Certainly I was not entirely enthused with the idea of coming back. While Skabs looked forward to selling his artwork for ungodly sums, and Jerry wanted very badly to get his hands on free swag, I knew that Otakon 2003 held only one thing for me. And that one thing wasn't very pretty. Seven straight hours of panels from Saturday morning to Saturday night with a little "warm up" three hours on Friday, you know, so that I'd be able to ease my way into it. And like I said, it sure as hell wasn't very pretty. Backed up by the well intentioned, but rather clueless Andrew and Bare I knew that I was in for something that the scope of last year's panel. Anime is a burgeoning slime that creeps its way across America, and as such everyone and their mother was going to be at these panels with one intention in mind, free swag. Which means that well intentioned people like me who only want to take notes get crappy seats and can't here any of the questions. I took solace in the fact that I'm not using Jerry's laptop anymore and so I won't have to deal with its magical, mystical 15 minute battery. No. I had a good eight hours worth of battery life to work with.

It's just a shame that I didn't realize you could use a computer to play games until I was in the Pioneer panel. Computer solitaire has never seemed so enjoyable, and even though I only won a single game, the computer knows that I will be back (Though likely it won't be until Otakon 2004). Speaking of which, here's a hint. If you're sitting next to someone on a laptop show some common courtesy and try not to looking DIRECTLY OVER THEIR FUCKING SHOULDER. That's just rude. I understand that many of the people attending events like this aren't entirely aware of common ettiquette and courtesy and stuff like that, but I would've hoped it would be common knowledge. Two other fairly important points. 1) Just because someone is holding a conversation doesn't mean you should be privy to that conversation. People talking to each other are most likely friends, and in panels the quarters are WAY too close for you to start sticking your nose in. This isn't a party and it's not a singles bar. I, for one, am not going to these things to make friends. I've got enough trouble with the friends I've already got. 2) This one is a bit more considerable. If you are wearing a pair of pants that are loose around your waist, wear a belt. Guy in front of me who seemed to have no problems revealing 90% of his ass crack to the world, that was just gross. This is probably going to end up sounding like my mantra, but show some freakin' decorum.

Some things remained the same, but thankfully some of the most important remained the same. Manga Entertainment was shot right up to first place in the listings, which I can only assume is just as bad positioning as being last as they were the year prior. Keith Burgess took it with significant aplomb and his sidekick, whom we'll call "Crazy Nicotine Patch Bitch on Speed" was kind enough to fork over a Read or Die poster. Now, I don't particularly care for the show...but Keith gladly signed it for yours truly. So soon it will go up on my wall, and I'll be the proud owner of a bit of anime history. Five minutes later I'll have drawn moustaches on the characters, but that's hardly something I can avoid. I can't know for sure, but I think that large, black man would be proud of me. I can only hope anyway. Manga's releasing a special edition of Ninja Scroll and at some point the company's being sold. Keither assures that this is a good thing, and it seems to be doing wonders for his demeanor. That, or he's just glad that the Evangelion movies came out last year and as such he doesn't have to deal with any of those retarded fan questions. I'm willing to bet on the latter.

Animeigo was the panel I missed last year. And -this- year I can only wish I'd be able to say the same. Boring, uninteresting. Brian "The Accent" Galton was happy to tell us all about Animego's plans to release all of the Zatoichi films (which Joel tells me have all been released by Criterion anyway) and that they may dub Urusei Yatsura sometime in the future (thus forcing dub fans to buy it AGAIN). You know, I used to like these guys but their crappy production values, unberable delays, and total lack of general release for their shows has really pissed me off over the years. They say they're going with a distributing house now, so they might actually start selling their DVDs in REAL stores...but I think it would take a whole hell of a lot more than that to ameliorate me towards them, especially considering it takes them three years to release something individually that they've already released in boxed set form.

Funimation's panel was a mixed bag. Their PR guy looked and spoke like a twelve year old. Verbatim, Andrew said "I don't think the use of 'kick-ass' so many times in a corporate presentation is appropriate," and I'm inclined to agree with him. Also, I'm pretty sure there wasn't a historical character named "Aresenal" Lupin. Regardless of that Funimation really seems to be coming into their own, and surpassing even. Free DVDs to anime clubs, legitimate pricing on a single episode disc ($9.95) and a $120 retail for the Blue Gender boxed set. Now, I haven't seen enough of Blue Gender to really know if it's worth buying, but consider the fact that THEIR boxed set costs $40 less RETAIL than the online price of buying all the disks together and you'll realize that they've got a friend in me. This was the panel where we discovered Andrew's lovely "anime girl", whom he says was looking at me. I'm pretty sure though, that she was trying to put the moves on my main man. I saw her no less than three other times on during the next two days, which was kind of weird. But I was sure to lock the doors at night so she couldn't come murder us while we slept. Though, it wouldn't have been such a bad way to go. She was pretty cute afterall.

