News & Updates

I am really looking forward to Anime Boston this weekend. I’ve been wanting to attend for a few years now, so I’m really pleased to be attending as a featured panelist on the subject of Evangelion, when there are already so many Evangelion-related events on the schedule.

Please join me for:

Saturday – 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM – Hynes-Panel A
Evangelion Is Serious Business

Saturday – 4:00 – 5:00 PM in Hynes-Panel 306
The Evangelion Omake Box

I am not involved in this panel, but if you are also familiar with Gurren Lagann, you should check it out:

Friday – 6:00 – 7:00 PM – Hynes-Panel A
Tengen Toppa Evangelion

Finally, there are a number of other things to check out, including showings of Evangelion 1.11, Evangelion 2.22, as well as panels/autographs for some names you might recognize from Evangelion, including Spike Spencer, Greg Ayres, Brina Palencia, and Trina Nishimura.

If you’re going to be at Anime Boston, please come out to my Evangelion panels, and say hello.

Mandarake just auctioned off an apparently authentic production cel from Neon Genesis Evangelion, featuring Misato from the show’s opening animation.  Bidding opened at 80,000 yen ($962), and ended at 326,100 yen ($3,923).  That’s definitely too rich for my blood, even if it is a unique, tangible piece of the show’s history.  What’s interesting about this auction is that (as I understand it) most, if not all, of the cels from Evangelion are in the private ownership of Gainax and its members, and there are only a small number of legitimate cels used in the production of the show that are floating around out there.  There are of course reproductions, but this one claimed to come with a guarantee.  Trusting it’s authenticity, I’m sure this one will make the buyer very happy.  Me on the other hand, I’ve got plenty of cool stuff in my collection.  If you’re interested in Evangelion cels, a user at Eva Geeks noticed an eBay auction for a supposedly legitimate cel from The End of Evangelion.  I can’t vouch for its authenticity, but if you’re into collecting cels, or really just want to own a part of the show (literally), you should look into it.  If you know a thing about cels, be sure to share your knowledge with us in the Eva Geeks Forums.

I was revising some slides for my upcoming Evangelion panel at Anime Boston, and I thought I would head over to eBay and check to see what it would cost to purchase a copy of The End of Evangelion.  I was astonished to find the price ranging from $23 to $150, with the average price in the 80s.  The lower prices were predictably copies still in bidding, so their final price will actually be higher.  I realize Manga Entertainment allowed their Evangelion licenses to expire, but I hadn’t realized that it had gotten so costly and difficult to acquire.  I actually feel kind of bad for owning several copies of both Death and Rebirth and The End of Evangelion.

So if you’re a latecomer to this wonderful series, I’d like you to know that I’m thinking of you, and I would like you to know of one particular fansub.  Now, before you berate me about piracy, I want you to know that you should earnestly try to acquire a legitimate copy of The End of Evangelion.  It is a wonderful film worth owning.  But if you simply cannot (reasonably) get your hands on a copy, there is an alternative.  Quite a few years back, a group called  Zhentarim DivX created a fansub for The End of Evangelion, which was essentially the Japanese Renewal release of the film, combined with the Manga Entertainment Dub Audio and Subtitles.  For better or worse, they even included the audio commentary track from the Manga Entertainment DVD.

TLDR: If you’re simply unable to get your hands on a legitimate DVD, and have to resort to a fansub, you should look into this one:

http://www.zhentarim.net/zx/shownfo.php?nfo=zx.end.of.eva.renewal.nfo

If you’re not really familiar with the Evangelion manga, you should probably take a seat, because you’re about to get schooled.  You see… Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, as amazing as an artist as he may be, is terrible at being a manga-ka.  He has taken multiple, long breaks from producing the Evangelion manga, which he began in 1995, before the television series had even begun.  His most recent hiatus from the manga lasted over a year, and he has taken several such long breaks from it over the past sixteen years.  That really just blows my mind.  And I feel really bad for anyone who has been reading it since its inception.  I myself have been reading it since about 2001.  It’s really amazing to compare the pseudo-longevity of the manga to the rest of the franchise.  In that time, an entire television series, four feature films, multiple other manga series, numerous video games, and a plethora of merchandise have been released.  And still, Sadamoto continues with the manga, slowly but surely.

Why do I bring this all up?  Well, he finally made a new stage.  He’s back.  And you can read it.  This is the first stage contributing to volume 13, so if you picked up and read volume 12 in English, this is immediately where you left off.  You should check it out.

