Time to Give Up on Physical Media

I am fully aware that physical media is on the decline and has been for more than a decade now. Yet I remain a big consumer of it. I still buy books, magazines, CDs, Blu-rays and the occasional DVD. But several factors in my life, recent government legislation, the fluctuating currency market and the tightening market for physical media have made me rethink how I consume entertainment.

The major factor is the recent tax legislation on overseas good and the unintended effects that had. Rewinding back to 2010, you may recall Gerry Harvey, billionaire owner of national furniture and whitegoods chain Harvey Norman, lobbing to have the GST threshold on goods imported by consumers themselves into this country from $1000 to nil. In other words if you bought something online from overseas regardless of the cost, you’d be paying 10% GST. The main argument behind this is that as overseas retailers don’t pay the GST, they have an unfair advantage over local retailers, which is a pretty stupid claim to make. Of course they don’t pay GST as they aren’t in Australia. Unsurprisingly the proposed new tax did not go over well with consumers with Harvey stating he received online abuse (aka criticism);

“Because of my profile, I then get all these threats and people hone in on me. It becomes me, Gerry Harvey and Solomon Lew - billionaires, greedy, ugly, old, out-of-date cunts, and the people writing this seem to think we have been ripping them off for years and that we deserve this.”

That statement is pretty amusing as he inadvertently hits the nail on the head; consumers are being ripped off by local retailers and they knew it and took their business elsewhere. He doesn’t get it, and it was even more clearer with this baffling example he gave;

“What we are talking about is someone buying a guitar in New York, for instance, and having it sent over here 30 per cent cheaper. It is giving that overseas retailer the advantage”.

As people rightly pointed out, even factoring in shipping, it would still be far cheaper to import the guitar with 10% GST on it than it would to buy locally. Due to the rising Australian dollar, which reached above parity with US dollar at one point, forcing consumers to pay the GST didn’t create “a level playing field” for Australian retailers. Regardless, after years of lobbying from the business council and businessmen like Harvey, legislation was eventually brought in; The Treasury Laws Amendment (GST Low Value goods) Act 2017, which took effect on 1 July 2018. Essentially it meant that any overseas business that sold goods to Australians and earned a gross of AU$75,000 per annum had to collect and pay tax to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO).

So what the federal government was doing was getting retailers from overseas to collect tax Australian consumers from their purchases and then forward it on the ATO. No, I shit you not. In the UK where consumers pay Value Added Tax (VAT) on overseas purchases, the tax is calculated by customs and paid at the post office, much like here in Australia with goods valued over $AU1,000 (or $AU500 if you are getting stuff delivered via a courier). This method would be the most normal, consistent way to collect the tax one would have thought. Asking overseas retailers to do your dirty work seems absurd and you’d think most companies would tell a foreign government to fuck right off.

However 1 July 2018 rolled around and I was utterly surprised that some of the smaller companies actually complied the government’s demands, in particular CD Japan and AmiAmi. However I soon noticed that companies like the Right Stuf and all of the UK retailers I used did not add on GST. I thought I might be charged GST at the post office for these orders, but was not. The other thing I noticed as I passed through customs at Mascot airport earlier this month after returning from Japan, is that customs did not charge me GST there either. So with this non-compliance or ignorance of the law (and why should overseas companies comply anyway?) the new law is being applied inconsistently. Despite Gerry Harvey’s instance, it has created an even more uneven playing field.

Not only that, Amazon refused to collect the tax ad publicly and humiliatingly berated the federal government by threatening to block Australian customers from buying products from their overseas sites. The government didn’t fold and on 1 July 2018 Australian citizens could no longer order products from any of their international sites. The Australian site was of course not effected, however tens of thousands of products available on other Amazon sites weren’t available on the Australian site. When they were they could absurdly cost hundreds of dollars more. Frustratingly I later discovered that Amazon was collecting consumption tax for other countries where non US citizens, especially on the US site. In particular for European countries. It’s odd. Why is Amazon forgoing profit when they could easily comply? It seems so pigheaded.

You could potentially buy stuff from the UK and US sites, but would need a proxy shipper (forwarding service) to send the items on to Australia. But this of course requires additional fees and most of these forwarding services now charge and collect the GST for the government. In terms of collecting Japanese books, CDs and blu-rays, Amazon’s middle finger to Australian customers has put a large obstacle in the way. I could use a forwarding service, which can be quite expensive, or CD Japan, which has no discounts unlike Amazon Japan, far less products and charges the GST. As a result I actually pay 2% more consumer tax using CD Japan than Japanese citizens do for the same product (Japanese consumer tax is 8%).

This whole process of the government incompetently requiring consumers to pay GST on overseas products not only forces consumers to pay more for the same product, it essentially cuts off an entire country’s population from accessing hundreds of thousands of products, most of which cannot be purchased within Australia. It’s anti-competitive and anti-consumer.

The other big factor is the ever decreasing value of the Australian dollar. It has dropped almost 10 cents against the US dollar since the beginning of the year, and is at it’s lowest level in 18 months. The Australian dollar has also sunk slightly against the yen and British pound. I did buy discs when the dollar sunk to 47.75 cents in 2001. But taking into consideration rising utility bills and other items taking a bite into my paypacket, the increase in buying overseas discs is reasonably steep. I suspect the dollar will fall more over the next year putting more pressure on my buying habits.

