Have I mentioned that AnimeNYC 2019 was fabulous? It was, genuinely, fabulous. I’ve written a post about the event for The Comics Beat which sums up my feelings from a “professional” point of view: NYC’s Anime Con Wars Are Over & AnimeNYC Is The Clear Winner.
Today I want to tell you how much fun *I* had. ^_^
My con began on Thursday with meeting my dear friend and periodic roommate, Sean Gaffney. Sean’s blog A Case Suitable for Treatment covers everything in English. I go there when I need to figure out if I need to read something that’s out in English and he loves to talk about what he’s reading. I trust him with recommendations, and this time he recommended that I read JK Haru is a Sex Worker in Another World. I read and loved the cold clinical approach to Edo-period sex work in Moyoco Anno’s Sakuran,so… but I get ahead of myself.
Sean and I went to the industry party where we chatted with folks from Yen and Kodansha, among others. We’re all sort of professionally awkward and goofy, so I’ve gotten better at faking social skills. ^_^ I caught up with translator Mari Morimoto just long enough to give her all the stuff I’d bought her in Japan over the last three trips. ^_^; She was doing interpretation for the Guest of Honor, so had to hustle all weekend long.
Last year, you may remember, it snowed the Thursday befoere AnimeNYC. This year we were able to get the view from the rooftop garden.
Friday began late. The panels at AnimeNYC opened at 10:30, but the DR wasn’t open until 1PM. So Sean and I caught up with comics and manga writer Brigid Alverson. We bummed around until the DR opened then went our separate ways. I wasn’t paneling until 3, so I had some time to introduce myself to some of the folks at Sentai Filmworks. One of my complaints about Sentai has always been that they are good on license announcements and bad about letting people know when stuff is available. They’ve got a new marketing person, Hannah and she has been changing that. I picked up The Bloom Into You Premium Box set and was given a spiffy Revue Starlight lanyard which I’m keeping and plan on using at other events! They licensed Fragtime which was announced right before the anime premiered.
I dropped by the Yen booth, too for a quick hello. They were doing crafts – you could make a teruterubouzu. It was all very cute.
While walking around before panels, I ran into these lovely ladies cosplaying Bloom Into You‘s Yuu and Touko. This picture is being used with permission.
Eventually it was time for me to head to panels to present 100 Years of Yuri one last time this year. The crowd was amazing! Great questions. As usual, I gave out prizes for good questions. Masha gave me a couple of adorable pins (you can see her table with pins here) which I just love. Thanks Masha!
One of the questions asked about terms for fans of Yuri, the way fujoshi and fudanshi were used for BL fans. In response I went on a rant about why the women were “rotten” in that term. They were rotten for having a hobby that had to do with sex that didn’t involve their husbands or boyfriends. Effectively the reason the women are rotten is for having any space of their own that isn’t about the men they give all their time and energy to. Have I never explained how much I hate that? Well. I hate it. The terms Himejoshi and Himedanshi are stupid. Just flat out idiotic. For one thing, why are fandoms gendered at all, I asked. Why we are not all just…people.
And then I decided that we need a new word. So, I have officially announced that “Yuri fans” are to be hereafter known as “Yurijin,” (百合人) – Yuri People.
Like the word “Yuri,” I did not coin that, but I am endorsing it. It is not gendered, includes no age, sexuality or any other limits. Yuri is for anyone who enjoys Yuri. Yurijin are anyone who enjoys Yuri.
A new, queerer Yuri genre deserves a new, more inclusive word. ^_^
After that I talked with some folks, including translator and editor Kristi Fernandez of Vertical, who runs the Japanese Translators of NYC group. We had a fantastic conversation.
At last it was time for my final panel, “!? vs ?! The Great Debate” in which translator Zack Davisson and I argue loudly and vociferously about whatever random topics. It’s always fun. Especially when I win. Poor Zack took a beating. ^_^
I was off the clock after this, since all the things I wanted to do were against something else I had to do, so I wasn’t doing any coverage of panels.
Erik Ko of Udon Entertainment and a bunch of us went out to dinner where we had a lovely time until they closed the restaurant around us. Erik was so vexed…he was going to bring a copy of The Rose of Versailles, Volume 1, but they didn’t arrive at the office until he was in NYC.
Saturday started early because people who are not me had panels to get to! I basically finished up my wandering the DR, where I saw really fun stuff. There’s a ton of VR games including, inexplicably, a Spice and Wolf VR game. It’s the anime, but you go through it as the lead character. (YMMV of course, but economics in first-person is no more interesting to me than in third person. ^_^;)
I played slot cars for the first time in decades at the 5-Hour Energy booth.
The folks at J-Novel Club and I had a great conversation about Sexiled (Volume 1 is currently available in digital and will be released in print. Volume 2 is coming in December!) and they light-heartedly bullied me into buying JK Haru after all. ^_^
And, at last, it was time to line up for Fragtime. The line was pretty long and I kind of felt bad about that, because its being sold as another Kase-san … when it is the pretty much the opposite.
It’s totally male gaze, creepy sexual assault behavior being passed off as “like.” So I watched. And tweeted. I will review it, but the bottom line is that it will not get my endorsement.
After Fragtime, I hung out with lovely cosplayer Abby Murphy and longtime fellow con grunt Hyo Moon, two of the only people beside my wife I know who saw the Sailor Moon Super Live in NYC. So we had a brilliant time together, talking Sailor Moon, Utena, Sexiled and existential rage.
Finally, it was time to go shopping! The Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune Chouette figurines were sold out (phew, because how I would have gotten them home, I have no idea), so I headed over to Viz‘ booth, where I bought Sailor Moon Stars, Part 1 and Part 2. Everything old is new again – the premium set boxes are coming with space for part 2 in the box, just the way they used to do, back in the early days of DVDs. The bag they were giving away at Viz was, IMHO the best of the bunch with Eternal Sailor Moon’s locket on one side and her silhouette on the other, in a fetching purple.
As I was making my final rounds I hit up the artist alley. I picked up Afroseeds by Jojo at Mastermind Comics. Set in NYC, a boy named Amehotep meets a man named Maut and learns he has the power of the Afroseed in him. I’m looking forward to this so much. Jojo was a blast and we were hugging each other like we were long-lost friends when I left. Go read his book – you can download free comic samples at their site.
Before I left I found this lovely pair who have given their permission to use this photo.
From there, I headed to the Yen Press panel where I was just in time for their Yuri manga license. I caught up with Brigid again and then my boss at Comics Beat, Heidi MacDonald. All three of us when out for an amazing meal and some little light shopping at Uniqlo, because Brigid had lost her jacket
My time at AnimeNYC had come to an end, but as I said yesterday, I’m bumping this up to must-attend. I had more fun at this con than I had had at an anime con for years. I look forward to being a part of it next year if I can! 9 out of 10.
Next up…I’ll review Fragtime. Buckle up.
Thank you to everyone who came to the 2020 Online Yuri Panel! We had a great conversation yesterday. I’ve embedded the unedited video here. Youtube has made auto-captioning available, but we have hand more accurate subtitles coming.
Please join me on Sunday, May 31 at 5:00 PM Eastern US Time (9PM GMT/ 2PM PT) as I take your questions about Yuri manga anime and the state of the Yuri state for the 
I have returned from 
