Friday, March 31st, 2000

Checklist! (01:05 PM EST)

Convention time (10:02 AM EST): This weekend is the 3rd annual Sakura Con (previously named Baka-con I believe) in lovely Tukwila, Washington. I don't believe there are too many actual studio folks attending this convention, but there are a lot of voice actors. Also attending, and surely bound to get some hard questions, are the folks from Multimedia 2000 who put out the Bubblegum Crisis discs and are gearing up for the remaster to correct their "oversights" from the first release. As always, we love to hear from fans visiting the cons and what they hear and see while there, so let us know!

Thursday, March 30th, 2000

New next week (10:07 PM EST): Next week is a big week, probably one of the biggest so far this year with not only Bandai making it's entrance into the domestic anime DVD market, but making such an entrance with three titles, all ready to hit on time with the original street date. A tip of the hat is surely deserved for that. Already making their way into some smaller retailers, be on the look out for Blue Submarine No. 6 Vol. #1, Cowboy Bebop Session 1 and the 12 episode Eat-Man 98 Collection.

Dragonball Z DVD's (09:54 PM EST): Brian Real of the currently comatose toriyama.org site sent some new Dragonball Z information to DVD Animania today. Click here to read the full story on everything DBZ. For the DVD side of it, Brian had this to say:
 

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Yes, the DVDs are coming out. Contrary to what we were originally told, though, movie 4 will not be the first disc. Apparently the movie has been delayed somewhat. The discs are going to follow the same episode format as the tapes. Right now they have four discs planned, 2 being the Ginyu saga (The first 7 episodes of season 3) and the other 2 being the first batch of episodes of season 4. In other words, rather than forcing us to wait until they get past season 3 to give us the new season they're going to try to do them simultaneously. They expect the first discs to be out somewhere around May 29 and June 1 (Note: This is what our source at FUNi said. DVDs are normally released on Tuesday so expect 5/23, 5/30, or 6/6.) If the date is 6/6 then it will be a big day for DVD. Anime Village has 5 titles planned for that day already. I still don't know what the current pricing plan is or when they plan to do the BK promo episodes on DVD.

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More on Mononoke (09:04 PM EST): Michael Johnson, the list owner for the Miyazaki mailing list, contacted Mr. Kevin Kasha, Executive VP of Home Video for Miramax Films today to try and get the story on the Princess Mononoke release. For now, the title is being slated for a "Summer 2000" release and both the original March and the secondary June date (which was from the Buena Vista retailer information page) are no longer valid. The folks at Miramax are currently working to nail down features and a date for this title and should have more information in a few weeks. 

To me, this sounds like a very positive thing. I'm guessing that maybe with the amount of feedback they received about this title since its original announcement, they may try to do the film more justice with the home video release than they could with the theatrical. After all, the home video market has been a sizeable portion of a movies proceeds quite a number of years now. 

Review boat arrives (03:34 PM EST): I've managed to squeeze a little time away from changing diapers and getting formula ready today to get a bunch of both alternate angle reviews and a region 2 review keyed up and online. Be sure to check them out!

• Trigun Vol. 1 by Roman Martel
• Trigun Vol. 1 by Max Hagedorn
• Nazca: Blood Rivals by Peter Schall
• Revolutionary Girl Utena: The Rose Collection 2 by Justin Emerson
• Boogiepop Phantom Evolution 1 by Jon Faciane

Unreliability factor (08:34 AM EST): Yesterday we had up a couple of new title announcements from the Right Stuf website catalog updates. One we removed entirely as the studio behind it said it should not be there (and was also removed from the Right Stuf catalog) and the other, Jubei-Chan, I've heard from the grapevine that the date is wrong, which I suspected as much myself as June is already a full month for Bandai. I've kept the information in the upcoming pages here but changed the date to a TBA listing. Unfortunately, the Right Stuf catalog is becoming more unreliable so we'll be posting information from there with a grain of salt. Hopefully they won't become a "Diamond Previews" level of reliability.

Mononoke canceled? (08:30 AM EST): Everyone's emailed me telling me it's canceled. There's supposedly a press release about it out there but nobody can provide it. The only "firm" cancellation some people have gotten is that Suncoast has said it is and cancelled orders. Of course, they cancelled Eva DVD orders at one point as well. The title is still in the Buena Vista Home Entertainment online retailer catalog and it looks like most if not all online retailers are still listing it. So frankly, I don't have any reliable information to go by at this point.

New title (08:29 AM EST): Depending on how much you want to trust the DVD Empire catalog, they've got a new title from Central Park Media listed for 08/15 release. Genocyber: The Movie (presumably containing both tapes) is listed with an MSRP of 34.99.

Wednesday, March 29th, 2000

Bubblegum Crisis remastered (08:09 PM EST): On the AnimEigo mailing list today, Robert Woodhead indicated that M2K, the company behind the original pressings of Bubblegum Crisis, are getting ready to do the remaster of the series to fix the bugs. They're checking their list of bugs and want to make sure they get them all. Take a peek at the list and if you know of one that isn't there, make sure to tell them!

New announcements (01:00 PM EST): The Right Stuf catalog updated today with three new DVD titles. On June 25th, Bandai Entertainment will release Jubei-Chan 1: A Legend Reborn. Running time is 100 minutes (4 episodes) with an MSRP of 29.99. Extras include behind-the-scenes footage, bilingual DVD, and animated menus. Pioneer has added two DVD's to this date as well, and we'll see Pokemon 19: Our Hero Meowth and Pokemon 20: The Final Badge. Both are dub only and have the added episode count over the earlier ones with four episodes per disc instead of three. Running time is 90 minutes each with an MSRP of 24.95.

Newly reviewed (10:00 AM EST): One of the hottest shows to hit the US is now available on DVD from Pioneer. We got in our copy yesterday and watched it in both languages to bring you our review of Trigun Vol. #1.

Ask Ladycat (09:50 AM EST): After her brief break, Ladycat is back with a content thick column this week that covers culture, anime and DVD all rolled into one. She's also got a new site for herself, so make sure you check out this weeks column!