As I stated in the opening sentence, physical media is on a downward trend. I noticed this on my last trip to Japan that few shops outside the big electronics retailers (Yodobashi Camera, Bic Camera etc.) and the two main record chains, Tower Records and HMV, selling CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray discs. I was also baffled at the lack of illustration collection books (i.e. anime artbooks) in the usual shops. K-Books seemed to have given up and so did a large more mainstream book chain. Animate, Gamers and Kinokuniya still stocked them. Second hand anime discs seem to be virtually worthless, especially top tier titles. I managed to pick up the entire run (7 individual discs) of the second season of “Love Live! Sunshine!!” for a single note; ¥10,000. Most volumes retail for ¥7,000 each brand new (the first volume is a fraction cheaper). The set of seven discs I bought were virtually mint. I had also bought the entire series of “Macross Delta” for about a third of its full retail price in a second store in Osaka around 18 months prior.

In the west, the health of the physical video market seems really mixed. While limited run niche titles seem to do well (see what Discotek and All the Anime are doing), paradoxically the more popular titles seem to be selling less. Several high profile titles do not have releases or have incomplete releases outside of Japan; “Devilman Crybaby”, “Little Witch Academia” and “Sound! Euphonium” to name a few. I would suspect that due to the ubiquity of streaming that these titles will never receive western releases, and that the fans will mostly not care if they do. Those that do receive releases are sometimes quite substandard in terms of quality to price ratio, both in terms of video and packaging (Funimation, Aniplex USA and Pony Canyon US are often the worst offenders).

Lastly, I am literally running out of space to store stuff. I have been collecting anime related stuff for close to a quarter of century. Despite several culls, the house is packed to gills with books, magazines, video tapes, laserdiscs, DVDs and Blu-rays. It’s just about reached a critical point where my collection will go from looking organised and (mostly) out of sight to verging on looking like the house of a problem hoarder.

With the added expense, the additional hoops to jump through, the low quality/high price of some products or the fact they don’t exist at all in a physical format and the lack of space, I’m just about done with collecting. However it’s not a choice I want to make. I really don’t like not having a physical copy of shows I really like. There is no guarantee at all that your favourite TV show, movie, song or album will be available legitimately on a streaming service (and bootleggers sometimes don't take up the slack). Licences eventually run out. Sometimes they aren’t renewed. Sometimes companies don’t want to renew licenses or even licence the product in the first place. Companies decide that certain things are profitable anymore or even go bankrupt and vanish. With no physical copies, shows could easily vanish from the web, forgotten forever. While that may seem rather hyperbolic, I think it’s a reasonably plausible future.

But I suspect within a year push will come to shove and I’ll just have to give up on buying discs. I have practically stopped purchasing books, doujinshi and movie programmes as there just is no room to store them anywhere. Whether I like it or not, streaming is here to stay. Sure I’ll probably save a fair amount of money by not buying this stuff, but I think I will take a bit of time adjusting to the fact I can’t buy a copy of a new movie or TV series I like. It’s a real end of an era for me.

Anime On the Big Screen: “Mirai”

Venue: Dendy Cinemas, Level 2, North Quarter, Canberra Centre, 148 Bunda Street, Canberra City, ACT
Date: Saturday 25 August 2018
Distributor: Madman Entertainment
Format: Digital Projection, Japanese dialogue with some English dialogue with English subtitles
Length: 98 minutes
Production Date: 2018
Currently on Home Video in English (as of writing): No

Yet another anime film has come to cinemas. This time it’s Mamoru Hosoda’s fifth major film (discounting the “Digimon” and “One Piece” films he directed). This most certainly a much welcome change from the numerous anime compilation films and the run of stunningly mediocre anime features Madman has foisted on cinema goers this year. I was really looking forward to this film. It was a typical Canberra winter’s day; overcast, a shower which barely wet the ground; however it was quite mild, a bit warmer than the usual weather we’ve been having. As a result, the Canberra Centre was packed, even more so than usual. Dendy is still playing limited season anime films twice a day, first at around 4pm, the second screening around 6pm. Can’t say I’m overly happy with that arrangement, but whatever. I went to the earlier session. Only 10 people showed up for this session which did surprise me seeing as it’s a Mamoru Hosoda film. Madman even put a bit of effort into promoting this film; a single poster in the foyer. Usually they do bugger all except ads on Facebook and Twitter. Anyway, let’s talk about the film;

Four year old Kun lives in with parents in an upper middle class suburb in Isogo ward, Yokohama. Kun has a deep fascination with trains and constantly playing with toy trains, which his grandmother is attempting to get him to put away. However today Kun is only interested in one thing; the return of his mother. She has just given birth to a baby girl and is due home with Kun’s father any minute. Finally the family station wagon pulls up outside the house and Kun rushes down to the entrance. He is overjoyed to see his mother again but is also excited to meet his new sister. So obsessed with trains, Kun decides on two names for the baby; Nozomi and Tsubame, the names of shinkansen. Kun’s father is an architect and has built a very unusual house. Split into two separate parts on a slope of a hill, the centre part has a courtyard with an oak tree siting right in the middle. Kun’s parents have decided that father will stay home to look after the new baby and do freelance work while mother will return to work after three months leave.

