Princess Nine

[ZZalapski]

Just finished watching the thoroughly enjoyable Princess Nine. I did not expect to get sucked into it as much as I was.

I'm wondering, though, how bad the U.S. sales figures must've been for ADV to disown it. I mean, they put in the effort to make a damn good trailer (which I put on YouTube) for its 2002 release, and, a scant five years later, it's already out of print and there's nary a mention of it on the ADV website except for archived articles. To quote Mike LaFontaine from A Mighty Wind, "Wha' happened?"

[Milkymagic]

I thought Princess Nine was entertaining as well, and the ending left me wishing you'd get to see more. But still, well handled material, and the characters were particularly fun (rich variants).

Speaking of the characters, I guess I'm more like Koharu according to this survey:

Have Fun! (http://www.nobrandheroine.net/princessnine/p9quiz.html)

[laborpilot86]

sports anime don't do that well in the U.S for some reason, except maybe Prince of Tennis

Why is this?

[Mana]

Because most people who like sports don't watch anime, and most people that like anime aren't really into sports.

[laborpilot86]

sad but true...

I guess i'm an oddball then, cause i like baseball, soccer, and hockey almost as much as i like anime

[Mana]

Doesn't mean you're odd, just means that you aren't the majority.

[soundchazer]

I have a soft spot for certain sports anime too.

If you guys liked Princess Nine, you should try Touch! H2 or Major.

[Milkymagic]

I used to like sports, but now I just play video game sports instead. I don't think I've watched any sport on television for about two years so far (didn't even check out the Super Bowl). Yet, strangely enough, I've enjoyed sports anime.

But that's because certain sports anime capture the drama of those athletes that must practice with rigorous determination while balancing a personal life, and then trying to come out on top and win to accomplish a personal dream. Of course, there's bad ones too, but that's how the best ones have played out for me.

And it's certainly sad that Princess Nine will no longer be available from AD Vision, but I'm certain it won't be the only victim in the coming years, because there's still sports anime that hold some popularity here (Hajime no Ippo comes to mind). Still, it's a sad loss, and hopefully somebody else picks up Princess Nine if it is truly no longer available from them.

[laborpilot86]

you can get used copies of Princess Nine on dvd at amazon.com, often for almost nothing. But it is out of print, which sucks.

[ZZalapski]

sports anime don't do that well in the U.S for some reason, except maybe Prince of Tennis

After thinking about it some, I noticed that while good sports movies are not all that rare, I can't think of a lot of acclaimed sports series (excluding reality shows). There was The White Shadow, which was before my time, and...I draw a blank after that. So the scarcity of successful sports shows doesn't seem to be restricted to anime.

Why is that? If you'll allow for some personal conjectures...while it's not necessarily harder for a sports series to match a sports movie in terms of story and characterization, the budget for action scenes is going to be way higher for a movie than for a TV show. U.S. audiences generally associate sports with action; therefore, they may not be willing to sit through a sports series (anime or otherwise) if it doesn't have the amount of action they were expecting.

The irony is that, as Princess Nine showed, that it is possible to churn out a good sports series without going hog-wild on the action scenes. It'll be interesting to see how Air Gear does here in the States; if the ANN review is any indication, it seems to be a diametric opposite of P9 -- all action, blah story and characterization.

[ZZalapski]

you can get used copies of Princess Nine on dvd at amazon.com, often for almost nothing. But it is out of print, which sucks.

If you want to see something eye-popping, check out how much the box set is being offered for by a couple of people, apparently with a straight face.

[Mailorder]

What do you mean they disowned it? Like, they don't hold the license anymore and whoever wants it can buy it and redistribute it?

And I really enjoyed Princess Nine. My signature had Yuki from Princess Nine. In fact, I'm gonna bring it back just for this topic.

[Zelkiiro]

My signature had Yuki from Princess Nine. In fact, I'm gonna bring it back just for this topic.
Fifi-chan! O:

[ZZalapski]

What do you mean they disowned it? Like, they don't hold the license anymore and whoever wants it can buy it and redistribute it?

ADV still may have the license, but, for whatever reason, they're not making any more DVDs. Maybe ADV feels it costs too much for them to keep it in the catalog?

[laborpilot86]

It is out of whack with the bulk of thier catalogue, which is mostly action, mecha(Macross most notably), some drama(His and Her Circumstances) and a couple of comedy series(Excel Saga), so i'm not surprised they threw to the wolves.



We need to have a U.S distrubiter who specializes in historical series (Romance of the Three Kingdoms etc) and/or sports (P9, Hamije No Ippo etc), because none of the estiblished seems to think that 'true anime fans' would have an interest in those shows. They are wrong.

[ash_chan]

I remember I picked up the used boxset of this series at an old CD Warehouse that used to be here for a little under $30 and I accidentally watched the middle of the series first, and I still haven't gotten around to watching the rest of the series. ;P

From the 2 or 3 episodes I did watch, I could definitely get into the show. Guess this gives me more incentive to dust off my DVD player, huh?

[LunarEmpress]

I can see what you all mean. I am not much of a sportsfan either, but I thoroughly enjoyed the series. In an email from Tiffany Grant, she mentioned that she enjoyed making the series and that there had been numerous requests for the sequel..