Okita

Actually to the best of my knowledge, Nausicaa was never release state wise, (or at least it wasn't a year or so back) because I had to purchase my version as a Japanese import, I usually purchase the R1 US import but the dealer told me there wasn't one for Nausicaa, bear in mind that this was a few month after Princess Mononoke was released (i think) so it might have been release during that time... Anyways, I still think Nausicaa is Miyazaki's best work, the artwork for its time was spetacular, and the story was wonderfully captivating... The butchered 'warrior of the wind' was the sole reason that Miyazaki withdraw from western audience for such a long time, which is really a shame, the lack of understanding of 'Anime' by western media during that time didn't help and Ghibli was doing fine at home with success after success. IF it does get release in the state, it might even get release is Australia!!! (gasp!) If that's the case I'd get it again in a snap.

You should also talk to someone that can do art (if you haven't already) I know a good pair of girls who created a nice web comic, one does the plot while the other create the art, this would be a nice compliment if you can someone that works well with you. (They they kinda lived in the same city so it makes co-oping easier). If you really want to go ahead, that's the next step you should do... who knows? you could be the next mega tokyo....

This concept of your manga is your standard and typically cliche adventure story base, which is to say: it has a good chance of becoming a popular shounen series if it ever gets commercialised and promoted, the party theme and characteristic background of the story's protagonist (ie: the legendary warrior's great great great somesuch descendent -add or remove generation as applicable-) as well as the typical romantic entanglement are genre staples and you really can't go wrong. However as anime goes, it's not very original or inspiring. Now if this were to ever be made into a game, THEN it would have potential to rival the likes of FF and Dragon Quest, the cliche setting are stock genre standard that have huge potential to be magnified by graphical delight, and the storyline typically tends to have an episodic nature by default, making the adventure set scenario the best suited to compliment game narrative. The world would be fantasy base, and since the protagnoist comes from the 'real' world has the potential to cross into techno-wizardry (technology vs magic is on!) and your genre-fied character are REQUIRED to filled standard role in the game's adventure set. Make some decent background story for each side character, make the world more immersive by adding history, tradition and unique culture, and you have a stockstandard FF sellout that will have millions of fans around the world (myself included) drooling in happiness and suffering from sleep depredation. Copyright your story concept and see if you can sell it to squaresoft or namco et al, and when you've made your first million, remeber poor lil ol me and shout me a round at a pub ~_^

This is an odd little gem that nearly slipped by me without notice, by it's title alone I would have imagined a fantasy series or other such standard adventure pack, to my surprise, the series is something that completely blew me out of the water. The main character happens to be a weapon of mass destruction name Lucy (as per the standard law of anime: in the form of a cute little girl) who at the beginning of the show is in the process of escaping from the top secret lab where she is being held. Injured during the escape, she never-the-less managed to make her getaway (and in the process received a split personality via a head injury). From there she is rescued by Kouta and his cousin Yuka, who gave her the name of Nyou because (big surprise!!!) she can't speak save to repeat the monosyllabic phrase of 'nyou' (can you say 'chi' people?). As you can see, superficially, the beginning of the series has a lot of resemblance with Chobits, however (and this is a HUGE however) this anime is SO riddle with violence and angst that I must clearly warn away any faint of heart. (Because that faint heart will most likely be stressed beyond tolerance level by the first ten minute of the show.) Some scenes in this series are brutally violent, we are talking about graphical spine ripping, head decapitating, body crushing violence without any attempt at discreet censorship. It also contains partial nudity and disturbing psychological profiles that are obviously aimed at a more adult audience. The atmosphere permeated throughout the show is extremely nostalgic and melancholy, which reminds me of Saikano, the music score also helps enhance this atmosphere; fairly slow paced with an emphasis on string instrument, it fades quietly into the background yet still remains distinct and memorable. The intro song is a slow and melancholy solo of the series' theme song that reminds me of a Latin church hymns, and the surprisingly uplifting ending by Chieko Kawabe rounds up a very strong musical presence. The theme of the show has a tendency to make you feel melancholy, and as I mention earlier reminds me of Saikano. This gives me a dreadful premonition concerning its ending. Getting emotionally attached to character that could very well die (especially with the degree of callousness that life is treated with in this series) can be a seriously depressing thing. Despite this hesitancy, I am looking forward to more of this series; it shows great promise of being at least equal to the likes of Saikano, and the shocking violence factor gives this an almost Eva quality. I earnestly recommend fans of Saikano to give this a try, its a gem! edit: my god dagger! is there ANY series you haven't covered yet??? =P

Note that most anime and manga had their story board created in Japan, that ebing said, their are tones of anime and manga that are either influenced or based on classic japanese literature, their are even a plethora of anime based on world literature. (ludwig kakumei comes to mind as does Reign) the recently made Otogizoushi and Samurai 7 would be examples of reinvented classics as well...

This type of survay should really call for a poll, with particular cases being discussed, you gave five manga choices, of the five, I am incline towards kenshin, though even that is marginal (I only like the kyoto arc) bleach is semi decent as well but I've yet to see much of it so cannot make a better judgement...

