsuguhiko's newly founded Media Works, which lead to the creation of Monthly Comic Dengeki GAO! in 1993; that magazine would last until 2008. The same year as GAO!'s debut, Haruki Kadokawa was arrested for smuggling cocaine into Japan from the United States via a close aide, as well as embezzling money from Kadokawa Shoten to help fund his cocaine purchases; he would be convicted in September 1994 & serve 2.5 of a 4-year prison sentence. In turn, Kadokawa Shoten would need a new head, with the end result being the return of Tsuguhiko Kadokawa, and after the conviction it was decided that Comic Comp would first be suspended, before being merged with a smaller magazine called Comic GENKi to create Monthly Shonen Ace. As for the fates of the Brothers Kadokawa, Tsuguhiko is currently the chairman of Kadokawa Future Publishing, while Haruki would found his own studio, Kadokawa Haruki Corporation (totally not to confuse potential partners, am I right?), after serving his time in jail & getting paroled. Isn't it nice when a magazine is seemingly created partially to spite a sibling, especially when it's essentially an act of vengeance?

Galerians: Rion: Screw Cocaine... Nalcon & Red are a Hell of a Drug!

Survival horror games are the perfect thing to experience during the month of October, but what about anime based on survival horror games? Well, to be honest, there really aren't many anime adaptations of the genre, with easily the most well known being the various CG movies based on Capcom's Resident Evil franchise. Obviously, that game series wound up inspiring plenty of "clones", but one of the most interesting to come about in the 90s was easily Galerians for the PlayStation. Developed by Polygon Magic (Incredible Crisis, Slap Happy Rhythm Busters) & published by ASCII Entertainment in August 1999, Galerians differed from the usual "Resident Evil clone" of the time by going for a heavy sci-fi aesthetic, in place of the usual zombies, vampires, & the like; also, the character designs by Sho-U Tajima (Madara, MPD Psycho) helped give it a unique look. Crave Entertainment would release it in North America & Europe in 2000, & in 2002 Enterbrain released a sequel in Japan for the PS2, Galerians: Ash; Sammy would release it internationally in 2003. To go with that new game, an full-CG OVA was also made that adapted the plot of the original game, releasing alongside the sequel; to match the naming style of said sequel, the OVA was titled Galerians: Rion.

A year later, the OVA was re-released in Japan in a new "Director's Cut" edit that turned the 3-episode OVA into a feature-length film, though only barely at just over 70-minutes; from what I can tell, little to nothing was actually cut out, aside from the OP & ED sequences. It would be this Director's Cut that would then get licensed by Image Entertainment for English release, first on DVD in 2004, followed by a release in 2005 on the most "universal" of "media"... Sony's UMD (you know, for the PSP). A few months after Image's DVD release, Galerians: Rion would actually start seeing heavy repeat airings on American television, and on a most-unexpected network at that: MTV2; this was during the network's short-lived attempt to air anime, like Heat Guy J. Therefore, there are actually people out there that would have some nostalgic memories of this OVA, especially because it aired on a well known network that didn't already have Toonami. Still, it's been a solid 15 years since Image's release, so I'd call it "forgotten" enough to be worthy of being covered on this blog. Also, the way Image handled the dub for this OVA is especially interesting, so let's see where on the infamous "video game-based anime scale" this endeavor comes out.

It's the year 2522, & an teenage amnesiac awakens in Michelangelo City Memorial Hospital strapped into a giant swinging mechanism, watched over by doctors. Hearing the calls from a girl asking for his help, he subconsciously breaks free, realizing that he has psychic powers based on various drugs that he was experimented with, like Nalcon (shockwave blasts) & Red (pyrokinesis); if he uses them too much, he risks shorting out, & without injecting himself with Delmetor, he'd die. After hijacking the hospital's computer, he finds out his name is Rion Steiner & where his family lives, leading him on his journey to find out who exactly he is, who the girl named Lilia Pascalle is that's sending him psychic messages, & what they have to do with Dorothy, the "Mother Computer" that's in control of Michelangelo City. Meanwhile, Rion & Lilia are being hunted by Birdman, Rainheart, Rita, & Cain, who are all Galerians, artificial humans with psychic powers created by Dorothy.

(Not Really) Ahead of My Time, But Too Lazy to Care: 10 Years After Starting a YouTube Channel

Previously on the 2019 Anniversary Retrospective:
"Anyway, after that entire moment with GameSpotting came to an end, life pretty much returned to normal. I graduated from high school, went to Rutgers, graduated after five years, tried making zero-budget YouTube videos for a year..."

Oh, I guess it's time to go over THAT in detail, isn't it? Ahem...
"Hey There, Gamers & Anime Aficionados!"

This was YouTube's logo back in 2009. Today, the tagline would be
"Broadcast What We Approve of, or Else No One Will Know About It".

So, as mentioned above, after that "I got published on GameSpot" thing happened in late February, I graduated from high school the following June, right before my 18th birthday. I then attended Rutgers University for five years to get a Bachelor's Degree in "Journalism & Media Studies", and it was during that time that the way we as a people interacted & learned new things changed. For example, I remember in what may have been my very first day of school at Rutgers, back in September of 2004, being told about this new-fangled website called "Facebook", which had only launched earlier that February, where college students could intermingle online & talk about their professors; today, Facebook is an absolute behemoth of social media. One year after that site launched, though, another website would launch & become a phenomenon of its own kind: YouTube. This site allowed people to upload videos that they had produced, and while online video hosting wasn't anything new, it was the first of its kind that allowed essentially anyone to upload & share content. And when it came to video games, one man in 2006 essentially changed everything via YouTube: James Rolfe.

