OLD NEWS & UPDATES FROM
JULY 2006

Older updates are at the bottom.

2006/08/29---CN Anime is this weekend

On Sunday, the Toronto Star published an article about the upcoming Hobbystar convention taking place in Toronto this weekend. (The article can be found in Sunday Star's Buzz section on page C5.) For some reason, it talks more about elitism than anything else. But it does manage to call Bleach "Leach", so that's kinda amusing. Because a lot of people are confused, I will now attempt to clarify the name of this convention. I usually refer to the convention this weekend as "CN Anime", which is short for "Canadian National Anime Expo". This refers to the anime section of the "Canadian National Fan Expo", which also has comics, sci fi, horror and gaming sections. There is currently an attempt to get the general public to call it "FanX" for "Fan Expo". If all of that went over your head, don't worry. It really doesn't matter. XD Anyway, you can find the main website for FanX here, or skip to the anime section by going here. I've attended it for the past couple of years, and although it's not as fun as Anime North, it's still an event I look forward to every year. If you're in the Toronto area, you may want to check it out. :3 Sakura: They're insane. Naruto: Probably. -Naruto Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/28---More than a dream

The new pic and quote of the week are up. The pic features Mitsuki and Eichi from the Full Moon wo Sagashita manga. The words on the pic are just something I came up with, but I think they suit the daydream-like quality of Mitsuki's character and the image. I hope you like it. :3 The quote of the week comes from episode 42 of Naruto. Sakura says it to Ino during their battle. She stares Ino in the eye, and shows her that she has grown into her equal. "I'm not some crybaby anymore. If you play with fire, you're going to get burned." -Sakura, Naruto Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/26---Now with slashing action!

Some news catch-up: The FUNimation's official English website for the FMA movie is up here. On a related note, the FMA movie will be airing in select theatres throughout the United States. You can find a list of theatres here. A couple of days ago, ANN posted about Bandai's recent press release warning fansubbers not to fansub Ghost in the Shell: Solid State Society. This is an interesting development in the fansub issue, and I'll try to keep an eye on how it plays out. For now, you may want to check out the 300-something posts in ANN's forums regarding the press release. Also in the news, the Bandai Museum will be closing at the end of the month. D: And on a totally random note, is anyone else amused by the packaging for these official Naruto figures? English packaging, FTW! XD "And I thought she looked scary before." -Naruto, Naruto Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/24---Hold eternity

I'm back from BC. Anime Evolution was, in a word, awesome! I took approximately 1800 photos, so it's going to take me some time to go through them all. I'm hoping to have them, and some sort of con report, up before CN Anime next week. :3 Although belated, the new pic and quote of the week are up. The pic of the week features Suu from CLAMP's Clover manga. The words on the pic are from a poem by William Blake. It's a weird combination, but I think it turned out rather well. The quote of the week comes from Fuyutsuki from Evangelion. (Fuyutsuki is one of Gendo's subordinates at NERV.) "I'd rather live in a world with people in it, no matter how stained it is with sin." -Fuyutsuki, Evangelion Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/16---CCS update and a notice

Story time: Back in 2001, I used to host some anime websites. One of the websites I hosted was The Animé Archives, which was run by a girl named Sakura. By some coincidence, years later, she ended up at the same school as me and has since become one of my closest friends. Anyway, about a month ago, she handed me a CD and on it was her Card Captor Sakura section. And so, thanks to her awesome donation, the Card Captor Sakura section will be overhauled with shiny new content. I've just added the first of this content. The Card Captor Sakura characters section has all new character biographies. I also added new images. Check it out! :3 While I was at it, I also updated the Card Captor Sakura voices section. On a totally different note, Anime Evolution is taking place this weekend in Vancouver, British Columbia. If you're in the Vancouver area, definitely check it out! I went two years ago and had a blast. X3 I'm planning to attend this year, and am flying out to British Columbia tomorrow. I'll be cosplaying as either Naruto or Mystel. If you happen to spot me at the convention, please feel free to poke me and say "hi". I swear, I don't bite. :3 I'll be gone for a week, so there's a chance I won't update again until after the 23rd when I return. Since I'll be away, next week's pic and quote of the week will be delayed. I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause! Upamon: It's the Forbidden Valley of No Return. Kari: Why do bad guys always name things like that? TK: It's in the job description. -Digimon Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/14---Set your spirit free

