2012 Round-Up + Gerry Anderson

Which brings us to the end of another Year of the Dragon, which is actually my year of birth — and what a year it's been here in Tokyo, as well as elsewhere I'm sure.

Over at Forces Of Geek, head-honcho Stefan asked us to submit our Best of 2012 lists, which I did and I'm going the put an excerpt of that list here:

Best Movies of 2012
The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, Rust and Bone, The Master, Django Unchained, A Letter to Momo, Evangelion 3.0, Helter Skelter and Dead Sushi.

Best TV Shows
Smile PreCure!, Sekai no Hate Made ItteQ and Kamen Rider Wizard.

Best Song
Si Begg — UFO Original Soundtrack

Best Blu-ray/DVD Release
Captain America and The Dark Knight Rises.


You can check out a whole wad of other cool contributors' ideas for the greatest bits and pieces of 2012 over at Forces Of Geek, so take the time to investigate.

It's been a great twelve months for me personally, with the publication of my second novel One Hundred Years of Vicissitude (a surreal/slipstream/noir account of Japan from 1929 into the near-future), finishing a third novel (the comicbook/noir Who is Killing the Great Capes of Heropa?), and having a few short-stories published via Shotgun Honey, Pulp Ink 2, Crime Factory, Weird Noir, Solarcide and Off the Record 2.

Next month there's another anthology I get to be involved in, and it's called All Due Respect, from the rather respected noir short story website run by Chris Rhatigan.

In the American and Japanese summer (winter in Australia) in 2013 we should also have out the anthology I'm doing with Another Sky Press, called The Tobacco-Stained Sky — which focuses on the noir/dystopic, near-future Melbourne explored in Tobacco-Stained Mountain Goat.

More news as soon as I know.

Closer to home — ie. here in Japan, this month I also got to be a gaijin extra (think refugee running amidst fire and rubble) in the new live-action Gatchaman movie, aka Battle of the Planets.

It was filmed at an amazing, abandoned paper mill in Takahagi-shi, Ibaraki, the temperature was about 1°C, and there were aliens galore (getting coffee, as in this picture). The movie should be released next year.

Music-wise I just released (yesterday) my latest Little Nobody EP through IF? Records ('Behind the Meme Claw'), with remixes from Detroit legend Alan Oldham (DJ T-1000) and Sydney's Biz and Sebastian Bayne, and I remixed David Christoph's track 'Sandman' for We Call It Hard Records earlier this month. I've additionally had the chance to remix Chicago's Lester Fitzpatrick, and that'll be out on vinyl in 2013.

The melancholy thing was winding it up with news yesterday of the death of the great Gerry Anderson, the man behind such landmark series as Thunderbirds, UFO and Space: 1999, along with one of my favourite sci-fi movies, Journey to the Far Side of the Sun (1969). Thunderbirds is equally huge in Japan — I picked up my ready-made Eagle Transporter at a very cool toy emporium in Akihabara — so I know a lot of people here will be sad as well.

I just wrote a piece on the man for Slit Your Wrists! magazine, but check out the incredible visual set-shots from Space: 1999 and UFO over at Gavin Rothery's site.

Reading-wise, it's been a superb year.

While I tend to gravitate towards old loves like Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett and the '60s Marvel comics scripted by Stan Lee and Roy Thomas, writers that've made an impression over the past 12 months include Josh Stallings, Shuichi Yoshida, McDroll, Nigel Bird, Paul D. Brazill, Guy Salvidge, Yukito Ayatsuji, Tony Pacitti, Julie Morrigan, Chad Eagleton, Gordon Highland, Chris Rhatigan, Jay Slayton-Joslin, Gerard Brennan, Liam Jose, Chad Rohrbacher, Heath Lowrance, Dan O'Shea, Ed Kurtz, Kristopher Young, Patti Abbott, Matthew C. Funk, Julia Madeleine, Caleb J. Ross, Phil Jourdan, Michael Gonzalez, Craig Wallwork, A.B. Riddle, Andrew Nette, Haruki Murakami, Tony Black, Richard Godwin, Mike Miner, Erik Arneson, Joe Clifford, Court Merrigan, K. A. Laity, Carol Borden, W. P. Johnson, Benoit Lelievre, Luca Veste, Renee Asher Pickup, Dakota Taylor, Jessica Taylor, Laramore Black, Richard Thomas, Jonny Gibbings, Mckay Williams, and Martin Garrity.

I've probably missed someone vital, so apologies in advance!

Art and comics-wise you can do no better than check out Drezz Rodriguez (who does El Cuervo), Michael Grills (Runnin’ With a Gun), Nathan St. John (Baja), Marcos Vergara (La Mesa Habitual), Andrew Chiu, Harvey Finch (Logar the Barbarian), Denver Brubaker (The Tales of a Checkered Man), fellow Aussie Paul Mason (The Soldier Legacy), Giovanni Ballati, Saint Yak and Dave Acosta.

Anyway, enough rambling. Have a great new year, all the best for 2013 whatever you're doing and wherever you are, and as they say here in Japan: よいお年を (yoi otoshi o!). 

Coffee & Soda, anyone?

OK, so this came out on the market a couple of days ago in Japan, and Suntory have been doing blanket advertizing on the telly and the trains here in Tokyo. 

The theme is fun - three Blues Brothers-like types running amuck in a fairground. Given that I love my coffee (and caffeine in general) and I've always dug soda water, the idea of a combination of the two was, well, intriguing.

I simply had to try it.

The verdict, sadly, was what most realistic people would expect. It was shocking. As much as I'm fond of coffee and soda water, never EVER shall the twain meet.

Suntory, you make pretty decent beer, but please (PLEASE) do not make fizzy coffee.

