Author: Jonathan Clements

September 1, 2015 · 0 comments

By Andrew Osmond. Pictures by Carlos Nakajima. The towering Roppongi Hills complex in Tokyo is the kind of structure that you could imagine being blasted into orbit to become a space habitat for some wide-eyed anime space opera. Not yet, alas, but until September 27 it’s playing host to “The Art of Gundam,” an extensive […]

August 25, 2015 · 0 comments

By Jonathan Clements. In the 13 years since I curated a season of Chinese animation at the Udine Film Festival (the programme is reprinted in Schoolgirl Milky Crisis), I still occasionally get asked about it. Producers, who fret that the Japanese mother lode has been mined out, want to know if I am sitting on […]

August 22, 2015 · 2 comments

By Andy Hanley. Every light novel that enjoys sufficient success to continue beyond its first volume faces a single, pivotal problem – how do you take the core concept and then build or improve upon it? This is particularly true in the case of Sword Art Online. Its original tale of a virtual reality where […]

August 19, 2015 · 0 comments

By Andy Hanley. It is the year 2022, and virtual reality has become the new must-have accessory for gamers everywhere. But this isn’t the kind of technology familiar from our own present. Rather than simply a headset designed to place a virtual world in front of your eyes, this is the real deal – a […]

August 16, 2015 · 0 comments

By Meghan Ellis. Does the idea of a near-future romance sound like something created especially for you, or was that just me? If the answer is a resounding yes, then you should check out Hal. Anyone familiar with the girls’ comics sub-genre in Japan will almost certainly recognise the character design, carefully created by manga […]