However father isn’t all that competent with housework, much to mother’s frustration. Things become a bit tense in the household with rising tensions between the two parents and Kun becoming increasingly jealous of his sister as both parents dote on and take care of their new baby daughter. Storming out into the courtyard crying after being scolded by his mother, Kun discovers he seemingly has been transported into another world, a kind of European-like ruin overgrown with plants. There he meets a middle aged man who calls himself the prince of the house. The self-proclaimed prince tells Kun that he was once doted on by mother and father and ruled the house until Kun came along and that Kun is jealous of the new baby. Kun suspects he knows who the prince is when he discovers the family dog’s favourite toy nearby. He throws it repeatedly and every time the man fetches it for him. The prince is in fact Yukko, the family’s miniature dachshund. Kun finds Yukko’s tail and grabs it off him, much to Yukko’s horror. Kun then jams it above his tailbone and is amazed to discover that he can partly transform into Yukko. He excitedly runs around the living room, while his parents see him as Yukko and can’t understand why their pet dog is acting that way.

Later Kun relays Yukko’s request that he wants better dog food, which father buys for him. Eventually Kun’s parents decide on the baby’s name; Mirai, meaning future. Kun thinks it’s a bit of a silly name. His grandparents come over to see the new baby, however Kun is still jealous of the attention Mirai is getting. Mother eventually returns to work and father is finding it difficult to cope on his own, with a crying baby and a jealous four year old. Hinamatsuri (Girls' Day) has come and gone and mother, traveling on a long business trip, has specifically asked father to take down and store away the set of ornamental dolls used to commemorate the day. This is because of a superstition that for every day the dolls are on display, the girl’s marriage will be delayed by a year. Frustrated that father won’t play with him as he is dead tired due to caring for Mirai, Kun sticks whale shaped biscuits on Mirai’s face while she is sleeping. Still annoyed, Kun goes out to the courtyard where again he is transported to another world, this time a large domed greenhouse filled with plants and butterflies. He finds a trail of whale shaped biscuits on the ground and follows them to an angry looking young female high schooler who is waiting for him.

She claims to be the teenage version of Mirai and asks him not to bully her as a baby. But more pressing issues are at hand for Mirai. Father has not put away the dolls as requested. Mirai does not want her future marriage to be delayed and eventually forces Kun to ask father to put away the dolls. However father is so immersed in his work he practically ignores Kun. Kun comes up with an idea that he should pack up the dolls, however they require a special ritualised way to be disassembled and stored away, and Kun is obviously not up to the task. Instead a plan is hatched for Kun to distract father while teenage Mirai and Yukko (in middle aged man form) pack away the doll set. Of course it doesn’t go to plan, with father becoming rather suspicious and Mirai and Yukko almost being caught out several times. Mother later arrives home and complements father on putting away the dolls. Confused, father states he never did. Kun later owns to packing them away with Mirai and Yukko’s help, but his parents don’t quite believe him.

As I said before, this is Hosoda’s fifth film as writer and director. When I was in Tokyo late last month I noted “Mirai” was still in the midst of a very big promotional push for the summer holidays. It was practically in every cinema, with adverts on the screens in pretty much all Japan Rail trains on every line, a retrospective of Hosoda’s work at the gallery at Tokyo Dome and you could not escape the somewhat annoying theme song from the film, Tatsuro Yamashita’s “Mirai no Theme”. Hosoda’s previous film, “The Boy and the Beast”, was also broadcast on TV while I was there, with “Mirai” TV adverts during every break. Yet despite this relentless promotional push, the film has not lived up to commercial expectations, despite good reviews and debuting at second spot at the box office. According to industry analysis, it seems that Japanese audiences are more interested in Ghibli or franchise works.

As with the majority of Hosoda’s other works, this film deals with family connections. But whereas his other films explore the drama and tension in those family connections, here it is almost solely focused on one member of a family. Kun is front and centre of this film, so much so that other than his sister and the family dog, no other character seems to have a name. Hosoda portrays Kun as a quite realistic child. From the opening scenes, everything is seen from Kun’s viewpoint. Hosoda perfectly captures the excitement of a child anxiously waiting for his mother to return home, the way he clumsily navigates stairs with his short stubby legs and of course the tantrums. To a degree however, Kun’s behaviour becomes a bit too much and at times and I began to despise him.

But it's the unusual architecture of the house the family lives in which drives the plot of the film. There’s two separate worlds in that house; Kun’s playroom which is in the lower part of the home and the main living room where Kun’s father and mother work, do household chores and look after the baby. Right in the middle is the courtyard which contains an oak tree. Though it is not explicitly explained in the film, I believe Kun’s adventures in these other worlds take place in his own imagination, fuelled by stories his mother, father and other relatives tell him. As the film progressed and Kun visited past and future versions of his sister, mother and grandfather, and as he developed bit by bit as a person because of these journeys, it felt very reminiscent of Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol”, albeit a much gentler version. At the beginning of the film these excursions, while amusing, felt a bit aimless. In particular Kun’s attitude to Mirai. The teenage Mirai explicitly tells Kun not to tease or upset her as a baby yet Kun seems to ignore her pleas. It frustrated me that Kun was still a tantrum throwing turd, even though I knew he was still a child. However as the film progresses, in other aspects of his life the experiences he has with past and future versions of members of his extended family really do change him for the better.

