The Old School Otaku Lounge

Lea Hernandez spent a year working for Gainax, back in the late 80s, and is starting a webcomic about her experience: http://boingboing.net/2013/10/23/bani-g ... the-s.html

It just started up, so there looks to be only 1 comic so far, but I'm looking forward to seeing more of it. She's also got a supplemental tumblr for it: http://bani-garu.tumblr.com

Thank you for finding this. I look forward to seeing more!

I recall my brush with General Products at the 1984 Worldcon in L.A. I grabbed a flyer off their table and said I was glad they were at the con. They didn't have anything to actually SELL there, I think it was a dry run to see how things might work out.

I wrote them after, got back a polite (if clumsy) letter about how they couldn't sell overseas but here, have a catalog.

Oh, what could have been, if they only had some common sense and listened to their American employees...

(well, what could have been would have been even faster bankruptcy, I suspect)

Thanks for posting this usamimi; I can't wait to see more!

SteveH wrote:Thank you for finding this. I look forward to seeing more!

I recall my brush with General Products at the 1984 Worldcon in L.A. I grabbed a flyer off their table and said I was glad they were at the con. They didn't have anything to actually SELL there, I think it was a dry run to see how things might work out.

I wrote them after, got back a polite (if clumsy) letter about how they couldn't sell overseas but here, have a catalog.

Oh, what could have been, if they only had some common sense and listened to their American employees...

(well, what could have been would have been even faster bankruptcy, I suspect)

Heh, I remember when Gainax first started their website, and they had to specifically put an English section on it asking people from America/Canada/the UK to stop emailing them with requests to mail products to them via mail order. (Specifically their computer games, I remember so many fans wanting those dumb strip mahjong games they were putting out. XD)

Kame-Sen'nin wrote:Thanks for posting this usamimi; I can't wait to see more!

No problem! I thought that it sounded absolutely relevant to the board, so I had to share! I also posted about it on my Tumblr, but not many people seemed too interested? I guess I'm the only old foggy on Tumblr who cares about this kinda stuff, lol. (I'm specifically looking forward to it because it's not just Gainax, but it's from a female's perspective. I've heard a few artists from America talk about getting into the anime biz in Japan before, but it's always been male artists...which is cool, but this is something new and different, so I'm looking forward to hearing her story.

It's been a long time and this comic seems to underplay it, but at one point Lea was really, really, bitter about her experiences at Gainax, or at least it came off as such in interviews. She also really didn't like what they did to the "gaijin" in Otaku no Video, who apparently did work at Gainax as well but they sort of made a fool of him in his segment without his consent.

llj wrote:It's been a long time and this comic seems to underplay it, but at one point Lea was really, really, bitter about her experiences at Gainax, or at least it came off as such in interviews. She also really didn't like what they did to the "gaijin" in Otaku no Video, who apparently did work at Gainax as well but they sort of made a fool of him in his segment without his consent.

I had honestly forgotten about those until I saw the comic start. I can tell she's probably still bitter (but from what I remember, for good reasons?), but she also has good memories, too. So it'll be interesting to hear both.

Otaku no Video is one of those titles for me now where there are parts of it that I like, and others that make me cringe. When I first saw it, I thought that some of it had to have been "faked", but to find out that they made fun of one of their workers without his agreement was very disheartening. I think that's what ultimately gave me a love/hate relationship with Gainax...they've made so many titles I love, but then they've done some crap over the years that isn't really cool, so...it's frustrating. :/

I do feel very honored that it seems like Lea is reblogging/sharing a lot of the stuff I post from Anime Nostalgia and adding personal anecdotes and such with them, though...that is very cool.

usamimi wrote:

llj wrote:It's been a long time and this comic seems to underplay it, but at one point Lea was really, really, bitter about her experiences at Gainax, or at least it came off as such in interviews. She also really didn't like what they did to the "gaijin" in Otaku no Video, who apparently did work at Gainax as well but they sort of made a fool of him in his segment without his consent.

I had honestly forgotten about those until I saw the comic start. I can tell she's probably still bitter (but from what I remember, for good reasons?), but she also has good memories, too. So it'll be interesting to hear both.

Otaku no Video is one of those titles for me now where there are parts of it that I like, and others that make me cringe. When I first saw it, I thought that some of it had to have been "faked", but to find out that they made fun of one of their workers without his agreement was very disheartening. I think that's what ultimately gave me a love/hate relationship with Gainax...they've made so many titles I love, but then they've done some crap over the years that isn't really cool, so...it's frustrating. :/

I do feel very honored that it seems like Lea is reblogging/sharing a lot of the stuff I post from Anime Nostalgia and adding personal anecdotes and such with them, though...that is very cool.

I think my avatar should pretty much tell you how I feel about Evangelion anyway.

Also, thanks for posting that, I'm still a huge fan of Honneamise but the more I read about Gainax...bleh.

Yeah, I mean...I like a lot of the things that Gainax has made, but hearing some of the stuff that went on inside the studio as I've gotten older has been disappointing. Of course, Gainax is definitely not the same studio it used to be now--most people from the original Gainax seem to have gone off and started their own studios now or whatever. But I remember back when I was a teenager and didn't know much about the company itself, I used to think almost everything they did was awesome. Now it's like "Well, I like a lot of these old works they did, but at the same time..." lol.

The Wings of Honneamise is one of my favourite films, anime or not, of all time. Made at the height of the economic bubble when huge risks were made.

Gainax's love of profit soon overshadowed many of their works into the 90's. I still remember my heart sinking when ANN interviewed Hiroyuki Yamaga who said, "Hey, if moe sells, we'll do it too!".

I do fondly remember the huge, epic, overblown anticipation for Gainax's "Follow-up" to Evangelion, which was, of course, Ebichu.

Captainbubby wrote:I do fondly remember the huge, epic, overblown anticipation for Gainax's "Follow-up" to Evangelion, which was, of course, Ebichu.

Actually, their first "follow-up" to Evangelion was KareKano (aka: the guys behind Eva do shoujou high school romance), and it actually was pretty good until it cut off in the middle. There were a lot of rumors as to the why, I still don't know what the truth is behind why that one got cut. But the manga is really good, and some friends and I still think the first 4 episodes are a pretty perfect little love story. I'd say stop watching right there if not for the pretty epic, "had to be Gainax" chase sequence a few episodes later.