Starting in May of 2004, a few months after my GuestSpotting piece (amusingly enough), Rolfe would go on to produce a trio of short videos where he bemoaned how horrible he felt the NES games Castlevania II: Simon's Quest, Dr. Jekyl & Mr. Hyde, & The Karate Kid were. In 2006, he uploaded them onto YouTube after an idea by his friend Mike Matei, and not long later the "Angry Nintendo Nerd", later the Angry Video Game Nerd, became a hit. Naturally, this influenced others to produce their own videos about old video games. Some of them would take a more positively-attuned focus, but many followed Rolfe's lead & simply trashed games they hated; the main difference, though, was that Rolfe would exaggerate his hatred, for simple comedic effect. Personally, while I might have heard of YouTube around 2006 & 2007, I didn't actually really start going to it regularly until around 2008, while my first AVGN episode was the one about the Atari 5200, which was first released in early 2007 over at GameTrailers, but wasn't uploaded to YouTube until mid-2008. Still, it was stuff like what James Rolfe was making, alongside other YouTube channels like MN12BIRD (who actually came back this year, after a 4-5 year hiatus!), Classic Game Room (itself a revived version of The Game Room from 2000, one of the very first online video shows), & Happy Console Gamer, as well as much smaller producers like MJC Reviews & JQJDaMan who have stopped making videos a long time ago, that started making me wonder if I could do something like that, too.

Retrospect in Retrograde: The Fuma no Kojirou OVAs

Following up a massive success is a tough proposition, to say the least. You now have these major expectations that didn't exist previously, and should you not meet those you run the risk of failure. This is especially true in the world of manga, because not everyone is an Akira Toriyama or Rumiko Takahashi, who can follow up a major hit (Dr. Slump or Urusei Yatsura, respectively) with a second, arguably bigger smash (Dragon Ball or Ranma ½, respectively). Some, though, manage to follow a major hit with something that, though not similarly successful, is still a decent enough hit. A perfect example of that latter situation is with Masami Kurumada, who in late 1981 finished Ring ni Kakero, the "SF Boxing" manga that made his name known to the Japanese populace & would influence so much manga that Shueisha would deem it "The Hot-Blooded Fighting Manga Bible" in 2014. Naturally, Shonen Jump readers were excited for what Kurumada would follow that up with, and a few months later, at the start of 1982, they found out with Fuma no Kojirou/Kojirou of the Fuma, a story revolving (ostensibly) around ninja. While it seemed to be a success of its own merit for the time, though obviously not on the level of RnK, the manga still wound up ending after only a solid two years, finishing up at the very end of 1983, after 10 volumes. My theory is Kurumada prematurely ended FnK in order to finally start working on the series he had been planning out for a decade, Otoko Zaka, only for said series to fizzle out after not even a year. Kurumada would then aim for the mainstream, creating Saint Seiya in 1986, and here's where we return to Fuma no Kojirou.

Saint Seiya was a bona fide smash hit during the second half of the 80s, arguably influencing more people than they realize (in particular, what people associate Dragon Ball with was likely due to Toriyama being encouraged to follow Saint Seiya's lead). It was such a instant hit that Toei Animation debuted a TV anime adaptation before the manga was even a year into its run, which itself wound up becoming a big hit, especially around the world (except for "North of Mexico", of course), and would end in April of 1989, after 114 episodes; the manga would run until late 1990. Likely seeing that Seiya's anime was coming to an end, though, producers from MOVIC, retail arm Animate, & CBS Sony Group obviously wanted to continue riding whatever wave of Saint Seiya popularity was still cresting, before it crashed. The end result was Fuma no Kojirou (later given the subtitle Yasha-hen/Yasha Chapter), a six-episode OVA adaptation of the first story arc of the FnK manga that came out during the summer of 1989, with the first episode coming out only two months after Saint Seiya's final episode aired; they started working on the OVA before the show finished, obviously. Sales must have been good, as the following year saw Fuma no Kojirou: Seiken Sensou-hen/Sacred Sword War Chapter, a six-episode OVA adaptation of the second story arc that came out during the fall of 1990. Finally, after a two-year hiatus, a 50-minute OVA titled Fuma no Kojirou Saishushou: Fuma Hanran-hen/The Final Chapter: Fuma Rebellion Chapter, which adapted the third & final story arc of the manga, came out at the very end of 1992; today, the entire thing is generally counted as a single, 13-episode series. There were five DVD releases covering all three OVAs in Japan throughout mid-2001, put out by SME Visual Works (the former CBS Sony Group, & now currently known as Aniplex), but nothing else since; admittedly, it'd be nice to see these be given an HD remaster & Blu-Ray release.

I reviewed each of these OVAs long ago, the first in 2010 & the other two in 2012, and at the time there was no English translation whatsoever, fansub or official, for any of them; there was supposedly one back in the old VHS fansub days, but it's never surfaced. Today, however, there is actually an English fansub out there, though most of it (read: 11 of the 13 episodes) is based on a Spanish fansub, which means that it's mostly a translation of a translation. Sadly, though the translation itself is okay, the video quality is that of a multi-generation copy of a VHS tape, & Fuma Hanran-hen's fansub literally just plasters English subs over the Spanish subs; it's the best we got, sadly. Still, with Masami Kurumada having returned to Fuma no Kojirou recently with the Jou no Maki/Prelude Chapter prequel manga, and an "Ultimate Final Edition" of the original manga planned for a November release, I'd say now's as good a time as any to finally give these OVAs a new, comprehensive look, and see if I feel any differently about the anime adaptation of "Masami Kurumada's Fourth-Most-Well-Known Manga".

