The inevitable dilemma with any anime convention is deciding whether to go or not. I missed out on Anime Boston 2005 due to obligations and regretted it. Now, a year and some change later, I decided to venture up to Boston once more. Thankfully, this was a trip well worth taking.

Day Zero
I'm one to consider the journey to the convention is just as important as the convention itself. After all, what is the point of going if you do not consider the journey worth discussing? In the past I have traveled to Boston via train. Seeing as how close I live to New York City, this is ideal. But this was the year for change. This was the year I ventured using Amtrak. True, it may have been more expensive, but the ease of having an area of seats all to yourself without having to worry about a stranger passing out next to you and drooling on your shoulder makes the extra cash worth it.

Of course, seeing as how I'm about as lucky as a black cat at an Atlantic City roulette, this happened to be the day when the Amtrak decided to have a power outage. All this after I bought my ticket. Thankfully, someone must have been smiling down on me, because this East Coast dilemma only set my train back by half an hour. Not even a mass electrical power outage would keep me from this convention. It must have been… my destiny. Either way, the train departed from Penn Station at 4:20 pm, and it was a long haul to Boston. Luckily, I had my laptop and a couple of episodes of One Piece to keep me busy. I'm not too sure when I arrived at my destination (Islington, a small town a few minutes from the big city), but it must have been around 8:00 pm. Hime was waiting for me at the station; I was to stay at her house for the next few days, another reason why it's good to have a loved-one close to a major city.

We spent most of the night charting out a battle plan. Experience has taught me that planning things out before a con is a lot less tiring than going with the flow at the convention site. When that was done, we both went out to eat. Hime took me to a Cold Stone Creamery, came back, chilled with her family and canine, and then I crashed. By this point it was 11:00 pm and we wanted to get an early start.

Day One
Friday marks the earliest I have ever woken up for a con: 5:30 am. Hime and I were ready to go... well, as ready as a pair of blood-shot, coffee-deprived otaku can be. By 6:30 am, we were on the train from Islington to Backbay and the Hynes Convention Center. We arrived at the station at around 7:00 am and walked through Copley Plaza to get to the registration room over at the Sheraton. After navigating through the closed kiosks and multiple skyways, we made it at 7:20 am.

See, Hime didn't get a chance to pre-register and I had to wait for the press room to open in order to obtain my press pass. So we figured that we could wait online to buy a weekend pass, which should have been no problem seeing as how the Anime Boston website stated that there were still passes available. In the meantime, I went up to see if the press room was open. Low and behold, it was still closed. I tried asking the con security, as well as the staff; wouldn't you know it? They had no idea when it would open. Eventually, I was told that the room would open at 9:00 am, so I went back to Hime and waited on the line with her.

Eight o'clock came and the registration doors still hadn't opened, as can be expected of most conventions. By this point, the line had wrapped itself around the hotel lounge. But as soon as 8:25 am rolled around, the line had started to move. It was an interesting system of human traffic, as the line spilled into a ball room and then split between those who pre-registered and those who needed to buy their passes. By all accounts, this system should not have worked and should have gave way to entropy rather quickly, but the staff seemed to keep everything in order, and Hime got her pass.

We hung around Copley Plaza until 9:00 am and then headed to the press room. All was well and good… until I realized I forgot something. In order for me to come in possession of my press pass, I had to provide proof that I was with Anime Academy (as if my e-mail confirmation and Anime Academy T-shirt was not enough). Thankfully, I had my laptop on me, all I needed was an Internet connection. Fortunately, there was a Starbucks in the hotel lobby, so Hime and I ran downstairs to see if we could snag a connection.

While we were waiting for the computer to boot up, I couldn't help but notice all the cosplayers sitting down for coffee. That was a sight that made me smile. You know you're at an anime convention when Inuyasha and his friends are sitting two tables down from you. After I had my proof on my laptop, we ran back upstairs, and by 9:50 a press pass was mine. I should tell you that my press pass did not look any different than a regular pass, except for the ever-so tiny label of "press" on the upper-right hand corner. Also included was a blue folder and CD filled with press goodies.

At around 10:00 am, we headed down to (where else) the dealers room. It was not set to open until 11:30 am, but there was already a massive line forming outside the double doors. However, rather than wait this time, Hime and I walked up to the security guards, I flashed my pass and they let us in.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is the power of the press.

Now, a dealers room is always synonymous with "big, noisy room filled with money-splurging fanatics," which is a fair definition. However, you don't get that feeling when you're in a dealers room before it opens. Hime and I walked to all the different vendors, occasionally chatting with whomever was busy unloading boxes, setting registers, arranging wallscrolls, etc. Some of these people, we actually met at last year's Otakon; they didn't recognize us though. There was a sense of ease in these merchant's voices. There were more smiles and friendly voices here than in any other part of the con. This was truly the calm before the storm.

With a half-hour before the doors opened, Hime and I watched an episode of Nana (something to hold us over). After the doors opened, the room shifted from ease and peace to the entropy and commercial carnage I have come to know these dealers rooms by. I didn't buy anything at this go-around, but I did take note in some things that I would consider buying later on. One such item was the first volume of Shonan Junai Gumi by Fujisawa Tohru, but now was not the time to buy.