It culminates in an amazing fantasy sequence where Kun is trapped in a nightmarish version of Tokyo station. This is a wonderfully realised sequence. But at times I wondered if Hosoda had structured the story in the wrong way. Would it have been better if Kun had entered the fantasy world for the majority of the film rather than for him to enter occasionally then return to the real world? For example, something like “Spirited Away”? Having thought about it, the answer is no. However I think Hosoda spends far too much time setting up how this fantasy world works, first using Yukko, and in the second fantasy sequence which introduces the teenage Mirai. Neither of the sequences really adds a great deal to Kun’s development as a person which is the major plot line of the story. The other thing which struck me is how out of line Kun’s parents are with the rest of Japanese society. They’re upper middle class with an amazing house with two children, not exactly your typical Japanese citizen. They also seem to have very few real problems other than minor domestic duties issues, which are blown out of proportion in the story. Most Japanese women would love to go back to work after having a baby like Kun's mother. The vast majority don’t get the opportunity to do so.

So summing up, I really don’t think this is Mamoru Hosoda’s best work. I think the basic idea is sound; exploring a fantasy world of a four year old as he becomes second fiddle to the new arrival. However I think it could have been written a lot better, wasted less time on the set up and maybe showed that Kun had grown a bit with his earlier interactions with teenage Mirai. Though Hosoda really knows how young children think and manages to believably show the thoughts and physical actions of a young child on screen, with the sole focus on Kun, his tantrums can become really grating. At times you can question if you really want to watch this annoying brat for nearly 100 minutes. But when it does work, Hosoda creates magic. At times it feels really nostalgic and takes you back to childhood. I think the audience was confused at times as to how the film worked. They were quite silent by the end. However if you just accept that Kun’s interactions with past and future versions of his family members are all in his imagination, it makes sense and is quite enjoyable. 7.5 out of 10.

Slightly Belated Fan Event Report: Comic Market 94

Two weeks after Wonder Festival, it was time for Comic Market, or Comiket as it’s colloquially known. In between those events, the temperature had gone up and down like a yo-yo. On the Tuesday prior it had sunk to 25°C due to rain from yet another typhoon, the 13th of the season, and fortunately stayed that way for another day. Alas it didn’t remain that way and shot back up to the mid 30’s again towards the end of the week, just in time for Comiket. I had managed to do a number of things I planned to do this trip, but I think by this stage I had grown weary of the heat and humidity (but had somewhat acclimatised to it) and was ready to head home. I wasn’t exactly all that hyped for it, even though Comiket was the number one fan event I’ve always wanted to check out.

I know every man and his dog have written about the convention and there are endless guides to the event, but I still want to give my views and experience of it. But first I want to talk about this history of the event. In April 1975 at Meiji University in Tokyo, a small group of friends, including renowned manga critic Yoshihiro Yonezawa, formed the circle (i.e. university club) Meikyu (Labyrinth). The circle members were frustrated at the state of commercially published manga in Japan at the time. They felt there wasn’t much diversity in the market and there were few outlets for young authors to create and sell more experimental works. This eventually led to the creation of the first Comiket on 21st December of that year at the Nissho Hall in Minato, Tokyo. That first event had 32 circles (groups of fans) and over 700 attendees showed up.

The event was initially held three times per year and by the early 1980’s 10,000 attendees and over 500 circles participated. As the 1980’s progressed, the event finally found a semi-permanent home at the now defunct Harumi Fairgrounds (Tokyo International Trade Fairgrounds), located in Harumi on reclaimed land in Tokyo Bay, not far from Odaiba. By the end of the 1980’s, over 100,000 people attended the event which was now held over two days and had become biannual. With the demolition of the Harumi Fairgrounds in 1996, the iconic Tokyo Big Sight became Comiket’s permanent home the same year. In the year prior the event was extended from two to three days. In modern times Comiket has over 35,000 circles selling their works (mostly doujinshi, i.e. self-published comic books) and fluctuates between 500,000 and 550,000 in terms of attendance. But the Comiket committee states that if someone comes to the event every day, they aren’t counted as one person, rather as three. Regardless, Comiket is the biggest convention of its type in the world, soundly beating San Diego Comic-Con (aka Comic Con).

My plan was to go to day one and two only. I had planned to go to the Fukagawa Hachiman Festival on the Sunday rather than going to third day of Comiket. On the first day of arriving in Tokyo, I went straight to Akihabara and into Animate to get the paper copy of the Comic Market 94 Catalog for ¥2,500. A DVD-ROM version is also available. People say this all the time and it’s true; you really need the catalog to find where you’re going. B5 sized and literally the thickness of a 1990’s big city phone book (1,420 pages). The first few pages are fold out maps of the east and west halls of Tokyo Big Sight. After that there’s about 60 pages of basic information about the event including four pages each in English, Chinese (simplified and traditional) and Korean. There are additional pdf maps in English on the Comiket website, which aren’t in the catalog, show where the cosplay areas are and the morning line-up areas are (for those silly enough to come before the start time of 10am). I found both maps useful planning tools.

