Podcast Episode 17 – Anime Weekend Atlanta XIV Megacast

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Finally, three months after the convention, this episode is edited down and is ready for your consumption. Consume!

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Podcast Notes:

This episode has two components, the first recorded on Friday, 19 September 2008 when we sat down with a good friend of mine, Keith Daniell. Keith has been staffing with Anime Weekend Atlanta for the past 14 years, save for one year. Jason Brown, Marc Smazik and myself discuss with Keith the origins of Anime Weekend Atlanta from his perspective of working as a groundling and up to the rank of Assistant Director. We also share some of our early memories of the convention and how we’ve noticed changes at the convention, everything from the growth and the change in attendees (WARNING: There are a few instances in which what we say could probably be followed up with “Get off my lawn!”). In our second part, Richard joins Marc, Jason and Drew as we sit down with some other friends on Saturday evening (20 Sept. ’08):  Chad Bonin, who writes for Toon Zone and runs the nerd-culture blog, Gaijinside and Scott Laney, another contributor/editor at Gaijinside. Chad gets his Cartoon Network fanboy hat on as we briefly discuss the announcement of the end of the waning Toonami programming block and we chat about events and activities we’d done and went to at the convention as well as some preliminary opinions about how the convention went this year.

Promos:

Our first episode with promos!

OSMcast! – I ended up on the Podcaster’s Roundtable with two of the gents from OSMcast!, a podcast all about everything geeky. Generally, these types of podcasts aren’t my thing but theirs is truly exceptional.

Anime World Order – The reason why after a curious Google search that I decided maybe there’s something to this anime podcasting thing. It’s also their fault that I said, I can probably do this, too and gathered my motley crew and created the Akihabara Renditions podcast. This promo’s less of a promo, compared to the other one listed on their site, but I feel that it captures the feel of the show more.

Special Thanks:

To our guests Keith Daniell, Chad Bonin, and Scott Laney, all of whom we’d love to work with again!

To Paul Chapman/the Alimighty Gooberzilla of Greatest Movie Ever Podcast and Daryl Surat, Clarissa Graffeo and Gerald Rathkolb all of Anime World Order for not only hosting the podcaster’s roundtable at Anime Weekend Atlanta but also inviting podcasters in the audience to join in.

Additional Links of Interest in this Episode:

Anime Weekend Atlanta

And, as always, any comments are welcome, you can use either the comments section or send us an e-mail to akibaren (at) gmail (dot) com!

/Drew Sutton, Akihabra Renditions

Podcast Episode 16 – A Mid-summer’s News Round Up

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With Anime Expo 2008 a few weeks away and our last episode several weeks before and the lack of news content in the past several shows, we decided to jump back in the game with some news-oriented discussion.

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Jason Brown, Marc Smazik and Richard Hoelsher.

Notes:

I’m sure most of the news articles came from this fine site here but if you can’t find something we talked about, then you can always check here.

Podcast Episodes 13, 14 and 15 – The Gundam Trilogy

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After a brief hiatus and considering a switch to a second “season” (and, deservedly being made fun of for it), Akihabara Renditions is back to touch upon another massively popular and important franchise to Japanese animation fandom.

Download Episode 13 – Pen Testing which covers Mobile Suit Gundam I.

Download Episode 14 – Not A Zaku Boy which covers Mobile Suit Gundam II: Soldiers of Sorrow.

Download Episode 15 – Ichinen Sensou Senshuu which covers Mobile Suit Gundam III: Encounters in Space and wraps up our thoughts on the trilogy.

Hosts: Drew Sutton, Richard Hoelsher, Jason Brown and Marc Smazik.

Notes:

After our review of Mobile Suit Gundam F-91 back in episode 5 and Marc being confused by it, we go head first into “non-Mecha-Fan-Alienation” and pick up the Mobile Suit Gundam movie trilogy (1981-82).

Podcast Episode 12: Do You Remember Love

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This is the last episode from 2007! Episode 12 tackles yet another fan classic and we hope we can do it any sort of justice.

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Richard Hoelsher, Jason Brown and Marc Smazik.

