Zannen, Canada

UK theatre chain Cineworld (owners of Regal Cinemas in the US) has purchased Cineplex, meaning that our movie media monopoly is no longer even Canadian! What does this mean for anime? Almost certainly nothing, but it's crucial to know what's at work behind the scenes! Randy and I share our thoughts on all of the anime films released in Canada in 2019, evaluate the improvements over the previous year and speculate on what we can expect in 2021.

Forty years ago, the entire non-English speaking world was captivated by Candy Candy, the chronicles of the endless tragedies befalling an spunky and adorable freckled orphan. This shoujo classic was a staple of Radio-Canada's anime line-up throughout the 70s and 80s, but was scrubbed off the face of the earth in the 90s amid legal turmoil. Join Dave, Shaindle, Chris and myself to find out why so many people continue to spread the good word of Candy despite the ongoing effort to erase her from public consciousness!

Big thanks to Vincent Bergeron for his help compiling information for this episode!

The annual Zannen, Canada holiday special has arrived! This year, voice actors Caitlyn Bairstow, Ian Hanlin, Brian Doe and Disney-approved Spider-Man actor Cole Howard join me live from GGRP Studios in Vancouver to share their favourite media from 2019 including Seiss Manos, Alita, The Dragon Prince, O Maidens in Your Savage Season, and a whole lot of independent films such as Gemini, Shuttlecock, Tokyo Lovers and Puppet Killer.

The year is 1997. After years of careful planning, Canadian broadcasting consortiums have unleashed upon the public an assortment of new cable channels, all of which are wildly experimental in their attempts to gain your attention. Among these channels is Teletoon, although it is very different from the Teletoon we know today. It is bold, it is ambitious, and it is so determined to get the attention of adult audiences that it is willing to harness the raw power of Manga Entertainment with Late Night Anime. Ashley joins me once again to talk about the four movies that were central to this effort: Ninja Scroll, Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise, Patlabor: The Movie and Patlabor 2: The Movie. What an age it was.

This episode is all about Animethon, Canada's oldest anime convention, despite denying being an anime convention for a significant portion of that time. Eryn Cerise, Ian Horner and Brendan "Beej" Dery help paint a picture of how what started as a membership booster for an Edmonton anime club grew into one of the epicentres of anime fandom in Western Canada - not to mention the increasingly crowded anime improv scene.

In 1997, CBC's Undercurrents ran a legendary exposé on otaku as obsessive collectors of data. It featured William Gibson, Hitoshi Doi, as well as a charming fellow with an overzealous fixation on Sailor Mercury. That fellow was Gregory Taylor, and he joins me in this episode to talk about the segment, as well Sailor Moon chat groups in the 1990s, rogue anime screenings at the University of Waterloo, anthropomorphized math concepts and his own cataloged experiences in the world of Sailor Moon online roleplaying.

In a separate segment, I also talk about Anime Revolution 2019, and the unfortunate controversy surrounding the event this year.

Full Undercurrents Otaku Segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcczGPlbrYQ

Music Video featuring Greg: Alex Lacasse - "Like This, Like That" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ekMLv7ITH4

Greg's Website: Occasional Homepage of Gregory Taylor - http://web.ncf.ca/cz159/

Greg's Twitter: @mathtans

Anime News Network article on AniRevo 2019: Victims Speak Out After Canada's Anime Revolution Con Allows Serial Harasser, Convicted Sex Offender to Attend - https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2019-08-21/victims-speak-out-after-canada-anime-revolution-con-allows-serial-harasser-convicted-sex-offender-to-attend/.149978

Information on donating to Kyoto Animation directly: https://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-news/2019/07/24-1/kyoto-animation-officially-starts-accepting-donations-through-bank-transfer

GoFundMe donations through Sentai Filmworks: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-kyoani-heal

Karl and Corey share their thoughts on the horrific arson attack at Kyoto Animation. We also discuss the surprising prospects of Toonami on Adult Swim Canada, and why it may not have the content you want! We also go predictably in-depth about Warner's recent announcement of HBO Max and how it has possibly destroyed any reasonable expectation we had for their streaming strategy.

Ashley Hakker joins me to talk about the remarkable, unstoppable life-form that is Anime North. All of the planning in the world could never have prepared me to properly absorb this convention in one go, and together we talk about its history and the exact ingredients that caused it to become the giant glorious mess that it is today.

Not to be confused with the Margaret Atwood novel, Cat's Eye (or "Signé Cat's Eyes") aired in French on Radio-Canada in the late 80s and early 90s, and oh boy did it stick out like a sore thumb on that line-up. Chris joins me once again to share his own experiences watching the show. Dawn from the Anime Nostalgia Podcast also appears to give her own perspective on how well this show really holds up. We touch on many important points such as Club Dorothée, the connections to Nicky Larson (sometimes referred to as "City Hunter") and what it must be like to discover classic anime through Citypop and Vaporwave videos as opposed to just being old.

With little notice, Corus launched the world's first ever 24/7 Adult Swim network, and the good certainly seems to outweigh the bad... at least if you ignore the lack of streaming options! Sketch from the Toonami Faithful Podcast, as well as Karl, help me take a close look at what this new channel does right, what it does wrong, and what it still needs to do to truly capture the Adult Swim voice. The channel's launch also raises many questions, such as: will this stuff ever appear online again? What is the future of CanCon on this station? WILL WE EVER SEE TOONAMI? We do not have answers to these questions, but we certainly have plenty of speculation. You like speculation, right?