Posts Tagged ‘studio deen’

While everyone was busy being excited hearing about Viz Media nabbing the license for Vampire Knight awhile ago, everyone else was anxiously awaiting news that the second season had been grabbed as well. This morning via their Facebook page, Viz Media confirmed just that: Vampire Knight Guilty will be coming to American shores on DVD though no word on a release date.

Viz Media announced the license of the high school vampire melodrama at last year’s ComicCon before releasing it to DVD this summer. Glad to see that this one will be released in its entirety here even if I had to give up on it a few episodes away from the end. Yeah sorry but the emo vampires just became too much for me to overcome.

<Via AnimeNews.biz>

Available from Amazon Available from Right Stuf

Hell Girl Two Mirrors Set 2 Released By: Sentai Filmworks Released: 7/27/10 Reviewed: 8/7/10 Related Reviews Rated: 15+

The Story

In the second half of Hell Girl Two Mirrors, Ai will continue to spend most of the time answering the calls of those who wish to have vengeance against those who wronged them in the past. While previous episodes explored those who were justified or the twists of fate to those who pull the string, this is the first half to truly explore the meaning of the phrase ‘curses come home to roost’. Five words that Ai has recited countless times to those who call to her for help, in these episodes it’s time to see what that truly means. What happens to someone after they’ve pulled the string? Are they able to live a normal life such as the mother who pulled the string to get away from an abusive husband? Or does their life take on tragic consequences such as a high school girl who selfishly uses the straw doll in order to keep her friend on a tight leash? Perhaps most importantly, what of the ones who don’t actually deserve to go to hell? Tying these episodes together with their own stories, three episodes will finally reveal the hidden back stories of those who serve Ai as assistants. People and objects from throughout history, their stories serve as a reminder that human nature rarely changes throughout time.

Sandwiching it all is another story. When the second half begins, we meet a young boy named Takuma. After living in New York for 10 years due to his father’s work in show business, his family returns to Japan and moves to a new neighborhood with his father’s old partner. Soon after they arrive, the family is subjected to terrible harassment which eventually leads to death and serious injury. In the end, it’s a pull of the thread that saves Takuma but also lands him in a new world of torment. Blamed for everything, the entire town begins to blame Takuma for everything slightly wrong. When the entire town also discovers Hell Link, he becomes the perfect scapegoat for everyone forcing Ai to silently watch another child going through the exact same torture that she once experienced.

Good and the Bad

Continuing the pattern from the first half, the closing side of Hell Girl Two Mirrors is mostly told in one episode stories. In the first half, the questions asked by the series always followed a ‘what if’ scenario. Leaving the behind, Hell Girl is now much more interested in exploring life afterwards or the ones who want the power of the doll for purely selfish reasons. In their quest to constantly explore new directions, the stories in this half succeed in giving the audience a new flavor to chew on. In one episode in particular, a woman pulled the string to get her and her daughter away from an abusive husband. Now years later, her own daughter has the doll and is ready to send her mother to hell with the doll. In this particular episode, the story is much more than just a person who knows there’s someone who will be unpunished. It’s a true escape for her only to have it return later as she realizes her daughter wants to send someone to hell. In another example of escape, a man takes his in estranged ex-wife which puts his daughter through a terrible strain that almost breaks up her engagement. Would you pull the string if it meant you could forever escape the source of your abuse? It’s not always such an unpleasant situation however. For the most part, those who call on Ai have been wronged in one way or another but also keeping things fresh are a string of motivations that become much more selfish and petty.

In these episodes, Hell Girl takes an exploration into humans and their egotistical capacity for hatred. In one way or another, you can always argue that just calling Ai to begin with is selfish. Every character who feels like their anger is a just enough cause to curse someone to hell and they all think they are justified. When a teenager extorts friendship from someone or because their father yells at them to get a job, it’s a stark reminder of just how low mankind is willing to go to get what they want out of life. While the general description of these events may sound like its simple, time after time you’re reminded of just how justified these people feel they are to what they consider happiness. To watch these episodes play out, it’s easy to pass it off initially but thinking about it for any extended period becomes a chilling reminder of the selfishness that exists in all of us. Those moments of selfish desperation are what drives this half forward and keeps it so hard to turn away from.

