Iced Hell Dept.

The impossible has happened. Or, rather, the deeply improbable has found a chink in the armor of the possible to slither through. Or something. The animated adaptation of Sayonara, Zetsubo-Sensei is being released domestically. (See my reviews of the books.)

Impossible if only because I always believed the amount of work required to localize the series would be daunting. If anyone was going to pick it up, I rationalized, it would be someone like AnimEigo, a label that specializes in doing things in a very fan-centric way. (This despite the fact that most of their product as of late has been live-action samurai cinema material, not anime.) But no: it's Media Blasters, of all people. I'm going to be very curious — shilling for concerned — to see how they pull this off.

Also: Some interesting notes in that piece about how expensive it is to create even a single animated series. The most appalling part was learning that your average animator makes pathetic wages, far less than your average office worker. The problem is finding people to consistently foot the bill, which explains why most shows these days are ground out as follow-ups to existing, known-good properties. Less risk that way.