Anime News - Novelist Sakyo Komatsu Passes Away

Influential science-fiction novelist Sakyo Komatsu passed away in an Osaka hospital on Tuesday, July 26 at 4:36 p.m. due to pneumonia. He was 80 years old.

Komatsu wrote a number of novels that gained recognition not only in Japan, but around the world. Perhaps his best known novel is Japan Sinks!, which inspired two live-action films and a live-action television series. His stories also inspired the Komatsu Sakyo Anime Gekijō television anime series.

Komatsu was born in Osaka and he graduated from Kyoto University in Italian literature. After working as a magazine editor and a factory foreman, he became a comedy scriptwriter. He then made a name for himself in large-scale science-fiction epics with historical and literary themes with the 1964 novel Nihon Apache-Zoku.

Komatsu's 1973 disaster novel Japan Sinks! inspired a live-action movie in the same year it was published. Shinji Higuchi, one of the founders of the anime studio Gainax, directed a second live-action film version in 2006 under the English title Doomsday: The Sinking of Japan. The second film starred SMAP singer Tsuyoshi Kusanagi and actress Kou Shibasaki (Battle Royale, Dororo) with cameos by Evangelion director Hideaki Anno, Gundam creator Yoshiyuki Tomino, Hataraki Man creator Moyoco Anno, and actress Mayumi Shintani (Cutie Honey's Scarlet Claw). The novel itself has sold over three million copies and won an award from the Mysery Writers of Japan. Komatsu then wrote a sequel that won a Seiun Award from the Japan Science Fiction Convention in 2007.

A service was held for family members.

Source: Nikkei

(animenewsnetwork.com)

Oddly enough, I just got into this man's work. 

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Anime News - Princess Mononoke Is No Longer a Buena Vista Title

Responding to a query by ANN, Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment confirmed on Tuesday that Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli's 1997 film Princess Mononoke is no longer a production of its Buena Vista Home Entertainment label.Walt Disney Studios suggested contacting Lionsgate Films for further information. However, Lionsgate told ANN that there was "no current information on the release of this title."

Disney's former subsidiary Miramax released the film theatrically in the United States, and then released it to DVD in 2000 (cover pictured). After Miramax's founders Bob and Harvey Weinstein left the company in 2005, Disney sold the company to Filmyard Holdings in 2010. In February, Miramax licensed the home video release of 550 titles in its catalog to Lionsgate and StudioCanal, and then licensed 251 more titles to Echo Bridge Entertainment.

[Via The Fandom Post, Mania, animenews.biz]

(animenewsnetwork.com)

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Anime News - Totoro Marks 500th Week in Top 300 DVD Chart

The DVD of Studio Ghibli's popular anime My Neighbor Totoro marked its 500th week on Oricon's DVD sales ranking chart this month. During the July 18-24 week, it landed at #33 by selling 2,184 more copies for a grand total of 1,084,134.

The DVD first went on sale nine years and 10 months ago on September 28, 2001, and it has been a unprecedented "long seller" since then. It sold its 1-millionth copy last May after 440 weeks on the chart. It is only the fourth million-copy anime title; Studio Ghibli's Howl's Moving Castle sold over one million copies since 2005, while Spirited Away sold over 2.3 million copies since 2002.

On Japan's all-time DVD sales ranking chart, My Neighbor Totoro is #9. The DVD tends to double its sales during summer vacations and extended holiday seasons.

Besides Totoro, other Ghibli works benefited from the July 16opening of the studio's latest film, Kokuriko-Zaka Kara. Arrietty(7,291 more copies for a new total of 230,737), Kiki's Delivery Service (1,055 more copies for a new total of 460,973), and Laputa(893 more copies for a new total of 730,524) ranked #7, #80, and #92, respectively, on the most recent weekly top 100 chart.

