Day 4

Sunday, July 2nd, 2007

With checkout at 11AM, there was a bit of a rush to get people to wake up and pack. Afterwards, I headed off to the exhibit hall at 11:30, since I actually wanted to look around and buy something.

It was then that I nabbed a Revoltech Saber figure for $25. Niiice. With a bit of money left over for a few more purchases, I searched around for one store that had an Arche Klaine figurine: one that wasn’t $69. And that’s when I saw it… marked down to $35 for the final day. Previously, it had been $45, which was still out of my price range on Day 1, and I would later find out that $35 is about where you’d actually want to pay excluding shipping.

Going through some last rounds through the booths before I headed towards the line for the Transformers movie, I snagged six packs of T-M Lycée cards before bidding fare well to the exhibit hall. ::sigh:: I wish I had more time.

The line, however, was ridiculously long, worse than the line for the exhibit hall (though not as bad as Day 1 Registration). Stuck in the blazing hot sun, Tokyopop bag beginning to break due to excessive use, I showed off what little I had to the rest of my group. And, of course, like every other line I’ve ever been in, whenever I get incredibly bored and try to situate myself into a less-boring and more entertaining position, the line moves. Like magic. Which usually means trying to stuff everything back into my backpack. D:

Mahou~

We eventually made it faster through some creative maneuvering and a contact we knew further up the line. Wheee… Stuffed into balcony seats, unfortunately.

But I guess that didn’t matter. Transformers was by far the best action flick I’ve seen in forever. The robotics animation was fluid yet natural. The power of the Autobots and the Decepticons seemed on par to a Gundam, yet seemed more believable given the live-action context. The plot wasn’t that bad for an action movie, and served to complement it rather than exist separate from it. Old-school quotes were well-received in the movie, but not to the extent to make it painfully obvious, cheesy, or out-of-place. And the U.S. military, even though they were getting their ass kicked by Blackout and troubled by Sector 7, proved themselves to actually be competent, adaptive, and effective, unlike how many other movies typically portray them.

My guess on why people still are mixed about this movie is because they have these enormous preconceptions as to what the movie would be about, with some having their heads so far up their own asses to see that why a lot of the changes from the original Transformers had some very good reasoning behind it. But, you know, I’ll just group them with the same people who think that the Fate/stay night was horrible because it lacked the sex scene, or that Emiya Shirou is an idiot and a loser because he isn’t using his Unlimited Blade Works non-stop.

So… anyways!

After Transformers, we headed over to the closing ceremonies. A short foreign film called “Otaku” was playing, where these two Latin American (?) otakus are arguing over some insignificant detail about some anime series. The argument escalates into a DBZ-like fight between nerds, which was actually surprisingly well-done. Afterwards, the Guests of Honor came out, and all the fans cheered for them. I’m glad they were there, because the host was a retard who didn’t know how to speak if it wasn’t actually written in his script. Ishikawa was there, and my sister and I cheered for her. I had a feeling that they, too, felt disappointed with the Anime Expo itself because of how things were organized. And, I think the fans wanted them all to know that they very much appreciated having them over.

And, that was the end. While it was probably the worst Anime Expo I’ve been to, I ended up finding things to do anyways, and generally enjoyed myself. I just hope that Anime Expo cleans up their act.

I also hope that next year, Anime Expo at the Los Angeles Convention Center won’t be a bomb, either.

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Day 3
Sunday, July 1st, 2007

For once, something was actually scheduled correctly. The new AMV Contest re-viewing thing at 10:00AM actually went off without a hitch. We all left at 9:30AM and got there just as it started.

Had the original AMV Contest schedule actually gone smoothly, it would have been a fairly good all around. Not stupendously impressive, but good nonetheless.. There were a total of three Fate videos: Even More Fatal Blood (probably from the guy who made Fatal Blood the year before), Nascent Malediction (two more words I have to Google), and Knights of Fate, which I felt was the best made out of the three, and might have a good chance of actually winning. That is, if everyone doesn’t vote for Skittles, the Haruhi video.

