Going directly to DVD just before The Dark Knight this summer will be a new DC Universe animated movie featuring the cast of the Christopher Nolan live action films.
Six anime shorts, all produced by DC animation guru Bruce Timm and written by Josh Olson, David Goyer, Brian Azzarello, Greg Rucka, Jordan Goldberg, and Alan Burnett. Each segment will have its own direction and art style and produced in Japan. Think of it like the Animatrix, but with Batman.
The story will supposedly play out in continuity following the events of Batman Begins but before The Dark Knight. Deadshot, Killer Croc, and Scarecrow are confirmed villains.
Thanks to Rabban for the heads up.

Although it’s all but unknown over here, Hirohiko Araki’s manga Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure has enjoyed a sizable following in its native Japan. A bizarre mash up of vampires, martial artists, fortune tellers, superheroes, and gangsters, Jojo is a story about the trials and tribulations of the Joestar family. A major focus of the series are the stands, psychic entities which grant their users powers. Much of the series has been inspired by music, as it features several characters who have been named after songs, rappers, and rock bands. The series has been divided into 6 arcs, each taking place in a different time period and centered around a different main character. Capcom produced a series of games based on the third story arc, in which Jotaro Joestar, his grandfather, and their allies travel to Egypt to defeat a vampire in order to save Jotaro’s mother from her own stand (don’t ask). Although they are fighting games, they are as far removed from Street Fighter as they get. The first game, Jojo’s Venture, was released in the arcades in 1998 and was bought to the PS1 and Dreamcast with exclusive features. In typical Capcom fashion, Jojo’s Venture received a championship edition-style update complete with new characters and features known as Heritage for the Future. A third game was released in Japan for the PS2, but never made it over here.
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You can get the movie through one of the links below:
Play-Asia
Amazon Japan

Note that you will need a region 2 or region free DVD player to play this movie.

The images we linked to last week led to an interesting discussion on our forums about why we are so hyped for the upcoming Speed Racer movie. Well, here is what most of us have been waiting for to get an idea of what to expect.

Source: Blogs@Newsarama

USA Today has 8 stills from Speed Racer, the new adaptation of the classic anime directed by the Wachowski Brothers (The Matrix).

Just seeing Spritle and Chim Chim in the trunk of the car is enough for me.

And now you can see the full trailer at Moviefone. (thanks Ryan!)

Official word has it that the highly popular and controversial (banned in China) anime/manga series, Death Note, will be shown on Adult Swim. The series is set to premiere October 20th at midnight on Cartoon Network. New episodes will follow on a weekly basis. A press release was published the day before yesterday with more details.

Read on for the Press Release.

Source: Blogs@Newsarama

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Last week the animation company Toei conducted a poll through the Anime News Network asking “Which of the following Toei titles would you be interested on viewing by Video on Demand?” and despite there being nearly 50 options in the poll Sailor Moon came out on top with an astounding 63.7% of users, that being 2535 people, voting for it. Keep in mind that users could still vote for more than one show at a time but this still made Sailor Moon the clear winner of the pool with more votes than any other.

Thanks to Sailor Moon fan site Genvid‘s users and staff for bringing this poll to the attention of fans and voting in it. That being said this is not simply a case of a web site ganging up and swaying the results of a poll. Sailor Moon was well ahead of the game when this poll was first noticed by fans.

Without a doubt this shows that there is clear interest in the anime fan community in Sailor Moon, despite the show no longer being licensed in the international market. The results of this poll are to be taken into consideration when releasing shows on demand for cable and IPTV.

Read on for the show notes.

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