Paintwork is out now – you can get Kindle versions from Amazon US and Amazon UK, and versions for all other popular e-readers (including iPad and Nook) at Smashwords. Those of you that prefer to buy your eBooks from an independent store can grab it from The Wizard’s Tower.

Print versions are now available from Createspace or Amazon US and Amazon UK.

“In an era of “post-cyberpunk” science fiction, Maughan is firmly cyberpunk — or maybe “cyberpunk++,” a genre that captures all the grit and glory of technology with a higher degree of plausibility and respect for real computers and networks than the genre had in its glory days…Maughan has a keen eye for the fictional possibilities of technology, a good hand with the what if/ten seconds in the future mode of storytelling, and he’s quite adept at filling his work with hyper-cool eyeball kicks. These stories are fun and thought-provoking, a great combination.”
- Cory Doctorow, author of Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom and Little Brother (read full review)

“In our hothouse present, where technology is little more than vapour, Tim Maughan catches those fleeting moments of possibility in stories that ought to have no shelf-life whatsoever – and which, regardless, linger in the mind. I don’t know how he does this. I don’t know whether he is very naive, or very clever. One thing I do know: these stories are very, very good.”
- Simon Ings, author of Hot Head, The Weight of Numbers and Dead Water.

“They used to say that Science Fiction was hard to define, but that you’d know it when you saw it. How then to best recommend a collection like Paintwork? A book of augmented realties, icy conceptual surfaces and a healthy dose of contemporary corporate paranoia. Is even a simple book blurb as innocent as it first appears? The best Science Fiction isn’t a road map, it’s a toolkit, and Paintwork is a virtual users guide to a new kind of fictional future. A place where it’s fine to pretend life’s all a game, just so long as you stay on the winning team.

“If Science Fiction is a toolkit, Paintwork is the missing users manual.”
- Tom Hunter, Director, the Arthur C. Clarke Award

“Havana Augmented is the third short story in Tim Maughan’s excellent Paintwork (2011), a collection that focuses on the meaning of artistry in a near-future cyberpunk landscape…(it) follows two streams of conflict. Paul and Kim battle with enormous robots which is, frankly, awesome. Mr. Maughan knows how to write an action sequence without letting it take over. The battles are short, streamlined, vicious and very, very fun…this is the crown jewel of an excellent collection. I’m a sucker for sports movies, especially when the game or match has some sort of Great Significance. Mr. Maughan tugs at my heartstrings with Havana Augmented – a giant robot smackdown with a country’s future on the line.”
- Pornokitsch.com (read full review)

“Paintwork itself is about the making of art, and what it is that makes it authentic. Is it craft or is it result that matters? And following that, is the satisfaction to be gained from doing it properly personal or something more than that?…It would spoil the story’s denouement to go into much more detail, but it revolves around a fascinating set of dichotomies about art as inspiration or product, about the fashion in technologies, whether art is somehow more worthwhile if you go about it in one way or another…and this idea spills over into Havana Augmented, which is a joyful and outrageous story of young games programmers who have moved a virtual game into the augmented reality of their spex and are now playing Rolling Iron through the streets of Havana. Inevitably governments and big business become involved, and I can’t deny that the story’s ending smacks somewhat of the fairytale, but in the end, why not? In all, Paintwork is a very enjoyable and thought-provoking collection of stories about the place of art in the future.”
- Maureen Kincaid Speller, Paper Knife (read full review)

“Hip, cutting-edge cyberpunk with a techno rave attitude. Tim Maughan is definitely a writer to watch.”
- Gareth L. Powell, author of The Recollection.

“The title story Paintwork is an interesting examination of the lives and work of graffiti artists in the near future, trying to keep their art relevant in a world whose environments can become virtual with the blink of an eye. This is a Bristol story through and through, and Tim has done a great job of taking our landmarks and weaving them into a world that is very futuristic while remaining completely familiar to residents of the city…anyone who has an interest in urban art will draw much from this story. I loved Paintwork. All three stories show a writer with a real gift for accelerating the world we know into a believable future, with a deft local touch that adds an extra something for us Bristol folk…(it’s) a great read, that pinches a few ingredients from the SF greats and blends them with a unique flavour all of its own.”
- Guide2Bristol (read full review)

Augmented reality street artist 3Cube wants to break into the mainstream, and as one of the best in the graffiti mecca of Bristol he stands a real chance. Except that someone, some unseen rival, seems set on using even the most old-fashioned of methods to stop him from succeeding.

