With this recent wave of 3D movies, the anime industry seems to have taken some interest in trying it out for themselves, mostly because of fan pleas to the production companies. Toei Animation will be producing this movie like it has with all of the One piece movies. The movie is titled One Piece 3D right now but the name might change later on, the plot for this movie will center around Luffy’s Strawhat.

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Car looks amazing to bad the price is amazingly high as well.

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K-On!!’s opening theme “Go! Go! Maniac” was able to reach #1 on Oricon weekly charts. The song is the first anime song to do so. The K-On!! girls also got number #2 for their ending theme “Listen!!”

According to ANN this isn’t the first time an anime has topped the charts, but unlike previous anime which were only able to hold the top for 1 day, K-On!! has held it for 7 days.

I am surprised that the songs did so well, I preferred season one’s songs, but this seasons songs are more catchy especially Go! Go! Maniac

Looks like Evangelion: 2.22 is going to be this years top selling anime film;

The Nikkan Sports newspaper reports on Tuesday that over 800,000 copies of the DVD and Blu-ray releases of Evangelion: 2.22 You Can (Not) Advance (Evangelion Shin Gekijōban: Ha) film have been pre-ordered. The film’s Japanese home video distributor King Records will ship its release on May 26. According to King Records, Evangelion: 2.22’s 800,000 pre-orders far surpasses the 500,000 copies in the first shipment for last year’s hit film, the manga-based live-action Rookies: Graduation (Rookies -Sotsugyō-)

Evangelion was pre-ordered on amazon.co.jp; 88,000 orders in one week.

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The second trailer for the Beck live action movie is up on the official site. It’s looking pretty good right now, at least compared to the Dragon-ball live action;

Some of the funniest and worst subtitles I could find while surfing the web;

Some main sources, source 2

Finally the long awaited continuation to Code Geass is here, well not here but announced anyway. The name Code Geass Gaiden Bōkoku no Akito translates into “The Ruined Land of Akito.”

This time Code Geass is going to be primarily set in Europe, or so it seems;

a.t.b 2017. A KnightMare unit of 11 youths embark on an operation to save their comrades stranded on the European front, their odds of success only 5%

Code Geass Gaiden Bōkoku Akito information was released via bonus material on “Kiseki no Tanjobi” event disc.

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It seems that free online scanlations and a lack of big name T.V anime titles are the major contributing factors to the shrinking manga industry;

The ICv2 retail news source reports in its “State of the Comics Industry” white paper that North American sales for manga fell from US$175 million in 2008 to US$140 million in 2009 — a decrease of 20 percent. Manga sales in 2007 were US$210 million, which means that sales have decreased by a third between 2007 and 2009. ICv2 also wrote that the decline was more pronounced in standard bookstores than in direct market retailers such as comic stores.

ICv2 attributed this decline in manga sales to several factors. The first is that young teenage fans of shōjo manga who created the manga boom in bookstores have aged. According to ICv2, attempts to get shōjo fans to read josei manga have failed, and so these fans are turning to other activities as a result. ICv2 also attributed the decline to the lack of TV exposure for shōnen hits that accompanied the Naruto, Bleach, and Death Note manga releases. ICv2 also mentioned the problem of the availability of scanlations online, and the lack of “collector mentality” that manga fans have when compared to comic book fans.

The number of volumes of manga sold also declined from 1,513 in 2007 to 1,115 in 2009, and ICv2 projects around 968 different volumes for 2010. However, manga represented 35 percent of graphic novels release in the U.S. for 2009, and accounted for 38 percent of sales.

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Surprise surprise just like Pokemon Digimon lives on;

The online figure and game prize store Fumuo de Pon is listing a set of Digimon straps for what it describes as a “new Digimon anime premiering on television throughout Japan!” The retailer says that the accessory strap lineup, which will ship at the end of July, represents the main characters from the beginning of the tentatively titled New Digital Monsters program: Shautomon, Dorurumon, Barisutamon, Gureimon, and Monitamon. It also gives a copyright notice of “Digital Monsters © Akiyoshi Hongo/Toei Animation.”

Although nothing is 100% confirmed, and this is merely speculation  there is still a big possibility of a Digimon anime being made.

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China is making it’s move, and starting a push to help boost its own anime industry and not just be a sideliner to Japan.

Chinese people, they are starting to think, ‘How come I’m manufacturing for someone else?’ Why are we not creating anything ourselves?’”

“China is a big market, and everybody is trying to get in,”

Komazawa’s enthusiasm for something new is a small victory for China’s fledgling animation industry, and could well represent a widening crack in Japan’s global anime dominance. Japan may be the birthplace of anime, but China is gunning for its future as it mounts an aggressive effort to expand the country’s creative prowess and reputation.

Yoko Komazawa had been at the Tokyo International Anime Fair for nearly six hours when she fell in love with a brown-and-white stuffed panda — a character in one of the fair’s featured cartoons.

“It’s so adorable and interesting,” she said, staring into its gleaming pink eyes. “I want it.”

Unfortunately, the panda wasn’t for sale and Komazawa had to settle for a photo. But she walked away from the small booth impressed by the panda’s creators — from China.

“Japan is certainly an amazing anime country,” said the 30-something anime fan and collector of all things cute and cuddly. “China has some intriguing characters though. They’re different, and that definitely catches my attention.”

So why did China decide to expand its own anime industry all of a sudden?

China’s growing ambitions coincide with an ominous industrywide slump in Japan.

After peaking in 2006, the number of anime minutes made for television fell 20 percent to 108,342 in 2009, according to the Association of Japanese Animations. A survey of the group’s members shows that overseas anime revenue fell 21 percent between 2006 and 2009.

Some of the reasons associated with the slump are more adult related titles, but not just that, terrible wages and working conditions for young animators is pushing them to leave the animation industry. Because of shortages, animation companies are forced to outsource to other countries such as china, which will be able to create the work for much less money.

“The Japanese anime industry basically gave China, Korea and all these countries the keys to the candyshop,” Alt said. “By outsourcing so much work to them, they trained this work force of people who are now far more ambitious and far more hungry than a lot of Japanese animators are.”

I wonder how the anime industry is going to be 10 years from now, and how much anime will be produced in China.

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