In sharing the back stories of Ai’s assistants, the series also inserts some emotion into the series that regular viewers might not be expecting. Beyond general psychological horror, this season has not been afraid of allowing the characters to show softer sides to themselves. More than just tools for Ai to use as she needs, these three were once figures within the real world that served a purpose and had a history. Unfortunately the stories shared are mostly predictable and if you think about it for just a little while you can probably guess roughly where they each came from ahead of time (except Ren, he’s a twist I wasn’t expecting). Even still, how Ai manages to collect them all are all stories worth watching that provide valuable glimpses into these characters lives.

Despite all of these interesting stories, where Hell Girl manages to lose itself a little is as it enters its final story arc featuring Takuma. Starting with episode 24, the series completely does away with the episodic storytelling and moves into one complete story. And it ends up feeling completely like the staff has forgotten how to tell a sustained story which kills the pacing with a swift knife edge. Completely slowing down to the crawl, the story development is repetitive before long and predictable soon after that. The straw that finally pushes the final story arc completely into its own world however is the moment it kills its individuality and approachability.

Up until this point, Hell Girl has never required its viewers to know anything about the first season. Certainly those who had already gotten to know Ai and her team were the ones getting the most meaning out of their back stories and actions but despite that its always remained approachable to newer viewers. For some reason, this all changes in the final episodes as a detective begins looking into a strange rash of disappearances in town. Beginning an investigation, the detective begins doing research into Hell Link which brings him back to two characters who are going to look very familiar to first season viewers. For a short time it appears that these two are going to play an important role in the closing episodes but soon afterwards they will disappear all over again and their roles are seemingly meaningless. No new information is really brought forward and newer viewers will have no idea who they really are or what possible connection to the series they could have. With such a superficial insertion into the series, I was left wondering if it was meant to provide foreshadowing for the final season but some will be scratching their heads.

Music

Opposite to the story, the music in this half of the series starts weak but introduces a number of strong themes for the closing arc. For most of the episodes, the background score is largely the same as what was produced in the past. The same haunting strings follow Ai, the same intense drum beat when Wanyuudou takes Ai to work, the soft themes which introduces each new episode, it’s all there and sometimes hardly noticeable. In the closing episodes however, there a couple of solo violin or piano themes that do an amazing job of filling the darkness with a new emotion. With Takuma spending much of his time alone at home, the music does a great job of creating a mood that is more than just fear. Filling the air with desperation, loneliness and an almost state of madness from solitude, the music composed by Hiromi Mizutani and Yasuharu Takana do a wonderful job of filling the emptiness and simplistically bringing forward what is hidden in the silence.

Overall

Despite losing itself a little in the closing episodes, it is hard to argue the raw power behind the stories told throughout this set. Hell Girl has been a series always capable of something new and shows a great sense of adaptability. Newer viewers to the series may find themselves lost at times but gradually everything becomes clearer as the journey continues until the end when its confusing again. This is a dark horror to watch and savor. Recommended for everyone who needs a new psychological horror to dig into.

Alright, finally we’re in the home stretch of this very busy news cycle that Funimation put everyone through today. Saving the best bits for last, Funimation made five license announcements today at their panel at Otakon. Starting with two new summer simulcasts, Funimation revealed today that they will be picking up the “fairy tale parody” series (I use that phrase very loosely and love that even Funimation use the phrase ‘fairy tale-ish’ in their release) Ookami san, the vapid moe harem eroge adaptation Blessed of Campanella (Shukufuku no Campanella) and the popular fan service series Strike Witches 2. Honestly all three of these are kind of a surprise to me; Strike Witches 2 because it started as a Crunchyroll simulcast earlier this month and the other two because they really aren’t that good. Regardless, all three series will begin streaming on the official Funimation site in August with DVD releases all planned for 2011.

In Hetalia news, Funimation also announced today that they have picked up the latest season of the popular series Hetalia World Party along with the movie Hetalia Paint it White. Like the previous announcements, the latest season will begin streaming on their official site in August and the movie will see a DVD release in 2011.

