Or so the story at the Huffington Post would have you believe. The front part of the story gave me a grin, but the link to the rest of it doesn’t actually give you the rest of the story. And a new entry has been posted to the Sci-Fi Songs Podcast collection you should check out.
Anime Today interviewed Bandi Entertainment’s Robert Napton about the new movie EUREKA SEVEN – good night, sleep, tight, young lovers for episode 99. They covered some other interesting topics as well, which mostly involves trying to sell you things, but there are a few good contests you might want to get in on. The movie will be showing on the big screen in the US for one night only on 24Sep09 courtesy of Fathom Entertainment. If you happen to be in Texas this weekend, you might want to hit San Japan, the Japanese Culture and Anime Con in San Antonio. To the north, there is Anime Iowa, and for Europe try Aya Revolution. All the Cons are running Panels, Cosplay, Screening Rooms, and all the other usual; two have AMV competitions, and one has both a J-Pop and J-Rock lounges.
I spent a little time watching the Perseids Meteorite Shower this morning, or as much as I could see through the overcast and light pollution. I am obviously not the only one, as my tweet box is full of such links to pictures. SteamCon is coming in October, and it looks like a lot of fun. Author GoH is Tim Powers, Music GoH Abney Park is my favorite Steampunk band, and Artist GoH Paul Guinan is well known for his Victorian Robots web site, although his Heartbreakers Graphics Novel series (created in conjunction with his wife, who does the plot/dialog/story segment of the process) are Steampunk Webcomics that have been nominated for the Eisner Award. Finally, I was not impressed by much in the G.I. Joe movie beyond the special effects, which even I had to admit were at least somewhat competent (sad when somewhat competent impresses you compared to the other aspects of the presentation). But I did enjoy this little twist, which reminded me of Firefly’s The Hero of Canton to the point I had to include it for comparison… and then a counter-argument.
My favorite moment during last night’s awards presentation (which I had to watch online through Cheryl Morgans Live coverage, not being there) was when they announced Best Fan Writer goes to Cheryl Morgan and her response: #*%! I won a Hugo!!!… LOL. David Anthony Durham won the Campbell Award for best new writer. Best Dramatic Presentation: Long Form was won by Wall-E, while Best Dramatic Presentation: Short Form went to Dr Horrible’s Singalong Blog. Winner for Best Novel was The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman, and Neil was the presenter for Our brand new category, Best Graphic Story: won by Girl Genius, Kaja and Phil Foglio. Other winners included Ellen Datlow, David G Hartwell, Weird Tales, John Scalzi, Ted Chiang, Elizabeth Bear, Nancy Kress, and several others. I find this rather amazing, because for the first time ever every one of my picks from the nominations were actually the winners. Congratulations to everyone, and do you know where your towel is?
Fathom Entertainment brings another exclusive Anime event to the big screens across the US. This time around they have the feature film Eureka 7 – good night, sleep tight, young lovers, playing one night only on Thursday, September 24th (yes, that is 2009). Tickets went on sale today for its only other big-screen showing in North America, and its North American Premier, at the FanTasia 2009 Film Festival in Montreal, CA, on July 28th. Purists will want to be at the FanTasia showing, which is in Japanese and subbed; the Fathom presentation will be dubbed.
The Fantasia International Film Festival 2009 starts this Thursday, July 9th, and runs to the 29th. The films include a dozen of my favorites that I never expected to hear about being on a big screen, like Cyborg She and The Clone Returns Home, as well as many others I would love to see but never have, like Rough Cut and 8th Wonderland. There are even some I would go to just because of the silly titles, like Lesbian Vampire Killers. It doesn’t hurt any that Montreal has near-perfect weather in July.
Since I don’t have the option of going there, my sights are set on something a bit more temporally restricted: Otakon 2009, the Otaku-friendly Anime Con also held every July, this year from the 17th through the 19th. It kicks off with a performance by VAMPS, and has way too many guests and events for me to go into here; visit their Guests and activities menus for a full rundown.
And finally today, I had to share this video of Guillaume Estace playing the Star Wars Cantina song on a Chapman Stick. Enjoy…
The Chicago Tribune did an excellent interview with David Tennant about his winding up his tenure as the Doctor. Many insights, no spoilers, and a permissible number of hints and teases, including his response to the 11 Doctors Special rumor. BBC America just sent everyone who signed up for their notifications a reminder that they will be rolling out HD on July 20th, with a full week of quality programming. I love the way they have realized who their core audience is! They feature 8 shows to go HD on the page, and the first 4 are SF/F; Being Human, Doctor Who, Primeval, and Torchwood! It should be a killer week!
Speaking of killers, what if the Vampires were at risk of extinction because their food supply (that’s you and me for the Humans in the audience) had been hunted out? That is the premise for Daybreakers, and it may just have the first recognition that even Vamps have a geek side to their culture; the undead scientists who try to figure out a way to save the species, theirs and ours both. The Kate Bush soundtrack cover by Placaebo is just a bonus; enjoy the trailer…