Another series ending right about now is The Tower of Druaga, and it, too, will be getting a second season. The story will thus continue with The Tower of Druaga: The Sword of Uruk, as Gonzo calls it, but impatient fans might be disappointed to hear that the second season will start no sooner than 2009 - maybe even July 2009. And, quite frankly, we don't know yet if it will be another 12-episode series, or just a short OVA. For what it's worth, though, I'm betting on a full-fledged sequel. They should have plenty of time to make one.

Stay tuned for some artworks / fanarts of Coopa, the cutest (and only) loli from the first season of Druaga; and some with Fatina, too.

Update: There we go: Coopa and Fatina pics are now up in our gallery.

Vampire Knight, one of the anime series ending around this time of the year (on July 1), will be getting a second season, along with some sort of web-radio show hosted by fictional Cross Academy students. The announcement was made on the official website of the Vampire Knight manga and, via ANN's report, we learn that the second season will start airing in Japan during October.

As for the web-radio show, since we couldn't care less about it, we'll just quote ANN to the letter and move on to more interesting news.

"A Vampire Knight: Cross Academy Broadcasting Club web radio show will also premiere on July 7. On the radio show, Mamoru Miyano, Daisuke Kishio, Susumu Chiba, Junichi Suwabe, and Sōichiro Hoshi will play their fictional counterparts Zero Kiryū, Kaname Clan, Takuma Ichijō, Akatsuki Kain, and Senri Shiki, respectively."

We've been slacking on the news front over the weekend, due to more pressing issues - like splitting our trailers website, TVkon, over two servers (yeah, it's getting THAT big), and moving Animekon to a faster (and more reliable) server. Which meant coding, coding, and more coding... and, inevitably, a few tiny little mishaps along the way, which hopefully not too many of you noticed. But anyway, we're all done now, so let's get back to loli business.

- Innocent kids juices for sale! *Slurp, slurp*

- The flying mecha-lolis anime Strike Witches will also be aired online on Crunchyroll and YouTube, as announced by Gonzo (via Giapet). The TV series, which continues last year's Strike Witches OVA, is part of the Summer 2008 anime season, with a Japanese premiere set for July 4. And, presumably, it will also be rolled out online at the same time.

- If, like us, you're a fan of Makoto Shinkai (5cm per Second, Beyond the Clouds, Voices of a Distant Star), you might want to read this report from a screening event in London he attended on June 20. The focus was on 5cm (since it was screened there), but Shinkai talked about other things, as well, hinting that his next film will be a full-length feature.

- Miyazaki plans museum anime shorts after Ponyo. Whatever, Miyazaki is so last century, Shinkai for the win.

- Another week, another round of Akihabara killer copycats: a 19-year old boy was arrested (backup) after he posted an online threat saying "I will go to [Tokyo] Disneyland to stab visitors to death", and the police also took interest in a 16-year old girl (who wouldn't?) after she threatened (backup) on the Internet to commit mass murder in Tokyo's Shibuya district. For the first time since this month's Akiba massacre, however, somebody went one step further, slashing 3 people with a knife at the JR Osaka Station (backup). They only suffered minor injuries, but the attacker hasn't been caught, yet.

The catchingly-titled manga Kodomo no Kodomo (Child's Child), about an 11-year old girl who gets pregnant, is being adapted into a live-action movie, and ANN reports that the Japanese premiere is set for September 2008. An unrevealing trailer is up on the movie's website, and ANN has the background story if you're curious about it.

An interesting thing about this film is that, even though the subject of child pregnancy is not new, Kodomo no Kodomo pushes it far beyond below previous cinematographical takes on the issue - such as the American film Juno (about a pregnant 16-year old, played by the lolicious Ellen Page), the unrelated Korean film Jenny, Juno (15-year old), or the Japanese TV drama 14-Sai no Haha (14-year old).

The other interesting thing about the movie is the newcomer actress playing the lead role: 12-year old Haruna Amari, pictured below. Interesting from... various points of view; rotated or otherwise.


In totally unrelated "Kodomo no nyuuzu", Kodomo no Jikan appeared (sort of) in an American newspaper, as part of an advertisment for a digital TV converter box, with parental controls. The irony...