John Smith was successful once, if only for a fleeting moment. Now the documentary film maker is broke and jobless, and finds himself putting his life on the line as one of the new-breed of paparazzi – snapping celebrity video gamers in virtual worlds.

And on the sun-bleached streets of Havana two young Cubans find themselves locked in a fierce struggle with one of the world’s most powerful organisations, as a seemingly innocent video game tournament becomes a fight for both personal and national pride.

Paintwork is a collection of three stories from our imminent future by British science fiction author Tim Maughan, including the 2010 BSFA Short Fiction Award nominated ‘Havana Augmented’.

About the Author

Tim Maughan lives in Bristol in the South West of England, and when he’s not writing science fiction he writes about Japanese animation and comics for websites like Anime News Network and Tor. He also daydreams about being a techno DJ and spends far too much time on Twitter.

Paintwork is out now – you can get Kindle versions from Amazon US and Amazon UK, and versions for all other popular e-readers (including iPad and Nook) at Smashwords. Those of you that prefer to buy your eBooks from an independent store can grab it from The Wizard’s Tower.

Print versions are now available from Createspace or Amazon US and Amazon UK.

Yet another quick update – if you follow me on Twitter you may have already heard that I recently started blogging about anime and manga for the science fiction and fantasy website Tor.com. Those of you that havn’t heard of Tor should go and check it out; it’s the community and news portal for one of the world’s biggest SF/Fantasy publishers – but far from just promoting their own products it covers a wide range of ‘genre’ related topics from movies and TV to novels and comics. Needless to say with some great resident bloggers and a huge reader base it’s an exciting move for me, and I was extremely flattered to have been asked.

My involvement kicked off a couple of weeks ago, when the site re-posted my infamous 10 Anime Films to See Before You Die list. The response to that over there has been fantastic – many thanks if you read it or left a comment. Just yesterday saw my second post - a review of Vertical’s brilliant body-horror/sci-fi manga 7 Billion Needles.

So what does this mean for this site? Well, obviously I will be posting most of my anime/manga related reviews and articles over at Tor (they are paying me for them, after all), but hopefully that should mean I’m free to cover some wider topics here. For a start I’ll be using this site to promote my forthcoming book Paintwork (I have a book forthcoming. Had I not mentioned it? It’s called Paintwork), plus if time permits I’ll be covering some other related topics…science fiction, art, internet culture, video games etc. That’s the plan, at least. So don’t go too far.

Right, I’ll try and keep this as brief as possible.

Last night, inspired by the latest ‘foreign pirates are killing anime’ outburst from the Japanese industry, I fell into one of my usual rants on Twitter:

“The anime industry avoiding the same elephant in the room as music industry did 10 yrs ago: consumers know worthless product when they see it.

My point isn’t about ‘defending piracy’ – it’s about giving it a cultural context.”

Well, I thought what I was trying to say was fairly straightforward – that like the music biz the anime industry had devalued its own product so much that it is hard to act surprised that people don’t want to pay for it. But judging from the flood of responses I got, apparently a few things need clarifying. Lets have a look:

Wow, what show are you talking about?

I’m not talking about any specific shows, I’m talking about how anime in general is – rightly or wrongly – perceived.

Your theory makes no sense, because good shows sell just as badly or worse as bad shows.

Well, for a start, that’s not my theory at all.

My point is not ‘anime doesn’t sell because it’s low quality’, it’s ‘it is seen as acceptable to steal any anime because it’s all viewed as disposable’. My argument is that this is exactly what happened to the music industry: in a desperate attempt to exploit every revenue opportunity while also reducing costs and investment it devalued its own product to the point that consumers feel little unease with obtaining it illegally.

Nah, it’s not the industry’s fault – people pirate because they are evil and immoral.

Um, maybe. I like to be a little less nihilistic than that. Besides, there are examples of people (I’m thinking Cory Doctorow and Radiohead here) in other media making a success of asking people for money while giving away their work. Perhaps what is needed is some risk taking and imaginative thinking?

OK you clever bastard, so what did the music industry do to solve all this?

Well, the industry itself did nothing really to solve it. What it mainly did was gripe and whine and bitch and demand pointless, ineffectual legal action while still taking the same attitude to the product it was churning out. Sound familiar?

In the end it wasn’t the traditional industry that tried to fix things, but Apple and iTunes that stepped in to present a different model.

WHAT? BUT iTUNES AND APPLE ARE EVIL!!??!?!!?