Finally, Funimation licensed two additional movies. The first one is the one that fans have probably long suspected would be coming but here it is anyway: Yes Virginia, Funimation is releasing the second of the four Evangelion remakes Evangelion 2.0: You Can [Not] Advance. The movie originally opened in 2009 in Japan and will finally be getting its North American DVD and Blu ray release in 2011.

Last from Funimation is the one that completely took me by surprise. Released in 2009, the family fantasy movie won the Best Animated Film category at the Japanese Academy Awards and features a family coming together to fight off a real world crisis that occurs after a teen accidently brings down a worldwide social networking site. That’s right, Funimation has picked up Summer Wars. You can tell them thank you for that in all the usual places.

And that does it for today. It’s almost 1am and I’m exhausted! If there are any incoherent rambles, typos or just plain weird passages that you notice I haven’t fixed feel free to point them out and I’ll fix them in the morning. For now though Funimation, thanks for an exhausting night of catch up. For everyone else, all the press releases are below the cut and as always it’s been real, it’s been fun, it’s been… zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

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It’s that time of year again! The summer season has started and things are a little tame this time around. With earlier season previews always turning into short novels I decided to split things up this season. In the first part, I’ll be taking a look at all the series premiering in the first week of July (which is most of the season). Part 2 will focus on the rest of the month and part 3 will lay out the OVAs and OADs hitting shelves in the next couple of months.

Around two dozen series are premiering this season with AIC being the busiest (4 series from them this season if you count AIC+ and AIC together). Behind them are Madhouse (High School of the Dead, Stitch!) and A-1 Pictures (Kuroshitsuji II, Sekimatsu Occult Gakuin) with 2 series each. There’s an interesting mix this season with the most high profile series falling mostly in the moe (ok, that part isn’t surprising anymore) or horror categories. This season my hopes for entertainment are falling on High School of the Dead and Shiki but just like every other season, I suspect a couple of series are going to surprise me.

For coverage this year this season things will be slightly different once again. I still intend to view/review as many new series as I can but only series that create a particularly strong opinion are going to get its own write up (no more struggling to describe mediocre series!). Otherwise, be sure to look out for the end of the month wrap up to see which premieres filled with win and which ones are filled with nothing.

Ookami-san to Shichinin no Nakama-tachi
Mr. Wolf and the Seven Friends
Studio: JC Staff
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Premiere Date: 7/1
Trailer

First Impression: Sweeet!

A girl named Ookami Ryouko is a girl who has taken it upon herself to fix her school’s problems one at a time with her partner, Ringo Akai. Throughout the 13 episode series, the girls will solve one problem after another as famous fairy tails from throughout history are parodied.

Why You Should Care:

- Fairy tale parody anime? I am so there!

- The cast and crew sound great! Yoshiaki Iwasaki (Love Hina, El Hazard – The Magnificent World, Hayate the Combat Butler) is directing and the cast includes Kanae Ito (Ruiko in To aru Majutsu no Index, Airi in Queen’s Blade) and Shizuka Itou (Haruka in Amagami SS also airing this season, Hinagaku in Hayate the Combat Butler) as Ryouko and Ringo respectively.

- In the supporting cast more familiar names include Aki Toyosaki (Yui in K-ON) as Ryugu, Rie “Tsundere Queen” Kugimiya as Mimi and Yui Horie (Tsubasa in Bakemonogatari, Eri in School Rumble) as Alice.

- Besides the second half of Kaichou wa Maid sama, this is the only series produced by J.C. Staff this season.

Amagami SS
Studio: AIC
Genre: Romance
Adapted From: Playstation 2 game
Premiere Date: 7/1
Trailer

First Impression: And they’re going to avoid making this repetitive, how exactly?

Following a visual novel format, the story centers on second year high school student who finally gets his big chance to ask out a graduating senior girl on Christmas. Which heroine he ends up with will change multiple times throughout the series to show each girls ending.