The new pic and quote of the week are up. The image is a really happy one of Sakura from Card Captor Sakura. It's from the cover of the 2005 Card Captor Sakura calendar, which had slightly different art than the anime. It's a very pink image, but I think it came out nicely. I hope you like it. :3 To go with the pic, I made a matching wallpaper, which is just as pink and cheery. :3 800x600 | 1024x768 The quote of the week is quite possibly my favorite quote from the Naruto series. Genma (of all characters) says it in episode 62 during the Neji and Naruto battle. I've loved this quote since the first time I heard it, and I find it to be rather inspiring. "The power to believe in yourself. That will become the power to change fate." -Genma, Naruto Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/12---Naruto reviews

I'm getting caught up in my Naruto dub reviews. The review for thirty-nine is up here and the review for episode forty is up here. :3 "OK. I admit it. I kind of borrowed that move, but from here in, it's all original." -Sasuke, Naruto Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/11---Keeping up with the times

Time magazine has an article up about the attraction of manga to girls and publishers in the United States. Besides giving the standard "this is what manga is" and the problematic "look how popular it is with girls, unlike American comic books", it does attempt to challenge the popular definition of manga as comic books from Japan. If you're interested, you can read the article here. Also, Time has put up an interview with Natsuki Takaya, the mangaka of Fruits Basket. It states that she plans to end the manga this year (which isn't really news to anyone following it ^^;) and she has a brilliant answer for the question "What do you think about manga being attempted by non-Japanese creators?" You can see the article up here. "Stop saying strange things!" -Kyo, Fruits Basket Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/08---New and Improved Digimon Section Online!

I've finally completed my update of the Digimon section! :3 The sections looks a little different now. Below you'll find an explanation of the new content: Main Now with actual content! Characters This section is finally organized by season. Most of the information has been re-written. Characters are organized by their dub names, with their Japanese names noted if there was a change. As an added bonus, most (if not all) of the embarrassing typos should be gone. Episode Guide This section is also now organized by season. Images from the official site have been added so that almost every episode summary has a corresponding image. Moreover, there has been a spelling and grammar clean up. A complete episode guide for Frontier has been added, thanks to submissions by Meilin8, Ally West, and Madison. I cleaned up the grammatical tenses a bit so that it reads a little better. Devices This section got a huge update. It only contains information on the first two seasons, but it explains items like the digivices, tags, crests and digieggs, and matches up the crests with the digidestined. I've also added quite a few images to this section. It's much better than it used to be. :3 Voices I've cleaned up the coding and removed the images that I didn't make. Gallery I removed all the images that I didn't make myself, as well as some really low quality screencaps. This leaves... not much. But I'd rather this than content that wasn't mine. Before you send me letter bombs, note that I will be adding shiny new images in the future. Please don't kill me. Movies It's still horribly out-of-date, but at least what I do have doesn't completely suck anymore. V-Tamer This was the manga section. It's been cleaned up quite a bit, although my scanlations still suck. On the plus side, it now has actual information about the manga, including the ISBN codes for those of you who wish to import it. Changes This section now features actual sentences! It still only covers the first two seasons and the first three movies, but now it actually makes sense. Yay! Lyrics I removed all of Megchan's Digimon lyrics, seeing as they're still available on her shiny website. I kept and cleaned up the lyrics for all of the music from the English dub. TCG This trading card game section is pretty much the same. I cleaned up the coding quite a bit though. Mythology It's basically the same, but with some corrections here and there. Humor I debated with myself whether or not to keep this section. It's from long before LELOLA had any form of quality control, and it shows. But I do recognize that this section is still quite popular. While I've cleaned up the coding, I haven't cleaned up the content, since the section will probably be deleted before I do that. (On an entertaining note, if an anthropologist ever wants to do a study on fandoms from around the year 2000, interpretations of some of the section make great essay fodder. o___O;) Fanzone Much like the humor section, I debated what to do with this section. I ended up keeping the fanart and poetry sections, because both contain some amazing submissions that deserve to be seen. The fanart section has been reorganized for slightly easier navigation. Stuff This section has some content removed from it, but also a lot of content shuffled into it. The content was cleaned up. Forever It's been cleaned like whoa, but not much has changed. Onii-san Like the Forever section, it's pretty much the same, but cleaned up. I also re-organized, renamed and thumbnailed the screencaps in the gallery for easier access. I know the section has shrunk on the left scrollbar, but I haven't removed that much. A lot of content was simply reorganized, so be sure to take a look around the new and improved Digimon section. :3 Also, because of these updates, the URLs for practically every section have been changed. Google is going to hate me. They no longer are obscure things like "diginc.shtml", but actually make sense to average person. If you're linking to any part of the Digimon section, you'll probably have to change your links. Other Organizational Changes The Tenchi section has been moved to under the Other Anime heading at the bottom of the scrollbar. Also, the DragonBall Z section has finally gone poof. In addition, the anime on the left-hand scrollbar are in alphabetical order for the first time since, well, ever. I get some complaints from people having trouble navigating the website, so hopefully, this will help a bit. :3 Coding Cleaning The update of the Digimon section has also enabled me to remove the last of the horrible onMouseOver coding that was on the site. I started using the onMouseOver coding back in 1999, when LELOLA was hosted at Geocities, as a way to disguise the fact the site was hosted on a free server. Because it was on virtually every page of the site, I had a lot of trouble removing it, since it had to manually be removed from everything before it could be removed from the layout. I started removing the coding in the fall of 2003 and I finally finished today. It has now been wiped from every page and the layout, giving the site a cleaner look and slightly faster loading times. *does a little dance* I have also cleaned up a lot of the pages containing submissions on the site. I had SSI coding embedded into most of them that I went through and removed. I've theoretically tested these changes, but it is possible that I forgot something. If something doesn't work, or if you encounter something weird, please let me know so I can fix it. :3 Anyway, there's been one heck of an update. I hope you like it! "When we had to survive on our own, we grew up very fast. Except for Joe. He just threw up very fast!" -Tai, Digimon Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/06---Summer Fun

