Keith Palmer's Multi-Purpose Journal

Before I made the trek back to the Anime North convention this year I repeated a step I’d tried years before and dropped in on the Uniqlo store in my city’s shopping mall. This time, though, I couldn’t find the “45th anniversary Gundam T-shirts” I’d somehow picked up on Uniqlo selling this year, and in the end I donned the very shirt I’d worn the first time I visited the convention.
( Looking ahead )

Fishing flyers out of my mailbox today, in noticing a promotion for Halloween costumes I recognized it showed someone in a Naruto costume. That got my attention; what might have pushed things a bit further was recognizing two more people in the cover picture in costumes from Demon Slayer, which hasn’t been around for as long. (The Nezuko didn’t have the chunk of bamboo in her mouth; that accessory was visible, though.) It was something to realise it still gets to me when I notice some new hint that “more people recognize anime than you might think.”

At the same time, aware of the continued wailings over the Right Stuf online anime store having been shut down to redirect commerce to Crunchyroll, I am conscious of the tension between “surely everyone would like what I like! (or that’ll help prove my taste is valid and I’m not wasting my time)” and “I’m better than everyone else for not following the crowd; when something gets popular, it’s spoiled.” I also got to recalling impressions that those dedicated to “cosplay” make their costumes themselves (or at least get them produced in artisan fashion), but as I’ve admitted before, I’m just not as into that as a lot of other people are.

As I composed an end-of-year post mentioning things were ending pretty much as they had the year before, I was at least looking forward to one little bit of that repetition. Another “Anime Hell” streaming marathon scheduled by davemerrill seemed worth staying up into the first weekend of the new year. Analyzing the experience may be as foolish as just rattling off a list of favourite segments (or worse yet, “ones I can mention trivia of my own about”). Still, where before I’d noted “Animator Expo” shorts as something I’d already seen, I could now place a commercial, a Godzilla short, and “the Bartkira trailer” in that category. Outrageously mumbled-up and otherwise re-edited GI Joe “safety moments” might have been where I laughed the most, again in a “trying to explain or even go back might deflate things” way. A few “American cartoon commentaries on anime” also got my attention, although which ones were “funnier” for me might amount to matters beyond that commentary. I also recognized I was watching something I’d only heard of before when a music video with Urusei Yatsura clips in the background showed up. Seeing announcements just hours before of a new adaptation of that manga (in advance of the Anime News Network article, too) might have increased the impact, even if it raised an idle question or two of whether “the editing’s locked down well in advance of the presentation.” In any case, I did weigh thoughts about how the new adaptation might turn out against impressions the clips showed the style of the animation kept shifting throughout the 1980s.

Mentioning how one day these presentations will be back at conventions and something I only hear about is one more bit of unfortunate repetition; getting to see another streaming presentation is a feather on the high side of a weighed-down scale. I did appreciate the experience all the same.

When I started seeing notices the first online anime convention I’d streamed during the hunkered-down days of last spring would be returning for its second year, that got my attention. Things are a bit different now as I count the days until it’ll have been two weeks since my second vaccination, even contemplating a thing or two I haven’t or hardly haven’t done in over a year, but as I’ve supposed before “a passel of fan panels you don’t have to travel to see” can be handy regardless of still not having the online accounts that would let me join in group chats. As the list of panels filled in, spending a weekend tuned in to the stream did get to seem appealing, even if on the weekend itself my certain peculiar way of viewing meant I didn’t see every panel that had caught my eye right then.
( References and fan wants )

It’s been a little while since I last took in a “streaming fan presentation,” so when I saw some notices Discotek Media would be offering one of them I did mull over watching it. I’ve bought a good number of their anime Blu-Rays, even if one reason for that might be taking heart it’s possible to make anime discs that keep other fans enthusiastic without encoding quality being signalled by prices far higher than anything with actual wide appeal. (The company does seem to run on a shoestring all the same, re-releasing titles put out by other companies years ago and following that up with works years or decades old.) There were promises of a big announcement, although seeing the speculation of some had me a bit cautious about “letting expectations run away on you.”
( The big announcement )

Returning to the opening episodes of the anime OVAs listed on a preserved poster for the first club show I attended at university had been enjoyable in general, in a way that seemed a bit broader than sheer nostalgia. With the rest of those series now opened up (even if not all of them had been continued that first term going by later posters), I went ahead and worked my way through them over the following months. Things stayed a bit more complicated than “resurfacing memories,” but perhaps those complications got a bit mixed too by the end.
( Five series unfolding )

It took “the anime convention I actually visited in person” launching its own online substitute to get me tuning back into live streams, but as I watched some panels from Anime North I was thinking one weekend ahead to another online convention I’d become aware of. Otakon has registered on me before, and now of course it being associated with somewhere further away doesn’t matter. Noticing there would be six simultaneous streams, though, was just a little intimidating for all that I could suppose having to pick and choose was no more and no less than anyone ever had to do in person.
( The suspicious solution )

So far as “fan events at anime conventions” go I was at least aware of davemerrill’s “Anime Hell,” but despite some curiosity going to see one of them didn’t mesh with my “early to bed, early to rise” schedule. Recent announcements of an online-streaming version did get my attention; as better as it would be for everyone for that not to be necessary, I could see it as a welcome-enough diversion. It also turned out I could resort to a backup browser and watch the video from a Facebook address without a Facebook account.

The eclectic mix of clips and commercials keyed into my interest in Mystery Science Theater 3000 and animation in general (and I found brief distraction from an old “Women of Robotech” toy commercial by spotting the keyboard of an original Macintosh in it); saying something about there being no particular emphasis on pieces of animation made in Japan might, I suppose, produce an “that’s exactly the point” response. A selection from Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! did have a welcome “it’s not all nostalgia” feeling to it (for all that it had featured nostalgia for an older series to begin with and led into a bit from that show). I am a bit aware that viewing this with a crowd able to share out-loud laughter would have increased the humour, but this might be one case where having missed out on the unadulterated experience before didn’t hurt me.

Going to conventions seems a big part of anime fandom. Saying “seems,” though, is an admission I don’t go to them. A few ways to explain this to myself have come to mind over the years. It can be tempting to jest “I accept other anime fans are out there without having to see them in person,” but at other times, looking at convention reports, I’m ready to think “cosplay doesn’t seem to do a lot for me” (even if that might start to scratch at that ever-lurking horror named “2D complex”). Once upon a time, I did make a trip or two to a general fan convention in downtown Toronto easily accessible by the GO train, only to just wander the dealers’ hall for a while then leave.
( Many things since then )