Forum - View topicNEWS: Media Blasters Picks up More Yaoi
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Tenchi
 Posts: 4469 Location: Ottawa... now I'm an ex-Anglo Montrealer. |
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I'm guessing their problem is that your A-list titles just aren't "A-list" enough for them because you're not licensing something truly niche-expanding (with a general North American adult audience) on par with Cowboy Bebop, but, as good as 2006 has been for new quality anime in Japan, I just don't see anything out there with the potential to have the same impact with Adult Swim viewers whom aren't "anime fans" that Cowboy Bebop had half-a-decade ago. As for you guys not releasing more than one (non-nostalgia) A-list anime title at a time, I think that's just reflective of the reality of the anime distribution business today: licensing fees for the good stuff have gone through the roof and Media Blasters doesn't have pockets quite as deep as ADV, Geneon, Bandai Entertainment, or Funimation, so you guys chose, very sensibly, to save your acquisition resources for one or two high-quality A-list releases a year, and smaller titles in the niche markets you've cornered (re: mainly yaoi/shounen-ai), instead of oversaturating the market with a whole bunch of B and C-list titles and seeing what sticks. |
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Seca
 Posts: 149 Location: WA |
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GiTs is a co-license with Bandai so it doesn't count. Isn't FLCL rather old? I mean if you're going to call the Rurouni Kenshin old even though it's R1 DVD release didn't end until 2002 and it aired on CN in 2003 then FLCL should also be considered old. How are Hare+Guu and Miami Guns 'mainstream' when you don't seem to think MB titles like The Twelve Kingdoms (2002, released 2003-2005), Shrine of the Morning Mist (2002, released 2004-2005), Midori Days (2004, released 2005), Grenadier (2004-2005, released 2005), Green Green (2003, released 2006) and Genshiken (2004, released 2005) are?
And so it's ok to you for Animeigo to license older, 'less mainstream' titles but not MB? What kind of double standard is that? And what credentials do you have to make such judgements on companies and what they should and should not do anyway? Do you work for any of the anime companies? Are you a professional market analyst? |
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AyumiHamasaki
Posts: 219 |
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Personally i think Yaoi is not considered a "niche" market anymore if you consider the manga sales for the recent months.
I know this information is for yaoi manga but usually the yaoi manga fans are fans of yaoi anime. I copied and paste this info from a thread on AN. SOURCE: http://animenation.net/forums/showthread.php?t=196799 -------------------------------------------------- JUNE 2006 http://www.icv2.com/articles/home/8985.html Yaoi is really getting popular in American. Just look at the chart, there are 6 yaoi manga on the top 100. Not to mention most of the books on the ranking are American comics. YELLOW VOL 4 is at #43 with 1,928 copies sold. (The fifith best selling manga of the month) JAZZ VOL 2 is at #63 with 1,592 copies sold. OUR KINGDOM VOL 3 is at #64 with 1,561 copies sold. LA ESPERANCA VOL 3 is at #66 with 1,531 copies sold. CLAN O/NAKAGAMIS is at #70 with 1,462 copies sold. LOVE MODE VOL 3 is at #97 with 1,087 copies sold. That's 6 out of 19 manga on the ranking. And all of those are from DIG except for LOVE MODE, which is released under BLU(tokyopop) And of course, LOVELESS is currently the best selling BL manga this year. It debuted last month with 2,681 copies at 31. It was the best selling manga by TOKYOPOP in May. ----------------------- JULY 2006 As for July, there are again, 6 yaoi mangas on the ranking. That's 6 out of 21 manga on the rank. The rest are American Comics. http://www.icv2.com/articles/home/9144.html ANTIQUE BAKERY VOL 4 is at #57 with 1,817 copies sold. GORGEOUS CARAT GALAXY is at #61 with 1,738 copies sold. TIME LAG is at #70 with 1,590 copies sold. KURO NO KISHI BLACK KNIGHT VOL 1 is at #74 with 1,556 copies sold. CAFE KICHIJOUJI DE VOL 3 is at #79 with 1,510 copies sold. ONLY RING FINGER KNOWS VOL 2 NOVEL is at #85 with 1,420 copies sold. Keep in mind that over 80% of the graphic novels on the ranking are AMERICAN COMICS and only like 18-20 mangas are usually on the rank and yaoi manga are on the rank every month with 5 and up. ----------------------------------------------------- So at least that indicates that YAOI is not a small market anymore. With July 2006 alone, the 6 yaoi manga that is on the rank adds up to 9,631 copies sold. As for June 2006, all of the yaoi manga on the top 100 adds up to 9,161 copies sold. There's practically more yaoi manga on the rankings than shoujo manga. But then again, yaoi is a subgenre of shoujo. |
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Wolverine Princess
 Posts: 1100 |
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These aren't yaoi manga, they're just shoujo. Sure, DMP has them, but they aren't under their June (Yaoi) publishing line. Antique Bakery might be a little bit slashy, but that hardly qualifies it as a true-blue BL manga. Kache Kichijouji is just bishounen comedy fluff with no sexual innuendo at all between any of the male characters. |
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CCSYueh
 Posts: 2707 Location: San Diego, CA |
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Antique Bakery isn't a traditional yaoi title, but the owner of the bakery is the crush the gay baker confessed his love to only to be very cruelly turned down. The gay baker is seen with a few of his lovers in bed & we get to the gay bar he hangs out in several times. In a way, one could argue it's a more realistic portrayal where the guy has to live with the fact one of his first major crushes is fiercely hetero & carry on with life.