I kinda’ wanted to head back to the exhibit hall, mainly to look for the Revoltech Saber, but I needed to send off a friend who was going home that day. I ended up instead heading to the line to get tickets for the Ishikawa Chiaki concert. Luckily, there wasn’t much of a line. And, luckily, even though they were delayed, and security were particularly anal, the concert wasn’t a disaster like the Haruhi one. Everything was fairly solid, even if the Arena wasn’t exactly crowded.

Strangely enough, the Masquerade was mostly on time. We got in fairly quickly, and it actually started on schedule. There weren’t any T-M costumes, though, so that was a bit of a shame, but for the most part, there were some very good cosplays. Unfortunately, it seems like the Long Beach Convention Center itself and their hired security retards were getting in the way of a lot of people. Or, at least, that’s what I could glean from the situation. Apparently, upper-management of both Long Beach and SPJA were… stupid, anal, and overly concerned about money. But that’s just my opinion.

As I chat away in #beastslair, my eyes become tired. I need sleep. But I can’t stop typing.

D:

Day  2

Saturday, June 30th, 2007

Ended up sleeping in until 11:15AM… I ended up staying up last night fairly late to watch a friend of mine play Melty Blood on his laptop. And… the Ishikawa Chiaki panel was to start at 11:30AM. For those who don’t know, Ishikawa-san is the singer half to See-Saw, with Kajiura Yuki making up the second half. Recently, she’s been going solo. Guaaahh… I’m gonna miss this… ;-;

But, this is me. And I’m not gonna let something like oversleeping keep me back!

So, I threw on my clothes and whatnot in five minutes, then ran off towards the convention center. Only to realize that I had to go the far end to get to the panel. So I continued to run. D:

I arrived at the panel at 11:40AM. Ouch… oh well. I enjoyed it anyway. Ishikawa-san was a very nice and friendly person. And had her own cute way of talking, I guess. I didn’t know and still don’t know much about her anyway, so the questions that were asked of her and her corresponding answers were very insightful and enjoyable for me. I’m also somewhat glad I can understand about maybe a third of what she’s saying, despite my limited grasp of Japanese. Whee~!

Honestly, I feel that the only enjoyment I’ve had from the AX events themselves are the panels.

After we were let out at 12:20PM, I headed into the exhibition hall for a bit. Spotted EvoSpace again at his booth, seemingly bored with his job at that moment as he passed out mini-fliers. He pointed me towards a booth somewhere the 600 Aisle that he said sold some Lycee cards. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find it. -_-; Worse, when I went to visit my favorite booth again, they lacked any more Touhou games in their doujin game section. Guhh… I was hoping to pick up at least Imperishable Night, then Perfect Cherry Blossom there. ::sigh::

I wandered around some more, but decided that I should probably search for the line for tickets for the Haruhi concert that would be coming up later on. So I headed over to the Arena building and secured six tickets for Haruhi, one for each of our group. YAY! Something is going right!

Or not.

I ended up waiting in line for hours on end. First outside for hours, then inside the building for hours, then inside the concert area for hours. Nothing has started, and they were already a few hours late. I missed watching the Death Note movies because of this. D:

I don’t know exactly what was going on. But I’m betting it’s a mix of technical difficulties, inability to locate the three seiyuu, and inability for management to tell workers what the hell is going on. But, I honestly waited many hours of my life doing nothing. And when people finally came on stage (first Mikuru, then Haruhi & Nagato afterwords), it was obvious that the hosts were stalling for time because of some major complication. We also find the English VAs being forced onto the stage to partake in various delaying tactics. It got to the point where there the people were even arguing and blaming people on-stage. Yeowch.

In the end, we got several songs spread throughout the event, anyway. Which were good in themselves, but as part of the whole… I was enjoying those moments mostly for the fact that something was going on.

Later on, I went to the dance at one of the hotels. Now THAT was actually fun. Something good at the end of the day. Dancing isn’t really my thing, since I can’t really dance at all, but it got my mind off of the worse parts of the day. There are a few stories about that, but I’ll save that for later, since I’m heading off to the AMVs now. Hopefully they got it right this time. D:

Day 1

Friday, June 29th, 2007

Woke up at 6:30AM, but didn’t start getting ready until 7:00. By 7:30, though, I was pretty much ready to head out for registration. But, just like I predicted, other people would be slow. So, as I waited and played music for the next hour or so, I breathed a sigh of regret. The line would only get longer and longer.