Descending into the area leading to the west halls

The bulk of the catalog lists all the booths for the three days, in Japanese alphabetical order. The circles are also given a small 3cm x 2cm spot in the catalog to advertise their table. Usually genres and franchises are grouped together. For example train, military and food doujinshi appear on the third day in the east halls, with each subject or genre grouped in the same aisles. Some franchises will generally appear only on the one day. An example; circles selling “Tiger & Bunny” doujinshi appear in east halls 4 to 6 on the Saturday. This makes it really easy to collect what you want if you are interested in specific subjects or genres. Each hall (six east halls, two west halls), has the aisles of tables listed in Japanese alphabetical order and English alphabetical order when the Japanese alphabet ends. Each table is numbered in each aisle. The catalog concludes with a list of commercial booths (which are found in the west halls at the higher floors) and several articles and Comiket related manga.

With Pixiv and social media sites like Twitter and Tumblr, it’s pretty easy to find and follow Japanese doujinshi artists you like. When it’s close to Comiket, the artist will usually let you know what they have to offer and where they’ll be located. For example they might include their location at Comiket in their Twitter name, as an example; C94(日)西め-18a. So C94 is of course the event, 日is Nichiyobi (Sunday), 西 is nishi (west), め is me in hiragana and 18a is the table number. So the artist is in West Hall, Row me (め), table 18a on Sunday. Simple huh? OK, not really. You may have to learn a bit of hiragana and know the kanji for east and west and also Friday to Sunday to know where circles are. To make it easier, I look up the table on the map in the catalogue to see which number hall the table is in. In the example above the table is in the first hall.

With my list of artists locations written on a piece of paper, I was ready for day one, Friday 10th August. I decided to arrive a little early, around 11:30am, just to see if I had to wait in line. It is generally recommended to arrive after 12pm if you want to avoid standing in line in the sun. Once I arrived at Oimachi station to change trains to the Rinkai line, I noticed the crowds on the platform were similar to morning weekday peak hour on the Yamanote line; i.e. it was really crowded. Station staff were on the platform directing passengers onto the train. At Kokusai-tenjijo station (near Big Sight), it was even worse. The station was filled with possibly close to a couple of thousand people or more. The station staff were doing their best to herd people out of and into trains and in and out of the station itself.

Day one was a sunny 35°C (with the apparent temperature being 47°C when you factor in the humidity). Outside the station the hard sell was already in swing hundreds of meters before you reach Big Sight, with various companies giving away promotional material and trucks with large advertisements spanning the entire length of the truck and loudspeakers advertising games, anime and whatever else. Local restaurants and various food sellers also lined the path to Big Sight selling food, drinks and ice cream. Like Wonder Festival, my survival kit was the same; two bottles of water, two bottles of Pocari Sweat, salty snacks and a small hand towel to wipe off the sweat. Heatstroke is no joke. 30 people were treated for heatstroke on day one. Finally arriving at Big Sight, it was barely controlled chaos. I was rather surprised and glad there was no line up. I saw that the cosplay areas were full to overflowing with people and decided it was too hot to screw around lining up in the boiling sun just to take photos of them. Priority one was getting doujinshi.

Table with circle selling jewelry

I followed the crowd inside with the goal of getting to the west halls. While outside in the shade it was surprisingly pleasant with a coolish breeze blowing in from the bay, inside it was incredibly hot and stuffy. You soon end up drenched with sweat. The connecting covered bridge section between the entrance and the main building was particularly hellish, almost like a sauna. From there it’s down the escalators into the halls. As you can imagine it’s quite crowded and somewhat difficult to get where you want at times. Despite all the planning I did, I still found it a bit difficult to find the specific tables where circles were. Some of the columns in the halls do have maps and show where you are in relation to the map. They were really useful. Rather than tearing out the maps in the catalog, I photographed them with my phone and referred to them when I needed to. This seemed to work well.

The sellers were rather nice and really appreciative of people buying their work. I had saved up as many ¥100 and ¥500 coins as well as ¥1,000 notes as I could beforehand to make transactions as easy as possible. Most doujinshi are usually in the ¥500 to ¥1,000 range, especially for the full colour illustration collections which I was interested in the most. Some sellers really tried to get you in to read their work and get a sale, but most were laid back and a bit passive. I discovered that the west halls generally have a lot of niche stuff, while the east halls have more popular titles are therefore more crowded. After I got the books I wanted in the west halls, I headed to the east halls. “Fate/Grand Order” was insanely popular. So much so I began to think every table in east halls would be “Fate/Grand Order” only. However the “Love Live!”, “THE iDOLM@STER” and “Kantai Collection (KanColle)” franchises were also well represented. I soon discovered that any of the circles situated around the walls of the halls most likely meant they were incredibly popular. The reason they are situated there is so Comiket staff can herd buyers in lines outside the halls so as not disrupt the flow of human traffic inside.