Around 12:28 pm we left the dealers room and headed for the artists' alley. This is the part of any convention that upsets me. See, I want to buy everything these artists have on sale, and I want these artists to get paid for everything that they do. From the anime character magnets, to the soft-cover doujinshi, I want to buy it all. But I can't, and that saddens me, because if I don't support these artists, who will? Oh well, more money for the dealers room.

At 12:54 pm we left the convention center to find some food. There was a small restaurant called the Summer Shack not a block away. Hime went with the shrimp, I got the calamari. The food was good, the price was right... what more could I ask for?

We wandered back to the convention at around 2:00 pm, and it was here that I realized that there was something screwy with the schedule. Apparently, Friday and Saturday were holding the exact same events. Either this was a typo, or this was going to be one redundant con. We journeyed back to the press center in hopes of obtaining a new schedule. They didn't have one but said we could see it on their website. Good enough for me.

At 2:30 pm, Tokyopop was holding a panel, so we went. There were three people sitting at the table in the front: John Chen, some other guy and the author of My Cat Loki. A slideshow was set up on the projector screen next to them. They announced several new licenses, including Otogi Zoshi, Grenadier, Elemental Gelade, Trinity Blood, My Hime (Mai Hime) and, ironically, Shonan Junai Gumi, which they are calling GTO: The Early Years. Oh well, that's marketing for you.

They also mentioned their new line of novels, such as Love Hina, Gravitation, Devil May Cry, Gundam Seed (doesn't someone else have the rights to that?) and a few titles from the .hack series, as well as a new line of books under the "Pop Fiction" imprint. John pointed out that these books will have "stories dealing with life and its imperfections, as well as some non-Japanese stories." Titles included Scrapped Princess and Kino's Journey.

From there, they switched gears to further discuss global manga. The author of My Cat Loki spoke, and a few panels from her work were displayed on-screen. Most of the work discussed came from winners of their Rising Stars Contests, some interesting franchises and several surprising authors. The stuff from the winners included MBQ, Dramacon, Riding Shotgun and, of course, My Cat Loki. Also, be on the lookout for manga based on (I kid you not) Labyrinth, The Dark Crystal and Neil Gaiman's Mirror Mask. I'd pick up the Labyrinth manga just to see how David Bowie would look in manga form. There was also mention of the World of Warcraft manga (for all you MMO players out there) Juror 13 (which is going to printed in three colors!) and Boys of Summer, by former X-Men scribe Chuck Austen, among other titles.

Finally, a Q&A opened up. The one thing that stuck out in my mind the most was when a man asked about the popular manwah, Priest. Not only did John confirm an upcoming volume, he mentioned that Sam Raimi is still tied to producing a live-action movie, Andrew Douglas is still the director and now Viggo Mortensen is being signed to play the lead. Very cool. Oh, and a little fun fact: after correctly answering a question in regards to Great Teacher Onizuka, I was able to win the first volume of Shonan Ju... whoops, I mean "GTO: The Early Years." Either way, I got something I was going to buy for free. I love cons.

After the Tokyopop panel was over, Hime and I stuck around for the Media Blasters panel, which was to start at 3:30 pm. Well, 3:30 pm rolled around and nothing happened. 10 minutes later, John Sirabella (CEO of Media Blasters) came in. He was pretty laid back and didn't have a setup the way Tokyopop had. This was both refreshing and disappointing. After a brief introduction, the panel went straight to Q&A. I was surprised that most of the questions regarded either Voltron (yes, this included both Go Lion and Dairugger XV) or GaoGaiGar. Sirabella also mentioned that Media Blasters will wait to see how this format war between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray will turn out before they pick a side. There was also mention of an upcoming Kite sequel in the works for next year. According to Sirabella, the new anime will be 45 minutes and is not going to be about Sawa. Also, Media Blasters is assisting in the production.

And that was it. The panel was only 17 minutes long.

After a couple of pictures, we headed back to the Sheraton for coffee. Then at 4:21 pm, we walked back to the convention center for the first ADV panel. The panel didn't start until 4:35 pm, but we figured we would get seats ahead of time. When 4:35 pm rolled around, Dave Williams took the stage.

Now, this was supposed to be ADV's title-announcement panel, but Williams informed the audience that he did not get clearance to discuss any recently obtained titles. So, instead he screened the first dubbed episode of Nanaka 6/17. Though I would have preferred watching it subtitled, the show seemed quirky enough. After the episode was over, Williams took the stage again, but he still didn't gain clearance to discuss any titles. So, our eyes fell back to the screen. This time he screened the first episode of This Ugly Yet Beautiful World. I was not going to sit around for that, and I was certainly not going to let my significant other have to watch it, either. So we were out of there.

We zoomed around the convention for awhile, ducking back into the artists' alley and one video room (I didn't care to see what was on), and we also snagged a quick peek into the larping room. Not to be mean or anything, but there are just some things in this world that arouse curiosity, horror and hilarity. A bunch of kids whacking each other with foam weapons while a crowd looks on is one of them. I think Hime said it best when she asked, "What's that funky smell?"

My answer: "Male pride at its worst, darling, male pride at its worst." Thus ended day one.

Continue to Anime Boston 2006: Part II...