Why You Should Care:

- One reason I dislike harem series is that the hero never ends up with the one I want him to. This series aims to fix that problem by making everyone happy.

- Between the director and writers for this series the closest things I can find to actual experience with romance is an incest OVA from 2005 written by Touko Machida. I fear for what this means we’re going to see here.

- On the plus side Hiroaki Gohda did the character designs for Please Teacher and Please Twins.

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu
The Legend of Legendary Heroes
Studio: ZEXCS
Genre: Fantasy
Adapted From: RPG
Premiere Date: 7/1
Trailer

First Impression: Eh, I’m really iffy about this.

A lazy student enrolled at the Roland Empire Magician School has his life change when his kingdom goes to war against another country. After losing all of his friends to the battle, Lute launches on a quest to find legendary artifacts and stop a curse before it can kill everyone else.

Why You Should Care:

- ZEXCS may not have much experience with fantasy series but director Itsuro Kawasaki does having already directed Chrome Shelled Regios, Chrono Trigger OVA and Rental Magica.

- Providing the lead voices will be Jun Fukuyama (Lelouch in Code Geass, Lawrence in Spice and Wolf) as Lute, Ayahi Takagaki (Nina in Chrome Shelled Regios) and Daisuke  Ono (Sebastian in Kuroshitsuji) as Shion.

- One of the first series to be announced for simulcast by Funimation this summer!

Kuroshitsuji II
Black Butler II
Studio: A-1 Pictures
Genre: Horror, Drama
Adapted From: Manga
Premiere Date: 7/1
Trailer

First Impression: Maybe I’ll stick with it this season.

The horror series returns with a new master, Alois Tracy, and a new butler, Claude Faustus.

Why You Should Care:

- In this case the new season means a new cast and a new director Hirofumi Ogura.

- A-1 Pictures (Moribito, Sora no Woto) returns to do the animation which is never a bad thing.

- Also will be streamed by Funimation in very near future.

Shukufuku no Campanella
Blessed of Campanella
Studio: AIC
Genre: Harem Romance
Adapted From: Eroge
Premiere Date: 7/2
Trailer

First Impression: I’ve been so tired of harem adaptations lately but fine, what’s one more?

Taking place in the fantasy trading city of Ent’Aria a young man sees a shooting star while at a party. Tracking the star to its landing point, he finds a young girl who is now calling him father.

Why You Should Care:

- Ecchi fan service and wacky adventures? Well, the DVDs have already been promoted as coming with 3D bath scene extras so yeah, most likely.

-  Brought to you by the man who directed Oomari Himari and the writers of Tayutama – Kiss on my Diety – and Karin.

Mitsudomoe
Studio: Bridge
Genre: Comedy
Adapted From: Manga
Premiere Date: 7/2
Trailer

First Impression: I’m willing to let this one surprise me.

A set of triplets, Mitsuba, Futaba and Hitoha, in the sixth grade have their daily adventures and events chronicled in this series.

Why You Should Care:

- This is the debut production for animation studio Bridge.

- This is series #2 this season for both Ayahi Takagaki who plays Mitsuba and Aki Toyosaki who plays Yuki.

Seitokai Yakuindomo
Studio: GoHands
Genre: School Comedy
Adapted From: Manga
Premiere Date: 7/3
Trailer

First Impression: I know you have guys in Japan, I’ve seen them!

A high school boy named Tsuda Takatoshi transfers into a recently gender integrated high school that is almost entirely populated by females. Almost right away,  he is asked to join the all female student council as the vice president.

Why You Should Care:

- Usually serving as back up, this is only the third title GoHands has produced as primary animators. Their first attempt was last year’s Princess Lover while their second production, Mardock Scramble, is still in production.

- Speaking of Princess Lover, this series has the same director, writer and art director.

Sekirei ~Pure Engagement~
Studio: Seven Arcs
Genre: Ecchi Action
Adapted From: Manga
Premiere Date: 7/4
Trailer

First Impression: Didn’t watch the first season, not going to watch this one.

Picking up where the first season left off, the second season continues to follow Minato Sahashi, Musubi and others paired up with a Sekirei.