A line outside for one of the more popular circles

Contrary to popular belief most of the sellers are female artists, at least 60% to 75%. I also noted that a lot of the ero stuff, perhaps near 40%, was from female artists. And I don’t mean the Boys Love stuff, I’m talking about the graphic heterosexual stuff. I also think the amount of ero material on sale is vastly overstated by people. Taking to consideration everything that is available such as doujinshi on trains, computer programs, electronics, rock and pop bands, food etc., as well as other items such as music CDs, software, jewellery, cosplay accessories etc., I would guess only 25% to 30% would be considered 18+ pornographic material. The assertion that over half of the attendees are male seems to ring true. However I was surprised at the amount of women present to buy stuff. And it just wasn’t the stereotypical fujoshi, I saw several groups of women dressed to the nines buying stuff and really enjoying themselves. There was a wide range of ages, both male and female buying and selling. Some parents even bought their kids which I thought was a bit silly considering the crowds.

Trying to find a spot to have rest inside the halls can be difficult but not impossible. The volunteer staff have some areas taped off with red tape which are no go zones for attendees. I assume that these areas are for boxes and other material they need to move around and temporarily store, however the vast majority of time they were vacant. Generally they don’t mind if one or two people are in these areas, however if a group of people starts milling about in them, they angrily hunt them away. I had read that it was impossible to get into the toilets inside the halls, though I saw no line ups outside them. I didn’t use them to find out for sure, but if you go to this event do be aware that they could be hard or near impossible to get into. There are also a number of restaurants inside Tokyo Big Sight, but are pretty much running at full capacity all the time. It’s far easier to bring your own lunch.

After two and half hours I was done. I was rather surprised that despite the heat and humidly the experience was tolerable to certain degree. It was definitely uncomfortable, unbelievably sweaty and a bit smelly. The train journey back was a bit nightmarish. It was really crowed and some jackass stereotypical looking overweight otaku almost wouldn't let me get on the train even though there was clearly enough room for me to be let on. My original plan to get a taxi to Tamachi station (which was on the direct line back to my accommodation) was scuttled when I saw the line up at the taxi rank. Day two, Saturday 11th August, was little rougher for me. I think I was bit drained from the first day and the cumulative effect of the exhaustion over a day and half really kicked in. I realised a lot of the circles I wanted to see were unbelievably popular with close to a hundred people waiting in line. I also wanted to buy some of the cosplayer’s photobooks and DVD-ROMs but soon realised they were also really popular and had extreme difficulty navigating the incredibly crowded aisles and ended up frustrated and empty handed.

After an hour and half, I decided I had enough. Lucky the train journey back this time (I left about 1pm) wasn’t all that crowded. Over the two days I had bought just over a dozen doujinshi (I bought another 15 online afterwards, mostly of the circles that had sold out or had massive line ups). According to Comiket’s twitter account, the total attendees for the first two days was 160,000 each day, with the third day, which I didn’t attend, bringing in a hellish 210,000 people. Total attendance equaled the record for a summer Comiket despite the record breaking heat. I did enjoy the experience to a degree and was glad I went, however I think this is a one off. I don’t think I’ll be going again. I doubt I could survive all three days, especially in summer. In the end I didn’t go see the cosplay or go to the area where the corporate booths were, but I’m more than OK with this.

My meager haul

Over the last few years, there has been talk about Comiket being no longer relevant. Doujinshi are pretty easy to find now days with two large chains, Toranoana and Melonbooks, almost exclusively selling books and related merchandise. Even Animate sells a fairly large range of doujinshi. You can see most artists work on Pixiv and buy it on affiliate website Booth. Coupled with the modern ubiquity of doujinshi, the issues and problems with Comiket are so numerous that Japanese Wikipedia has an entire page dedicated to them, separate from the main Comiket article. However I still think the event is still relevant. Putting aside the commercial aspect of it (and I don’t think you could argue that the modern doujinshi market isn’t highly commercial), there still are segments of Comiket which are very niche and are not of that nature. Fans of artists can and do interact in a way at Comiket that they can’t do online. Also while you can order much of what is on sale at Comiket online or buy in store on the Monday afterwards (unofficially known as the 4th day of Comiket), reprints of artists books are usually only made available at the event.

Next year will see some changes as Comiket moves some of its events to the smaller Aomi Exhibition Hall while renovation work takes place at Tokyo Big Sight. The event is also set to take place over four days instead of three. To conclude this absurdly long post; as I said before, I mostly enjoyed the experience. It has always been something I wanted to do. I got a fairly decent selection of doujinshi and had a bit of fun. But I don’t think I want to do it again. Once is more than enough. Please note I have nicked some images of booths off Twitter to illustrate this post as I only took a handful of photos. If the circles have any problems which this I am more than willing to remove them.

Belated Fan Event Report: Wonder Festival 2018 [Summer]

In July 2017 I noticed on my Twitter feed a number of festivals occurring in Japan. I had always toyed with the idea of going to Comiket (Comic Market) during the winter, but was really put off by the down time during the Christmas and New Year’s break due to business and attractions shutting down during that period. That time of the year was also hellishly busy in terms of travel. I discovered that the biannual Wonder Festival (colloquially known as WonFes) was on two weeks prior to Comiket. I had also wanted to go to that event as well, but in winter it was held at an inconvenient time.