Read stage 84:
http://eva.onegeek.org/pipermail/evangelion/2011-April/006887.html

My 2011 panels offering continues forward with Tekkoshocon this weekend.  I’m looking forward to coming back for my second year, so drop by and say hello to me.  In addition to hosting several panels that are relevant to your interests, I’ll be staffing in the panels department once again.  Serving as my wing-man and co-panelist on this trip is fellow Eva Geeks admin Drinian.  We’ll be dorking it up, and hopefully hitting Primanti’s before the weekend is through.

My preliminary Tekkoshocon schedule:

Saturday (Friday’s Schedule) – 1:00-2:00 AM – Panel 2
Evangelion Is Serious Business

Saturday – 5:30-6:30 PM – Panel 4
A Brief History of Gainax

Sunday (Saturday’s Schedule) – 12:00 – 1:30 AM – Live 4
Evangelion, WTF?

For fuller, more accurate schedule information, check out Tekkoshocon’s official Panels page.

So, yeah.  Evangelion 2.22.  On DVD and Blu-ray.  Pick your poison… which in my case would be both.  Now available at fine retailers everywhere.  You now have no excuse to not have seen this film.  It’s been in theaters.  It’s been camripped.  It’s been fansubbed.  It’s been re-released to theaters.  It’s been dubbed and released to video.  Go.  Get out there, and pick it up.  And whatever you do, do NOT make a drinking game out of Mari’s swearing in the English dub.  You will get drunk very quickly.

Rachel Macwhirter, who I’ve posted about before, has released another original Evangelion song, entitled “With Me Now”.  Unlike “A Thousand Angels”, which was kind of general, this song focuses on the second child, Asuka.  It starts off kind of loose and builds up over the course of the song, adding in strings, percussion, and flute.  Like most of her music, the song is heavy on vocals and piano, and serves as a nice theme for Asuka.  There’s an obvious lack of music based upon anime fandom, so I’m pleased to see more.  Be sure to check the video description for download links.

• With Me Now on YouTube
• A Thousand Angels on YouTube

To promote the DVD and Blu-ray release of Evangelion 2.22, FUNimation is teaming up with Shirt.Woot for it’s latest shirt design derby.  The theme is Robots Save the World, and in addition to Woot’s typical $1000 prize, FUNimation is tossing in a bunch of other prizes, like copies of Evangelion 2.22, home theater systems, and various other swag from FUNimation titles.  I suck at designing things, but I’ll enjoy looking over the submissions.  Sadly, the derby does not allow for Evangelion related shirts, but who knows, maybe some interesting uses of parody will present themselves?  If you’re artistically inclined, consider submitting to the derby.  Submissions open tomorrow, and close at noon (CST) on March 23rd.  Get to work!

This weekend, I will be paneling at Katsucon, a convention which holds special significance to me, because it’s where I hosted my first panel, an Evangelion panel, back in 2003.  It was on a Sunday morning.  There was a blizzard.  There was a “structural emergency” in the rear of the building.  But the show went on.  Fortunately this year it will be much warmer.  The forecast calls for a high of 70 degrees on Friday, so snow will be the least of my worries.  It’s been a few years since I’ve been a panelist at Katsucon, I’m looking forward to seeing some familiar faces.

Without further ado, here are the panels I’ll be hosting that are relevant to your interests:

Friday – 5:00-6:00 PM – Live 3
A brief history of Gainax

Saturday – 4:30PM to 6:00PM – Live 3
Evangelion Is Serious Business

You’ll probably also find me at:

Friday – 5:30-7:30 PM – Live 1
Evangelion 2.22: You Can (Not) Advance with Introduction by Mike McFarland

Saturday – 12:00-2:00 PM – Video 4
Evangelion 2.22: You Can (Not) Advance with Introduction by Mike McFarland

I took a stop off at Barnes & Noble on my way home tonight to pick up Evangelion manga volume 12, which had a street date of the 15th. An Eva Geeks forum user reported grabbing it last week, and Carl Horn corroborated that some direct vendors like comic shops may have received shipments in advance.  This volume, if you’re curious, covers the JSSDF’s infiltration and massacre of Nerv headquarters on through Eva Unit-01 awakening and breaking free of the Bakelite.  The volume’s bonus materials include a customary note from Sadamoto, as well as a pair of articles from Tiffany Grant and Yuko Miyamura, the voice of Asuka in English and Japanese, respectively.  They comment on how their opinions and relationship with the character has changed over the last fifteen years.

As an additional note, this was the first time I was able to go into a store and purchase three separate Evangelion manga at once.  It was certainly an interesting feeling.