New UK DVD's (09:42 AM EST): Ian Goggin wrote in to let us know that there's a couple of new anime DVD's hitting the UK shores in the next couple of months. Urotsukidoji III (all four episodes) and Star Blazers - The Quest for Iscandar - Part One are due out on 4/17. No features, languages, etc are listed yet. The Plastic Little/Black Magic double feature DVD has been delayed until 04/25.

Petitions (09:40 AM EST): A few new petitions have cropped up in the last couple of days (though I've not gotten more than one from the 123 Petition site), so check out that page.

Tuesday, March 28th, 2000

Bandai changes the date (07:00 PM EST): I talked briefly with the folks at Bandai today about last nights Pioneer site update with several titles having changed dates. These are definitely the new confirmed dates for those five titles (Blue Submarine #6 Vol. 2, Cowboy Bebop 2 and 3, Haunted Junction and Vision of Escaflowne 1). All five titles will arrive on 6/6 and the Bandai Entertainment site will be updated to reflect it. So toss those old dates you may have seen out the window and get ready for a sizeable release day on 6/6.

Revolutionary DVD? (06:53 PM EST): We finally got in our copy of Revolutionary Girl Utena and have prepared our review for your reading pleasure.

Anime in the UK, Part 2 (06:50 AM EST):  Following up with our previous bit about Pioneer UK moving out of the market, we received this tidbit this afternoon from Niels Viveen as written by Toshiaki Watanabe of Pioneer UK: "Unfortunately we have decided to change the strategy for anime business in Europe. We will withdraw the anime business for Europe from UK by the end of March. Pioneer Entertainment Europe Ltd will transfer the administration function into Pioneer Entertainment (USA) L.P."

Guest article (02:28 PM EST): Justin Sevakis, former editor of Anime News Network, has sent in a guest article today entitled "The Next Butchered Anime". I'm sure this will generate some comments on the forum.

Anime in the UK (02:20 AM EST):  Dan Jackson forwarded a tidbit that may cause some alarm among the growing number of UK readers here. "Pioneer Anime UK have ceased distribution with there distributor and no further Pioneer Anime UK tapes are available as yet. Pioneer Anime UK also don't answer there phones and Pioneer UK aren't too sure if Pioneer Anime UK is still around." Will Pioneer anime DVD's surface in the UK through another distributor or will fans continue to have to import region 1 NTSC DVD's?

Bandai bit (09:00 AM EST): Just a word of caution for those who may be getting a bit excited out there. A couple of news sites are reporting the Bandai title information from the Pioneer update a little strangely. The section from the update that contains "DVD Extras include interviews with cast and creators, additional footage." is being attributed to the Vision of Escaflowne disc but is associated with the Cowboy Bebop section both in the html page and definitely in the PDF file. So don't get your hopes up for the additional footage found on the Japanese LD's for Escaflowne just yet. The interviews and additional footage seem much more likely to come from the Session 0 Japanese DVD, part of which is already on the first Cowboy Bebop disc here.

Monday, March 27th, 2000

Pioneer updates (10:23 PM EST): The Pioneer Entertainment site updated early this week with some anime DVD information. Vision of Escaflowne Vol. 1 is set for a 6/6 release with four episodes. Cowboy Bebop Session 2 is set for 6/6 with 5 episodes and oddly Session 3 is listed for the same date with 4 episodes. That may be a mistake though. Blue Sub 6 Vol. 2 and Haunted Junction are also listed for a 6/6 release date. Haunted Junction has had a 5/16 release date for awhile now, so I'm not sure if it's been bumped or a mistake. Click here to see the cover artwork!

Reviews (06:57 PM EST): A new review has arrived today for your reading pleasure; Cool Devices by Joe McCulloch

Manga makes more noise (06:30 PM EST): Keith Tujague wrote in this afternoon with some new Manga information. "...the latest Manga Nation Newsletter and they say Giant Robo is coming to DVD. No date though. Most of the article talks about Macross Plus, Perfect Blue & Devil Man [as if they have already been released]. Perfect Blue will have 5.1 Japanese and English, not sure if that was on the site. Here's the rest:  Other titles that will soon grace this new format are Wings of Honneamise, Giant Robo, Patlabor 1 & 2 and Street Fighter II V."

Warriors of the DVD (03:57 PM EST): Lou Rinaldi noticed that Anchor Bay Entertainment updated their news section today with an interesting tidbit: "Also, to the fans of Hayao Miyazaki's Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind (a.k.a. Warriors of the Wind) we are currently in negotiations with a company to provide the DVD community with the original uncut version of the film under the original name.  There will be additional postings once some final details are worked out.

Brief contest (03:15 PM EST): To help round out the March contests, we've added a very brief contest for a copy of Catnapped!: The Movie!

And in this corner... (11:00 AM EST): Weighing in as probably one of the bigger DVD box sets to date, if not the biggest yet, Matthew Shaw has sent in a review of the Maison Ikkoku TV Complete Box. It is truly a shame that this series will likely never see the light of day on DVD here in the US.

Sunday, March 26th, 2000

Magically digital (03:40 PM EST): Jeff Kleist got the one-sheet information on the Magic Knights Rayearth box set today, and it looks to have some great stuff in it. Scheduled to be included are art gallery, alternative auditions,  outtakes, bloopers, character profiles, roll call, cast list, interviews with the cast, creators, magical spell index, alternative openings/endings including omake endings, alternative versions of songs, interactive menus scene access, both dubbed and subtitled versions.

After reading this and the previous information on the effort going into the box design, I'm fully reversing my opinion of the price increase. This set is the set to get if you're a MKR fan. I've never seen the show and I'm really primed for it now.

Animenation studio day (12:20 AM EST): Animenation had their grand re-opening this weekend and had some studio reps on hand to help celebrate. Kevin Cook of DVD Animania is local to the area, so he's got a great report on it up on his site. Noteworthy things include CPM tentatively scheduling the first Slayers DVD box for September and the Record of Lodoss War TV box in an October/November timeframe to make sure it's ready for the holidays. It also looks like they're going to try to do a commentary track for it as well with voice actors (US I would guess). From what Kevin says, DVD is definitely going to become a bigger part of the CPM lineup in the future. Maze and Photon are definitely on the way for this year as well. Check out the 3/25 news on DVD Animania for more.