Metropolis vs. Metropolis: Lang vs. Rintaro, with Tezuka as the Referee! A Robotic Battle of Babelic Proportions!

In 1927, German director Fritz Lang's silent film Metropolis, based on the 1925 novel of the same name by his then-wife Thea von Harbou, debuted in German theaters, where it was originally received rather coldly & bombed hard, financially. H.G. Wells himself, whose works were a big influence, called it "quite the silliest film", while Lang himself would eventually admit dissatisfaction with it. Today, however, Lang's film is considered one of the all-time greats & one of the earliest pioneers of science-fiction, with it receiving all manner of restorations over the decades, most recently in 2010, though due to various cuts made to the film back in the day (along with the condition of the only surviving reel of the original cut), only 148 of the original 153 minute run time has been rescued & properly restored; it's likely this is the best we'll ever get. Twenty years later, in 1947, a 19-year old Osamu Tezuka had just made a name for himself with New Treasure Island, which helped prompt publishers into wanting to release more "real" comics, so Tezuka offered to make a science-fiction story. Said manga would eventually be 1949's Metropolis, with the name & main character being influenced by Fritz Lang's movie... Or rather, a single still image of "The Machine-Man", one of the film's most iconic characters, that Tezuka saw in a magazine around that time; Tezuka had never actually seen the film, nor known what it was even about. Regardless, the manga was a big hit, becoming another early example of the man who would later be nicknamed "The God of Manga".

As successful as Tezuka's Metropolis was, though, he also never saw any interest in adapting it into another medium, like animation. One man who did have an interest, though, was Shigeyuki Hayashi, better known to anime fans as Rintaro. A former Toei animator who worked on 1958's Hakujaden, the first color anime feature film, Rintaro moved over to Tezuka's Mushi Pro at the dawn of "modern" TV anime, working on the original Astro Boy series; he'd later help found Madhouse in 1972. While Rintaro wanted to adapt Metropolis into anime, though, it was the "God" himself who was the main roadblock... Until he wasn't after 1989. In interviews, Rintaro essentially admitted that he simply waited for Osamu Tezuka to die before finally starting work on that anime adaptation, but even then it wouldn't actually come to be until mid-2001, and Rintaro admitted that Tezuka likely would have hated it. The end result, though, certainly sounds amazing on paper: Rintaro directing, Akira's Katsuhiro Otomo doing the writing, animation by Madhouse (& produced by the legendary Masao Maruyama, who considers this production to be his favorite), conceptual support by Tezuka Pro, music by celebrated jazz composer Toshiyuki Honda, distribution by Toho (which, coincidentally enough, also distributed Lang's Metropolis in Japan), & a budget of 1 billion yen. Not just that, but Rintaro also added in elements of the original film, making this a unique fusion of both Lang & Tezuka's works. Much like Lang's film, though, it bombed in its home country, not making back its budget, but has since earned itself a cult following; both Roger Ebert & even James Cameron praised what Rintaro & crew achieved.

Therefore, with both films now currently available in English in HD-remastered Blu-Ray, it's time to ask the question: Which film is better? Is it Fritz Lang's seminal classic, or is it Rintaro's fusion of both the film & the manga? After all, Lang went on to not be happy with his final product (though some argue that this was mainly because the Nazi Party enjoyed the film), while Rintaro's film can be embellished as "The film Tezuka didn't want you to see!", so this Vs. Battle could very well be closer than anyone expects. This battle will be fought across the following categories: Story, Characters, Visuals, Music, Acting, & Execution. Therefore, let's not wait any longer for the Tale of the Tape, und lass es uns machen ("& let's get it on")!

[NOTE: The version of Lang's Metropolis I am going off of for this battle is the 2010 "complete" remaster, so as to judge the movie based on its original vision, as closely as possible. Sorry, but no Georgio Moroder version here.]

Obscusion B-List: Unknown Japanese RenderWare Games

Video games, today more than ever, aren't easy to make, and one way to help alleviate some of that workload across multiple games is to rely on a previously existing engine or platform, also called middleware. Some examples of that are Epic's iconic Unreal Engines, Capcom's MT Framework, 3D Realms' Build Engine, & id Software's various id Techs (the "Doom Engine" & "Quake Engine", for example), but probably the most well known & iconic one of them all during the 00s, at least for console development, is easily RenderWare. First launched back in 1993, it was originally something that creator Criterion Software solely used for games like Scorched Planet & TrickStyle (though there was a game or two which saw some assistance from it, like Rayman 2: Revolution), but when the PlayStation 2 came out, the engine became almost legendary.

Sony's 128-bit Emotion Engine that powered the PS2 quickly became infamous for being, simply put, a pain in the ass to develop for, and what Criterion wound up doing was update RenderWare so that it became a way to more easily develop for the PS2, and its cross-platform support made it possible to port games over to the likes of the GameCube, Xbox, & PC with little fuss. So, starting with Take-Two's City Crisis in 2001, Criterion licensed out RenderWare to any & all interested companies, & even after EA bought Criterion from Canon in 2004, old contracts were still honored & new licenses continued to happen. While EA stopped supporting the engine around 2007, due to its lack of power for the likes of the PS3 & Xbox 360, supported games continued to come out through 2013, plus a one-time return in 2018 for Burnout Paradise Remastered; in total, somewhere over 200 games were developed using Criterion's middleware engine. Still, that RenderWare logo appeared on so many iconic games from that era, whether it was the Burnout franchise, the Grand Theft Auto franchise, the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater franchise, Manhunt 1 & 2, Sonic Heroes, Bully, Persona 3 & 4 (plus their respective updates), Crackdown, or Black. There were also tons of games you probably at least heard of but didn't know were developed using RenderWare, like Suikoden III, DreamMix TV World Fighters, kill.switch, Max Payne 2, RoboCop [2003], the pre-HD Mortal Kombat games of the 00s, killer7 (at least on the PS2), & even Fate/unlimited codes (a rare arcade appearance for the engine!).