Source: Oricon

(animenewnetwork.com)

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Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok Manga to Resume Online

After seven years, Sakura Kinoshita will resume her Mythical Detective Loki manga in a new series that launches in Mag Garden's online manga magazine Beat's on August 25. The new manga series is tentatively titled Matantei Loki Ragnarok ~Shin Sekai no Kamigami~ (Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok: The Gods of the New World).

The occult mystery story follows the Norse god Loki after he is exiled to the mortal world in the form of a human child. He must collect auras of evil in order to return to the world of gods, so he runs a detective agency to accomplish this.

Kinoshita began the first Matantei Loki (Mythical Detective Loki) manga series in Square Enix's Monthly Shonen Gangan magazine in 1999. The manga then migrated to Mag Garden's Monthly Comic Blade magazine under the new title Matantei Loki Ragnarok (Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok) in 2002. Matantei Loki Ragnarok inspired a television animein 2003 before ending in 2004.

ADV Manga published the Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok manga in North America, and ADV Films co-produced and released the entire television anime series.

Source: Comic Natalie

(animenewsnetwork.com)

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Tiger & Bunny Gets Manga Series (Updated)

So, Tiger and Bunny is getting a new manga series. I'm sure 98% of the anime community is gonna love this news as much as I am. Young Jump is going to announce that Hiroshi Ueda (of Full Metal Panic! Sigma fame) will be illustrating a Tiger and Bunny manga, starting in the 5th issue of Miracle Jump in October.

Check out the link yourself!

I also found out that Masakazu Katsura will be drawing a one-shot based on the series. Don't know Mr. Katsura? He only made Video Girl Ai, DNA2, and Zetman! Excited as hell for this, fellow readers!

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Kenji Kamiyama's Full Xi Avant Anime Streamed

The official website for the stereoscopic 3D theatrical release of Kenji Kamiyama's Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex: Solid State Society movie began streaming the full version of Kamiyama's Xi AVANT animeshort on Tuesday. While the online streaming of Xi AVANT is in 2D, theaters in Japan added a stereoscopic 3D version of the anime to screenings of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex: Solid State Society this past Spring. The short is a tie-in with the NTT Docomo's next-generation Xi data service.

Kamiyama just established Steve N' Steven, a new consulting firm for planning and producing animation in advertising and other areas, with the ad firm Hakuhodo on April 1.

Source: Saishin Anime Jōhō

(animenewsnetwork.com)

Here's a sneak peek at the piece. Looking awesome so far.

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Persona 4 the Animation's New Extended Promo Streamed

The Mayonaka TV teaser website for the Persona 4 The Animationproject began streaming a new extended promotional video on Wednesday. (Like the previous videos, this one debuted at midnight in Japan or 11:00 a.m. on Tuesday EDT, and is only viewable for a limited time.) The anime will premiere on Japan's MBS, TBS, andCBC stations this October.

Shihoko Hirata, the singer of the opening and ending theme songs for the original Persona 4 game, will also perform the anime's opening theme song "sky's the limit" and the ending theme song "Beauty of Destiny" (with Lotus Juice). The official Twitter account for the animeconfirmed that the anime will last two kūru or half a year, and the official site posted the second key visual image from the anime.

Director Seiji Kishi (Angel Beats!, My Bride is a Mermaid) and the anime studio AIC ASTA are adapting the Persona 4 role-playing game from Atlus into a television series. Persona concept designer Kazuma Kaneko, original character designer Shigenori Soejima, and musical composer Shoji Meguro are reprising their respective roles from the game for the anime.

Cast members Daisuke Namikawa (Yu Narukami), Showtaro Morikubo (Yōsuke Hanamura), Yui Horie (Chie Satonaka), and Ami Koshimizu (Yukiko Amagi), Tomokazu Seki (Kanji Tatsumi), Kappei Yamaguchi (Kuma), Unshou Ishizuka(Ryōtarō Dōjima), Akemi Kanda (Nanako Dōjima), and Mitsuaki Madono (Tōru Adachi) are all returning from the game to play their respective characters.

Source: MyCom Journal

(animenewsnetwork.com)

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