The long-running but highly-sporadic Hellsing OVA, also known as Hellsing Ultimate, has recently entered its final "season", with the release of volume 8 this past July in Japan. Now, it's being announced that volume 9 will follow on February 15, 2012 (on Blu-ray and DVD), leaving one last volume to conclude the story after that - hopefully before the end of 2012.



Meanwhile, FUNimation has announced over the weekend that it acquired the U.S. home video rights to the 8th volume of the Hellsing OVA. They plan to release it (...)

 Continue reading 'Hellsing OVA 9 Release Set, OVA 8 Licensed'...

Sounds like Japanese lawmakers have been watching too much Akira lately. In light of this year's quake-tsunami-nuclear disaster, various Diet members, of various political colours, have formed an association to promote "urban crisis management". Most notably, they are proposing (via ANN) the creation of a new, "backup" city, in case Tokyo ever gets hit by a major earthquake - something the Japanese have been bracing up for, for decades...



This "substitute capital" would be established at the site of Osaka International Airport at Itami, safely placing it some 400 km (250 miles) away from Tokyo, to the west. Plans (...)

 Continue reading 'Emergency "Neo-Tokyo" Backup City Proposed'...

That vague "big project" that was hinted back in July for the Minami-ke franchise turns out to be another anime adaptation, indeed, although it's still not clear if it will be a TV series (that would be season 4) or if it will take some other format, such as OVA or anime film. The announcement was made at the end of the character song CD which came with the limited edition 9th volume of the Minami-ke manga.



Another vague big project - anime or otherwise - is also being teased for the Working!! franchise, as "the next step after the ongoing second television anime season", (...)

 Continue reading 'Checkpoint: Minami-ke, Working!!, Hatsune Miku'...

A new TV anime project was announced last night on the GA Bunko blog, one that will be based on the Oda Nobuna no Yabou (Oda Nobuna's Ambition) light novel series amusingly authored by Miyage Kasuga and finely illustrated by Miyama-Zero. The historical romantic comedy novels have been published since 2009, with 6 volumes released so far, and a 7th volume coming out in Japan this November 15.



The original story, as outlined on ANN, follows a modern-day high school boy named Yoshiharu Sagara, who is transported to Japan's Sengoku Jidai (...)

 Continue reading 'Oda Nobuna no Yabou Light Novels Get Anime'...

The second TV anime series in the Aquarion franchise - Aquarion Evol - is now planned to start airing in Japan from January 2012. The anime is once again created by studio Satelight, like with the earlier TV series (2005), OVA (2007) and film (2007), with a story set 12,000 years after the first Aquarion. Interestingly enough, the new characters might turn out to be reincarnations of Apollo, Silvia and the others from the first series.



The latest Kenshin OVA adaptation - Rurouni Kenshin: Shin Kyoto-Hen - will have its first episode screened in a couple of Japanese theaters for one week only, starting (...)

 Continue reading 'Checkpoint: Aquarion Evol, Kenshin, Saimoe 2011'...