Bandai was a raucous affair, led by the ever infatigable Jerry Chu and his total disregard for fire marshalls. At least, we're pretty sure it's him. He introduced himself as "Richard Kakuhina" in a clever ploy to disguise himself and I think it worked. Even my calls of "Jerry Chuuuuu!" would not arouse his unyielding rage, and so our dreams were shattered. Bandai was when I realized that they really need a better TV. We were "shown" the first episode of SD Gundam, though I use the term in a very technical sense. Seeing as how I was on the far right side of the room, there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell that I was seeing anything. Maki Terashima of Production I.G. was there, but I'm pretty sure she had been beaten or used intoxicating drugs before arriving. Despite copious amounts of leading from my main man Jerry Chu, she couldn't even seem to remember that she had autographed some of the Saber Marrionette J Ultimate Collection boxes. On that note, I now know why I was able to pick up so much of Saber Marionette J to X for so cheap. You know, besides the OTHER reason.

CPM sucked me hard. Gone are the days of Justin Sevakis and John O'Donnel spreading love and witty banner into the world of anime fandom. No, this time we had to listen to "Mike and Ross" spew pure boredom from their mouths and throw T-shirts with arm strength a six year old girl would be ashamed to have. Always trying to be contrary, there was a pretty attractive woman with them. I think she was just a plant though...as everyone knows that girls don't watch anime. I refuse to believe they do, anyway. Most astounding was the total lack of knowledge on the rep's parts. Mediablasters announced that they had the Iria OVAs last year, yet CPM still doesn't seem to understand that. Highlight of the hour was definetely when Bare caught a DVD above his head with both hands. Upon his showing it to me I immediately made him toss it away. It was a trailer disc.

Tokyopop was useless, or I can only assume they were. I purposely avoided their panel so we could get something to eat, as I don't particularly care for manga and I was reluctant to spend another hour with Joel Barrell and his Fan-fiction crew, or whoever they were. When we came back early, I found that it wasn't Joel Barrell at all. I wasn't too heartbroken though, as far as things go. What I learned the most from Tokyopop this year is that Subway is delicious, and I should eat their hoagies more often in the future. Or I would, if I had a house made of GOLD. God damn those things were expensive.

ADV again told us about having every anime ever created, and actually managed to impress Andrew when I told them they were run like a real business and not five guys in a garage somewhere timing subtitles. Of course, this wasn't to last when he saw their very unprofessional demeanor and DLW's half unbuttoned shirt. I cracked a joke that it was for the "swimsuit photo shoot" later and some buttinski just HAD to compliment on that. Oh well, it was better than the girl in front of us at Funimation who thought we had any inkling of a care about Fruits Basket. Now starting to release manga, ADV is quickly coming into their place as ruler of the entire world. Other parts of Megazone 23 are finally being released, adding much to the joy of the event, but an annoyed fan said "Hey ADV! Don't mess up our Sailor Moon boxes!" (you have to imagine my doing a nasal voice when I say that for the joke to work). We'll get right on it sir! I'm sure they replied, before giving away six hundred thousand dollars worth of merchandise they had brought with them. The City Hunter boxed set was totally swiped from me, even though Joel asserts that my hand was the first one up in the air (he also tells me that this Korean girl was trying to get into my pants, so his judgement is kind of up for grabs). Also, girl over on the right that named all the Knight Sabers, I hate you. If ever there was a question with me in mind it was that one. I can't remember what series was being given away with that Bubblegum Crisis themed question, but that's not the point. I don't particularly care for either of the shows that they were giving away with those questions, but it's the principle of the thing.

I do believe that TM Revolution was mixing it up a bit too much during the Pioneer panel, as the floor honestly felt like it was going to collapse. Damn you TM Revolution there were more important manners to discuss! Pioneer seems to hate their fans, as they refuse to use DVD-9s and have managed to keep episode counts down to 3 or 4 a disc when everyone else has gone up to six disc shows as the norm. That ain't no thing though, as the Japanese man with the very heavy accent from Pioneer's music department launched into a very impassioned monologue about fansubs and the danger they bring to the anime community. I was so enheartened by it that I started up a roaring round of applause, much like I had done with a similar subject during the Bandai panel. However, the applause this time was much smaller. Andrew seems to think that this is because there was no doubt in the crowd that I was applauding this man for hating on fansubs, whereas with Bandai it could've went either way. But whatever, Japanese guy (whatever your name is) you're my hero. Thank you Japanese man, other Pioneer guy, and Jerry Chu for telling it like it is about fansubs. And thank you Dell, for putting Solitaire on this laptop. Pioneer was the most professional of all the panels, and that gets them some props in my book, though the humor of Sevakis and O'Donnel, as I said before, will not be forgotten.

And finally, Mediablasters, which was just as small as last year. I felt kind of bad for them, but it seemed like they (or he, as the case may be) came only to say that they loved releasing animated porn and they had copies of Versus in the dealers room. One of those is a good thing, and I hope you know me well enough to know which is which. "Be it samurais or robots," I quote, Mediablasters focuses more about action oriented anime (and porn). John was sure to tell us time and time again that he was "Not a robot guy" and it's good of him to be so upfront, but I must admit it made me lose a little respect for him. All the same, he was very poignant when it came to why Mediablasters was avoiding selling soundtracks, and gladly informed us that a special edition of Mezzo Forte is in the works (Now with twice as many enormous cocks in it!).

Most of the panels weren't as enlightening this year as last and again all announcements were made before Otakon anyway, but good moments were still to be found. And honestly, who can complain when there's a total lack of the omnipresent "Hindu-warrior"? Otakon 2004. I'm coming for you.