We finally left at 9AM, but the line was, at this point, ridiculously large. Sent to the back of the line, which snaked itself in and around the whole of a parking lot. We finally registered around 12PM, around when the exhibition hall opened up. I wasn’t able to get into it until 1:30, but I was able to quickly locate Hen Da Ne, which I regularly go to each Anime Expo for various doujin and… uhh… visual novel goods.f

Chatting with the storekeeper, he seemed to have figured that TYPE-MOON stuff in general tends to be good sellers. He had stocked up a lot of hollow ataraxia, as a result, but Realta Nua was going “for a high price,” as the shopkeeper from Resident Evil 4 would say. It would be bundled with the telephone card, all of the grail bust statues (sans the Kuro Saber), and, as well as the Torabura game. The sad fact of the matter is that I don’t own a PSP, and as much as I’m disappointed with Sony in various ways, I wouldn’t mind owning a PSP at all.

I ended up purchasing Fate/hollow ataraxia, the This Illusion and Hollow singles, and the Hishoku no Sora single by Kawada Mami. Uwaah… Oh wait. And Fate/Zero volume 1 & 2. Yay.

I wandered around some more, and spotted a rather nice Arche figurine. I was hoping for $30-40 USD, but it ended up being $69 USD. Ouch. ;-; I’m, sorry, Arche, but my money is tight. Maybe if I can find you at a more reasonable price.

Afterwords, I headed to the Broccoli booth to track down EvoSpace, or Koji. Supposedly, he was supposed to be near, but the people at Circus didn’t know where he was. Hell, I asked for “Koji,” and I got a larger, more broadly built man. I’m thinking, “ZOMG THAT’S NOT EVO… unless he changed a lot. o__o”

I hung around for a bit, hoping to spot him. Luckily, I ran into none other than Raven, who I somehow remembered. I exchanged some words with him, and he found out that Koji wouldn’t be coming until maybe a half hour.

Damn. You need to work, Evo!

So, we waited and hung around, idly chatting as we looked for Koji. We spotted him and flagged him down, intercepting him before he could even get close to the Circus booth. We greeted him and talked with him a bit as a few other people joined in. Koji was doing such a -wonderful- job of handing out brochures as we loitered around.

And so, around 2:30 or so, I took my leave and started look searching for the inevitable line that would lead to tickets for the AMV Contest. Apparently, the staff has no idea about anything. The people by the ticket office tell me to go downstairs. Downstairs tells me to go downstairs. Downstairs’s downstairs tells me to check near the exhibition hall. The exhibition hall tells me to check near the ticket office.

WHAT.

I swear, organization this year is absolutely stupid dumb. Instead, I head into the Galaxy Angel panel, which I thoroughly enjoy. I didn’t win any raffle prizes, though, but… eh. It was getting to see the producers and character designers talk and whatnot. I know it must be difficult to speak in English, so I applaud their efforts.

Afterwards, it’s sitting in line for the AMV tickets. After waiting for hours, it turns into sitting in line for the AMV itself. Which somehow turns into, “Someone stole my laptop which had all the contest AMVs on it so no AMV contest tonight.”

D:

Now THAT just sucks. Worse, they plan to reschedule for 9:30am tomorrow morning. NINE THIRTY. It was already hard to get people to leave at 9AM for something as important as registration.

Long Beach sucks.

All that was shown was a single category: AmTV. Which isn’t necessarily the best. There was a rather nice Fate/stay night video called “Knights of Fate,” but I guess our votes don’t matter!

In the end, I returned back to where we’re crashing to drop stuff off and pop a pair of aspirin pills for the annoying ass headache that the whole AMV fiasco caused.

I was hoping that I would enjoy more of the events and less of the exhibition hall this year. Unfortunately, due to inept care of the AX staff, that hope was scattered into the wind.

Today’s loot

- Fate/hollow ataraxia
- Fate/Zero Vol. 1
- Fate/Zero Vol. 2
- Fate/stay night - This Illusion / days Single
- Fate/hollow ataraxia Single
- Kawada Mami - Hishoku no Sora Single (Shakugan no Shana OP1)