Still, this is Obscusion B-List, so allow me to bring up some Japanese games you likely never heard of in the first place that utilized RenderWare!

Spectral Force Chronicle Divergence: Farewell, and Thanks for All the Hiyoko Bugs

From 1998 to 2005, video game company Idea Factory tried its hand at being a true multimedia company by releasing a baker's dozen of anime to help advertise its video game releases, most of which were literally nothing more than promotional OVAs that didn't tell a full story, of any sort... And nearly all of them aren't what anyone would exactly call "good". Back in 2013, I wrote reviews for six of the thirteen produced anime, followed by another five reviews across both 2017 & 2018. Among those, I've seen the ill-advised freshman effort of Spectral Force, the "much-too-soon" attempt at making a full-CG TV series with Run=Dim, the animated horrors of Gakuen Toshi Vara Noir (which in Japan is considered part of the "Yashigani Trilogy", alongside Lost Universe & Gundress), the apparent "worst of all time" in Mars of Destruction (spoiler: it's terrible, but not really "the worst"), and the lazy & seeming despondent final release of Rebirth Moon Divergence; throughout all this, Idea Factory truly showcased that it was "The Ed Wood of Anime". At the same time, though, not all of it was downright terrible, as there was the rather enjoyable introductory story of Generation of Chaos III & the legitimately good (if still beholden to the studio's quirks) & self-contained Kingdom of Chaos - Born to Kill. With only two more Idea Factory anime left to cover, on which side of the spectrum shall this next one fall?

Idea Factory was founded in the Shibuya ward of Tokyo back on October 26, 1994 (Happy Early 25th Anniversary, Idea Factory!) by Shingo Kuwana (a former Data East planner & designer for the Joe & Mac series' SNES entries) & Yoshiteru Sato (not an ex-Data East employee). Over the course of the next decade, the studio would find itself a bit of a niche with the IF Neverland franchise, which produced a wide variety of games (mostly RPGs, of some sort) that all took place in a shared timeline within the fantasy world of Neverland. While 1996's Spectral Tower is technically the first entry, it was 1997's Spectral Force, a spiritual successor to Sega Saturn cult-classic Dragon Force (& developed by a lot of the same staff), that truly marked the start of the first major storyline in the franchise, the First Neverland War. So, to celebrate the studio's 10th Anniversary, Idea Factory decided to return to that original story & show it in a new way. The end result was early 2005's Spectral Force Chronicle for the PlayStation 2, which acted as a "digest" retelling of the plot of Spectral Force 1, 2, & Lovely Wickedness, but rather than the war simulator that the series was known for, it was instead a strategy/tactical RPG, similar to that of Tactics Ogre, Front Mission, or Super Robot Wars. It was also the only game from Idea Factory's partnership with Taiwanese studio XPEC Entertainment that did not see international release of some sort, with the others being 2003's Black Stone: Magic & Steel for the Xbox (Idea Factory's first international release; known as Ex-Chaser in Japan), 2004's Bakuen Kakusei: Neverland Senki Zero for the PS2 (released abroad only in Europe as Realm of the Dead), & 2006's Spectral Force 3: Innocent Rage for the Xbox 360 (which used the same engine as SF Chronicle).

To go with this 10th Anniversary strategy RPG, Idea Factory also produced an OVA that came out two months after the game, titled Spectral Force Chronicle Divergence, featuring animation by Wao World!, the same studio that produced the anime cutscenes used in the game. Unfortunately, the last "Divergence" OVA I covered, the one that went with fellow strategy RPG Rebirth Moon, was literally just the various cutscenes from the game, with nothing more than a static image & narration to link each one in chronological order. Is that simply the modus operandi of the short-lived "Divergence" OVAs? And if so, does this first one at least make more sense than the broken mess that was the final Idea Factory anime?

Following the Blue Bird's Path: Experiencing Zone of the Enders Chronologically

Ask hardcore fans of the PlayStation 2 what one of the best series is on the console, and it won't be long before someone answers with Zone of the Enders. Though generally credited as the creation of the legendary Hideo Kojima, though he only acted as a (highly supportive) producer, the series was actually the creation of Noriaki Okamura, who had worked with Kojima on games like Policenauts & Metal Gear Solid. While most generally only consider the two main games when thinking of the series, Z.O.E was created as a bit of a larger & more multimedia production, which in turn all take place in a shared world & timeline. As someone who's never really given the series a chance before, I've always wondered if going through all of Z.O.E in actual chronological order would be a great way to experience it all. So, over this past summer, I finally went through a massive Orbital Frame bender, checking out Konami's (& Sunrise's) cult-classic franchise in a way that I'm sure most haven't really considered. While I will give my general feelings about each production here, this is going to be focused more on how what happens in each part of the story, and if going through it chronologically actually provides any benefit.

So "Kiss Me Sunlights", as I put a "Ring on the World" to go "Beyond the Bounds", because "You Know Where We're Going?"

ZONE OF THE ENDERS!!!

Just using the Japanese logos for consistency.

