Day Three
July 4th Sunday didn't begin with any fireworks, just at 7:53 am with a7m4 and Ben snoozing in the other bed.

I stayed in the same room for the Geneon Entertainment Anime panel because there really wasn't anything else interesting to attend until the Yoshimatsu Takahiro panel scheduled for 11:30 am. This panel itself began at 11:06 am, and the company representatives began by announcing their DVD release schedule. Afterwards, they took some time to make sure that the audience knew that the proper pronunciation for Geneon sounds like "jenny-on" because everyone was pronouncing it differently than what they wanted. Next, they did a few previews for upcoming titles, followed by the first few minutes of the first episode of Samurai Champloo. Unfortunately, I had to leave at 11:29 am during a good fight scene to make it to the Yoshimatsu panel…

… which was canceled. Yoshimatsu Takahiro couldn't make it to AX 2004, and I didn't know until I got to the panel. However, this was replaced with the president and founding member of Studio Madhouse, Murayama Masao. What luck! I walked in a bit late at 11:32 am, and they were showing trailers of recent Madhouse-made anime. The speaking portion of the panel began at 11:44 am, and Masao was quick to introduce himself and then invite three other Madhouse employees, Nishimura Satoshi, Masanori Shino and Cindy Yamauchi, up to the stage "to give me moral support". Then he spoke about the trailers that were shown, the stories behind them and some of the people who were working on the projects. The panel then shifted into Q&A mode, and things got down to business. Masao spoke about how he wants to work with Studio Ghibli but they don't want to work with Madhouse (but Ghibli workers on hiatus usually come to Madhouse to work), the current status of Ninja Scroll II and the whole story behind Madhouse's involvement with the Wachowski Brothers and The Animatrix. The panel ended at 12:39 pm, and Masao took a few minutes to show three posters signed by Madhouse employees that were going up for the SPJA Charity Auction on July 5th.

I was kicked out at 12:42 pm despite my press pass and good seat; it seemed very obvious that my privileges as a member of the press didn't really go anywhere or get me anything special other than a different pass than most people. I would've stayed for the Seki Tomokazu panel, but there were far too many rabid fan girls waiting in a lengthy line, and I didn't have enough patience for all of them.

So I took a little stroll up to the Anime Trivia II panel and found Ben. We began walking upstairs to the VIZ Anime panel and a7m4 found us, so we continued onwards to the panel room. However, I wasn't too interested, so I stepped outside onto the third floor balcony to catch up on this con report and warm up in the sun. I went back inside at 1:09 pm, and as I walked past the room to the escalator at 1:12 pm, there was still a lengthy line for the Seki Tomokazu panel. Hunger pains struck me as I was going down the escalator, and I thought that I might find a deal or two that might satisfy my appetite in the Dealers Room, but nothing really caught my eye. I left and eventually came back to the ACC at 2:07 pm. Next, I arrived at the Chigira Koichi panel at 2:16 pm and the Seki Tomokazu panel was just letting out; that should tell you something about his popularity.

… but I came back in at 3:55 pm for the Hirata Hiromi panel. Although the only big role she has yet to play in anime has been Maggie Mui from Read or Die: The TV, she has had a few small roles up until now that she felt weren't worth mentioning or that she might be embarrassed about. Speaking of which, Hiromi was quite nervous at the beginning of the panel, but either she gradually loosened up or she turned her nervousness into a positive and friendly atmosphere. She seemed very quick to laugh and smile despite the fact that she says that she tends to think negatively, which was one reason why she felt that she fit the role of Maggie Mui quite well. During the Q&A session, she said that she thinks the animation quality of Read or Die: The TV dipped towards the later episodes, spoke about her favorite author and gave her general impression of America and American fans. In a turn of events, she began asking the audience questions, namely on how American voice acting and dubbing are performed, as well as recommendations for anime to watch. The panel ended at 5:03 pm, and I left for a bit to await the Geneon Entertainment: Gungrave panel outside of the room.

