The new Full Metal Alchemist anime so far…

I have never read the Full Metal Alchemist manga, but I did watch the original anime series that came out in 2003/04 and loved it. I heard that around the middle of the first series, the story took a completely different route than the ongoing manga. So now, about five years later, we finally have a new FMA anime series that is meant to follow the manga…

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Why do we buy anime collectibles?

The title of this post is a question that I’m confronted with fairly often. Why do hardcore fans spend so much money buying anime collectibles, such as figures, plushies, and trading cards, when such things are relatively expensive, take up space, and all they do is “sit around and collect dust?”…

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Hetalia and the phenomena of MAD videos

The skill, ingenuity, and often times bizarreness of fan-made anime MADs never cease to amaze me (and Hetalia ones are no exception)…

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How Japanese young adults feel about anime and fans (at least from my experience)


Unlike Haruka, I didn’t hide my hobby in the least

During my trip to Japan a few weeks ago, I spent most of my time with Japanese college students (between the ages of 18 and 23) who I stayed with at the dorms and who took us out during our sightseeing. I was curious how Japanese people my age would feel about an American female anime fan like me…

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Cel vs digital: does animation style affect overall quality?

(Left) Lina from Slayers Next, 1995; (Right) Lina from Slayers Revolution, 2008

Ever since all anime switched from cel animation to digital animation back in the early 2000s, there has been some debate among fans about whether story/character quality has decreased even though animation techniques have increased…

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Nostalgia: what anime did you used to watch on TV when you were little?

I used to love Samurai Pizz Cats! ^.^

It wasn’t until I became an anime fan around 1999/2000 did I find out what anime really is. However, unbeknown to myself at the time, I used to watch some anime and anime-related shows on TV back when I was a kid in elementary school, despite the fact that I didn’t have cable TV back then (and anime like Voltron, Robotech, and Kimba were before my time). Lately I’ve had a wave of nostalgia these past few days thinking about and missing some old cartoons I used to watch. So I felt like sharing four of the old anime TV shows I used to adore when I was a little kid…

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Fansubs and what the R1 industry needs to do

This has been a pretty hot topic amongst the English speaking anime world lately, especially with the collapse of Geneon and with ADV barely holding on. Now I don’t know much about business, licensing, finance, etc., nor about the inner workings of US anime companies. However, from what I’ve seen being an American anime fan for almost ten years, I definitely know that there are some things that need to be done in order to help the R1 anime industry recover, outdo fansubs, and to also please the majority of fans…

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Anime is a luxury…

I could’ve used this money to pay off my debts…

From what I’ve seen during my years of anime fandom, there are generally two kinds of fans; those who mostly watch their anime by buying the official DVDs and those who mostly watch their anime via fansubs. Putting the limited amount of anime aired on English TV aside, DVDs and fansubs are really the only other sources for watching anime. But I’ve noticed that some fans who are dedicated to buying the official DVDs (and may also have morals which put them against downloading fansubs) have a poor respect and think little of fans who only download fansubs and don’t support the anime market by buying the DVDs. Since I’m one of those fans who watches almost all my anime via fansubs, I want to point out the main reason why I do so and don’t buy the DVDs when they come out; I’d like to buy them, but I simply can’t afford it…

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Anime at school


Back when I first started getting into anime about seven years ago, I never thought that you could bring your passion for anime into the realm of school work, at least not here in the US. Even though I think that some anime are complex and philosophical enough to be placed on the same level as the works of literature they teach about in high school and college, I never thought that there would be actual anime-centered classes at regular colleges and universities, nor that one would be able to relate anime to assigned school reports…

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An Anime Fan: the odd one out


This is actually a topic that has been on my mind since I became an anime fan, I just never got around to writing about it. I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels this way, so I would love to hear other anime fans’ comments about this…

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