Friday, July 16, 2010

The Imagi Gatchaman Movie... Not Dead Yet?

Just when we'd written off Imagi, the studio that had been working on the Gatchaman CGI feature film, here comes this post on Twitchfilm.net. Also interesting was the fact that a blog referring to an "old" Gatchaman preview on Felix Ip's blog (an excellent source of Gatchaman info) is now deleted....

Hmm, I'm still a little skeptical, but if Imagi is indeed rising, Phoenix-like from the ashes of bankruptcy to forge ahead with the Gatchaman film, bravo!

Check out the Twitchfilm post: There are five demo/preview reels with Gatchaman action. Is this what might have been, or what could be?

GatchaCon Update

GatchaCon takes place this year, as it has for the past thirteen years, at the San Diego Comic Con (July 22-25, 2010), and this time, I can make it! The main Gatchafan activities at the con will be our daily lunchtime meetings in the table area in the Sails Pavilion. Look for a group of folks in black GatchaCon t-shirts around noon on all four days. We might also have the "battle flag" with us—a black flag with the bird-head insignia in red. You can't miss it. Come by and say hello. We're a friendly bunch.

Unfortunately there's no Gatchaman programming in the convention schedule this year, but Battle of the Planets fans will be interested in the Cartoon Voices II panel (Sunday at 11:15-12:30, Room 6A), which will include Janet Waldo, the voice of Princess. Gatchaman fans will be interested in the Dark Horse panel featuring Yoshitaka Amano (who worked as a character designer during all three series). Amano will also be signing autographs at the Dark Horse Comics booth (2615) on Saturday from 11:00-12:00, and on Sunday from 1:00-2:00. You'll need a ticket to attend the signing; someone at the Dark Horse booth should be able to offer more information.

While it isn't Gatchaman, other Tatsunoko programs will be shown in the Anime Room in Marriott Hall 6. Friday and Saturday, Tekkaman Blade runs at 11:40am and Casshern Sins will run at 5:45pm.

A thorough search of the dealer's room always seems to yield some sort of Gatchaman merchandise. Try Anime Link (Booth 400) and AnimeEd.com (Booth G09 and G10) for cels. Alex Ross's booth (Booth 2419) might have some art he did for the Gatchaman DVDs/Top Cow Battle of the Planets comic covers. It also wouldn't hurt to swing by the Capcom booth to see if they have any goodies from last year's Tatsunoko vs. Capcom promotion.

Hope to see you there, and as always, big thanks to Tatsunokofan for the information.