Saturday. The big day. The one where the heavy hitters come out to play. The concerts, the costume masquerade, the hentai dubbing party. Yes, you heard me right, a panel dedicated to fan dubbing animated porn, but more on that later. Lots of fun to be had all around today and thankfully a lack of any major crowd bottlenecks of more than maybe a minute. My hat's off to the intrepid security people, panel coordinators and technical staff for making this Saturday pleasantly soothing and relatively pain free.
After a wonderfully long night of sleep, chain saw snorer in the room and all, the day started with a bit of watching one of the trivia contests and the "all you care to know about mecha" panel, a little lunch and a panel on the various adaption of "Journey to the West" aka "Monkey" aka "Saiyuki" aka "Dragonball" aka...you get the point. Following a brief break, FUNimation made the big, and only, industry news of the Con with the licensing of Spice and Wolf, the dub cast for Evangelion 1.0-You Are Not Alone and a solid street date for the first Sgt. Frog collection, September 22, 2009. It still feels weird to have so little industry news at one of the biggest fan gatherings in the country.
Following another break, and a little bit of reporting work, my buddy Brian got to run a full 2 hour version of his infamous "Bad Anime! Bad!" panel focusing specifically on the supposedly set in Boston "Dracula: Sovereign of the Damned". To explain too much about the panel would be to ruin it for anyone who might go, but you will laugh. Oh, how will you laugh, if only to cover up the pain of just how bad some of the things he has dredged up are. Much the same for the follow on panel "Totally Lame Anime:" more of the worst of the worst. A very filling dinner at the local Pour House, possibly the best near the Hynes for a good, reasonably priced meal and adult beverages.
After a little bit digestion time the aforementioned "Dick and Buster's Hentai Dubbing Extravaganza!" filled out most of the rest of the pre-midnight time. It's, well, amateur porn dubbing, with all that entails, for better or for worse.....mostly for the better with the exception of one drunk guy who managed to not only not ad lib as he was supposed to, but read the lines of the female character in the scene they were voicing. The day wrapped with a bit of discussion on what moe is and how it has been slowly taking over more and more of the anime market, and what we can do to maybe stem the tide a little, should we want to, and a long bit of discussion on the industry and other bits of life with Tom Wayland of TripWire productions.
And such ends the major portion of Anime Boston 2009. Not that there is nothing going on Sunday, far from it, just that as usual for a 3 day convention, the 3rd day will be smaller stuff and wrap up up as everyone rushes to get out of town. Hope you all have been enjoying this journey through the heights and depths of Anime Boston 2009 and I look forward to the next time we meet.
Salutations, and good night.
MORE ANIME BOSTON 2009 COVERAGE:
|
|
|
|