Cool and hot anime (12:20 AM EST): It took a little bit, but we've finally gotten through all of our Cool Devices box set and have our review up. Please remember, this title is intended for 18+ viewers only.

Saturday, March 25th, 2000

Petitions (05:50 AM EST): A new petition service has surfaced recently called 123 Petitions. The service lets you set up a petition and gives you the links for promoting it to other people. The only downside to it compared to how most fan sites do petitions is that it doesn't list the number of people who have signed to the general public. If you're focused on a particular show and set up a good site for information on it, this really is an ideal way to do it though. In fact, we've done a quick petition for one of my favorites, Dirty Pair TV on DVD. If you set up a petition through them for an anime on DVD release, let us know and we'll add it to our link page. If you set up a full page elsewhere with a link to it, give us that so people can see what the show you're pushing for is all about.

Advance review (03:40 AM EST): Rounding out the early reviews we've gotten in over the past week is the start of the kids series Monster Rancher. Sublicensed to ADV Films for home video release, the first two discs will be available on 5/23. We've got a review of the first disc here for you now.

Tidying up (11:00 AM EST): Just for those who like to check out some of the special features we run here, we've modified our sidebar column so we have the "Main Menu" and some "Bonus Features" listed on it as well. We cleaned up our You Rate It section last night and added in several more titles as well, so make sure to add your rating and comments for the already released discs. 

Friday, March 24th, 2000

Advance review (07:25 PM EST): A long time in coming, ADV Films Neon Genesis Evangelion Collection 0:1 will street on 5/23, but we've got the full review of this disc here and now.

New next week (07:15 PM EST): Pioneer kicks off a new series next week with the release of the much anticipated Trigun: The $60,000,000,000 Man. This of course brings us down to just about a week until the Bandai DVD explosion begins. 

Media Blasters makes it real (05:25 PM EST): The Right Stuf catalog was updated today with the first hints of Ruroni Kenshin (their spelling) for release by Media Blasters this year. On 7/18, we'll see the first DVD, Ruroni Kenshin 1: Legendary Swordsman, with a running time of 100 minutes for 29.95 MSRP. TRSI also lists a second VHS volume for the same date but no corresponding DVD for it. (please note we corrected the price from 24.95 to 29.95. We must have been reading the VHS price by accident).

Later tonight.... (05:25 PM EST): We love our UPS man. Today he delivered an advance review copy of Neon Genesis Evangelion Collection 0:1 and Monster Rancher Vol. 1. We've jotted a few comments in the forum while we prepare our full review of Eva for later this evening.

Thursday, March 23rd, 2000

Animeigo adds more muscle (01:25 PM EST): Animeigo added some sizeable DVD news to their site today:
 

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Every day we get about a dozen emails asking "when will my favorite video be coming out on DVD?" It's driving us nuts!

Folks, we're working as hard as we can to get our products out on DVD at the level of quality you expect from AnimEigo. We spent over 6 months last year patiently working out ways to do DVD subtitles in the AnimEigo style -- we even found bugs in one of the major DVD authoring systems that had to be corrected.

We now have two DVD authoring studios working on getting our titles out. One is working full time on Urusei Yatsura (and will also do some samurai films), the other is ramping up to release our other titles. Because we don't want to make promises we later find we can't keep, we aren't even going to announce release dates on DVDs until the authoring is done, the packaging is ready, and all we have to do is send them off for replication.

The first DVD title that will be released is going to be the UY TV 1-5 box set. We are just going through our final paranoia checks and it should be sent to replication (and announced) around April 1 (appropriate for UY, don't you think?).

Our second (new) authoring studio is hard at work on DVDs of Baoh and Spirit of Wonder. We know, it sounds like we are nuts, doing two of our less well-known titles first, but we want to start out with two simple titles to make it easier for the new studio to get up to speed with our style of subtitles, etc. That way, if any mistakes get past us, it won't be a major problem. Once that's done, we intend to release almost all of our catalog on DVD, roughly in order of popularity.

This means that you should expect to see us release titles like Bubblegum Crash, AD Police, Vampire Princess Miyu, Oh My Goddess, You're Under Arrest, and KOR OVAs/Movie within the next year or so. We're just not promising in which order, or exactly when. In addition, we'll be releasing the Lone Wolf & Cub and Zatoichi samurai films on DVD, and it looks almost certain that sometime early in 2001 we will release KOR TV on DVD as well.

So please, be patient, check the website every so often to find out what's new (or subscribe to AnimEigo-News, see below), and stop bugging poor Robert about the darn DVDs! If he cracks under the pressure, none of them will get released anytime soon!

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Wednesday, March 22nd, 2000

New title announcement (09:25 PM EST): Through Diamond Comics' listings, we've got another June title on our hands; Viz will release (via Pioneer) the Please Save My Earth DVD, which looks like it could contain all the episodes as it's not listed as a "Vol. 1" release. Hopefully a date and some details will surface soon.

A vocal minority  (01:55 PM EST): That pretty much seems to be the topic of conversation in this column over at EX this month by Chad Kime. Part of it even covers the attempted boycott of Pioneer products that someone started on our studio feedback forum a few months back. Be sure to check it out. 

A Magic box set  (09:25 AM EST): We got in a bit of information on the Magic Knights Rayearth box set last night that may make this box set something a bit more special. The chief designer for the packaging wrote in to let us know a bit about it. "From the start I wanted something extra special for the Rayearth DVD box.  I had seen the Fushigi Yuugi box fell in love.  Well unfortunately the better your packaging the more it cost you..." Merideth wrote us. She felt that the VHS releases fell far from what she hoped for, and being a big fan of this series, is hoping to make it something truly special for DVD owners. "When I design any packaging it has to be something I'd want to show on my shelf. I'm going to try and make up for them in the DVD packages.  So please forgive my short comings... I will do my best to
make it worth everyone's money." From what I've seen of the minimal amount of box art this'll definitely be something to really look forward to.

