Is she Sailor-Moon?

Photo by Rokunon

I went to Toshimaen Cosplay Festival last Sunday (^^)

Misuzu has blond hair. And, despite of over 10 years from first broadcast, the most famous character with blond hair is Sailor Moon. Thus they often say "look! there is a sailor moon!" ^^;

If watched in detail, Sailor moon has a so-called "twin-tail", and Misuzu has a single pony tail. Please look me carefully and don't call me Sailor Moon!

However at Toshimaen, a new rival came, Marin. (Misuzu was called Marin)
She is a very famous character from Umi-Monogatari(Marine Story), Pachinko.
http://www.sanyobussan.co.jp/products/pk_supersea_okinawa/index.html A girl in the left

She has a pony tail, side hair... just same as Misuzu! Moreover, this pachinko is so famous that there're Umi-Monogatari in almost every pachinko hall, and some of them has 1/1 sized figure of Marin! What a difference in popularity!

The only difference might be, Misuzu has white ribbon. You need to be very careful to call kigurumi's name (lol

Doll, Doller, Dollest

Photo by Risa-Nyanko

Kigurmi players are sometimes called as "doller." In my feeling, it seems this usage is valid for only in kigurumi community; I think "doller" is usually who has dolls, or human-like toys.

In this two years, it seems more and more Moe-type, or anime-type dolls came on the market. I myself have dolls in this meaning, thus I'd like to review the world of character-doll today.

First, definition. Dolls are different from figure, in the point that has joints, so that you can make the doll to have different pose. And also, you can change the clothes of dolls and this would be the most important feature. The feeling of clothes are never copied by PVC figures!

In addition, Dolls are divided to two category: "Action Figure", which has hard PVC hair, and narrow "Doll", which has soft string hair. But it seems action figure is also called as doll.

Second, size. Roughly, dolles are taller than figure: about 27cm, 60cm, or human-sized. There're few moe dolls of human-sized, thus I'd like to show examples of 27cm and 60cm dolls.
Megahause, Action Figure Collection (27cm, PVC head)

http://www.megahouse.co.jp/products/figure.html '06-
Lunamaria Hawk(Gundam Seed Destiny), Kosaka Tamaki(To Heart 2), Asahina Mikuru(Suzumiya Haruhi)

Azone, Hybrid Active Figure (27cm, String Head)http://www.azone-int.jp/cct/index.html '05-
Saber(Fate/Staynight), Katase Shima(Stellvia, 60cm), Suzumiya Haruhi(Suzumiya Haruhi)
Volks, Dollfie Dream (60cm, String Head)

http://www.volks.co.jp/jp/dollfiedream/charactors/nemu/index_menu.aspx '04-
Asakura Nemu(D.C.), Ayanami Rei(Evangelion), Komaki Manaka(To Heart 2)

Not-Moe-type dolls are also very popular among people especially women, clothes and accessaries are widely made. There're some market of dolls and clothes, like Dolls-Party (it's similar to Comic-Market).

Recently, major figure maker Kotobukiya announced the join to the dolls market. Although perfect mimic of anime character would be difficult in today's level(especially for string-haired one), along with the movement to the more active posed figure, we must keep an eye for dolls!

Light Novel is Expanding in Anime World

Photo by Hayarina

Many animes are based one Manga. This type of anime includes DRAGON BALL, Card Caprtor SAKURA, DEATHNOTE, Doraemon... Nowadays, I think more than half of animes on air are originally started as Manga.

Other source of amines are game and light novel, which are particularly increasing. I'd like to talk about "light novel" today.

Light Novel(juvenile novel) is basically novels for teens. Though the definition is not clear, it can be said they usually have many illustrations in the novel, in some cases by famous dojin illustrators. This may be because the readers are tend to be otaku...But the influence of light novel isn't limited to otaku; Quite frequently some light novel are listed as #1 sales among all novels.

This category is not so new, there have been since 1990 or more past. The early examples of anime introduced from light novel would be Slayers(1995). However, the number of animes seems to be exploded in this three years. Namely, Suzumiya Haruhi, Shakugan no Shana, Full Metal Panic... it would be impossible to show them all.

I'm frequent reader of light novel from my younger times, I grew up with Slayers and Records of Rodoss War. Usually these novels are written by plain text, however some have inpressive expression. My definite recommend is "Iriya no Sora, UFO no Natsu" or "Iriya's Sky, Summer of the UFOs" by Akiyama Mizuhito. Though his novel also transfered to anime, it seemed to me that the sense of the text was not fully transported. Full translation might be impossible by today's level of anime.

The distinction between light novel and common novel is becoming more vague. Some writers started their career in light novel have got most respected prize in literature (Naoki prize). In the othre case, Otsu-ichi(he's one of my favorite, also light novel writer at first) is now considered as one of the most prominent young mystery writer.

We can't take our eyes from light novel!

No Moe, No Holidays

Photo by Raise

There have been succeeding holidays (called Golden Week) in Japan. Many people travel abroad or inside Japan, or go to amusement park, special convention, so on.
Trains and airplanes are full and roads are highly congested. Are some 20 miles of congestions common in your country?(I don't know well about other countries...)

I went to my grandparent's house, thus there was no Moe in this Golden Week, handful of anime unwatched are only remaining ^^;

Here's a photo report of Children's day(5/5) in Akihabara. It seems there're plenty of maid, lolita, TV staff, maid, China clothes, police officer, family, Dragon Ball, figure, Kamishibai, Hentai illustration, Oden-can, police officer.
Akihabara goes as usual, because Akihabara may be always in festival (^^)