Tapes, Super Tapes, and Chacha (with a ting of blazing transfer students)

      There are days where something positive comes out of nowhere and makes your life that much more enjoyable. These days aren't very common for me. I mean I graduated college, got a new car, worked at Anime Festival Orlando and Megacon, and went to Wrestlemania 24. Not common at all. All joking aside, one can make the case that those positives did not come out of nowhere, and he/she/it is right. Last Saturday, I was working with some convention staff to help create some graphics and story elements. Midway through the meeting, the man holding the meeting (lets call him "Steve") said that he needed to go to Anime Sushi to get some Fist of the North Star tapes. He seemed like it was nothing really. He asked who wanted to come with him. The camera guys said that they had something to do, leaving me and "Steve". He then asked me, and I said "sure."

      I hop on his Mustang, and we make it to Anime Sushi. We give them our greetings and they hand "Steve" his tapes. I was getting a little bored until they mentioned that they had more tapes that needed to be gone. They motioned towards a storage area, and I was astounded with the selection. Boxes among boxes of fansubs, magazines, and OSTs. I asked them what would happen to these tapes if I didn't takes them, and they just said that the tapes would be dumped. I then preceded to take a box, and fill it..then another...and another...

You don't want to go to his school.

     I ended up with about 5 boxes filled with anime from the 70's to now. "Steve" and I got a box filled with Raijin Comics and Animerica Extra, two manga anthologies that I read ages ago Very surprised with this, especially with Raijin Comics. "Steve" and I agreed to split the box, me getting the Animerica Extras and "Steve" getting the Raijin Comics. May not have been the smartest decision. I mean, I love Animerica. Just not as big a fan of the "Extras". Don't know why either, seeing as I am a fan of Video Girl Ai, Banana Fish, and many of the others. Maybe it was the fact that Raijin Comics had Fist of the Blue Sky, Slam Dunk, City Hunter, Guardian Angel Getten, Baki the Grappler, and Keiji. Damn it, "Steve".

The Cockpit: One of the greatest anime OVAs of all time. Period.

 
   At least I have the millions of fansubs of series I have been meaning to download but couldn't find...oh wait, my VCRs didn't work. Damn it. I went and bought a newer VCR, and I was ecstatic to find that my tapes worked. Another unfortunate aspect of this great day was the fact that most of these tapes were S-VHS, or Super VHS. The VCR couldn't play these tapes. After smashing a few things, I went to the Salvation Army store and low and behold, I found a VCR with S-VHS playback. PERFECT. Now, I am watching some classic OVAs and TV series, like Heavy Metal L-Gaim, High School Kimengumi, and Akazukin Chacha. Expect some reviews from all of these series, especially the OVAs. Many of them are absolutely unheard of, and that's pretty sad, considering I'm a huge fan of the stuff. The Cockpit, for one, is still one of the most powerful anime ever, and that was never really given a fair shot outside of its crappy Urban Vision release.

..Whatever.