Before we start, though, some quick set-up to establish things, for those unfamiliar. Zone of the Enders takes place in the latter half of 22nd century, specifically from 2167 to 2174, following mankind's colonization of Mars & space colonies being set up around the orbit of Jupiter. The eponymous "Enders" are what those in control on Earth call the Mars & Jupiter colonists, which in turn has resulted in harsh laws & taxes against them. This has resulted in various groups & organizations rising up to rebel on Mars, the most important for the overall storyline being the military force BAHRAM, based out of Vacilia County. As for the giant robots themselves, they come in two main forms: The standard Laborious Extra-Orbital Vehicle, or LEV, & the more advanced Orbital Frame. With those basics out of the way, let's start running!

Investigating the "Eva Clone" Part 2: Are Any Worthy of Kaworu's Grace?

*cues up "Komm, süsser Tod"*
Everybody thinks they understand Eva. (They never understood anything.) They thought it was supposed to be a world without copying... Without references. (That's because they thought that nothing else came before it.) He betrayed them! Anno betrayed their feelings! (They misunderstood from the very beginning. They just believed what they wanted to believe.) Nobody wants these "clones"... So they can all just cry. (Then what are their hands for?) Nobody cares whether or not they exist... Nothing ever changes. So they can all just cry. (Then, tell me, what is their heart for?) It would be better if Eva never existed... So it should just cry, too. (Then why are they all here?) ...Is it okay for them to be here?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!

Huh, looks like the "Evangelion discourse" from the Netflix airing has already long died out... Oh well, I might as well finish what I started. As I said at the beginning of Part 1, Neon Genesis Evangelion's influence went far beyond the world of mech anime. 1998's Serial Experiments Lain was touted as being "Pioneer's Eva" in terms of importance, and it was certainly an influential hit, in its own right. 1999's Betterman was more of a horror anime than a mech anime, though there were giant robots, but it definitely took some notes from Eva's handbook. And let's not forget the "sekai-kei" genre that people attribute Eva as having started, which found its own icon in the late 90s in the form of the Boogiepop light novel series. That being said, I've generally seen the term "Eva Clone" reserved mostly for mech anime, and generally as a quick & dirty way to deride a show, which if nothing else shows the shallow, vapid, & generally derogatory connotation it carries. For example, few would call Lain or Boogiepop "Eva Clones", but people have no trouble using it to describe something like Darling in the Franxx. I bring this up mainly to illustrate why I'm only investigating titles that can be called "mech anime", because that's where the term itself originates from. Also, I've already gotten 12 anime to look at, & I value my sanity; I want to believe my feelings at that time were real, & not simply an obligation.

Anyway, let's move on to the second half of this investigation, covering the rest of 2000 up through 2005, the 10-year anniversary of Evangelion.

Demo Disc Vol. 15: Jump Juku

Two years ago, I covered some anime pilots that went nowhere for Volume 9 of Demo Disc. Last year, Volume 13 covered what I called "precursors", as they weren't all "pilots", that did see later productions made. So, this year, it's time to check out some of what are probably the most synonymous of them all: The Jump Pilots. Most anime & manga fans are probably at least somewhat familiar with Shueisha's annual end-year Jump Festa, which has been going on ever since 1999, as it's where new anime announcements related to Shonen Jump (& the occasional other Jump magazines) are essentially guaranteed. In the past there was also Jump Super Anime Tour, a travelling road show where anime pilots for popular newer manga got showcased to the public to gauge interest in potentially making them into full-blown anime series; in turn, they usually become available to purchase for a short time at the later Jump Festa. While not a truly annual occurrence, and there hasn't been one since 2013, it has resulted in many pilots to Jump anime that, to this day, have not seen official release outside of Japan, even if their later anime productions have seen some sort of official release. Usually, this is due to licensing complications, as these pilots can have completely different companies involved (& Shueisha is the primary producing company here), and this has even resulted in most of these being without any sort of re-release in Japan.

So let's take a look at four Jump pilots for series that have all seen an official English release at some point, in some form... And where better to start than one of the very first Jump pilots?

Kimagure Orange Road: Shonen Jump Special
About a decade before the Jump Super Anime Tour ever became a thing, Shueisha's first actual road show was the Jump Special Anime Daikoushin/Big March in 1985, which appeared in 22 cities around the country. At this travelling event, Shueisha showed off its first two anime pilots: One for Kochikame, animated by Tatsunoko, & the other for Kimagure Orange Road, animated by Pierrot. While the former wouldn't actually see a TV anime adaptation for a little over a decade, the latter saw its own 48-episode TV anime adaptation in less than two years, debuting in 1987 & even featuring some of the same staff as the pilot, like director Osamu Kobayashi; Pierrot even returned to animate. These two pilots were then re-shown in 1988 as part of the Jump Anime Carnival, alongside an OVA conceived by Akira Toriyama titled Kousuke-sama Rikimaru-sama: Konpei-tou no Ryu, which also offered VHS copies of both pilots as prizes in a contest. Since then, neither pilot has ever been re-released, but while Kochikame's pilot has effectively become a "lost anime", as there isn't even a photo of the cover art anywhere online, Orange Road's pilot has since been discovered, ripped, & even fansubbed. Unfortunately, due to licensing issues, Discotek has so far been unable to license the pilot as part of its recent rescue of the anime franchise, but at least it's out there, somewhere, so might as well see how things started out.

Investigating the "Eva Clone" Part 1: You Can (Not) Take Influence!

