Erufailon4

You'd think that in a country where One Piece  has a beloved translation and is the longest manga ever published and still ongoing after 17 years and 101 volumes, it'd be easy to get the franchise's new anime film in theaters, especially in an anime boom like this where more Japanese cinema is seeing wide theatrical releases in Finland than ever before. But, as it turns out, fans have had to fight tooth and nail to convince concerned parties that yes, it actually does have an audience that wants to see it. No such problems with Jujutsu Kaisen , Dragon Ball Super  or Sword Art Online  though!  Well, all's end that ends well - One Piece Film: Red  will open in theaters on the 20th, distributed by the ever-so-trusty Cinema Mondo for the film's European licensor Piece of Magic Entertainment. Interesting arrangement, by the way - CM's deals with Aniplex/Wakanim/Crunchyroll have not included any home media rights, only theatrical, so I wonder how it is with Piece of ...

Just earlier this week, it was announced that Wakanim (and its parent company Funimation) would be migrating their anime content libraries to Crunchyroll, meaning they would essentially cease active operations (adding new simulcast episodes) at the end of the current Winter 2022 anime season. Back in September of last year, I  wondered  if Wakanim would eventually be merged into Funimation, as AnimeLab had recently done, but it seems the higher-ups at Sony made a better decision and merged them both into Crunchyroll instead. Only time will tell how this will play out in practicality - a lot of Wakanim titles are for now region-locked in Crunchyroll and many have yet to be migrated at all - but one thing is certain: the anime streaming field is now more centralized than ever, with the plus side that for a consumer a Crunchyroll monopoly is still miles better than a Funimation monopoly. (Not so much for the workers behind the scenes though.)  Meanwhile in Finland, it's a ...

It's a great time to be a manga reader in Finland. Not one or two but three  new series have had their first volumes released during the last month, and since the roughly two-month period following a volume 1's release is the sweet spot where starting to read a series is at its easiest, having three of those at the same time is a big deal.  First off, we have Astra: Lost in Space  (彼方のアストラ, in Finnish Astra - avaruuden haaksirikkoiset ), which I personally was very excited about, having seen the excellent 2019 anime adaption when it aired and recently rewatched it. Publishing an easy-to-approach sci-fi manga during a time when space is a more prevalent topic than it has been in years is a smart move from Sangatsu and I hope it pays off for them financially.  Another safe and anticipated title is Weathering with You  (天気の子), of course an adaption of the Makoto Shinkai movie of the same name, which had a Finnish theatrical run troubled by COVID lockdowns in 2020. ...