I consider it yaoi, it just pays equal attention to all 4 main characters & 3 aren't gay. My problem with shojo is the same I have with soap operas & traditional romance titles-I usually hate the lead because she's insipid, stupid, annoying, whatever. We don't get that in yaoi/bl as much. They all start so promising, but by vol 10 (Fruits Basket, Boys Over Flowers) I just wish someone would kill the chick quickly, though maybe really painfully so all the bishonen in the title can comfort one another. Red River, the gal isn't so annoying as I can see all we're going to get is incessant plots on the Queen's part against the heroine & that's all annoying. And she's killing too many bishies. They waste so many bishies in shojo-look at Fushigi Yugi-all those beautiful boys in love with Miaka, dying for her? I wanted Yui dead in the worst way, also. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Realistically anime is a niche market in America & probably will never be as big as American cartoons here. The American way it to adapt things to our own style-the whole melting pot idea which for anime means the American anime-style titles like Teen Titans. The licensee companies have their own styles which work for them. ADV started out a fan company & they license titles that are things they like as fans (jiggle, sci-fi, humor with a weird divotion to kiddie titles-stuff for their kids?). Geneon gives us titles in their parent company's library they think they can sell here with an emphasis on fan service (Tenchi), & horror (Hellsing, Requiem From the Darkness, Tsukihime). When Tenchi's franchise seemed to die down, they passed on licensing the newer titles, but they also pick up titles they passed on first time around like Saiyuki Reload & Burn Up, both fan service titles. I was very worried about Funi for awhile there because DBZ was finishing up & they didn't seem to have a direction, but they've managed to find that direction. They have currently focused on working on Gonzo titles which keeps with their original theme of titles to sell to the DBZ/YuYu Hakusho fanbase & have hit the female mrket with Fruits Basket & I suppose Kodocha is doing well. I asked the Manga people at Comic-con about licensing Tactics & they commented they also noticed they had a heavy male-appealing catalog so they wanted to branch out & were amazed at how well Tactics was doing. The amount of interest voiced at Anime Expo a few weeks prior to comic-con seemed to surprise them. Bandai is heavily devoted to Gundam/mech titles. MediaBlasters has their porn line which is doing well for them, so their licensing yaoi is a natural, really. (Forgot Boku no Sexual Harassment, & Sensitive Pornograph because they're Kitty)> I constanly hope for MediaBlasters to pick up the overlooked titles they big licensees drop or show no interest in. I assume since they have been passed over, maybe MediaBlasters is getting them a bit cheaper which is why they can pass them on to the public at a higher episode per dvd count & with loads of original extras. Geneon & ADV milk us for 7 or 8 dvds on some series allegedly by what they paid for the license(on ADV's side at least. I think Geneon just figures they can milk us for more on high fan favorites) & Mediablasters gives us 6 dvd series releases or entire box sets at a nice price (not the $200 Geneon favors on their higher-demand stuff like the Fushigi Yugi boxes for the longest time) That's why I pay more attention to MediaBlaster titles. They bring us yaoi & we very probably can see the Japanese actor interview extras. |
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hikaru004
 Posts: 2306 |
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So a regular fan can't post an opinion? Besides, AnimEigo seems to aim for older titles. Media Blasters also licenses newer titles, like those examples that you have given. However, if Media Blasters can not continue to license newer stuff, then imo it becomes a spiraling problem and it may lead to them becoming another AnimEigo, a company who for whatever reason cannot seem to license newer titles and has longer periods between anime licensing announcements. Japanese companies sell their rights to distributors that can produce results as FUNimation's recent agreements have shown us. If they save their money and get another A-list title (highly popular in mainstream to ensure that MB as a brand name stays well-known, good reviews, sells like crazy), then no problem imo. GitS:SAC does count for Manga imo. More than 1 company associated with distributing a title isn't unsual anymore. If you look past R1, the UK distributor is Manga Entertainment. FLCL enjoys a permanent place in the mainstream conscience as evidenced by yet another run on AS and a spiffy 2006 re-release. Kenshin TV is actually circa 1996-1998. It had lots of releases and re-releases. |
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CCSYueh
Posts: 2707 Location: San Diego, CA |
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But they don't HAVE to license big titles. They can go on selling porn which is usually pretty good business. The yaoi is probably an outgrowth from the porn, in fact. They've had Boku no Sexual Harassment, Level C, & Fake for some time. If those titles didn't do well, I'm sure we wouldn't see them licensing all the yaoi they do. It's like any business--MediaBlasters has pretty much found their audience. Not everyone wants #1 titles. If someone licenses that Melancholy of WHoever that everyone's been going on about, maybe I'll check it out, but right now everything I've read about it doesn't appeal to me. Everyone doesn't love DBZ. ADV claimed once the reason we see 7 dvd sets instead of 6 sometimes is they had to pay a bit more for those titles, so they need a bigger return. ADV gave us GetBackers in 2 5-dvd sets, so they must have paid a bit less for that one. If MediaBLasters is getting these overlooked titles at a good price, they don't have to sell as much of them. If they licensed Voltron really cheap & can sell it to all the old fans, plus some newer fans who appreciate classics, then they