On October 4, 1995, Gainax, Tatsunoko, & TV Tokyo introduced Japan to Neon Genesis Evangelion, a mech anime created & directed by Hideaki Anno (Gunbuster, Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water) that helped revolutionize not just the mecha genre, but anime in general; even today, its influence can be felt. Now, to be fair, "Eva" (as it's often shortened to) wasn't truly all that original, as Anno is an Übermensch of an otaku that few can truly match, and took influence from everything he loved, like Gerry Anderson's Thunderbirds, Eiji Tsuburaya's Ultraman, & Yoshiyuki Tomino's Space Runaway Ideon, while the various Gnostic, Kabbalic, Judaic, & Christian references were primarily put in simply because they sounded the coolest. Still, it was the fusion of all of those elements, alongside Anno's own bouts with depression at the time heavily affecting the writing, that wound up transforming Evangelion from a quirky love-letter to all of Anno's favorite things, plus some personal soul searching, into a generation-defining pop-culture icon; it's even considered the originator of the vague & debatable "sekai-kei" genre. Also, just to clarify, Eva originally aired on TV at 6:30 pm, actually replacing the Japanese dub of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, not at late-night, as some online will often state; it'd later re-run during that time, after it had become popular. Late-night anime wasn't even a thing by 1995 (that started mostly in 1997), and Eva wouldn't have become a cultural icon if it had aired in the otaku-focused late-night hours.

Naturally, Eva's success resulted in similar anime being created, many of which came from other notable creators! Over time, anime fans abroad would categorize these alleged imitators with a simple, if not amusingly ironic, phrase: "Eva Clone".

Okay, now one of you Rei's MUST be able to sing as good as Kaye Ballard,
Frank Sinatra, Claire Littley, or Helena Noguerra... Or just don't even bother, like Netflix did.

Now, to be fair, it's not like people immediately chomped at the bit at simply copying Eva wholesale; this wasn't NG Knight Lamune & 40 debuting barely a year after Mashin Hero Wataru finished airing. No, no... They waited a year after 1997's End of Evangelion, the movie finale, debuted in theaters! But, in all seriousness, the term "clone" is a rather harsh one & honestly is only used by those who simply want to belittle or lessen the potential relevance of these anime. After all, mech anime in general is intensely iterative & runs primarily off of whatever becomes the next big thing. Mazinger Z started the super robot boom of the 70s & Mobile Suit Gundam started the real robot boom of the 80s, while Wataru & Matchless Raijin-Oh started the early-to-mid-90s trend of either making the robots more chibi-looking (though not fully Super-Deformed) or having young children (rather than older teenagers) pilot the robots, respectively. Without "clones" from those eras, we wouldn't have series like the Nagahama Robot Romance Trilogy, Fang of the Sun Dougram, Armored Trooper VOTOMS, or the Brave & Eldoran Series, many of which advanced mech anime & became classics, in their own right. Also, while Eva is one of the most popular anime of all time, it is simply true that not everyone has seen it, or at least saw it before seeing any of these "clones"; for them, those later productions are the valuable & influential ones. In fact, I'm one of those heathens who honestly has no major interest in ever watching Neon Genesis Evangelion in full; let them who is without sin cast the first stone (Wait... No one is shamed about sin on the internet!). However, I am still somewhat familiar with Eva's themes, characters, & some of its important scenes, simply due to a mix of cultural osmosis (i.e. I couldn't NOT know something about it), playing a bunch of Super Robot Wars games (which Eva sees inclusion in somewhat often), seeing the first Rebuild of Evangelion movie (which was mostly a recap of the first six episodes, with some differences), & seeing the climax of End of Eva years ago (because how could I NOT have seen it at some point?!).

Therefore, to celebrate Neon Genesis Evangelion's long-awaited return to legal availability in English via Netflix's streaming option (complete with a [controversial] new English translation!), I want to investigate these so-called "Eva Clones", and see what they tried to bring to the table; I will only be seeing the first 5-7 episodes of each, though, as this is merely a basic look at them. Also, as someone who hasn't seen all of Eva before, do these other productions truly showcase their "clone" status? After all, even the greatest in scientific research can result in a copy showing flaws in a way that even the most lay of people can tell at first glance. I'll be covering up to Eva's 10th Anniversary in 2005, because that's around the time the term itself stopped really being used for most newer imitators (it's still used, but nowhere near the frequency it used to be), but that still gives 12 different anime to cover, so I'll be splitting this up across two parts, & we're starting with 1998 to 2001.

Arc the Lad: Sing Me a Song of a Lad That's Wanted by the World!

While I wouldn't consider myself to be a truly identifiable "anime fan" until 2004, when I started following the original Fullmetal Alchemist anime via fansubs, I had already been a fan to some minor extent before then. I'd say that I first started knowing what "anime" was back when Digimon Adventure, Ultimate Muscle, & Escaflowne were airing on FoxKids & Kids WB, and I became more of a fan when I found Toonami via G Gundam in 2002. But it wasn't until 2003 that I decided that I really wanted to own an anime on home video, and much like how I originally got into JoJo's Bizarre Adventure back in 1999 because of the Dreamcast port of Capcom's 2D fighting game, my first anime DVD purchase was because of a video game.