Pokemon, Take Two (09:23 AM EST): Following up on my review of the first Pokemon movie last night, Thomas Kinnen has sent in a review of it as well!

Tuesday, March 21st, 2000

Pioneer brings more Tenchi to DVD (09:30 PM EST): Pioneer announced today the date for the first volume of the Tenchi Universe Collection I - Tenchi Muyo on Earth I DVD. This disc, with 4 episodes, will arrive on 6/20 with Japanese and English language and English subtitles. Our upcoming pages have been updated accordingly.

Newly reviewed (07:30 PM EST): Our latest shipment of DVD's made it in today and we've slipped the Pokemon Movie into our DVD player to bring you a new review of it.

The icepicks cometh (03:50 PM EST): ADV Films announced their next DVD title today. The Burn Up W DVD is coming 6/27/00. It contains all 4 Burn Up W episodes on one disc and is priced at $29.98 SRP. Languages are Japanese, English, Spanish and English subtitles. There's 4 less VHS tapes on my shelves now...

Monday, March 20th, 2000

Philosophy in a teacup (03:20 PM EST): This time out, His Lordship Chaos takes the quick and easy route for a rant topic and talks about.... anime kids!

Pioneer shuffle (09:50 AM EST): Well, it was bound to happen after the news came out about Pioneer selling off their video manufacturing business here in the US. Asuma posted this to the general forum this morning:
 

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The Tenchi Universe DVDs will be individuals for the reason mentioned above. ^_^ [too many box sets scheduled already]

Deluxe Digital Services, which recently bought out Pioneer Video Manufacturing, is requiring substantially more lead time from materials delivery to street date (which is entirely within their right to do). This led to a serious conflicts and a reshuffling of my personal work schedule. This means once I finish Nazca I will immediately begin on Tenchi Universe to make existing street dates (yay!).

Unfortunately it also means I won't be able to complete work on the EH box until after the FY box is finished (boo!). Sorry to you folks who were waiting for El Hazard... I'm afraid you'll have to be more patient... at this point the street date is TBA, with the earliest being late 2000.

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Sunday, March 19th, 2000

Cleaning out the folder (03:50 PM EST): We've got a bunch of varied reviews for you to take a look at today.

• Nazca: Blood Rivals by Roman Martel
• Rei-Rei/Gigolo UK by Ryko Pins
• CDNow Store Review by Jonathan Collis
• Urusei Yatsura: Beautiful Dreamer by Ben Rudiak-Gould
• Pioneer DVD-626d Player by Thomas Kinnen
• Card Captor Sakura Movie by Chad Kawakami

Column of the fireflies (02:30 PM EST): Every now and then, Roger Ebert talks anime in his column or on his syndicated show. He's reviewed most of the theatrical releases when they come out, and this week he's talking in detail about one of the few anime movies that can truly be called film, Grave of the Fireflies.

Saturday, March 18th, 2000

Revolutionize region 2 (03:30 PM EST): Ralph Jenkins has sent in a good look at the recent release of the Revolutionary Girl Utena: Adolescence DVD in Japan as well as providing a pic of the cover artwork. It's too bad it'll probably be a long time coming before this movie gets over here, never mind the rest of the TV series.

Friday, March 17th, 2000

Advance review, take 2 (10:20 PM EST): Following up on our earlier review, we've spent the evening sitting down to 125 minutes of pure pleasure. I'm talking about Cowboy Bebop: Session 1. This disc will definitely add a lot of new fans to the series, and to Bandai.

New titles (10:10 PM EST): ADV Films has announced via their email newsletter the first Evangelion disc (as previously mentioned here on the site) and the first Monster Rancher disc. The only new disc listed in the release is the second Monster Rancher disc, due on 5/23 alongside Eva. There are also a slew of new region 2 DVD titles to be found here, as listed by CD Japan.

File this... (05:00 PM EST): I've been told that the trailers on the Bandai Entertainment DVD's do not reflect what's in the pipeline or planned for releases. Right now it looks as though their schedule is a bit front-heavy with a lot coming out at once, so they're bound to pause slightly this summer to regroup (what with several series running at once) and start pumping out more. After all, last fall was a huge release time for most companies so this year should be no different. Except this time we have a lot of series running from lots of studios throughout the summer!

Advance review (01:00 PM EST): We're just about 2 plus weeks away from Bandai Entertainment's first anime DVD's to hit the shelves. There's been a lot of posts and chat with concerns about street dates, quality and other things. All I've got to say is, sit back and enjoy the discs. They're coming. In fact, you can read my review for Blue Submarine No. 6 Vol. #1: Blues right now. And we'll be back much later tonight with a review of Cowboy Bebop: Session 1 as well.

New next week (10:50 AM EST): The calm before the storm is just about over and the first signs of lots of new anime DVDs starts next week. For the kids, Warner Bros. will have Pokemon: The First Movie with all kinds of extras including a commentary (but not Japanese tracks at all, per licensing agreements). For the anime fan looking for something a bit more thought provoking and with much better music, Revolutionary Girl Utena: The Rose Collection 2 will finally see release. 

Hardware (10:10 AM EST): Even with all the troubles Sony is having, more region free players are making their way into the market. With the Apex out there, most DVD-ROM players and the Sampo that I've heard about (but not seen), add into the mix the Shinco player. Eve Pukero has sent in this review of it from Finland.

Playstation to be less fun (09:55 AM EST): Though they're downplaying it, Sony looks like it could face major problems from the Hollywood studios after its surfaced that their new Playstation console can be tweaked very easily to play DVD's from other regions. Fixes look to be going into place with the software, but how long until someone figures out how to bypass that? Even moreso when the consoles hit nationally here in the US later this year. Check out this article on Yahoo for more.

Anchor Bay (09:55 AM EST): A lot of people have sent in the emails to me recently regarding the Anchor Bay acquisition of the Warriors of the Wind and Angel's Egg license and whether they really do have it. You can check out their letter here.

Thursday, March 16th, 2000

Bandai clarifications (08:50 PM EST): I've received some feedback regarding the new Bandai site this evening. The Gundam Wing discs are definitely not 29.98 as listed but 24.95. That's the good news. The bad? Well, it's not really bad, but the Vision of Escaflowne is mis-marked as 5 episodes. It will be following the VHS release as we had been originally told. The site will be fixed shortly I've been told.

