I figured this was going to happen last week, but it was only a few days ago that crunchyroll announced that they were going to host Makoto Shinkai's three major works for streaming for free for the 24 hours that Global Shinkai Day will last (Friday (2/27) from 5 pm/PST to Saturday (2/28) 5 pm/PST). So I'm late that even Anime News Network had covered this yesterday, just been a very busy time between work, trying to prepare a few things for GSD, and other responsibilities.

There's a group made on crunchyroll for this event. Click here or on the banner below to go to it.

A group in Argentina came up with this nicely produced film:

That ending theme rocks! I approve of making fun of otaku in this way1.

1. 1. Not sure if I'd be considered one or not...

... but anyways:

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving. Well, those of you in the U.S. Hope the rest of you had a good Thursday...

Looks like Crunchyroll is on a roll here. This time, they will be streaming Catblue: Dynamite, though I'm not sure if the movie will be available for download (whether for pay or not) from the site. I have talked about this fun CG anime before...

Hopefully, this me reporting on series showing on Crunchyroll reported by Anime News Network won't be what this blog pares down to. I'll try to get a proper post up at some point...

I was just thinking of Eve no Jikan (Time of Eve) when I saw this announcement on Anime News Network:

Crunchyroll to Premiere Time of Eve in English/French

posted on 2008-09-23 15:48 EDT

1st 2 acts of Yasuhiro Yoshiura's sci-fi anime to debut online on October 2

The Crunchyroll video-sharing website and the media production company Directions, Inc. have announced that Crunchyroll will premiere Yasuhiro Yoshiura's Time of Eve (Eve no Jikan) anime series in English and French in North America and Europe on October 2. Yoshiura and Studio Rikka — the creators of the Mizu no Kotoba and Pale Cocoon anime — developed this "non-hard science-fiction" story about everyday life in a future Japan populated by robots and life-like androids.

Wabi Sabi's post on the trailer of Yasuhiro Yoshiura's Time of Eve reminded me to search for a DVD of Yoshiura's earlier works. And found it I did on CDJapan. The R2 DVD does come with English subtitles (and Aquatic Language on the DVD comes with English dubbing) and I have a region-free DVD player, so no worries there.

So for a birthday present to myself (getting to the ancient age of 29 this Sunday), I decided to order the R2 DVD. Besides, I've liked Pale Cocoon enough that I feel I should at least own a real copy of it.

Martin has said everything I probably would have said about Pale Cocoon, so go there to read about it.

Here's the new trailer directed by Makoto Shinkai for the game "ef - the latter tale", Music was composed by Tenmon.

I haven't gotten a chance to watch it yet. My internet connection is being very obtuse right now. Hopefully, it will clear up in the morning so I can actually watch the entire video.

(Heads up via Daike. He also has links to where you can download higher-quality WMVs, which is probably the route I'll try to watch this.)

Well, I'm quite flattered that Fledge thinks my obsessions are working looking into. So, I will return with even more Makoto Shinkai visuals!

But first, I need to announce the Makoto Shinkai English Fan Forum And Site. It's not super active yet, and there hasn't been any major discussion of Shinkai's work yet, but hopefully, I can get some time to resolve that issue. It's been open for several months now, and I only found it from Daike's Shinkai Fan Site a couple of months ago.

Now let's go back in time for what I would call his pre-breakout days. These were the shorts Shinkai made before he quit his then day job to work on Voices of a Distant Star:

Not that it would do me much good, but it looks like the first episode of this movie will be offered online for streaming. According to MSFW:

Byousoku 5cm Official Site (Yahoo! Japan) says they will release the 1st episode for Yahoo! Premium members and Yahoo! BB members by streaming... The streaming is distributed only for 3 days: from February 16 12:00PM to 19 12:00PM (Japan Standard Time: UTC+9:00).