Actually, that title is a bit of a stretch. Powet was at this year’s Otakon in Baltimore, but seeing as how most of the staffers were attending the wedding of our very own Zac Shipley (congrats, btw), I took it upon myself to represent Powet as best I could. Of course, this also is a stretch to say, as I only caught about half of the convention itself, BUT IT MATTERS NOT!

With an estimated attendance of over 26,000 freaks, geeks and Otaku, Otakon certainly kept up its reputation for the largest anime convention on the east coast. Many great guests and voice actors were present, including a special concert by VAMPS even before the con itself started. I managed to make it to a fair amount of panels, most notably the “Sailor Moon’s Influence on Hentai” panel, which of course broke my soul a bit but was still fun. Sadly, I missed out on the “What to Do During a Zombie Apocalypse” panel, as the room was overflowing with con-goers by the time I got there and they were turning people away. Sadness abound. The Video Game Room was jam-packed with all the newest games on hand, as well as some throw-back goodies from the past, and sported heavy traffic from a good many Ghostbusters cosplayers.

Of course the only down side to Otakon, in the past 3 years I’ve attended, has been the convoluted layout. I consider Otakon to be “Disorganized Order”, as while panels are set up in the appropriate places and things are kept flowing in a orderly fashion, the ever-increasing run-around needed to get from Point A to Point B by going around to Points G, K, and Y first becomes more frustrating with each passing year. Oh, and they added a new Hilton hotel onto the convention center this year.

Overall, Otakon is always a fun experience for anyone wanting to spend 3 days in a more-or-less native geek habitat, while also being able to determine your superiority in the geek-chain by demonstrating your ability to use your +3 Deodorant of Smiting.

Long live the Otaku spirit.

A number of Powet.tv members have been attending Otakon for a few years. What follows was at some point intended to be some kind of comprehensive overview of the con, but it should be immediately obvious that we weren’t able to follow through with such an ambitious goal.

Enjoy the trannies, furrie, LARPers, and some even seedier perversions that plague the geek community attending a standard convention. All things considered, the simple act of Cosplaying really isn’t that weird at all.

To be eligible for the contest to win the Yaoi book mentioned in the above video, please leave your relevant comment to this blog post in the next month.

Great news for Sailor Moon fans hoping to attend Otakon 2008 this August 8th to 10th in Baltimore. Two Sailor Moon animation directors, Kazuko Tadano and Hiromi Matsushita will be appearing as guests. They both acted as animators for a number of Sailor Moon episodes, and were even featured as characters in one episode.

Fans will remember episode 21 “Protect the Children’s Dreams! Friendship Linked by Anime” or “An Animated Mess” as it was known in English. The episode takes place in an animation studio, and centers around the characters of Hiromi Matsuno and Kazuko Tadashita, references to Hiromi Matsushita and Kazuko Tadano. No doubt the parts about them being targeted by the villainous Nephrite and being turned into the monsters Castor and Pollux of the Gemini constellation were slightly exaggerated.

[Read the rest of this entry…]