Yaoi-Con 2006 Report

First, the biggest news of the day, the biggest news of the entire con, and one of the most exciting licenses ever as far as I'm concerned:

Juné Manga has licensed the Ai no Kusabi novel by Reiko Yoshihara!!! This book tells the in-depth story that is related in the well-known Ai no Kusabi OAV. This was a very early license, so don't expect to see it soon, but it IS coming!!

801 MEDIA PANEL

Rachel Livingston, who runs the new 801 Media imprint, and Erica Jeng, webmaster and self-admitted "techie" of Juné and 801, ran both the 801 and Juné panels. First of all, they cleared up some rumors that seem to have been floating around:

• 801 Media is not Digital Manga Publishing. Digital Manga Inc. is the parent company that owns 801 as well as many other companies such as June', Akadot Retail and Pop Japan Travel.
• DMP did not buy Be Beautiful or Drama Queen and re-name it. 801 is a totally new imprint.
• 801 is not made up of DMP employees who quit their jobs. They are still owned by Digital Manga Inc.
• DMP did not change their name to 801 Media in order to get new licenses from Japan.
• 801 Media is not an Original English Language manga company. They will license titles from Japan.

801 Media is starting off with four new announcements, and one title "stolen" from Juné's previous lineup, all rated M (18+):

• Ichigenmei by Fumi Yoshinaga: Vol. 1/March 2007, Vol. 2/July 2007
• The Sky Over My Spectacles by Mio Tennohji (taken out of the Juné line), March 2007
• BondZ by Toko Kawai, to be released in April of 2007
• Affair by Shiuko Kano, May 2007
• Love is Like A Hurricane by Haruka (Kazuka) Minami: Vol. 1/June 2007, Vol. 2/Sept. 2007, Vol. 3/Nov. 2007
• My Paranoid Next Door Neighbor by Haruka (Kazuka) Minami, October 2007

All books will be rated Mature (18+) and will retail for $15.95. They will have dust jackets and color inserts, and will be slightly larger than the original Japanese size, but not as large as the June' books. If you pre-order their first two books (Ichigenmei and Spectacles), you will get a "free gift." Pre-orders will be taken at their upcoming website, www.801media.com.

801 plans to distinguish itself by publishing "stuff Juné is too scared to publish," creating a wider variety of what's available and generally being more hardcore. "We'll go as far as people want us to go without us getting in trouble," said the panel leaders. Also, 801 will only publish professionally published work for now, and are not investigating licensing any doujinshi.

Finally, they will not license any shota. It's illegal.

JUNE MANGA PANEL

I was only able to stay for the license announcements and a few frequently asked questions, so here you go!

May through August 2007 (tentative) releases:

• Love Recipe by Kiriko Higashizato, about a college graduate who goes to work for a yaoi publisher
• In the Walnut by Toko Kawai
• Picnic by Yugi Yamada
• Othello by Toui Hasumi
• Sweet Whisper by Hyouta Fujiyama
• World's End by Eiki Eiki, the sequel to Dear Myself
• Ordinary Crush by Hyouta Fujiyama, originally titled something along the lines of "The Boys Love Situation Is Comparitively Often"
• Can't Win With You by Yukine Honami
• Words of Devotion by Keiko Kinoshita
• Nakimushi na Little by Keiko Kinoshita
• Lover's Flat by Hyouta Fujiyama
• Invisible Boy by Hotaru Odagiri
• Ai no Kusabi novel - Reiko Yoshihara

Juné has also been approached by some Japanese mangaka who want to write stories that will be well-received in English! The first book of these is by Yuno Ogami and will be titled Etoile. It will be published in English first! The story is about the takeover of a Japanese company by an American company, a "hostile takeover which becomes a consenting merger," as the Juné staff explained.

Juné will begin producing some more fan goods. They will have clear files of Hero Heel and Yellow artwork available by Christmas.

Finally, The Art of Loving volume 2 has no release date because it's not complete in Japanese yet. New chapters have been serialized, but a complete volume is not yet ready. Once it's done, Juné will publish it.

JAST USA

The yaoi PC game Absolute Obedience is now available online and at various retailers, as well as from www.j-list.com! My Yaoi-Con team picked up a copy in the dealer's room, and it's been on in the background while I wrote up this report. It's a great game, very dirty, definitely earns its Mature rating! Be sure to check it out!

BLU Panel

Lillian Diaz-Przybyl led this year's panel again, being the main editor for Tokyopop's BLU imprint. The first thing she touched upon was the addition of parental advisory warnings on the BLU manga. This was done because of "a retailer," unnamed, who would not put BLU books on the shelves without one. Lillian said they are trying to incorporate the warnings "as subtly and delicately as possible."