I realised that I could see both in summer 2018, plus get to see a lot of traditional festivals in the Kanto region that are on between those events which take place up to the beginning of the Bon Holidays (which starts the Monday after Comiket coincidently). I was rather hesitant on going at first as it would be horribly humid, but eventually decided I couldn't miss these events. Unfortunately Japan’s summer was insanely hot and broke temperature records, in some areas the highest ever recorded since records began. Before I had arrived in the country, 65 people had died and over 20,000 were hospitalised due to heat stroke. But somehow I adjusted and managed to see a fair few festivals, though I had cut a lot out due to the humidly and heat, so I wouldn’t wipe myself out due to heat exhaustion.

WonFes is fairly well known to western anime fans. This is because figure manufacturers use the event as a showcase and to announce new products. But the event’s shift towards fully completed, highly detailed, expensive figures is only a recent one which has taken place over the last 15 years. Prior to that plastic models and garage kits (made of plastic resin) were the hobbies of choice for those who wanted scale models of anime figures and robots. Of course this was also an expensive but ultimately a time intensive hobby which most modern day fans are not interested in at all. Modern fandom thinking seems to equate to; "why do all that work when you can just buy a completed figure for about the same price?".

The event originally began in December 1984 and was created by Daicon Film's (Gainax) merchandise arm General Products (WonFes’ creation was referenced in “Otaku no Video”). The first event was originally held in a General Products store in Osaka as a small “pre-event” which led to a fully-fledged annual event in Tokyo during January 1985. That event held at the Tokyo Metropolitan Industrial and Trade (aka Taito-kan, which is near Asakusa station) managed to bring in 2,000 attendees and 60 dealers. In 1988 WonFes became a biannual event. In 1992 the event hit a peak of over 12,000 attendees and close to 400 dealers. This was the era of the garage kit boom with a number of commercial companies such as Volks, Wave, Kaiyodo, Kotobukiya and B-Club (Bandai’s defunct garage kit and special merchandise division) joining the hundreds of amateur kit makers in the market. Still, it was pretty niche hobby within anime fandom.

But by that year General Products was losing money hand over fist due to poor management and eventually was shut down by Gainax. Kaiyodo took over managing the event. In 1996 the event was moved to Tokyo Big Sight and remained a biannual event until 2001 when the winter event was cancelled. It was restarted in summer that year, but an accident on an escalator which injured 10 people during the summer 2008 event caused it to be cancelled the following winter. The event was yet again rebooted for summer 2009 with an attendance of over 42,000 and over 1,700 dealers with a move to the Makuhari Messe International Exhibition Hall in Chiba prefecture. An adults only area was added the same year.

To this day WonFes remains as a biannual event at the Makuhari Messe. This year the summer event was held on Sunday 29 July 2018 from 10am to 5pm, taking up halls 1 through 8 of the Makuhari Messe. I arrived in Tokyo the Thursday prior and pretty much went straight to Akihabara to obtain the official guidebook which costs ¥2,500. It can be bought easily in chain anime shops like Gamers, Animate and as well as hobby shops. This guidebook is literally your ticket into the event. Roughly B5 size and about half the thickness of the Comiket catalogue (300 pages), it pretty much functions the same way as that catalogue; it lists all the dealers, where they are situated in the halls and includes a map, rules and guidelines for attendees. Like the Comiket catalogue, the dealers are allocated a 3cm x 4cm spot in the catalogue to promote their booth. But unlike the Comiket catalogue which has several pages in English, WonFes’ guidebook is only in Japanese. However it’s fairly easy to figure out where booths are and the rules and guidelines are common sense. Illustrations accompany the rules and guidelines, so you can get the gist of them without being able to read the kanji.

Despite the fact that anime figures are such a big part of fandom, over 50,000 people were expected to attend and over 2,000 dealers and corporate booths would be offering and showing off their products. When compared to other events such as AnimeJapan or Comiket, it seems rather small. Unfortunately Typhoon number 12 had rolled in over the Kanto region on Saturday, specifically in the direction of Tokyo and Chiba. It was a bit touch and go and the event was on the verge of being cancelled. But the typhoon didn’t cause any major problems and Kaiyodo confirmed on the website on Saturday evening that WonFes was still going ahead. However due to the typhoon, a number of smaller dealers could not make it to event in time.

The easiest way to get there is via the JR (Japan Rail) Keiyo line from Tokyo station and get off at Kaihin-Makuhari station, find the exit towards Makuhari Messe and pretty much follow the crowd. You can’t get lost. The weather was stifling that day; 32°C with over 65% humidity which meant the heat index (or apparent temperature) was anywhere from about 38°C to 40°C. There was also a small shower during my walk to the exhibition hall. If you hadn’t got your guidebook/ticket by this stage, they are also sold on site. On my way back from the convention in the late afternoon, I noticed several guys selling copies of the guidebook for cheap. Unsure what the deal was there. Did these guys acquire copies that had been thrown away and were reselling them? It did seem a bit dodgy. Probably a case of buyer beware if you get a guidebook from those guys.