A typically sporadic update today on encubed informs us that the fan group mirror moon has finished the English translation for the third and final route of Fate/stay night - Type-Moon's best known visual novel game, along with Tsukihime (both of which, by the way, paved the way for the world in which Kara no Kyoukai takes place).

Unfortunately, that doesn't mean that the game is fully playable in English just yet, as there's still some editing left to do. But that shouldn't take too long, hopefully. And once it's done, Nihongo-challenged fans will finally be able to play the third route, called "Heaven's Feel", which focuses on Sakura Matou as the main female character.

Mirror moon previously released the first route called "Fate" (focusing on Saber) last year, and the second route called "Unlimited Blade Works" (Rin/Archer) in March 2008.

- Zepy exhibits a slew of details about Little Busters! EX - the ecstatic edition of Key's game which will be released on July 25 - which he extracted from the new issue of Push!! magazine. And some NSFW scans, too.

- The eroge Aneimo will be getting an adult OVA adaptation, with the first episode set for release on August 25. Needs more flatness.

- Konami will exclusively manufacture and distribute the Blue Dragon trading card game (and accessories) in North America, according to a freshly announced licensing deal with VIZ Media. What the world needs right now... is not another TCG.

- Skip Beat!, the anime adaptation revealed this week based on a girls' manga, has been officially confirmed and it will start airing this autumn.

Just a quick, sad posting to pass word that the Lucky Star OVA may have been delayed from its previous release date of August 30, all the way to September 26, according to unofficial reports picked up by San'plex:

"The change has shown up in several different shops, so it can likely be taken as genuine. There is no official statement on why at this time, so we'll just have to speculate wildly.

There was some interesting talk on 2ch that this could be connected to revisions after the recent incident, but of course that is pure speculation."

Delays make the Lucky Star lolis sad. And pandas, too.

The sustained wave of recent anime annoucements continues with Queen's Blade - originally a combat picture book game series from a few years ago, which has since been adapted into... pretty much everything else: novels, two manga series, several anthology comics, even drama CDs. No live-action stuff yet, but they'll probably get there, too.

The anime adaptation is being announced in the two latest Queen's Blade books - featuring the curvaceous chicks Arudora (or Ardra) and Arein (or Allean, pictured below). For now, though, there are no details about when the anime will start airing, or who is going to make it. So just enjoy the pics.

Update: More juicy scans on AkibaBlog.

Update #2: Even more juicy pics on San'plex, and an official website for the anime.

- The game sequel Toushin Toshi 3 was revealed to be in the works at Alice Soft, some 14 years after the previous title in the series. Their latest game, released earlier this year, was Beat Blades Haruka.

- Battle Spirits, the "new generation of trading card games" developed by Bandai and releasing on September 13, will also have manga and anime adaptations. The manga will begin on July 26, and the anime series will start airing this autumn, produced by Sunrise.

- "Japan plans assault on fansubbing" is the title of a complex Sankaku story, which exposes the Japanese government's proposed measures for cracking down on illegal online distribution and fansubbing. Shortly put, "in 2008 we aim for the introduction of a framework in which Japanese IP holders can more easily make demands for the removal of infringing content".

This is a bit of old news, but hey, interesting and very educational. According to Dogz in ze Can, the Miyagi Prefectural Police uncovered the body of a poor 37 years old individual, burried in his apartment under large stacks of manga (and various other magazines, that may, or may have not, contained awesome wanking material). It all seems to have been an accident caused by the recent Japanese earthquake, but the folks in the department are still tirelessly investigating the strange happening.

Just a hint to all you manga stashers out there: if you happen to live in a place that is bound to fall victim to over nine thousand earthquakes per minute, DON'T, I repeat, DON'T organize your magazine collection in huge stacks of over 2 meters tall, near your bed. NEVER. While it may seem comfortable to sit in your futon-chan and casually reach out for the latest issue of "insert random loli porn here", it also means that just a minor ground shaking could turn your sweet loli paper castle into dust. On top of you. Getting you killed. Painfully.