Newly-released and coming-soon series include Junjo Romantica, the first volume of which is now out. Junjo Romantica is up to 7 volumes in Japan and is still ongoing. Also, Love Pistols, originally titled Sex Pistols, had its name changed due to the existence of a U.S. punk music group of the same name. Due to some licensor problems that were "not unusual" according to Lillian, Love Pistols might be delayed past its January release date. Love Pistols is also ongoing, with 4 volumes out in Japan. BLU does always plan to release all of any ongoing series, barring any licensor issues.

New BLU Announcements:

• Innocent Bird by Hirotaka Kisaragi: I tried to write down the Japanese title and got "Na Mo Nani Tori no Toru Yoake." This might not be accurate; the print on the slide was very small. If you've seen it in scanslation, it was probably titled "Innocent Bird." The story involves an angel and a demon, but the demon is disguised as a priest on earth and is trying to regain Heaven. There are 3 volumes and it will be rated OT (16+).

• June Pride, the first in a series of novels called "the Tamaki-kun novels," with story by Gotou Shinobu, art by Ooya Hazumi. School boy love, rated OT (16+).

• Bokura no Unsei by Temani Matsumoto. A story by the author of BLU's title Shinobu Kokoro. Rated M, and Lillian says it "really earns its M rating."

BLU is holding off on announcing a lot of licenses because they want to be absolutely sure of the licensing status.

In the Question and Answer session, a few frequently-asked questions came up, to which Lillian gave these answers:

* BLU does not censor, edit or re-touch any of their releases, beyond the odd cover change (like Man's Best Friend) which may cause a title not to be shelved on U.S. bookstore shelves.

* BLU would like to get the Gravitation Re-Mix doujinshi rights, but the rights are difficult to get because they are not held by a company but by an individual. Also, there will NOT be any re-release of the Gravitation manga by BLU.

* BLU is considering licensing novels, possibly the Kyou Kara Maou! novels, but due to the "extremely expensive" nature of translating Japanese novels, are not at the point of announcing anything yet.

Be Beautiful Panel

Masumi and John O'Donnell, the heads of Be Beautiful at CPM, were back to head this year's Be Beautiful panel. They started off with a preview DVD of their current manga titles, which was basically a series of panning shots of manga scenes, with a voice-over explaining the basic plot of the manga (i.e. "The men of Club Dandy entertain their clients well... but at night... they entertain each other."). It was fairly cheesy, but the DVDs were handed out for free to everyone attending the panel.

Be Beautiful explained in honest, upfront detail what happened to them this past year and cleared up a bunch of rumors that even I was wrong about. So here is the real story:

Earlier in 2006, the Musicland franchise (which owned Suncoast and other subsidiaries) went bankrupt. Later in the year, Tower Records also went bankrupt. These two retailers were two of CPM's largest sellers, and when they couldn't pay CPM, CPM couldn't pay their printers, translators and other employees. Many CPM employees had to be laid off, and the production schedule fell behind. They admitted that they did a bad job of getting the rumors cleared up, but it is a matter of public record: CPM itself never went bankrupt.

All of Be Beautiful's books are currently in print and can be ordered from their website, which remains the best place to get their books.

The big news is that the releases are back on schedule -- including Kizuna 6 now available, and Finder series 3 coming up! Here is the outlook for the coming months:

2006 October: Kizuna #6 -- it's available now at www.bebeautifulmanga.com !
November: Sound of My Voice
December: (off)
2007 January: Embracing Love #4
February: Kizuna #7
March: Midaresomenishi - A Legend of Samurai Love
April: Embracing Love #5, Finder Series #3
May: Kizuna #8, Casino Lily (the translation was just finished last week)
June: YEBISU Celebrities, Love a la Carte (JP title: Renai a la Carte)
July: Embracing Love #6, Virgin Soil (JP title: Hanairo Virgin Soil)
August: Kizuna #9

One note of bad news: Be Beautiful is still the licensor for the Embracing Love anime, but they are having trouble getting the complete materials to create the U.S. DVD. They had paid half the advance to Biblos and received the first episode masters, and then Biblos went bankrupt. The contract then went to a Japanese company called Trinet, who was unable to get the property from Biblos in the confusion of the bankruptcy of Biblos. So that license is in limbo right now.

John and Masumi are going to Tokyo next week to work out this and other licenses. Hopefully, we'll hear more soon.

Drama Queen Panel

Drama Queen's panel was accidentally scheduled at the same time as Be Beautiful's, so I was unable to go to both. Here are the new announcements from Drama Queen (thanks to D.W. Rye):

• Missing Road by Sakurai Shushushu
• Cage of Thorns by Sakuragawa Sonoko
• Angel & Devil by Uzuki Jun