Entry into the halls is pretty simple; hold up your guidebook like everyone else and walk in. I arrived at 11am to avoid standing outside in the sun and the crowds. Entry is into hall 8, which contains the adult section and other amateur dealers. The commercial booths are in halls 1 to 3. Rather than work your way through the crowds at a snail’s pace, it’s much easier to navigate to the hall you want via the upstairs walkway which spans all 8 halls. You will have to re-show your guidebook for re-entry into the halls though. Toilets are plentiful and are there are no line ups. The air inside the halls was humid and uncomfortable as heck, but I was determined to see as much as I could. It’s best to keep hydrated as much as possible. I had two bottles of water on me as well as bottle of a sports drink, Pocari Sweat (to replace salt and electrolytes as you'll soon be drenched with sweat if you're not already. Pocari Sweat has far less sugar than western sports drinks, so it's not as bad for you) and a few snacks to keep me going. There are various food sellers in the halls and along the walkway, but can be rather expensive. For example a Dominos pop up shop was selling single slices of peperoni pizza for ¥600. One of the first things I noticed as I entered the halls was how the demographics skewed heavily towards males. Most of the amateur dealers were middle aged men. I suppose this should come as no surprise considering most of hobbies this convention deals with are male dominated.

I sort of came with no game plan, so I just went randomly from one area to next which was probably pretty silly. As the commercial aspect of this event is covered extensively on pretty much all anime news sites every time it’s on, I’ll be mostly focusing on the amateur dealer’s products and other interesting stuff that is generally is ignored by those sites. But I did head towards the corporate booths in halls 1 and 2 first though. There was a lot great stuff on show here such as the Evangelion booth which of course highlighted a teaser poster for the concluding chapter in the Rebuild of Evangelion tetralogy as well as numerous new figures. The Kaiyodo booth had numerous upcoming products which caught my eye including new figures from the Ultraman franchise, “Grendizer” and “Tetsujin 28” figures. Volks had some nice “Five Star Stories” figures and a new 1/8 scale scope dog from “Votoms”. Also of interest was the Good Smile Racing Team booth which had the Mercedes Benz GT Supercar on display as well as a Hatsune Miku cosplayer, two girls in yukatas and someone in a Wooser character outfit. There was also a collaboration between “super flat” artist Takashi Murakami and the well-known modeller BOME with two life sized girl figures. I also spotted a Nekopara booth which was 18+ only, unsurprisingly.

In the far corner of the first hall, I noticed a lot tanks and other military hardware. Worse was a group of men standing next to it in World War II era Japanese military uniforms. This was a display by a group called Reenactor’s Gear & Shoei. I sort of found it a bit full on, especially when I saw one of the members getting lunch upstairs, dressed in an SS uniform. I sort of understand why people might like the designs of these uniforms, but am utterly baffled they don’t seem to see that those uniforms have incredibly negative connotations.

The amateur dealers in the other halls, almost always ignored by western anime new outlets, were far more interesting to me. There was a real mix of dealers in the halls; some were just selling commercial figures, plastic model kits and hobby supplies, some sold cosplay accessories. However a large percentage of dealers were selling garage kits. One of the interesting aspects of WonFes is how the companies who own the copyright deal with groups making garage kits of their properties. This is handled via a one day limited licence agreement which allows the garage kit manufacturers to sell their kits on the day. The kit manufacturers have to essentially negotiate with the licensor which usually involves a simple process of paying a small fee and sending a sample or photos of the kit they are intending to sell.

There were a wide range of kits on display, some completed and ready to be sold, others only in prototype stages. Most of the kit makers were middle age men in or older and the subjects of their kits showed their age. Most were of older anime properties such as “Dirty Pair”, “Mospeada”, “Cyber Formula GPX” and other older robot series, as well as Toho science fiction and Godzilla monsters. However there were also numerous figures from recent anime such as “Fate/Grand Order” and the “Love Love!” franchise. There were a number of booths which caught my eye including a “Patlabor” themed one which had a half scaled Revolver Cannon (the gun the Police Ingram Labors use).  Other booths had interesting aftermarket products such as a range of brass instruments designed for use with Figma figures.

Naturally there were plenty of adult figures. An adult section had been corralled off on the edge of hall 8. I wasn’t planning on going in, but thought what the heck, showed my ID to the guard (they ask for ID regardless of how old you look, I was having my 45th birthday next week for god’s sake!) and went in. Usually I’m not shocked by what fandom does, but this time… The first dealer you see as you go in was a guy selling nude lolicon pictures, which I had seen similar before and didn’t like, but wasn’t shocked by. Next to him was seller with CD-ROMs of 1980’s anime characters in sexual situations. OK so far… Then I came across a woman selling full scale realistic female figures in lingerie. And it just got odder from there; some really hard core ero guro stuff, really explicit nude figures and most bafflingly of all, a Godzilla figure made up entirely of penises and scrotums. That one really took the cake for me. I didn’t get it at all.

Summing up my really long report on this event; I found it really interesting and a whole lot of fun. I really don’t understand why fandom in the west practically ignores this event (apart from the reports of new figure announcements on anime news sites). AnimeJapan and Comiket seem to be the only events western fans are interested in going to see. And this is despite western fandom’s current obsession with anime figures, I saw less than half a dozen westerners roaming the halls. Due the heat, I only spent about two hours there. I think I could have stayed longer if I was attending the event in winter. However it is held in late winter, not an ideal time to visit especially with no other events or festivals on at that time. I didn’t bother with the cosplay as there was a massive line up to take photographs. It was just too hot for that shit.

I would definitely recommend going if you have even a slight interest in anything hobby related. The ticket price is a little expensive, but I think it was worth it. Next time I'll be talking about my experiences going to Comic Market 94.