Notes:

We review Superdimension Fortress Macross: Do You Remmeber Love? (1984). Now, for most people, they’ll stop there and listen because they know what’s up. For those that may not know what it up, beware because THERE IS NO ANIME THAT IS AS GOOD AS THIS FILM. It is a film that speaks on more than a thematic level but a film that encompasses an entire generation of otaku and fanboys and what promise Japanese animation had back then. It is also a crying shame crime that this film is NOT available domestically in North America because of legal issues both in the United States and Japan. So, beg, borrow and steal to watch this movie and then when you sit down to watch the next episode of Toradora or whatever flavor of Moe Moe~ Paradise is running, you should be asking yourselves what Drew does with every new season preview article: What the fuck happened, Japan?

Also, what’s a Macross review without considering the most important decision in anime ever: Misa or Minmei?

Podcast Episode 11: Christmas Craptacular

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All that’s glitter isn’t gold as the saying goes.  And classic Japanese cartoons are no exception. Our gift to you is this delightful episode.

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Marc Smazik, Jason Brown and Richard Hoelsher.

Notes:

The Akihabara Renditions crew dig through old boxes and closets to find some of the crappiest anime that they can for this special. I guess a testament to our collections is that Jason’s submission ended up being crappy in certain areas and Drew didn’t even have to touch his Robotech tapes for his crap. What did they review that was such crap? Download to find out!

Podcast Episode 10: Now With Less Finals

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At this point, all four panellists were all students. And, since we went to different schools, schedules got confused and Richard was accidentally left out of this one as Drew thought he was studying for an upcoming exam.

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Jason Brown and Marc Smazik.

Notes:

Again leaving out the roundtable to return at a later date, we review two late 1980s science fiction classics, first is GAINAX’s Wings of Honneamise (1987), which conveniently gets changed to Wings of Hummas and Mayonaise because that’s easier to pronounce. Then we review 1989’s Venus Wars.

Podcast Episode 9: There is No Win Without Fail

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Episode 9 features a review for a series which has a special place in most older anime fans hearts and probably one of the first series to make them cringe and scream in physical pain after watching it.

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Marc Smazik, Jason Brown and Richard Hoelsher.

Notes:

So yes, Akihabara Renditions steps up to the plate and offers another take on the 1987 (pseudo-)cyberpunk OAV series, Bubblegum Crisis. Deciding to skip the discussion section, because this episode featured one of our first planned travesties, we move right along into the 1991 sequel Bubblegum Crash.

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Podcast Episode 8: Tetsuo Kaneda Podcast

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Episode 8 is up and ready to be downloaded for the first time, for the last time!

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Richard Hoelsher, Marc Smazik and Jason Brown.

Notes:

Speaking of staples of 1990s-anime-from-Blockuster-Video, we’d realized that we were skipping over probably the most famous of all – AKIRA (1988). Our roundtable discussion is more of story-time as Drew attempts to start a profile-in-fandom piece and talks about the man that fans love to hate, Carl Macek. Finally, we review another little OAV, Dragon Half (1993)  that had captured a generation of fans, particularly AMV creators, with the phrase “What the fuck?!”. No, seriously. What the fuck were we thinking of reviewing this?

Podcast Episode 7: Koko wa Podcast Tank Police

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Episode 7 is now out again!

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Marc Smazik, Jason Brown and Richard Hoelsher.

Notes:

After the failure that was Please Save My Earth, we hesitantly pick up another shoujo title. Marc is pleased because he likes shoujo stuff and despite the trap in the series, 1993-96’s Koko wa Greenwood OAV goes over fairly well. Our roundtable this episode attempts to discuss the significance of that beast we all love to hate: moe~. Finally, we review a staple of 1990s anime-from-Blockbuster-Video, which all stores were required by law to have – Dominion Tank Police (1988).

Podcast Episode 6: 404 Title Not Found

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Episode 6 of the Akihabara Renditions podcast is now re-released!

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Hosts: Drew Sutton, Richard Hoelsher, Marc Smazik and Jason Brown.

Notes:

We come back to Miyazaki Hayao’s work in this episode and pick of the first Studio Ghibli film, 1984’s Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind. Jason admits his sacrilidge for not necessarily being a fan of Miyazaki’s films. We then discuss piracy in anime fandom and debate the topic as to whether or not fandom can exist without it now. We then wrap it up with a review of a little OAV called Juumu GUNM but is probably better known as Battle Angel/Battle Angel Alita.