The new pic and quote of the week are up. The pic features a group pic from Gakuen Alice. It's a fun pic that I thought was perfect for the summer season. It's simple but I hope you like it. :3 The quote of the week is from the second manga volume of Hana-Kimi. It's a happy quote to match the pic. "I won't get depressed over this. My specialty is optimism!" -Mizuki, Hana-Kimi Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/04---Giant Gundam model

The Japan Times, Bandai is going to make and sell a human-sized Gundam model starting on December 16th. (If I'm not mistaken, it's the RX-78 Gundam.) The model will be 1.5 meters tall, weigh 35kg, and cost 350,000yen. It can pose and makes all sorts of sound effects -- including the sound of rocket launchers. It also comes with a remote control, which will allow its owner to make it blink from a distance. Much like a standard model kit, the human-sized gundam comes in pieces, and will apparently take approximately four hours to assemble. You can see a photo of it here. "My ideal is nothing more than a fantasy than a single individual. History is an accumulation of daily events. I have no interest in an individual’s future." -Treize, Gundam Wing Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/03---Between a rock and hard place

Ask John recently answered a very interesting question about piracy. If you're a fan of shows like One Piece, which don't have an uncut North American release, you might find it rather interesting. I found it interesting, since it might be illegal to import and watch official Japanese DVDs. Also, I found this explanation of piracy to hit the nail on the head: "They resort to unethical or illegal means because there are no entirely legal or ethical alternatives." You can read the question and answer here. On an unrelated note, in the WTF-news department, this article reports that Microsoft and Nintendo are being sued over their game controllers. Otakon takes place this weekend. I know a lot of you will be going, so I hope you have a great time! :3 Also, Anime Iowa takes place this weekend. "...may I have another fork?" -Legato, Trigun Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan

2006/08/01---Cosplay Picnic Photos are up!

My photos from Saturday's cosplay picnic are up! Check'em out! :3 Also, like last year, I've added a section that links to other substantial galleries from the event. Be sure to check out other people's photos -- like DarthMarySue's, who has photos of the characters from Bleach riding a tractor and other such shiny goodness. :D "Sorry, Naruto. Change of plans. I'm not ready to die quite yet." -Haku, Naruto Till next time... Updated by: Pan-Chan