Yeah, OK. I know what you’re saying – iTunes has many, many issues. Sadly this is not that debate. What is interesting about iTunes is that it showed that by finding sensible price points, breaking up albums into smaller products, supporting micro-transactions and making the whole process very quick and easy it is possible to convince some consumers (in fact, a very large number of consumers) that buying legitimately is less hassle than piracy.

But the anime industry isn’t Apple! It can’t afford to start up a version of iTunes, plus the model doesn’t fit anime at all?

Sheesh, stop taking me so literally. I’m not saying an ‘Itunes for anime’ is the answer. Not at all. To be honest I don’t have a firm answer. I’m just some mouthy Brit on teh internets, its not actually my job to provide any answers. I’d like to think there are people out there in the industry who are much cleverer than me and whose job actually should be to come up with answers, and I can just go back to drinking and babbling on in an amusing chimney sweep’s accent.

But you must have some suggestions?

Well, if we can get back to what started all this: my main suggestion is that the industry stops whining about piracy and using it to deflect blame away from how it has devalued its own product. Connected with that it could stop throwing hissy fits and pulling simulcasts or not allowing foreign distributors from putting out boxsets and blurays. That would all be a good start towards calming down and trying to find a way out of this mess. Or maybe it really is too late.

So this just sounds like your usual ranting – you’re blaming the death of the industry on moe and lolicon and some shows that YOU don’t like despite being quite popular with fans.

Okay. Please – just take a deep breath and read this whole post again. Please.

But commercialization and sponsorship has been part of anime since day one, this isn’t a new thing.

Exactly – and the same is true within music – pop music has been used to sell other products etc since the 1950s. That’s not a criticism of my argument – its further evidence for it! You’d hope that after half a century of doing exactly what I’m describing here that both industries would act less surprised that consumers view their products as low value and disposable. I mean, how stupid do they really think we are?

But what is wrong with a show being disposable? I quite like some shows that I admit are disposable.

There’s nothing wrong with a show itself being disposable! There is always going to be disposable product in every entertainment industry, plus ‘disposableness’ is in itself – like quality – a subjective term.

The issue is this though: don’t whine about something being disposable if you made it that way. If you are a studio that makes shallow, disposable product then don’t act all surprised if people might enjoy watching it once, but don’t want to pay to own a handful of episodes of it on an overpriced DVD. You can’t blame them for that. Instead you need to find alternative ways of monetizing that one, single viewing. Or to price it far more realistically. Again this is how iTunes works, by charging mere pennies for products that its customers view as largely disposable. Not perfect for the artist and industry arguably, but its still a lot better than someone just stealing it.

Or, of course, you need to make a less disposable product in the first place….but lets stop there before we start going around in circles again, shall we?

I’ll be honest with you, I’m sick of writing about death.

If the recent loss of Satoshi Kon to cancer wasn’t enough, then anime was struck another blow last week with the death of Umanosuke Iida to the dreaded disease at just 49. Despite this relatively young age Iida had an impressively varied career, from working as an animator on such classics as Nausicaa through to directing Mobile Suit Gundam: 08th MS Team and perhaps his most popular show Hellsing. But for me he’ll always be remembered for directing the obscure, and sadly unfinished, 90s science fiction OVA Mighty Space Miners.

MSM is yet another example of anime’s obsession with space colonisation, and in particular the vision of orbital colonies outlined by pioneering NASA scientist Gerald O’Neill in his book The High Frontier. The designs and ideas outlined by O’Neill were clear influences on everything from Mobile Suit Gundam through to Cowboy Bebop, and MSM is no exception with it’s portrayal of struggling, hard working families trying to to literally carve a new world and existence for themselves out of space rock. This is the fundamental core of O’Neill’s writings – the idea of human endeavor against the inhospitable harshness of cold space – and as to why this has captured anime’s imagination so much over the decades is open to interpretation. Perhaps it is something that speaks fundamentally to the Japanese identity and the desire to create new living spaces for the crowded urban masses, or ignites a cultural memory of the post war reconstruction. Either way, what is interesting is while O’Neill’s imagined colonies were idyllic and seemingly utopian, anime interpretations have always introduced conflict and danger – whether it is the devastation of all out war between rival nations in Gundam, or the crime-riddled backwaters of refugee cities and frontier towns in Cowboy Bebop. With MSM it is the spectre of corporate greed, as the small community is abandoned by the company men back on Earth when faced with a grave disaster.