Staffing changes (05:20 PM EST): We've got a new staff member joining the Anime on DVD team today. As with past staff additions, this one came on board kicking, screaming, crying and basically struggling all the way. Amethyst Jade is now part of the gang! Both Melanie and I thank everyone for their warms wishes and thoughts during this time.

Bandai beefs things up (05:10 PM EST): Bandai Entertainment has kicked off their new site this week and they list a lot of upcoming titles and dates. Lots of good stuff in there and we've updated our pages accordingly. Curiously, Gundam Wing is now listed with a higher price of 29.98 instead of 24.98 as originally announced.

Wednesday, March 15th, 2000

More Inca fun (05:20 PM EST): This past Tuesday Pioneer released the second installment in the Nazca series, Blood Rivals. After our rave reviews of both the disc, the dubbing and the content back in January, how does it hold up in this release? Check out our latest review!

One for the naysayers (12:42 PM EST): Variety has a new article up on projected DVD software sales and overall format growth for this year (9.1 billion in software sales for DVD, 31.8 billion for VHS as well as numbers for 2010). 

Ghibli goodness? (07:20 AM EST): Anchor Bay recently posted on their site that they will be producing an uncut Warriors of the Wind and Angel's Egg DVD by the end of the year, dual language and all. A lot of people have met with this with some skepticism. After all, during the Miyazaki chat on Yahoo last year, Miyazaki himself said:
 

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Hayao Miyazaki: We made a foolish decsion early on, contracting all rights to an American distributor who chopped up the film into something we couldn't recognize. We spent years regaining the rights and we have now contracted with Disney who will release the film in its entirety. Probably what Disney will do is release an English and Japanese version in video of that film. (thanks to Tom Smith for providing the quote)

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So, what happened? One possibility that several people may have missed, depending on your "depth of knowledge" of the DVD field in general, is that Anchor Bay does subcontract a lot of shows from Disney/Buena Vista. And before anyone starts screaming that they produce crap, yes, they did at the beginning but have gotten immensely better. Anamorphic prints are used whenever available and their quality level has done nothing but improve. 

Is this Disney's plan for the Ghibli back catalog for the future? If Kiki's Delivery Service shows up on that list sometime, then I'd make an easy bet.

Tuesday, March 14th, 2000

Pssst (08:20 PM EST): Cowboy Bebop Session 4. Episodes 15-18. Early July. Keep it under your hat. 

More 'Wing (08:10 PM EST): According to the Right Stuf, Bandai Entertainment will release the second installment of Gundam Wing containing five episodes on July 18th. Our upcoming pages have been updated accordingly.

Anime in PAL (04:15 PM EST): Jerome Forestier has sent in a couple of new reviews for recently released French PAL format discs Albator 84 and City Hunter: Services Secret!

Pokereview (04:10 PM EST): Thomas Kinnen has sent in a review for Pokemon Vol. #11 today, picking up where I left off (though hope to begin reviewing soon again).

Kanno goodness (02:53 PM EST): Just in from Japan today is my copy of the Turn A Gundam Concert CD/DVD combo that was recently released. The package is a double jewel case with the CD in the front slot and the DVD in the back. This concert was a one-time gig done on 11/12/1999 with Yoko Kanno conducting the orchestra. The DVD portion of this set is just gorgeous. The concert footage itself is in widescreen while the omake and other portions are in full frame (no 16:9 encoding at all). The audio for the DVD was recorded in 48khz PCM and sounds wonderful. For fans of the series and for fans of Yoko Kanno's music, this is a rare treat to be had. 

Site news (02:15 PM EST): Just a bit of information for the daily visitors here. Wednesday night is likely to be the last daily update for a few days, probably until Monday of next week. My wife is going in for a planned cesarean for our first child Thursday morning, so we're going to be a bit busy. As always, the forum is active and usually has the most up to date information, and we should be on here and there throughout this weekend (with a picture or two of the new addition to our family as well). Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Cool Devices (02:05 PM EST): After a bit of a wait, my box set for Cool Devices arrived today. A quick glance at the set reveals a couple of things. The one to annoy most people is that the subtitles are part of the video, so you can't turn them off. Since there's no dub, TRSI and NuTech most likely figured this would save them a few bucks in authoring costs. The video quality looks decent and the audio quality is pretty much what one should expect from a title like this. An overall review may take a bit of time though due to the large amount of content.

ADV makes another date (11:05 AM EST): ADV Films announced on the rec.arts.anime.misc newsgroup this morning a release date for the Monster Rancher TV series to hit DVD. The first disc, containing episodes 1 through 3, will arrive on 4/25 (an already packed release date) for the MSRP of 24.95. The title will be dubbed only as the Japanese licensors have not authorized a subtitled release.

Pioneer poops on DVD (10:30 AM EST): Last week Pioneer released the Dog of Flanders movie onto DVD. Since it's arrival here along with Catnapped!, I've had a hard time getting any amount of enthusiasm to even remove the shrink-wrap from the keepcase. Back in July of 99, Pioneer released the 104 minute subtitled release of this movie on VHS. The March 7th release this year was the dubbed version on VHS with a running time of 93 minutes. With all the advantages of DVD, what did we get? You guessed it, the cut and dub only version. For a children's title no less, 11 minutes was cut from what many consider a classic. Pioneer had a couple of options to try with bringing this to DVD (branching, dual layered with both versions, one version on each side) but chose to go the easiest route and release the watered down dub only version. It will be quite some time before I get to reviewing this disc, if at all. However, Abood Rabbat has taken the time to go through the DVD and has sent in an alternate angle review.

Ask Ladycat (09:40 AM EST): Ladycat has chimed in with this weeks column with some tidbits about things like Kite, Tenchi Muyo and the introduction of the Addendum Masters!

Rumor bin (09:24 AM EST): It looks like there's a possibility that the Vision of Escaflowne could be following the same release style as Cowboy Bebop and Outlaw Star, which could bring the series down from 8 discs to 6 discs. Remember, this is a rumor only.

