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KYOTO VIDEO 2023 Quarterly Report (Feb - Apr.)

Published: February 9th 2023, 12:00:12 am

Ayane's High Kick – February 13th: All eras must eventually come to an end and the decline of the OVA format from its Golden Age was certainly a sight to behold. One of the more noteworthy victims of this decline was 1997’s Ayane’s High Kick; a short-lived anime that thought it could contend with its unique premise of “a sports anime where the protagonist couldn’t give less a shit about said sport” in a post Evangelion world.

Birth – November 27th: From its death, we return to the OVA era’s birth with 1984’s Birth. A visually-stunning masterpiece spearheaded by the incredibly influential animator Yoshinori Kanada that showed us the true potential of what the direct-to-video format could give audiences.

The Irresponsible Captain Tylor – March 17th: Turning 30 years old this year is an anime near and dear to my heart. The Irresponsible Captain Tylortakes the grandeur of space opera and transforms it into something far sillier without losing any of the heart the genre has. We’ll go into its beginnings as a lights novel, its strengths as both an epic sci-fi story and a character-driven comedy, and try to figure if our Captain Tylor is just lucky, know more than he lets on or both?

Vampire Wars – March 31st: We haven’t done a true dumpster dive in a long time. 1990’s Vampire Wars began as Toei’s attempt to adapt a long-form light-novel romance series and ended as true bottom-of-the-barrel clearance bin filler. How can anime be so violent yet so forgettable that it’s not even mentioned alongside brethren like Mad Bull 34? We’ll find out as we sink our teeth into it.

Iczer-Reborn – April 14th: It took AIC five years, but they were finally able to follow up on the successful OVA that made them the anime powerhouse in the latter half of the 80s with Iczer Reborn. But can it hold a candle to its predecessor? Especially in regard to how much more “cuter” it looks?

Ringing Bell – April 28th: You know I had to do 1978’s Ringing Bell one of these days. It’s practically a rite of passage for any hack animation YouTuber to talk about. We’ll be looking at the history of its studio Sanrio and their involvement in the larger anime industry as well looking deeper into it and seeing if there’s more to it than it just being “darker, edgier Bambi.”

Thank you for your patience and keep stayin’ tuned!