Why You Should Care:

- Like other sequels, most of the crew and cast members remains the same.

- Funimation announced the license of the first season not too long ago so keep this one on your radar for a possible simulcast announcement.

- Yup, Funimation has this one ready for simulcast too.

Gakuen Mokushiroku: High School of the Dead
Studio: Madhouse
Genre: Horror
Adapted From: Manga
Premiere Date: 7/5
Trailer

First Impression: Zombies, blood, a bit of ecchi… perfect?

Told from the perspective of one of the heroes, Takashi Komuro, this is exactly what you’re expecting: an anime style zombie apocolypse. After a worldwide epidemic create legions of zombies, a group of high school students and their nurse attempt to survive long enough to find out what has created the monsters and how to stop them.

Why You Should Care:

- From the studio that brought fans dark series such as Chaos;Head, Claymore, Black Lagoon, Rainbow and many others comes this bit of mindless horror.

- High School of the Dead will be premiering on Japanese satellite network AT-X which generally indicates plenty of mature content.

- The crew put together for this series knows horror and drama; Tetsuro Araki (In the Forest, Under Cherries in Full Bloom arc of Aoi Bungaku, Death Note, Kurozuka) as director and industry veteran Yousuke Kuroda (Madlax, Demonbane, Trigun) is writing.

- Not only will it be simulcast by The Anime Network but Sentai Filmworks will be releasing it with a full English dub later on.

Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin
End of the Century Occult Academy
Studio: A-1 Pictures, Xebec
Genre: Horror
Premiere Date: 7/5
Trailer

First Impression: I’m honestly not sure what to make of this.

The story follows a girl named Maya, daughter of a former headmaster in charge of a school dedicated to the occult. Joining her in her adventures is a young psychic named Uchida who has traveled back in time from 2012. Wait… he traveled back in time 2 years?

Why You Should Care:

- The OP is being sung by Shoko Nakagawa which actually isn’t that big of a deal. I just like her music so I thought I’d plug it.

- This is series #4 for Ayahi Takagaki this season playing the role of Ami. She’s also appearing in Asobi ni Iku yo, The Legend of the Legendary Heroes and Mitsudomoe.

- This is the third series in the Anime no Chikara project. The first two (Sora no Woto and Senkou no Night Raid) haven’t given this series a very high bar to climb over.

Nurarihyon no Mago
Grandchild of Nurarihyon
Studio: Studio DEEN
Genre: Supernatural Action
Adapted From: Manga
Premiere Date: 7/5
Trailer

First Impression: Ah, wacky supernatural split personality fun.

Rikuo Nura is a quarter demon and is set to be the next head of the Nura youkai clan. Finally forced to come to grips with his demon side, Rikuo decides to step up and accept his role despite challenges from those who don’t want to see him take over the role.

Why You Should Care:

- Aya Hirano takes on her only role this season playing the childhood friend character, Kana Ienaga.

- Director Junji Nishimura has been around for literally decades serving as director for Ranma 1/2, Violinist of Hamelin and Kyo Kara Maoh.

- This is the only series from Studio Deen this season which will make it of particular interest to a few of you out there.

That’s it for this time but be sure to check back soon for the rest of the month! But in the meantime, what are you looking forward to this week?

An announcement has been posted to the Hetalia official website revealing that the very popular web streamed anime will be moving to TV starting this July. No details have been announced regarding what kind of TV premiere it will be (i.e. new episodes, re-airing previous episodes or something else all together) or what network it’s on but hopefully new details will go up soon.

Normally this wouldn’t be as big of a deal as you might think. Sometimes a series that started online gets to graduate to television, its not entirely unheard of. In this case however, Hetalia has scored a particularly meaningful victory because its getting to move back to TV.

When Hetalia first premiered in early 2009, it was always meant to be broadcast on television. Unfortunately, in the weeks leading up to the series premiere protests began springing up in surrounding countries regarding certain panels that they felt put them in an unfavorable light. The network says that it was due to the many ethnic jokes but either way, the series was removed from the TV listings and regulated to the Animate TV website. Not that it mattered, the series went on to become a hit with fans in both Japan and the US and is currently in its third season. Funimation also recently began streaming episodes on their official site as well.

