It has undeniably been a rough year for all of us, given the Covid-19 Pandemic, political turbulence and the large amounts of social upheaval that has occurred all throughout the year.
But amidst all the anxiety, tension, division and loss, there's been moments and opportunities for comfort, unity, belonging and love to flourish.
I know that some among you have- or know of someone-, who has sadly lost someone to this pandemic.
But we can best honor their memory, not just by following pandemic protocols until the day where the vaccine has hopefully become publicly available, but by keeping up our spirits, and reaching out to and helping those you know are still hurting or struggling, weather than be in the realm of the digital, or the real world. We honor them by bringing joy, laughter, awe, and love to the world. We honor them by maintaining our currents bonds of friendship and fellowship how best we can, and perhaps find new ones in the days to come.
2021 may be a chance for things to be better, or maybe it's just the prelude to more trouble. but whatever might happen, we can still hope for the best.
Happy New Years, Everyone.
Hey yall, I'm back!
(well, technically I'm no longer AFK, due to forgetting to log out. but enough about that).
my fifth time up to Anime Boston!
let me tell you it is always a huge joy to be there and to meet old acquaintances and make new ones. not to mention seeing new anime, as well as screenings of old material you've seen in room with other people to enjoy. the staff, as always we're helpful. and I finally used the guidebook app to help schedule things. and like last year I was geared my towards panels than merchandise.
and like last year i'll divide this into parts with lines so it's not a huge wall of text.
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the celebrity guest where as varied as ever.
so straight off we have the English guest of honor-
greg ayres- a constant guest at anime boston, who I should really endeavor to meet next year.
johnny yong bosch- the voice actor of vash from trigun and ichigo fro mbealch, two of my favorite characters.
leah clark-who actually voiced Blair in Soul Eater.
kara Edwards- known as the voice actor for videl and gotens in DBZ among numerous roles.
Richard epcar- the English voice actor for Batou from ghost In the shell, among many others, Zangestu from bleach included.
billy kametz- who voiced hakuno in fate/Extra. and if i remeber correctly may be voicing the main character of rise of the shield hero.
lisa Ortiz- the voice of lina inverse, the main character of Slayers, among numerous other roles. as well as a director and producer.
Ellyn stern- a voice actor, writer and director she's been in numerous roles, bleach, mobile suit gundam, and pokemon generations
tara edwards- a vocie actor who has also worked on numerous audiobooks and has had a role as Filia UI Copt in Slayers.
and then we have the Japanese guest of honor-
Yoko shimomura, a composer of numerous video game music's. she's behind most of the music in kingdom hearts, as well as final fantasy XV, street fighter 2, parasite eve and the xenoblade chronicles, among other works.
Yoichi Kato, a screenwriter. he's worked on numerous scenarios for animated and live action series. among his numerous works, his most recent addition is City hunter: Shinjuku private eyes alongside Kenji kodama.
Kenji Komada-a series director who has worked on numerous series. he has worked for many years and conditioners action series his specialty. he has also contributed to City hunter, as mentioned above.
And finally the Band,MIYAVI a guitarist, actor and philanthropist.
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Recent premieres that I didn't see, but caught my attention, we're penguin highway by eleven film works (which honestly looks adorable and surreal), City Hunter: Shinjuku private eyes (which looks like it's bringing back some eighties style story telling and design with style), and the most promoted premiere was actually the premiere of the New Code Geass Movie- 'Code Geass: Lelouch of the Re;surrection."
a movie i did see, however, was actually not a new premiere, but an old one that I have seen before. Vampire D: Bloodlust. one of my favorites and a classic OVA.
on anime I did happen to watch in English dub was actually Slayers. I can defiantly see why it's iconic and treasured. like lodoss war, it's from the era of DnD popularity. and while i may not have bought a dvd of it, I look forward to seeing the series online should I get the opportunity.
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I Attended the'wait,wait, don't Anime!' panel again and while i may not have been able to participate, it was nice to simply be among the audience.
once again I attended he formal dance and the semi formal swing. the musical numbers wer'e great, though I had to re learn a few dance moves. danced with some beautiful girls, joined a few dance rings and overall, just had a great time, much like last year. it is pretty much the highlight of events. a fun little note is that this year had the theme of "tales of the shogunate" so the formal ball was listed as the 'Imperial ball'. and the Semi formal introduced a new dance; the east wing. unfortunately i missed that dance lesson.
attended the anime who wants to be a millionaire panel. it was actually quite fun, and the staff did replicate almost everything from the retro 'who wants to be a millionaire' run from the 80's-90's-early 200's.
that and i attended Cards Against Hum-Anime and Cosplay Shenanigans yet again.
and there was much shenanigans, humor, bad jokes, and rejoicing XD.
one thing I also attended briefly was AMV Hell. basically imagine Robot chicken with fan edited AMV's or clips of anime, and that's pretty much it. needless to say, I have become a fan and I am somewhat disappointed that such things are apparently very old. but they are still hilarious.
asofr games, I actually played a bit of guilty gear, soul caliber 6 and Ju,p force. gotta say, they're awesome! got my butt handed two me on the other two, but thankfully in Guiltygear xrd revelator, the character of ky kiske happens to fit me just fine.
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didn't actually buy all that much this year:
I got Blame! Omnibus volume 2 by tsumotu nihei. and being a huge fan of his art style, It's a welcome addition to my little library.
i also got M.F.K.Z. i was intially exposed via a traielr on youtube and at first ithought that it would only be out by October this year. so, imagine my surprise when i came upon it in dvd form. I really look forward to watching it, and maybe eventually getting a copy fo the comic it's based on.
I also acquired two prints; one of guts From Berserk and one of tifa lockhart. I forget the name of the artist but hopefully I will remember them or re discover them in time.
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I also happened to encounter the Artist and the works of both of which are awesome.
and i'll do a shout out anyway for artist who i might seen but not recognized; , ,, , , ,:iconaurAspirality,: if you where at Anime Boston, sorry i couldn't meet in person, but you're all awesome people any way.
and speaking off art;
I'm also considering expanding to Instagram, since almost everyone seemed to prefer that. At this point it's more a whimsical thought, but I will most likely update my page with an account link should it come to pass.
not only that i am working towards creating a plan for commission work in the future, so if anything comes about from that, expect a journal posting. expect to see it in either an art spotting or a journal update.
and honestly? I can only say thank you.
thank you Anime Boston Staff for organizing this.
thank you fellow con goers for making me feel welcome and being awesome people.
thanks to my family for allowing me to go.
and just thanks for being fellow nerds.
and to quote a rather nice Jester Cospalyer;
"Traveller be with you."
and peace be the journey-
M.C
(and yes, the title is a reference to the Title of the upcoming Star Wars Episode 9, in case you we're wondering. also sorry for taking so long to write this, I've just been dealing with post con exhaustion and writing this in a coherent way takes a lot of work.)