just might do well enough to consider it a big success. And there's nothing wrong with them being known as a company that licenses titles overlooked by the big licensees. Heaven knows there are a lot of fans out there hoping & praying their little title will be picked up-maybe really good, but rather obscure. If you haven't checked out 12 Kingdoms, you really should. It is a beautiful title which was even underappreciated in Japan to the point they cut it off at half the eps they planned to make. I suppose by your standards, that's a loser title, but everyone I know who has checked it out, loves it & Tokyopop is bringing over the novels they are based on. Del Rey licensed Ghost Hunt based on the same author's work, & I'm sure the fact it is by the author of 12 Kingdoms played a large part in the decision for Del Rey to pick up Ghost Hunt. MediaBlasters really scored a wonderful title when they picked that one up. |
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Kouji
 Posts: 978 |
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Let's not forget that Media Blasters also has MKR and it doesn't matter if that's an older series because it's Clamp; Clamp anime will always be popular with mainstream anime fans no matter how old the title is because it's Clamp. And while it's not as huge of a success as Gravitation is, Loveless has a quite a cult following with anime fans too, both with yaoi fangirls and with anime fans who don't normally even watch shounen-ai, despite it being a sub-only title. Personally, I have no problem with Media Blasters continuing to focus more on licensing more niche titles like yaoi anime. I think it shows that Media Blasters actually cares about the titles they license rather than simply being in it to make a quick buck off the latest Shounen Jump fad or the latest "hottest" umpteenth re-release of a certain popular psycohological mecha anime. While individually, these licenses of niche yaoi anime might not seem like it's going to help the anime community out much, I think it will as a collective whole. If anything, the fact that Media Blasters continues to license these niche yaoi anime shows that either a) there's more gay/open-minded people who are anime fans or b) there's more female anime fans these days than there used to be, though I must admit, I wish they would license some shoujo-ai anime too, in particular Mariamite.
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hikaru004
Posts: 2306 |
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I actually liked 12 Kingdoms and Otogi Zoshi. However, these titles are "under the radar" in R1 unfortunately imo. While they can do good business by selling hentai titles, being perceived as a distributor that sells hentai won't get you any points in mainstream America imo. They need to bring over other mainstream titles to balance any publicity from announcing a hentai title, just like the majority of the other distributors do. If your hentai branch gets more publicity than your mainstream branch, then you could be in for some PR difficulties imo. This also means that bringing over too many "under the radar" titles is not in MB's best interest either imo. It would also be a stretch to think that a Japanese owner of a good title would sell their license of their precious non-hentai commodity to a distributor with a reputation for distributing mostly hentai in the target region. Then, the vicious cycle starts of only being able to license certain titles because of their past projects and reputation imo. Pointing to a previous release of mainstream series X will not be much of an index of their current situation as perceived by the public if their recent announcements in the public consciousness do not contain mainstream titles imo. |
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tripperdan99
 Posts: 136 |
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I'm sorry AyumiHamasaki, but you've just made my point. (At least to me). Look at the numbers, consider the population and market potential. Here we seem to "navigating by the light on the top of the mast of your boat" rather than a fixed point. I see Avatar (yes, it's NOT anime, but a clone that's successfully being marketed as such) toys in Walmart, I see marketing and growth of well handled anime.. Bleach (just starting, will catch Naruto, IMHO), Naruto (has good momentum) and others. These have the proper potential for mass appeal. Yaoi, no matter how much you like it, will never be that. So yes, in the big picture, it's "niche." Selling 2,000 titles in a country of 300,000,000 isn't impressive. But this is just my perspective, mind you.
heehee, good point!
Do you get the "I just grew a horn with bells on it out of my forehead" look when you mention anime? Geezzz, we have a ways to go! Love anime. Working two careers, I only have very limited time, anime is my escape.
uhh, let's not use the word "shooting" ok? I just jumped to see if my body armor was tight... and I haven't worn it in 10 years! LOL, hate flash backs. Thanks guys, this thread has been fun. |
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AyumiHamasaki
Posts: 219 |
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I wasn't aware we were talking about the whole US population. (But, i was sure the majority of us were referring to anime/manga in general when we were discussing about yaoi being not part of the "niche" market) In that case, you should go ahead and apply the "niche" title to the 99.9% of the anime licensed in America. Actually, anime, in general, is "niche" no matter how you argue it in your standard. Therefore, BLEACH is still "niche" because according to icv2, it only sold 3,263 tanks in a country of 300,000,000 people. So, in the big picture, it's "niche". 3,263 tanks sold is not impressive to you, like you've claimed. But to the American manga ranking standards, selling over 2000 tanks of a manga title is good enough. And, for the record, in my earlier comment, i was talking about anime/manga in general when i said yaoi is not a "niche" market anymore. |
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