Hetalia moving back to television shows just how popular this series and it’s amazing that it took this long for it to finally get onto television. Admittedly I could never really get into it. I tried once but Italy drove me absolutely insane. I recently asked someone if I should try again. Their reply was that if Italy drove me nuts that quickly it was only going to be worse for me later.

<Via Gigazine>

Ready to have your Friday thrown into the middle of a sports riot? Crunchyroll has announced their big new score of the season to be Giant Killing. Animated by Studio Deen (Fate/Stay Night, Higurashi – When They Cry, Hell Girl), the 26 episode series centers on the East Tokyo United soccer (football to everyone else in the world) club which has lost almost all of its stars, fans and self respect save for one veteran player. Forced to resort to desperate measures, the board brings in a last resort: a genius player turned coach who left the team 10 years earlier for a career in Europe. Now the new coach has to find a way to unite the players, bring back the fans and create a winning club from virtually nothing.

The series has already been running for a few weeks but the first episode and newest episode will be added on Sunday, 8:30am Pacific with new episodes going up weekly. The stream will be available to United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Australia, and New Zealand.

Sports series are not hugely popular in the US and soccer even less so and yet Crunchyroll has joined the bandwagon which is attempting to find an audience for sports series again. And they’re doing it with a soccer series no less. The good news here is that Giant Killing has been getting some very good responses from audiences thanks to a uniquely simple art style and character drama that builds quickly. Even better news is that it will be available in other countries that actually do enjoy soccer such as the United Kingdom so I’m going to call this a score for Crunchyroll. Now go on and enjoy some soccer ya hooligans!

Full press release below the cut

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Finally we’ve reached the end of the week! It feels like we’ve been waiting forever to hear these words but finally Funimation is ready to break out their big announcements. Are you ready?

FUNIMATION HAS HETALIA AND THE SACRED BLACKSMITH!!!

Originally a manga created by Hidekaz Himaruya, Hetalia has been a constant source of conversation and controversy (imagined by the overly sensitive or not) since it was forced to premiere online last January instead of getting the TV premiere that was originally scheduled. In the series of fifteen minute shorts produced by Studio Deen (Higurashi – When They Cry and most recently Fate/Stay Night Unlimited Blade Works, Seitokai no Ichizon), various countries from around the world are represented by cute chibi characterizations. While the story mostly centers on the cowardly Italy and his new friend Germany in an earlier time, lots of countries get thrown into a mix of short comedy stories as the countries argue over every little thing (art imitates life?). Controversy or not, the series has been a hit getting three seasons green lit within one year! Funimation has licensed the first 52 episodes of the series (seasons 1 and 2) though with season 3 hitting the internet this spring, perhaps it’s only a matter of time before we see more.

The second big announcement from Funimation today was for the fall 2009 fantasy series, The Sacred Blacksmith. Based on the light novel series and animated by Manglobe *insert immature giggle*, the series follows Cecily who has followed her family tradition and become a knight in the village she lives in. After her sword is broken in battle, she is saved by a mysterious man named Luke who can create swords capable of slaying demons. Which is a good thing because someone in their world has recently broken the ban on demon contracts which threatens to throw the world into darkness and war once again.

Hetalia is a no brainer here; fans in Japan and the US have been all over this series for a year so it should come as no surprise that if anyone got the license it was going to be Funimation. The Sacred Blacksmith, on the other hand, wasn’t met with a large amount of praise when it was first released. While a lot of fans and writers I know were happy to talk about how good the series looked, I don’t know many who were particularly excited about the story. But then again, we started this week with 17 new live action movies so, weak story or not, this is still a vast improvement over where we were on Monday.

So to recap the week, Funimation now has the license to 17 new live action movies, FLCL, Zettai Shougeki ~Platonic Heart~ (I’m still working my way up to calling it Master of Martial Hearts), Jyushin Enbu, Hetalia and The Sacred Blacksmith and all of them are going to be released this year. 2010 just got a whole lot more interesting.

