American Anime : Animation, Art, Media

A few more years pass. I guess I'll keep this website up as long as I am still around. I'm an old otaku now, a bit greyer, a bit more tired. Still dreaming though. Recently, I've gotten back into watching anime again. The good news is that anime is still as great as ever, maybe even more so! Most of the fans consist of young whippersnappers now. I spend a lot of time lurking reddit.com and watching crunchyroll.com

This website never came to fruition, at least not the place I may have envisioned way back in the 90's of the previous century. But I think I'll still add my ruminations here anyways, add some reviews to some cool shows and just spit into the wind. As always, if anyone drifts by, drop me a line, but it's hard to cut through all the spam this site gets.

Not much activity in this little corner of the interweb, but I guess I'll keep trudging on, little by little. I guess I have only myself to blame for letting it moulder for so many years. I remember when people would actually email me about when this URL would become active with actual content, oh so many moons ago.

OK, that ends the shameless self-pity party session of this blog entry. On to the actual subject at hand.

What will be the "Big Picture" for anime in America?

In the past two decades, we have seen the rise of the big budget comic book movie. More and more of the box office pie is being served up by colorful, CGI-laden epics based on genre fiction (I am including written prose, as well as comics), from "Lord of the Rings" to "300" and, more recently, "Transformers".

One of the few, truly independent and American anime producers I've seen on the Net- Terrance Walker of Studio ArtFX. He's just launched his new on-line anime series, The Legend of ZAHUR at his website http://www.studioartfx.com/.

Essentially, I've been interested in seeing creative talent who are using traditional and 3D techniques to create unique anime style in America, not just Flash multimedia, fan art, or joint Japanese co-productions. Nothing wrong with those--there are some excellent examples out there--it's just that I have been focused on American creators in the anime style who are taking the initial steps to pull themselves up by their bootstraps (an American version of Makoto Shinkai or GAINAX before they hit the big time).

I recently purchased this book, Mangaka America. It is a collection of manga style artists in America. Lot's of nice art and some tutorials on drawing anime/manga style. I will do a more complete review later.

Will this site ever be regularly updated?

A good question. I may be going for an internet record of longest running cobweb site. Shall I endeavor for a cool decade of nothing happening? Write me your opinion!

Wired released their 2006 Vaporware Awards. Hey, how come this site isn't in the list? :P