I came back inside at 5:20 pm for the panel, and it began at 5:32 pm. Cindy Yamauchi, Masanori Shino and another Geneon representative made up the panel and decided to kick things off with the Gungrave trailer… but the AX staff goofed and played the trailers for Texhnolyze and Ai Yori Aoshi: Enishi. I eventually ran into Heimdal, an Anime Academy student, because he included a comment in a question that was unmistakably similar to something that I'd wrote in my Gungrave review, and I exchanged a few words with him before storming out of the panel at 6:00 pm. It was nice meeting another student, but the panel was absolutely atrocious. Only Cindy Yamauchi seemed to have any clue what the anime was about, but all of them kept finding ways to plug Geneon in their responses; "buy the DVD" and "you can find out if you buy the DVDs!" were common answers or parts of answers. No other panel hit that low.

I got into the Gonzo panel room at 6:27 pm, and they began very promptly at 6:30 pm. The panelists were Kajita Koji (President of Gonzo), Murahama Shoji (President of Gonzo Digimation Holding, Inc.), Murata Range and Chigira Koichi. Quite the lineup! Strangely enough, Kajita and Murahama weren't included in AX Guests of Honor list, but that didn't stop them from grilling both Murata and Chigira with plenty of questions. They discussed Last Exile and the director's and character designer's work on it, what difficulties they ran into during conception and production and the consistencies of our world and the anime's world. Then Kajita and Murahama took a moment to say that the story behind their company’s name ("gonzo" is Italian for "idiot") was because people would often say that they'd have to be idiots to dare to make anime like that. During general Q&A session, one of the panelists definitely considered a sequel to Last Exile based upon the very positive response from the crowd. Despite the fact that he was initially joking, the panelists told the story behind the title name for Kiddy Grade and that there is no planned sequel to Gate Keepers 21. Then the panel went into trailer mode for some of their latest work. After four rounds of jan-ken-pon to determine prize winners (I didn't win anything, but it was fun nevertheless), the panel wrapped up at 7:39 pm. Overall, it was very informative, entertaining and enjoyable.

Afterwards, I walked over to the main auditorium at 7:45 pm for the highlight of Sunday: Masquerade. Thanks to my press pass (and feigning ignorance with the main auditorium's manager; thanks a lot, Vicky!), I was allowed a seat in the front center section without much trouble at all. The show was set to begin at 8:00 pm, but the shower of ADV-licensed anime trailers didn't let up for a while; another sign of just how anime industry-driven AX is. Cries from the audience for the show to begin didn't earn any response from the AX staff until 8:45 pm when Masquerade actually began. The host, famed AMV creator Brad DeMoss, instantly won my respect just by saying, "It wouldn't be a con if we were on time".

Brad picked up right where they stopped by calling out award categories and winners of the Pop Shock Masquerade (which I hadn't heard about until he mentioned it). Then the AX staff ran into a problem: the Masquerade judges weren't done. In the ensuing attempt to delay the show for as long as possible, the AX staff began throwing out lots of AX T-shirts into the audience, which caused a flood of con-goers to the front of the stage. When the shirts ran out, the crowd subsided and Brad went back to entertaining the audience with impersonations and jokes to suck up more time; major kudos to Brad for successfully delaying the show for the judges. They finally returned at 11:58 pm with their decisions, and numerous prizes and awards were given to the participants. Masquerade officially ended at 12:34 am, but I didn't get out of the main auditorium until 12:45 pm because I just had to get a few snapshots of cosplayers. Masquerade had made the last full day of AX complete.

Day Four
The three of us strolled on over to the ACC and decided on a suitable location to meet at 12:25 pm. a7m4 went to the AnimEigo panel, while Ben and I went into the Dealers Room at 11:07 am to look for any last minute specials. I finally found a copy of the third volume of Berserk for as cheap as it was going to get, and my convention purchase list was completed. While on the way to the AnimEigo panel, we stopped in at the main auditorium to watch the AMV Encore. The AX staff did show a missing AMV named Reconfiguration that wasn't shown on July 2nd due to technical malfunction. We would've stayed to watch the rest, but I had a flight to catch. The rest is history… and boring stuff about my flight. But I did eventually get home in one piece!

Conclusion
My time at Otakon 2003 was what I'd call priceless, but my time at AX 2004 wouldn't rank nearly that high; it was good, but it could've been far better. There were true highs and major lows throughout, but the highs just couldn't make me swallow all of the lows. With a costly dent in my wallet, I was hoping for much more than what I received. Any of my future flights and stays in Anaheim, CA for AX will be on hold unless someone else pays my way or I win the lottery… and I don't buy lottery tickets.

Return to Anime Expo 2004: Part I...