When Sony debuted the PlayStation in Japan in late 1994, one thing the system needed in its home country was a killer RPG. That would come in June of 1995, when Arc the Lad saw release; it'd become the best-selling Japanese PS1 game that year, at ~1.11 million copies sold. What's most surprising is that it wasn't really a complete game, as developer G-Craft (Front Mission), later Arc Entertainment, had loftier plans, but knew that it wouldn't get the game out in time, so it was decided to split the game into two, with the first title really being more of a prologue to the REAL plot. Arc the Lad II came out in Japan November of 1996, also selling over a million copies, & told a truly epic (& tragic) tale that, sadly, didn't see international release at the time... Though not for a lack of trying. You see, as soon as the first game was announced, Victor Ireland wanted his company Working Designs to bring it over into English, but Sony Computer Entertainment of America played hardball, denying the idea because of how it was a strictly 2D game, which SCEA wanted to downplay in light of the PS1's polygon-pushing capabilities. In the end, it wouldn't be until April of 2002 that Working Designs finally released the game, but only as part of a giant Arc the Lad Collection that contained Arc I, Arc II, spin-off monster battling game Arc Arena: Monster Tournament, & 1999's Arc the Lad III.

At that time, the release was very hyped, & I made sure I got that collection as soon as it came out. I wound up loving the hell out of the release, though I never did finish Arc II (got to the final dungeon, though) or even play Arc III. Then, one day at my local Best Buy, I came across the anime section & saw a DVD boxset for an Arc the Lad anime; to say that I got excited about it would be an understatement. Anyway, this was a 26-episode TV adaptation of Arc II that originally aired in Japan throughout 1999 via satellite network WOWOW, and ADV would release the anime across six dub-only VHS tapes & six dual-audio DVDs throughout 2001, & the collection I saw came out in mid-2003; the Arc the Lad Collection was originally announced in 2000, so ADV likely tried to take advantage of that. As soon as I could save up the money, I bought that boxset & watched every episode, first via the dub & then about a year or so later via the original Japanese audio (with English subtitles, of course).

So now, roughly 15 years later, how will I feel about my first anime purchase? I still own that boxset, so it's finally time to take it off the shelf & pop those discs back in... They should still work just fine, right?

Obscusion B-Side: Hypothesizing a Sega Master System Mini

So Sega has now finally revealed all 40 (+2) games that will be included in its Sega Genesis Mini (Sega Mega Drive Mini, outside of North America) that will see release later this September, and it's seriously an outstanding roster of games for each variant (America/Europe, Japan, Asia). Sadly, it's next to impossible for Sega to really continue this line, hypothetically, by moving forward, as doing a Saturn or Dreamcast Mini would be much tougher (especially for the former), and would likely become much too expensive to really be worth releasing. However, a tweet from Sega City made me think of another possibility... Going backwards one generation.

At least a Pause button would get added to the controller now... Right?

Admittedly, if Sega was to actually go & make a Master System Mini, based on the company's competitor to the NES, it would be primarily aimed at two markets: Europe & Brazil. The console just wasn't able to really find footing in North America due to the NES' sheer dominance, & Nintendo's possibly illegal exclusivity agreement it forced upon third-party publishers, & Sega's only true success story in its home county of Japan was with the Saturn. Still, Europeans downright fell in love with the Master System (& later the Mega Drive), as Nintendo didn't really manage to take that market over due to the strong computer scene, & in Brazil the Master System is literally the best-selling video game console ever, due to Tectoy's marketing, exclusive releases, & continual re-releases of the hardware (among other reasons). If nothing else, make a hypothetical American release more of a limited product, though sharing Europe's roster, give Japan a Mark III Mini with its own roster that could even include some SG-1000 games (&, likewise, make it a limited release product), & let Tectoy go crazy with a Brazilian version that's filled with a bunch of its own exclusives (& winds up being the most coveted, in general).

Beyond all of that, though, is the major question: What games would even be included in a hypothetical Sega Master System Mini? Well, after looking over the list of games for the console, I came up with what I feel is a relatively realistic (if still semi-wish-list-y) roster, at least for a shared North America/Europe variant.

Obscusion B-List: Longshot Xbox One BC Hopefuls

[6/2019 UPDATE: Microsoft announced at E3 2019 that the Xbox One BC program would be ending with a final batch of Xbox 360 & OG Xbox games, none of which are the games in this list, sadly. It did announced that the next Microsoft console, currently codenamed "Project Scarlett", will include its own BC program, however, so who knows what the future may hold...]

With "the video game" getting closer & closer to the age of 50, at least if you're counting 1971's Computer Space as the "first" (if you count stuff like Spacewar! or Tennis for Two, then it's already well over 50), the concept of "game preservation" has become more & more relevant, and one method that has supported preserving games is emulation. Go back even just 15 years ago, and emulation was kind of a dirty word to the industry, but today it's become much more welcome, as it's allowed the preservation of so many games that would have otherwise been lost to time. A sort of variant of that has been consoles featuring backwards compatibility (or "BC", for short) with previous generations. While some made this possible by simply having a previous console's necessary hardware in the new console's design (see: the Atari 7800, Sega Genesis, Nintendo Wii, Sony PlayStation 2, & the earliest models of the PlayStation 3), most have done this via emulation of some sort. Still, if there's one system that's effectively changed the BC game, it's the Xbox One.

The funny thing is that, when Microsoft originally released the Xbox One in late 2013, having compatibility with previous consoles' games was the furthest thing from the company's mind. In fact, then-head of Xbox Don Mattrick was quoted in 2013 with saying, "If you're backwards compatible, you're really backwards." When Phil Spencer became head of Xbox in 2014, though, he secretly made BC a priority, creating an entire team in Microsoft solely to handle it. The end result came on June 15, 2015, when the first batch of 20 Xbox 360 games, both disc-based & digital-only via Xbox Live Arcade, were added. Unlike most BC efforts, though, these games were not just guaranteed to play on Xbox One exactly like they did on their original console, but would play better. Due to the sheer power of the One, 360 games can play with higher frame rates (or at least maintain their caps better), hit their max video resolutions more consistently (if they use dynamic resolutions), are given 16x anisotropic filtering (i.e. visuals look better at all angles & distances), & forced V-sync prevents screen tearing; when the Xbox One X was introduced in 2017, some games were even given new enhancements! Since then, Microsoft has been consistently adding more games to the BC service, at least 1-3 every month, & currently is at around 560 Xbox 360 games, which is about 26% of the console's total of roughly 2100 games; that's honestly super impressive.