Monday, March 13th, 2000

Official Eva (10:00 PM EST): The official street date for Neon Genesis Evangelion Collection 0:1 came down this afternoon directly from David Williams of ADV Films: May 23, 2000.

Escaflowne tidbits (09:30 PM EST): Benoit Thomassin wrote in today with some feedback he got from Anime Village about the Vision of Escaflowne DVD's: "The Vision of Escaflowne will be making its way to DVD this June. The episode count will follow the same as the Subtitled VHS-4 episodes per DVD at $29.98. Extras are are currently being negotiated. An announcement will be made shortly." The 4 episode count makes plenty of sense since it's being released alongside the dub VHS and this is definitely a solid amount of episodes per disc. This is definitely going to be a great show to get on DVD and it'll be interesting to see what kind of extras they'll manage to get (creditless openings and closings I hope!).

Cowboy Goodness (12:13 PM EST): A test version of the first Cowboy Bebop DVD was showing at Animazement this past weekend, and Mike Toole of Anime Jump sent in a few impressions and some info. "It has all the goodies we expected (five episodes, dub/subs), but it also has extras-- in this case, some footage from Session 0, the Cowboy Bebop special that's essentially a making-of for the series. Jerry said something vague about stretching the duration of Session 0 out throughout the entire six-disc run, so I'm not sure exactly how much is contained on the first disc. Also, I need to point out that the menu interface is just kickass-- it's animated, and it resembles the computer display that Spike and Jet use to check out bounties and watch Big Shots. This is going to be a hell of a disc when it arrives."

PS2 hacked already? (07:36 AM EST): Talk about finding it out fast. According to the Gaming Intelligence Agency now lists several codes that let you play region 1 DVD's on the Region 2 "locked" Playstation 2 gaming console. Whether the reverse will be true when it hits the US remains to be seen, but chances are that there will be a way to do it. Sony's original first generation DVD player, the S-7000, included a simple switch that made it region free. Thanks to Jake McNeill for the tip.

Picture time (07:12 AM EST): For those who have asked over the past several months, I finally managed to get up pictures of my little home theater as well as my office theater. Click here to check it out.

Sunday, March 12th, 2000

Patlabor TV DVD (09:12 AM EST): Is Patlabor TV heading to DVD? In the UK, quite possibly. There was mention recently of it showing up in the UK section of the Diamond Previews catalog (which doesn't seem to be available online anywhere). A little digging revealed this post on uk.media.animation.anime with what's said about it:

"Patlabor 1 DVD - Tokyo 1998. The Babylon Project blah blah (I bet you know all this by now!). In the first ep. of the series which has become a multimedia phenemon, rookie Noa Izumi arrives on base as crooks make off with the new Ingram Labor. Throwing caution and diginty to the winds, she gives chase and saves the day. Approximate running time: 30 minutes. (CAUT 1) DVD 19.99 pounds." as posted by Yoav Felberbaum.
 

Saturday, March 11th, 2000

09:51 PM EST: Getting it in a couple of hours early, but our weekly update of the overall top ten for 2000 is done (with a lot) of movement and new additions to the chart as well as our March top ten.

09:00 PM EST: His lordship Chaos here. Well, it's been some time since our latest rants (give or take a few OVAs),
but now that he has managed to finagle some time between fulfilling his insidious plans to rule the world, and doing his laundry, yours truly has conceived a revolutionary new rant. And after reading this, you will no doubt be thinking this very thing: evidently therapy didn't work.

05:56 PM EST: What does a producer for Tenchi Muyo OVA's, an animation director for Akira and the screenplay writer for Serial Experiments Lain have in common? They were all involved in the Catnapped! The Movie anime! Check out our latest review.

04:55 PM EST: The French disc of Albator 84, also known as the second Harlock series, has been released this week. Gregory Charvet wrote in with some of the details on this dual layered disc: It contains a French mono soundtrack, no subtitles, original opening and ending, bios, characters and ships artwork, trailers for City hunter - Secret Services,     Les Mystérieuses Citées D'or, Mermaid's Scar and Reincarnations (Please Save My Earth). The disc is in full screen presentation and though the cover says it's 2 1/2 hours, it's actually 3/12 hours and contains 8 episodes. The price? Between 159FF and 199FF (23-29$ US). Though the show is about 20 years old, the transfer is apparently pretty ok.

04:45 PM EST: Anime News Service has a piece up from their coverage of the Animazement con. It pretty much has the same information as we posted last night, but they also make mention of two other shows and their VHS place, which may have bearing on their DVD release: "Bandai will release Silent Mobius TV and Brain Powerd VHS, switching over to filling tapes with 5-6 episodes very soon, prices will remain the same. Bandai hopes to have both titles released on DVD eventually." I don't know about you, but I'd love to see both of those series on DVD with the same kind of release style as Cowboy Bebop.

Friday, March 10th, 2000

06:21 PM EST: DVD Express has gotten in 750 copies of Nazca: Blood Rivals, confirming it's release for next week (though some stores broke street date on it already). They also have the box artwork up for The Best Of Kitty: Vol. 1 and a new street date; 3/21/2000. Our upcoming pages have been changed to include the new artwork (as well as several other titles!).

05:18 PM: Mike Toole of Anime Jump sent in the first wave of news from the Animazement convention today. Jerry Chu from Bandai had some of the same information to tell and a bit more clarification for others. Vision of Escaflowne will definitely hit DVD in June and Outlaw Star will arrive in July and may feature the same price/format that Cowboy Bebop is (which is fantastic I might add). There will be no subtitled VHS for Gundam Wing at all. Bandai also may not concentrate on the original Gundam for awhile. Whether that means that they won't be licensing more Gundam shows for awhile or that they won't be bringing the 0080 and 0083 to DVD I'm not sure. Hopefully we'll get that clarified soon. Thanks Mike!

05:11 PM: According to DVD Express, they've finally gotten in their shipment of  Cool Devices: Operations 1-4, Cool Devices: Operations 5-8, Cool Devices: Operations 9-11 and Cool Devices: Operations 1-11: 3 DVD Set.