It’s this theme, coupled with the show’s gritty visuals, that gives Mighty Space Miners a surprisingly cyberpunk feel that its jaunty title betrays. In fact one of MSM’s greatest joys is to just wallow in its environmental and mechanical design; every object seems firmly solid and bolted together, lived-in and beautifully utilitarian. It’s a fantastic example of post Bladerunner and Alien science fiction realism in 90s anime, and coupled with a pragmatic approach to life in zero-gee and orbital mechanics it is an indulgent, exhilarating watch for hard SF geeks.

Which leaves us with the other tragedy of this story. Combined with high visual and audio production values – including music from Kenji Kawai – the first two episodes of Mighty Space Miners are fantastically paced, revealing a plot that combines thoughtful suspense and tense action. This is largely driven by 12-year-old Nanbu Ushiwaka, a child protagonist that is refreshingly – for anime of this genre – headstrong and courageous instead of being plagued by existential and emotional crisis. All in all they are a near perfect two episodes – the tragedy being they are the only two episodes. Despite some extensive research I’ve not been able to find out how many episodes were planned, or even why the OVA was canceled – though my guess is bad sales, especially in light of what must of been quite a high budget – but episode two ends on a cliffhanger which is never resolved. We never know the fate of Nanbu – the only child to have survived being born in space – and his plucky family, and now with Lida so tragically gone any sense of closure seems even further away.

Despite this Mighty Space Miners still remains when of my most treasured – and frequently re-watched – anime works. It is hard to track down, only ever receiving a limited VHS release in the US (and as far as I know never getting a UK release at all), but you can find a digital copy if you know the places to look. And it is well worth the effort. Plus you owe it to the memory of Umanosuke Lida, who clearly put so much love and energy into its creation.

This blog is not actually dead, it has just been hibernating.

This year has been pretty mental for me, on a personal level. Work life has been hectic, and a series of real life tragedies have left me and my better half exhausted. Add to that the fact that I’ve been trying to get some other projects off the ground (more of that to come soon) and it has sadly meant that this site has been neglected. But that doesn’t mean I’ve been completely static.

I’m sure most of you are aware of the tragic news earlier this year of the passing of anime director Satoshi Kon. I was hugely honored to be asked to contribute to Anime News Network’s week-long retrospective of his works, for which I wrote this piece on his darkly comedic classic Tokyo Godfathers. It was a tough but fun article to write, and something I’m very proud of, and the fact it was published on the day my partner lost her father to the same cancer that took Kon’s life made it a strangely poignant event for me.

Also over the past months ANN have published my reviews of Welcome to the Space Show and Mamoru Oshii’s Musashi: Dream of the Last Samurai, both flawed but still interesting movies that are worth checking out.

Words not enough for you? Then thanks to the magical nature of the internets you can hear my voice too. Back in August Scott Spaziani was kind enough to invite me back onto his podcast “Otaku in Review” along with my good friend Ed Sizemore of Manga Worth Reading. The topic was genre, and the result of putting me and Ed together is that we will ramble on about our love of science fiction until someone stops us. like the two old geezers we truly are. Actually, It was a pretty fascinating discussion, covering more than just manga and anime, and well worth a listen. For something a bit briefer and more lighthearted check out my “20 Questions” interview with Sean Russell over at Anime 3000. Warning: my contain the most offensive curse word known to science.

And finally, something a little different. After a break of about 12 years I’ve got back into one of my old obsessions: DJing. Check out some of my mixes over on Soundcloud under my Shinohara Heavy Industries moniker.

So that’s what has been happening over the last few months of apparent inactivity – but keep an eye on this site, as hopefully it should be springing back into life on a more regular basis – I’ve got some interesting anime and manga reviews lined up for the next few weeks, so don’t go far.

Last weekend saw the 17th London MCM Expo, with a record turn out of over 41,000 attendees as cosplayers, comic enthusiasts, videogamers, scifi fans and free huggers descended on the Excel Conference centre in London’s docklands.

For anime and manga fans the show is more like a giant dealer’s room than a full blown con, with only one anime themed panel over the two days, hosted by the UK’s three main distributors where they announced their upcoming releases for the year. You can check out the full details of their licenses elsewhere, but highlights included Beez Entertainment bagging fan hit Durarara!! and Manga UK’s announcement of Eden of the East.

As always, some of the best information comes to light with off the record chats with industry staff, including discussions I had with people about the recent news that US giant Funimation could well be sold off by it’s parent company Navarre. Specualtion was that a possible buyer could by a Japanese company, with Bandai, Aniplex or even manga publisher Kodansha being mentioned. Either way the vibe was that it was a positive step, rather than something that western anime fans should be panicking about.