Obviously, not every single game is going to be made BC with the Xbox One, so for this B-List I want to bring up six disc-based 360 games, plus one XBLA game, that I feel are definite longshots, but would love to see added to the BC program at some point. Note that I am not including games released on the original Xbox, of which only 33 have been made BC, mainly because there hasn't been any update to that in roughly a year, and licensing makes those exponentially harder to add; also, I could make an entire list just around those games, so maybe another time. So let's get started, shall we?

The Odds & Ends of Masami Kurumada: Artwork & Music

Hey, I'm back after a month hiatus! You miss me?

*silence quieter than deep space, with not even a cricket chirping*

Ahh, same as it ever was. Anyway, no better way for me to come back than to write something about my favorite mangaka, Masami Kurumada.

Over the years, I've written a lot about the works of this man, & ideally I'd love to one day cover all of his lesser known manga. To be fair, there are only so many titles left to cover, namely 1976 one-shot Mikeneko Rock (which was included in Volume 2 of Sukeban Arashi, so I may never cover this one), Jitsuroku! Shinwakai (a collection of gag short stories from 1979 to 1983), 1992's infamous Silent Knight Sho, 1993's Bakumatsu Era story Akane-Iro no Kaze -Shinsengumi Keppuroku-, & finally Ring ni Kakero 2; there's also the occasionally ongoing Otoko Zaka that I'll continue reviewing in chunks. I still hesitate to cover his various Saint Seiya manga, namely due to the series' notoriety, & I don't count the various spin-offs done by other artists in this list. I take my time getting to these, though, mainly because of a lack of English translation, official or otherwise, as well as a simple lack of availability at the moment.

Something I have also wanted to cover, though, is the various other bits of artwork Kurumada has done over the decades for stuff not related to his catalog. Most of it is simply for promotional purposes, but they are still interesting little pieces of his oeuvre, and some of them have neat stories behind them. Therefore, as a quick little return to blog, allow me to show you the "Odds & Ends" of Masami Kurumada's history.

Retrospect in Retrograde: Clockwork Fighters: Hiwou's War

Before co-founding anime studio Bones in 1998, the late Hiroshi Osaka worked on a bunch of mech anime, like Armored Trooper VOTOMS, Panzer World Galient, Blue Comet SPT Layzner, Jushin Liger, both Victory Gundam & G Gundam, & The Vision of Escalfowne. During the last nine years of his life with Bones, he continued to work with mech anime, like RahXephon & The Mars Daybreak. Therefore, it's not all that surprising that the first anime Bones would lead production on was a mech anime... Kind of.

"Wah, wa wa wau"... "Degaregeda, degaregadou!"... "Jam Jam!!"

Working with Noboru "Sho" Aikawa, who would become a reliable & stalwart companion to the studio to this very day, Karakuri Kiden Hiwou Senki debuted in late 2000, running until mid-2001 after 26 episodes, & was actually only the second original concept Aikawa ever put to animation, following 1998's Neo Ranga. Not just that, but it's also the only anime Bones ever did using hand-drawn cels, i.e. the "traditional" way. Apparently, Aikawa originally envisioned the story for older audiences, & a manga version drawn by Hajime Jinguji did run in Magazine Z, a seinen magazine, from mid-1999 to 2001 for four volumes, eventually going in its own direction. Instead, the anime wound up being reformatted as a family program, airing in the same "Satellite Anime Theater" time slot on NHK that would later air anime like Gakuen Senki Muryou/Shingu: Secret of the Stellar Wars & Kakutou Ryouri Densetsu Bistro Recipe/Fighting Foodons (one of these things is not like the others). After the anime finished airing, Bones would slowly earn more recognition via shows like Angelic Layer & RahXephon, before truly hitting it big with Fullmetal Alchemist in 2003. Meanwhile, Bones' first series would stay in the shadows, until Bandai Entertainment finally picked it up for English release in the mid-00s, using the name Clockwork Fighters: Hiwou's War, which honestly was for the better, as the actual translation is more like Fantastical Clockwork Tale: Record of Hiwou's War. While Bandai did hope to get the entire series out across three double-disc DVD singles throughout the second half of 2006, production & replication problems resulted in it taking close to two years to finish the release, ending in early 2008; former Bandai rep Robert Napton even called the release "cursed". Because of this, & the sheer obscurity of the series, it kind of became slightly infamous for a time, as FYE was selling brand new, sealed copies of Volume 1 for literally just $1.99! Even today, you can get all three volumes for super cheap, & there's next to nothing regarding the anime online, aside from the few reviews of the Bandai release, which tended to not like the show.

I originally reviewed this anime back in August of 2011, going completely off of memory, and I've always had the urge to rewatch it, seeing as it's now been a little over a decade since I last saw it. Is Clockwork Fighters: Hiwou's War still "proof that kids' anime can be good for everyone", or will all these years of new learning, like now knowing that Sho Aikawa was not the "creator" of Angel Cop (he only co-wrote the first episode), make me see this series with new eyes, & will it be for better or worse?