05:10 PM: I received a confirmation from Dan Ward of Palm Pictures that the Perfect Blue and Castle of Cagliostro discs will definitely be widescreen. No word on anamorphic though, but if I was a gambling man, I'd say Perfect Blue would be and Castle of Cagliostro may be 50/50

NEWS: 03/09/2K

More cover artwork: Another quick browse through Amazon revealed the cover for Bandai's upcoming release of Gundam Wing!

Cover artwork: Amazon has up several pieces of new cover artwork for anime DVD's coming out in April. We've added them to our upcoming pages, but you can click to Amazon and check out the larger artwork for Cowboy Bebop 1, Ranma 1/2 OVA, Sol Bianca and Trigun covers there.

What secrets revealed next: Today kicks off the third annual Animazement convention in Raleigh, NC. With the past few conventions all having great DVD related news, what will this one have in store for us? If you're attending, let us know what you see and hear! For those of us not going, it's time to check out Fans View to see all the pictures!

Manga adds value: Though not all the information is in yet on the three titles due from Manga at the end of April, more information has come to light:

We've also added the cover artwork to our upcoming section for all three titles. We're still tracking down the final official word on whether Perfect Blue and Castle of Cagliostro are widescreen and anamorphic.

Due next week: Next week is a bit lighter than it should be since ADV Films has apparently missed the street date for Sakura Diaries #1. Pioneer on the other hand does get the next volume out for Nazca: Blood Rivals. The week of 3/21 starts off what will be a disc laden three week run into April, so it's a bit more quiet before the storm begins.

Contests: We've pulled our random entry for the Sailor Moon contest, and big congratulations go out to Don Zimmerman! Don't forget to check out our big anniversary contest for March!

NEWS: 03/08/2K

Ask Ladycat: Talk about a question packed column today! Ladycat tackles many burning questions of the anime fans today with more on Akira, where to find anime in Boston, showings coming to DVD.... . dogs and cats living together . . .mass hysteria! There's also several reader addendums to previous questions, so be sure to check it out!

Contest ends: Our February contests ended yesterday and we're going through all the entries. We've got our winner picked for the Chinese Ghost Story contest and will have our Sailor Moon movie winner tomorrow!

NEWS: 03/07/2K

Bad retailers: Over yesterday and today, a couple of online retailers have made some boo boos with their databases. DVD Express accidentally replaced the Castle of Cagliostro listing with another title (an adult one no less). If you ordered from there, check your order for it and give them an email to get it fixed. They'll take care of it quickly and with no hassle. The Right Stuf website lists August dates for Lost Universe and Sakura Diaries #2. I've confirmed with ADV that these are not the dates they've set. Like Neon Genesis Evangelion 0:1, there is no set date yet. And finally, DVD Empire is listing the first volume of Brain Powered today with a release date of... today! Today is actually the release date for the first volume on VHS, which means they more than likely misread their Pioneer sell sheet information.

Bandai disc info: I got in a little clarification on the upcoming April Bandai DVD's, which have been the issue of some minor debate among quality fans. Cowboy Bebop is definitely DVD-9 and Eat-Man '98 is 2 DVD-9s. Blue Sub No. 6 is a DVD-5 naturally, but they've apparently maxed out the bitrate but keeping it within levels that all players can handle. And it definitely does have the Japanese 5.1 track.

PS2 DVD: Everyone's been talking about this past weekends release of the Playstation 2 in Japan (along with associated crimes!). Gaming Age News is one of the few that actually mentions something about DVD disc sales though. "It also said it had shipped 1.3 million PlayStation2 games and that the console, which can play digital video discs, had boosted DVD sales with video stores having ordered double to quadruple their usual number of DVDs since Saturday." While this is unlikely to affect actual prices of region 2 DVD's, it's a good sign that support of the format will be beefed up over the course of this year. After all, Sony essentially sold almost 1 million DVD players in the space of a weekend. Will the same happen here in the fall when it's released? Thanks to Jon Allen for the link.

Lupin in Italy: Yamato Video in Italy has a great page up now with information on the Italian Lupin DVD's that they're offering. It looks like not only do they have the original Japanese mono and the Italian mono tracks, but they've done a remaster for Italian 5.1 tracks as well. For 25$ US a disc or 125$ US for the entire 23 episode series and two bonus pilot episodes, this is a great deal for people who love Lupin. I'm not sure how the shows were changed, if at all, for Italian release though. These discs are region 2 coded and in PAL.

Ghibli DVD's: The FAQ at the official Ghibli site has been updated recently with some information about possible upcoming DVD's. "We have received many requests regarding DVD release. We are currently considering about it. We think that we can tell you a good news someday. So please wait a while more." This is actually rather unsurprising in the wake of Disney successfully negotiating DVD rights for Princess Mononoke. Considering the R1 release will have the original language track on it, there's bound to be some amount of re-importation of this title, especially at the price that it can be had for, even with international shipping. For those who like to import the originals from Japan, this will be good (considering the number of scripts of most Ghibli movies out there) and may very well make it easier for Disney to secure licenses to put other Ghibli movies on DVD here.

Alternate angle: Abood Rabbat has sent in a review for A Chinese Ghost Story (Animated) today. I'm glad a lot of people are enjoying this show, but it just wasn't my cup of tea. But this is what makes the world go round!

Forum: We've installed the latest upgrade to our forum today, so hopefully some of those minor bugs that we've seen will be completely stomped out. 

NEWS: 03/05/2K

More Manga dates: Also part of the Manga slight rescheduling, according to Manga's newly updated coming soon page, 5/30 will see the release of the Blackjack movie for 24.95$. Our upcoming pages also reflect these changes. Thanks to Tom Smith for the info.

Manga adds more muscle: Following up on the titles that Right Stuf listed awhile back, there seem to be a few changes but more in the way of real announcements to more vendors than just them. Previously listed as 3/28 releases and now set for 4/25 according to DVD Express, Manga will be releasing the Castle of Cagliostro and The Devil Man along with the previously mentioned Perfect Blue. All discs look to contain both language tracks though some information looks a bit sketchy. Only Perfect Blue looks to have the Dolby Digital 5.1 tracks, but that's to be expected considering the age of the other two shows. As long as Castle of Cagliostro is in widescreen and clean, I'll be most pleased.