Total eclipse of the something or other

The eclipse this morning, Tokyo 東京, circa 7:35 am... It was a very nifty experience, albeit a wee bit clouded up there. I'd actually "seen" a total eclipse once before, back in Australia when I was about 10 years old. This was more fun, since my 6-year-old Cocoa was so darned excited.


Here are me and Cocoa with our eclipse specs, looking like the audience at a 1950s 3D monster romp.

Cocoa's ones (the gold space-age pair) were absolutely brilliant. My disposable things weren't too bad...

Tokyo International Anime Fair 2012

Well, it's been one week to the day since I popped in to this year's Tokyo International Anime Fair (東京国際アニメフェア), held as always at Tokyo Big Sight.

When I say always, however, I lie. The event was called off last year (for the first time in a decade), since it was scheduled a couple of weeks after the big Tōhoku earthquake.

It's nice to see it back.

We call this "TAF" for short; for reasons as-yet-unknown, the organizers drop the “I” bit, maybe because it just looks better in terms of logo concepts.

Think displays by anime producers like Production I.G, Gonzo, Madhouse, Toei, Studio Ghibli, Aniplex, Sunrise, Bones and Bandai flaunting their upcoming wares, and not just via the scantily clad pseudo-cosplay girls outside their booths.

Here's my overview of the last serving, back in 2010. You might even find I nicked some of the editorial there for this piece, since time is previous right now - I'm in the middle of finishing off my next novel, One Hundred Years of Vicissitude, and in fact was editing the bugger on the sidelines of TAF.

“TAF is the Mecca for anime fans around the world,” Makoto Tsumita - the former marketing manager for the international division of essential anime production house Gonzo - mentioned to me about five years ago.


At that time, Japan produced almost two thirds of the animation watched around the globe “and 70 percent of this is produced in Tokyo,” a spokesperson for the TAF Executive Committee Secretariat told me in article that year for the now defunct Geek Monthly, making the argument that this city was the natural setting for the hugely successful anime trade affair.

“It’s the best place for foreign buyers to find everything under the same roof,” reported Stephane-Enric Beaulieu, a spokesperson for the Canadian Embassy in Tokyo.

According to the organizers, TAF2012 attracted 98,923 visitors during the four days of the Fair - less than that of the previous Fair in 2010, but the number of visitors on the Business Days were about the same, with an increase in foreign reps.

This year, the best displays were devoted to perennial favourites Lupin III, Smile PreCure!, and the zany merchandise for Hayao Miyazaki's old 1972 classic Panda! Go, Panda! (パンダ・コパンダ).

And I think that's half the problem: the things that excited me most this year are, well, three ageing franchises.

When I first started going to TAF events here in March, from 2002 on, there was a helluva lot of excitement about the brand new, innovative TV shows and feature films that would be unveiled for the first time.

Ten years on, with the changes in the anime/media industry and after the cancellation last year, things have changed.


While the pomp and ceremony, and definitely the professionalism, is still there - it all feels a little jaded and lacking oomph. Just a little. It takes more than cute poster girls, anime character suitcases, and flash cars to keep this wunderbar industry alive.

I know several of these companies, including I.G, Gonzo, Madhouse and Bones, will be working to rectify the problem - so here's to supporting them in these endeavours.

TAF2013 will be held from March 21 to March 24th next year.

Upcoming Japanese cinema, 2012

Well, by the time you read these words, the silly season is well and truly over (two months is fair enough time to lay it to rest), and over here in Japan we started 2012 with a bang: on January 1st there was a fairly hefty earthquake that shook Tokyo, just to ring in the new year in an oh-so-special special way.

Fortunately – this time around – there were no fatalities, tsunami or major damage.

Anyway, without further ado, I decided to get off my buttocks and do a mini round-up of some of the recent Japanese movies winging over your way.

You can over-analyze (or ignore) the article @ Forces Of Geek.

Old stuff, Ōokayama 大岡山, Tokyo

The other day I dropped my daughter off at her kindergarten and had a couple of hours to kill, so I wandered around the local area.

It's called Ōokayama, near Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech) and about 20 minutes by train from Shibuya.

Anyway, somewhere along the ramble I stumbled across this amazing oasis of miniature shrines alongside an artificial waterfall and huge carp in a pond. The place is located slap-bang in a minor valley, deserted and looked, well... old.


Obviously I loved it!

Plus there were some interesting old houses and objects around the same area. The refugee old rotary dial phone particularly appealed to me.

Also a great place to sit and read - since I'm currently getting into Shuichi Yoshida's novel Villain - and mull over the directions of my own, parts of which are going to be set in older Tokyo.

Smile Precure!

Well, it was bound to happen - Toei does it around February every year, and this will be the ninth time in succession.

I'm talking up the Precure anime, which I'll admit to having watched every Sunday morning with my daughter Cocoa for over two years now (her excuse is she's just turned six; I'm not sure what mine happens to be).

Every February Toei, the anime production house behind the series, revamps the cast and crew and reimagines the series.

In 2010 the best series screened - HeartCatch Precure, which was, in fact, my choice of anime series of the year for 2010 (something difficult to swallow since it's a shojo girls' show aimed at little kids) - and this year Suite Precure♪ has struggled to hang onto the coattails of its predecessor but isn't doing so badly now that characters Beat and Muse have jumped into the fray.

Anyway, the new line-up has just been announced, along with the customary annual name-change.

2012 will see Smile Precure! (スマイルプリキュア) hit the screens, replacing Suite Precure♪. The character designs do look cute, while still not in the same league as Yoshihiko Umakoshi's designs for HeartCatch Precure.

Well, as with all things Precure, only time will tell. And what else do I want to do every Sunday morning anyway?