There may be readers of Otaku USA younger than Cowboy Bebop, the 26-episode series that originally aired in 1998. Thankfully, there are multiple essays on this very site about the allure of Bebop, alleviating me of the burden of describing just what was so great about …Read more »
“The more expensive the car, the more fun it is to blow it up.” This statement by Kenichi Sonoda at this month’s Sakura-Con in Seattle boils down both the Riding Bean and Gunsmith Cats creator’s style and enduring popularity into a single statement. It’s safe …Read more »
That’s a wrap for day one of Comic Market 91. The long-running celebration of fan-made manga, games, animation and more that goes by Comiket for short is on in Tokyo, and we made our way there today to peruse, schmooze and, most importantly, snap some …Read more »
The Boy and the Beast was a big hit with casual fans in 2015. For folks interested in the business of anime, the release of the Association of Japanese Animation’s yearly industry report is something akin to Christmas. A dry, numbers-filled Christmas. Still, for industry geeks, …Read more »
Tokyo Game Show, one of the largest video game expos in the world, just wrapped up, and contributor Alexandria Hill has filed her impressions on the event with a healthy smattering of photos, including some awesome video game cosplay. This year I decided to treat …Read more »
For the month of June, at least, Tokyo's fashion capital Shibuya gave Akihabara a run for its otaku money. Aside from the recent opening of Production I.G’s retail store , this month Shibuya was also host to no less than three anime-related shops, devoted to …Read more »
Pixiv Zingaro, the Tokyo gallery co-run by art-sharing site Pixiv and pop artist Takashi Murakami, has been the sight of many anime and manga-based exhibitions since it opened up in otaku paradise Nakano Broadway a few years back. The latest, which runs from May 12 …Read more »
I was having a conversation with a young Japanese friend of mine the other day when we hit on the works of manga artist Naoki Urasawa. My friend’s face immediately lit up, and we spent the next hour or so talking about our favorite Urasawa …Read more »
Despite the conveniences New York City does offer its otaku – Japantown groceries, fresh imports at Kinokuniya, cheap manga and old games at Book-Off, a wide selection of quality ramen – we have longed for an anime convention. Though there are a lot of us, …Read more »
Created by Eiji Tsuburaya, the man responsible for bringing the original Godzilla to life, Ultraman has become a Japanese sci-fi staple after the first entry of the series, Ultraman , aired in Japan in 1966. The weekly monster show was a spin-off of the highly popular …Read more »
It's a strange, post-modern art project that shouldn't really work but somehow does: Bartkira , the project started in 2013 to redraw all of Akira with characters from The Simpsons . Ridiculous as the premise is, it's no small undertaking: the original Akira manga spans …Read more »
We were in Kichijoji the other day, so we popped into the manga-themed Cafe Zenon, which is currently done up in the style of Strawberry Flavored Fist of the North Star, the parody manga starring Fist of the North Star’s Souther in a variety of …Read more »
Kichijoji, a neighborhood in west Tokyo, has had a long relationship with anime. It’s host of several anime studios, the Ghibli Museum, and a healthy assortment of anime, manga and subculture-related shops and cafes. Since 1999, Kichijoji’s also been the host of Kichijoji Anime Wonderland, …Read more »
Japan has a mascot problem. Sure, the country’s sported adorable characters for everything from the police to construction sites for, well, centuries, some would argue, but the latest trend is local governments creating mascots to represent their town. Called yuru-kyara, these mascots are supposed to …Read more »
![Cowboy Bebop Cafe Celebrates 20th Anniversary With Food, Tunes [Photo Report]](https://otakuusamagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/bebopcafe-202x202.jpg)
![Cowboy Bebop Cafe Celebrates 20th Anniversary With Food, Tunes [Photo Report]](https://otakuusamagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/bebopcafe.jpg)
Matt Schley
Sean O'Mara![Comics, Cosplay and Long Lines at Comic Market 91 [Photo Report]](https://otakuusamagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/comiket91-202x202.jpg)
![Comics, Cosplay and Long Lines at Comic Market 91 [Photo Report]](https://otakuusamagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/comiket91.jpg)
Alexandria Hill![One Piece, Osomatsu and Kiznaiver Invade Shibuya [Photo Report]](https://otakuusamagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/img_1163-202x202.jpg)
![One Piece, Osomatsu and Kiznaiver Invade Shibuya [Photo Report]](https://otakuusamagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/img_1163.jpg)
David Cabrera
Ryotaro Aoki