Miscellaneous: Just a bit of small housecleaning this morning. The Anime 2K Checklist has been updated through 4/4 with titles and dates. The top ten for March has been added (with an interest mix of hot titles people are ordering) as well as our overall top ten for 2000.

NEWS: 03/04/2K

Anime chat: Anime.About.Com will be hosting a chat with Jonathan Klein of New Generation Pictures and Talesin Jaffe an independent voice director on Saturday March 11th, 5:00 pm PST.  New Generation Pictures are the folks who have subtitled over 50 different titles for Pioneer, Urban Vision, Central Park Media, and the Right Stuff. Recently, they began dubbing for Pioneer. They will be discussing their latest dub 'Nazca' and upcoming projects 3X3 Eyes and Nanako. They will also be discussing what is involved in producing quality dubbing, the differences between dubbing and subbing, and how  to make it in the anime voice business. With any luck, I should be able to attend this myself and hope to see the chat regulars at this site show up there as well.

New titles: ADV Films sent out their latest announcements last night and there's two new DVD's listed. First up is Lost Universe Vol. #1 which has a running time of 100 minutes (4 episodes) and lists for 29.95. The second is the next volume for Sakura Diaries with a running time of 90 minutes (3 episodes) for 24.95. There's a snag though, but not a major one. Both discs are announced with To Be Announced dates. ADV is still apparently getting their pipeline and authoring stuff set up, so they aren't sure when the discs will actually hit (especially since the first Sakura Diaries disc looks like it's going to slip as well). On the plus side, this is good news for those who weren't sure if Lost Universe was really going to get the shiny disc treatment and helps people to not buy things twice and then resent the studio for not announcing it was coming to DVD to begin with. Kudos to ADV for that. 

NEWS: 03/03/2K

Happy anniversary: Today's a big day here around the Anime on DVD group. Today marks our two year anniversary! Back on 3/3/98, we started the site on my old personal Netcom account. Within maybe two weeks we moved over to Geocities and stayed there for several months. Then in August of 1998, we made the "big move" to go to a domain name and really ramp up everything as the format and the anime titles began to get serious. It's been a wonderful two years and I've enjoyed myself immensely. I've made a ton of great friends and lots of valuable friendships with people. So, to celebrate, we're kicking off our biggest contest yet. Here's to another two years of Anime on DVD!

Magic discs 2: Yesterday, Jason Hill got a response from Media Blasters on the type of discs that will be used the four Magic Knight Rayearth Memorial Collection I set. To alleviate the fears of many, they will be dual layered DVD-9 discs.

Alternate angle: Completing out the series, Steve Brandon has wrote in on the finale to the Tenchi in Tokyo series.

Retailer review: Cliff Dixon has written in today with a look at his preferred retailer for DVD, Ken Cranes.

NEWS: 03/02/2K

It lives: DVD Express has begun the merger that was announced a few months back with Maximum and their subsidiary, Game Cave. Though they're still using their DVD Express domain, "Express.com" is the name on the pages and their inventory has just ballooned. Why is this interesting to anime DVD fans? Well, not only do they have everything they've carried before, they've got a lot of wallscrolls, toys and import games for a lot of anime titles. They look like they're going to be doing the full inventory gig this weekend, but there's a lot of cool things that they look like they'll be carrying. They've also added in a few new anime DVD's, including Garzey's Wing, Magic Knight Rayearth and the Sailor Moon S Movie: Hearts in Ice.

Magic Discs: For those like myself who have been wondering, I received a confirmation email today that the Magic Knight Rayearth Memorial Collection I set will be made up of 4 DVD's. Most likely it will be 5 episodes to a disc. No other information was given in terms of DVD-5 or DVD-9, keepcase or a Pioneer style box.

Cover art: I have to admit that this is simply a great looking piece of cover artwork for a release. Click here to see the box art for Kite.

Let's talk AnimEigo: The folks at AnimEigo seem to have snuck in a bit of an update on their Urusei Yatsura page. "We anticipate that the first set (UY DVD 1-5) will be released mid-April, 2000 -- though we are trying to do it faster than that. There are some uncertainties, because DVD production plant schedules are very tight. Subsequent sets will come out every 3 months or so." Talk about April becoming a busy month!

Due next week: Next week has the possibility of several releases that go from one end to the other. Pioneer has The Dog Of Flanders and Catnapped! The Movie (which is confirmed as dual language and subtitled), Media Blasters has The Best Of Kitty: Vol. 1 and Right Stuff has Cool Devices: Operations 1-4, Cool Devices: Operations 5-8, Cool Devices: Operations 9-11 and Cool Devices: Operations 1-11: 3 DVD Set. 

X marks more spots: More dates have been added to the theatrical run for the X/1999 movie from Manga Entertainment. Anime is definitely something that when seen theatrically is quite impressive!
 

NEWS: 03/01/2K

Media Blasters jacks it up: I confirmed today that Media Blasters is indeed jacking up the price of their Magic Knight Rayearth Memorial DVD Collection 1 from 130$ to 150$. DVD fans who have waited patiently for this set, of which we still do not know how many discs or what kind of box set it will be, will now be paying an MSRP of 50$ more than the VHS versions. The sub and dub VHS copies individually list for 19.99. In just the few conversations I've had with people from fans to people at the retail level, they've all said how this smacks of something worse than the Disney pricing hikes experienced last year. Media Blasters looked to be doing the right thing with their releases until this news came out, but now it's time to wonder how their Kenshin pricing will go. What do you think of this? Voice your opinion at this poll.

But a spot of good news: For those looking for bargains with the changes in the online retail world, I got in an email from the fine folks at Animenation that they've marked the single Cool Devices DVDs down to $19.95 and the box set to $49.95. These changes just went in as I'm typing this, so it may take a bit to show up on the site. And for those wanting to lock in their 40% discount for the upcoming Trigun series in case the pre-order discount prices go up as indications seem to be saying, DVD Express is now listing the entire series in their catalog.