Journey to the (So-Called) End of the World: From 2011 to 2012…

(NOTE: This was originally done and aimed to be posted in January, but Nisemonogatari and other circumstances have led to it being posted now. However, this turned out to be a blessing-in-disguise given the upheaval in the R1 anime industry: Bandai Ent.'s downsizing, Media Blaster's own downsizing and subsequent production issues, the potential nuclear winter that could be wrought by FUNimation and (Neo)-ADV Films lawsuit battle, and the rise of NIS America and Discotek in the wake of BEI's quasi-demise. So parts of this post had to be edited and altered a bit, but I still retained the "new year outlook" format of it and the predictions already made, In particular to the anime predictions, though I added a few more titles since January that have yet to air, I did not add any titles that are airing right now that I didn't add before, nor did I change their prediction category (see "Moretsu Space Pirates"), which would've been pretty cheap of me. ^^;; )

Compare & Contrast:: 2009 Predictions vs 2010 Reality…

As noted in last week's 2010 lookback/2011 look-forward, a surprising amount of the predictions made for 2010 happened to come true during the year…well, sort of. In this addendum to "2010, Fade Out… 2011, Fade In…", we'll be looking back at each of the predictions made at the end of 2009 and how much did (and didn't) come to past in 2010…

2010, Fade Out… 2011, Fade In…

2010 turned out to be a pretty nice one, both personally and for the site.  Much of the first half of the year saw the realization of one of my biggest goals in covering the pattern of dark-skinned characters in anime that have been shot in the head. Aside from the lull in late-summer (writer's block?), everything went fairly well, and the discussion thread experiment, while not a total success (only the ANN one got going), proved interesting. Of course, I would have done a few things differently, but overall, given its scope and size, it went well.

The second half of the year was perhaps the most pivotal for HardDoor, to-date. A completely new design, an improved layout, the start of HD's Twitter page and its integration into the site (a big, big addition itself, begun a month to the day before, and in honor of, HD's fourth anniversary), the introduction of anime reviews, as well as a greater emphasis on using pictures in posts (first tested with "Blacks & Head Shots in Anime") have all been implemented for the blog, which have certainly helped in making the blog more accessible and looking nice, as well as raising its awareness.

So, That Was 2009...

2009 has finally come to a close and along with it, the decade as well. Personally, the year itself has been an uneventful one overall, but I'm still looking forward to a great 2010 (not like it would take a whole lot to make it better than this year was). The same could be said for the anime industry, especially on the North American side, which is still in a state of reformation and self-correction. If your name wasn't "FUNimation", then you most likely saw yourself releasing a whole lot of sub-only releases and not conducting "business as usual". The face of the global financial crisis was in full view, and with the dramatic drop in dubbing, FUNi's apparent monopoly, and lower sales, it was not a good 2009 for many companies, but there were still silver linings to be found in the rapid proliferation of digital distribution, new business models (i.e. the former, season boxes for series), and the steady growth of anime's domestic awareness. And for all of the talk of boxing's "death", there has been a number of outstanding fights (Marquez-Diaz, Williams-Martinez), surprises (Margarito-Mosley, Cordoba-Dunne, Cotto-Pacquiao), and developments ("Super Six" shakeups, movement from belt system, "catchweight") over the past year, including the widespread recognition of a certain Filipino fighter. However, we also had the all-too-real and unfortunate demises of Alexis Arguello, Arturo Gatti, and Vernon Forrest, who passed away sooner and more tragically than anyone would have ever desired to see.

In both cases, I believe that 2010 will be a more positive year than people may think. As is customary around this time, I'll post a few of my predictions for what may come. Sometimes they're right and other times not quite, but it's all fun all around.

So Long, 2008!

And so ends quite the year that was 2008, or at least when midnight comes around later. The North American anime industry saw its biggest shake-up in years, if not in its history, with FUNimation solidifying itself as the dominant company with its acquisition of the titles from the doomed Sojitz-ADV venture and their partnership with the reduced Geneon (not including the major shows they picked up on their own) as well as its massive push in the digital distribution sector (more on that later). Bandai Ent. shocked many with its pick up of Gurren Lagann off the heels of the aforementioned deal collapse and created some intrigue (and amusement/annoyance, depending on who you ask) with their still-mysterious Project Nebula and the "novella" being played out within their site's source code. Even a small company in Media Blasters got in on the surprises when it announced its "rescuing" of Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit when it became a victim of Geneon's collapse late last year. On the boxing side, there were upsets galore, with Bernard Hopkins schooling Kelly Pavlik, the U.S. Olympic boxing team stinking up Beijing (and let's not even get into the scoring, all-around...), Antonio Margarito's march through Miguel Cotto, Joe Calzaghe smoking out Roy Jones, Jr., and the biggest of all, Manny Pacquiao's absolute destruction of Oscar De La Hoya.

Ah~ 2007, Adieu...

Well, the year 2007 is coming to an end at midnight(and this is only the second post of December! Three papers around ten pages each and two exams will do that to ya... -_-) and it's been quite the ride. Mayweather beats De la Hoya and Hatton, Toney and Taylor lose, Hopkins and Winky finally fought one another, Geneon USA goes down, Kadokawa Pictures USA and a number of big titles (Code Geass, Ouran High School Host Club, Toki Kakeru wo Shoujo) came up (as well as digital distribution) and so forth (can't forget about that "Shocking Punch" either...). It's been swell, but what will 2008 yield?