Nakama Britannica

At the moment I’m reviewing the manga titles Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE and xxxHolic, both created by CLAMP, and both published here in the UK by Tanoshimi. I can’t help but be impressed by the great job Tanoshimi have done in the presentation and translation of these (and other) titles. I’ve mentioned the excellent presentation in [...]

As reported on the AUKN News section recently, the BFI kicked off their Anime Now weekend at the South Bank venue with a screening of 5cm Per Second, the latest feature film from Comix Wave studios. As an added incentive the three-part feature was played in full along with a personal appearance from the director, [...]

Despite the academic tone of this articles title, and my rhetoric (which is usually inevitable), I have noticed that the majority of the articles on our blog recently have taken to the same format, so I’ll be staying away from quotation marks or overly critical statements for the duration of this latest monologue.
One thing that [...]

If you a veteran anime / manga fan, chances are you know who Osamu Tezuka is, or if you are a new to anime or manga and never head of him before, either way, this mangaká, director and animator led such a life, that the Japanese refers to him with two different titles – The [...]

I love CLAMP, I freely admit it. ‘Cardcaptor Sakura’ was the first shojo anime series I remember seeing on UK TV (before ‘Sailor Moon’?) and even in its mangled US version, I fell in love with it and went straight out to search for the manga. From the elegant art nouveau drawings on the Clow [...]

On Friday I had my geography exam. Geography is often called the study of Earth, but perhaps it is better to call it the study of humanity and its interaction with the planet. It made me think about how ‘The World’ will come to terms with the issues of tomorrow and the future.
One of the [...]

Lately, I’ve been reading a flood of essays tackling anime and escapism. Meditating on the latter, it’s clear that this subject is essentially very personal, if just because the word ‘escapism’ implies that the viewer has something to escape from. Of course, there is nothing new about that idea, as everyone slips into dreams every and now then, be it occasionally dragging ourselves to the local cinema, sitting for a few hours reading a book or spending an entire evening in-front of the TV. All of that is escapism too, and it’s exactly the same as enjoying hours of Japanese cartoons, just not as eccentric. But, after all, that’s an important distinction to make, as, in the deepest depths of our hearts, I think most of us yearn to be a part of the collective, to be (seen as) normal, but fact is, anime isn’t normal; it’s niche, foreign and strange.