Hmmm Dagger pretty much named all the significant graphic achievement that I'm inlcine to agree with, ghibli i think deserves an honourable mention, two of their work Nausicaa and Princess Mononoke, stand out as some of the most amazing graphical achievement of their time, Nausicaa was particularly breathtaking for its time. Another shiner would be evangelion, (yes yes we can argue about this till the sun goes down) the animation was truly an achievement for it's time, comparable to movie quality...

Firstly greenfield stated that fansub are being download off the net and copied to DVD and sold in Asia, this is suppose to be eliminating sales in Asia, yet not in other western country where piracy isn't as rampant. Just looking at the quality of their English subtitles is enough clue in that the process of Fansubbing isn't involved. Piracy and Fansubbing is two different matters, pirates will always have their source and I bet they're not neccessarily from the fansubbing community. Greenfield seems to imply that once fansubbing stops piracy will also follow. This is BS, piracy exist before fansubbing, it will exist through other avenues without being significantly effected if fansubbing ever dries up.

I don't get how the fansub community could effect the distribution of anime in Asia, almost all bootleg Asian anime are DVD ripped. Fansubbing rarely enters the equation in this scenario, most of these bootlegs are almost exact replicate of the Japanese release DVD with hastily put together subtitle in duel language. This is piracy and not fansubbing as Greenfield seems to imply. Going after the fansubbing community in this circumstance is like shooting the dog because the wolf stole the chicken...

It's a sad fact that 90% of female (when applicable) in this sort of show falls into the token female categories, they rarely if ever have anything important to add to the plot other than being a semi transparant moral officer or the occasional damsel in distress. Personally I'm ambivilant towards her, I don't find her annoying because she doesn't touch any of my personal pet peeve,(such is the case for characters like Relena from Gundam) but neither is she in any way captivating... she's like Keiko in Yu Yu Hakusha, I simply can't picture her as anything other than a background character no matter how much they try to integrate her into the show. I was going to try and draw a comparison with any character from shows simliar to this that has more of a role than being a 'token love interest' but am drawing a complete blank... can you think of ONE example of unique and outstanding females character fulfilling the same role as her in a sports anime?

I agree with Dagger on this, most mainstream channels will never show a wide variety of anime simply because unique and sophisticated anime don't neccessarily have a wide audience base to support it. Anime has a very restrictive audience base, it does not appeal to the majoritive of adult due to it being a 'cartoon' and the younger audience will often not appreaciate the depth of the slower paced, plot centric or unique styled and executed show. As there is no audience, no one will activily braodcaste it. There are some exception to this rule, but the majoritive of anime is action/adventure centric aimed at a selective teenage audience, the day I see mainstream Gravitation with a raving fan base will be the day I eat a box of lemon... ~_~ Anime has a long way to go before it ever goes fully mainstream. As a side note, who here likes Astroboy? I still think that it's one of the most important anime to ever be release outside of Japan...

You've pretty much mentioned most of the recent landmark achievement, though I'm a bit miffed that you left out some of the earlier great anime such as Astro Boy. (hello? it's anime dammit!!!) And you should also mention Princess Mononoke which had stars like Gillian Anderson as voice actor and was the first to be given the 'full star treatment' by hollywood. (Incidently, it was voted best film -and not just anime- in a German film festival)

I've never been a great fan of these shounen sports anime, I didn't get into slam dunk and neither did I like this show initially. I've since found myself reluctantly giving it a second chance after a local club marathon... the show IS addictive, and I find it's oddly unimaginative plot and character to be appealing on a simplistic but enjoyable level. Series that are extremely long have the potential to drag itself to death (like Inu Yasha) though most sports show tends to have a definite ending that is actually fulifilling and well planned. (There are exception of course, but a case example would be Captain Tsubasa or Touch)

I have cosplayed before, though the occassion for it is far less frequent than in the State where there are cons that are held frquently. I've done a couple of cosplay, one is a group cosplay as the crazy 88 and the other (which is far more better) isn't really that hard to figure out.... (hint: look at my nickname ^_^) I've grew my hair long to look like Soujiro, It's halfway down my back right now... the only authentic piece I'm missing is a real katana, the one i have is a cheap imitation set that couldn't chop firewood more than twice... (that and 3 shinai and 2 bokuto) I'm even taking kendo to make my roleplaying more authentic! I'm currently saving cash to try and get a real set from my sensei, though I'm uncertain if a need a licence to acquire the daisho set...

There have been many manga that made me lift my eyebrow in incredulity, series that has core theme that seems truly out of it or just plain pointless. A couple of years ago, if anyone had ask me if I would enjoy reading a manga about Go, I would have laughed my head off at the absurdity, Hikaru no Go changed that and shut my cynical view point like a sledghammer closing an air-tight coffin. Since then I've taking more interest in series that I would have initially ignore due to the core theme or concept sounding incredibly lamn on paper, series like Yukikate Japan sounds laughable or at least incredoubly stupid on paper. I mean cooking as an anime show isl worth considering, but restricting yourself ONLY to baking bread??? But guess what? I read the series and am now an avid fan, it doesn't have anything ground breaking, but the storyline tends to be addictive like drugs tends to be addictive. ~_^ So what other bizarre concept for manga have you expirience and enjoyed? What other series had a totally absurd or lamn souding premise that turned out far more than anyone might bargain for? Please share your thoughts...