Updated 1/11: Press releases added

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It’s been another busy couple of days for anime announcements which means another long list of catch up. We had five announcements on Monday so let’s go ahead and sandwich the week with another big list of five:

Hetalia: A third season of the quirky “political” comedy has been green lit for a spring 2010 premiere. If you’re an internet anime fan yet still not at least vaguely familiar with this series, I’d like to visit the cave you were living in earlier this year. Shown as a series of shorts, the Studio Deen animated series features the various countries from around the WWI-WWII era turned into cute characters that represent themselves. Originally it was set to have a television premiere until South Korea decided to get their collective pantsu in a bunch over one joke which they perceived as racist. That forced the series online where it’s not a huge smash success but has still managed to find a not entirely large but still loyal audience in both Japan and the US.

Milky Holmes: At a press event held recently, game developer Bushiroad has confirmed that their PSP romantic adventure game Tantei Opera Milky Holmes will be getting a TV anime sometime in the future. I’m not entirely familiar with the story but MAL describes it as a fantasy story taking place in the ‘age of detectives’. The four heroines are girls who are aiming to be the best detectives ever while taking down thieves. It sounds cute enough but that has got to be one of the worst accidental porn titles ever.

Hipira: The Little Vampire: An anime based on Hipira: the Little Vampire picture book is being produced for a premiere at the end of the month. Following a young vampire boy and the residents of the vampire town he lives in on their daily adventures, the story hardly seems like it will be particularly dark beyond the vampire theme. The interesting part is considering that the creators of this story are Katsuhiro Otomo (who created and went onto direct the anime adaptations of Akira and Steamboy) and Shinji Kimura (who has worked with Otomo in the past) who is directing and did the original illustrations. The series will air for five consecutive days starting December 21^st.

Bakuman: Weekly Shonen Jump published an announcement earlier this week that the manga series Bakuman will be getting a TV anime set to premiere in fall 2010. The slice of life comedy follows two ninth graders who need each other to become the greatest manga creators in the country with each pursuing the goal for their own reasons. The 25 episode series will be animated by J.C. Staff with Kenichi Kasai (Major, Sweet Blue Flowers, Honey and Clover) and Noriaki Akitaya taking on the director roles.

B Gata H Kei: Speaking of comedy, finally we come to the final announcement of the last couple of days, B Gata H Kei. Running in Weekly Young Jump since 2003, the series follows a female virgin in high school who decides to find 100 casual sex partners. After starting her search however, she ends up zeroing in on one boy in particular. No details on who will be handling the animation a premiere date but Yukari Tamura (Ranpha in Galaxy Angel, Rika in Higurashi-When They Cry) will be playing the lead role.

<Via Moetron, Anime Nation, ANN 1, ANN 2, ANN 3>

Seitokai no Ichizon
生徒会の一存
Student Council’s Judgement
Premiere Date: 10/2
Studio: Studio Deen
Genre: Otaku Comedy
Trailer (click ニュース)

Starting pretty much the same way I believe every episode is going to begin, episode one of Seitokai no Ichizon starts within a meeting of the Heikyo Academy student council. Made up of four cute girls and a perverted guy who’s only in as a perk of being valedictorian, the first episode is broken into two parts. In the first half of the episode, around eleven minutes of conversation revolving around anime, eroge, visual novels and harem endings as valedictorian Sugisaki exclaims his quest to obtain the harem ending with the girls of the student council. Moving into a minor story in the second half, the student council is given an actual task to accomplish but no one wants the pervert’s help to get things done.

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In an update to the super wonderful news revealed earlier, a release date has been set for the upcoming Fate/Stay Night movie! Newtype will be confirming on Monday that the new movie will premiere on January 23^rd in at least a dozen theaters throughout Japan. The movie will compress the ‘Unlimited Blade Works’ story arc from the original visual novel and bring back all the original cast and crew for the new movie. Like Studio Deen or not, the original TV series released in 2005 looked absolutely wonderful. While it may be a bit premature, I already have high hopes for this release and hope that Funimation will be bringing it over on behalf of Geneon sometime in the future.

<Via ANN>