Even more interesting – to me at least – was the result of my badgering people about the possibility of my current obsession Redline getting a US and UK release sooner rather than later. Now I’m sworn to secrecy over details, but I can tell you this: the film WILL be getting a western release, it could be this year, and some big players could be involved. I also found out that director Takeshi Koike and producer Katsuhito Ishii had checked out my review over at Anime News Network, and had liked what they had read – which is hardly surprising after I’d gushed all over the movie. But trust me, they deserve the praise.

So all in, London Expo is good day out. I got to meet up with some people I only usually chat to online, and grabbed a few bargains and new releases in the process. It might not be the in depth, anime orientated con that US fans get to visit on a regular basis, but I can heartily recommend UK fans drop by and check it out when they can, if only to get bundled about with the crowds and made to wonder whether the popularity of cosplaying as Yoko from Gurren Lagann is going to result in a spike in teenage pregnancies.

Photos supplied by Andrew Proom – check out his full set here.

It’s not even Christmas yet, but for me 2010 has already got off to a good start. January 1st sees the publication of my story Havana Augmented – a tale of globalization, celebrity gamers, augmented reality and non-existent mech battles. If you have an interest in video games, science fiction or anime then hopefully you’ll enjoy it – you can check out a brief extract below.

The story is being published as part of the M-BRANE SF anthology Ergosphere, and you can pre-order a copy over at their website right now. In fact, get over there quickly, as if you get your order in before Christmas Eve they’ll give you a year’s subscription to their monthly magazine for just a couple of bucks extra – which is a stupidly good deal, as the mag is always a fascinating read. Plus there is also a discount if you buy it with their previous anthology Things We Are Not – but time is limited, so get over there before they come to their senses.

Havana Augmented is accompanied in the book by a couple of illustrations from my good friend and artist WEIGY – one of which you can see at the top of this post – and I’m hugely grateful to him for his work, as I am to M-BRANE head honcho Chris Fletcher and guest editor Rick Novy for giving me this opportunity and being so enthusiastic – thanks guys.

Havana Augmented – Tim Maughan (2009)

Translucent windows hung in the air around Alphonso’s towering frame, linked to various parts of his heavily armoured body, each displaying differing statistics and data; ammunition levels, servo status, temperature readings. Glancing over the figures it was clear to Paul that Marcus had clearly made some important performance boosts already. Paul smiled. Looking at Alphonso always made him smile. Mainly because Alphonso looked fucking bad-ass.

Want to read more? Then go and buy a copy.

Fancy writing something for the site?

So far this has been strictly a one man show, but this January I’m off on my travels again – a couple of weeks in Thailand this time – and rather than leaving the site without content for a fortnight I thought I could get a few guest writers on-board. The brief is easy – you should have something to say about anime, manga or some other aspect of J-Culture, and at least *some* previous experience of writing online. This site gets a minimum of 30k visits a month, so it’s potentially a good way of giving your work some exposure.

Interested? Here’s what to do:

• Email me a brief overview – just a hundred words or so – on what you’d want to write about. DON’T email me the final piece yet.
• Also include a link to your blog or an example of your writing online.
• Have a look around the site, and make sure you won’t be duplicating something I’ve already done, and that it’ll be something my readers will be interested in.
• Reviews are fine, but I’d rather something like an overview of a classic show or franchise etc that you think people should know about. Or you want to explain some obscure aspect of fandom to a wider audience…whatever. Just keep it fresh and interesting.
• Article ideas must be emailed to me by no later than noon on Friday 11th December. If I like your idea I’ll get back to you ASAP and then you’ll have to get the final piece to me by Friday 8th January 2010. Accepted articles will be published later that month.

So…what you waiting for?

I guess it must be pretty obvious by now that I’m not exactly what you’d call – if such a thing even exists – a ‘typical’ anime fan. I don’t refer to myself as an otaku. I hate J-Pop. Mainly due to being a 35 year-old heterosexual man, both Yaoi and Shojo anime holds no more interest for me than an episode of Ugly Betty or Gossip Girl. I don’t collect figures of little girls with their pantsu showing – although I do have a few Gundams, Labors and Totoros lying around the house. Fanservice at the very least bores me, and at worst makes me uncomfortable. I despise, rather than lust after, Asuka from Evangelion. And perhaps most shockingly, until this last weekend, I’d never been to an anime con before.

Not that I’m totally new to the con experience. Many, many years ago I used to go to comic and roleplaying shows, and the last time I was at Excel – the venue for London Expo – I was actually working on a stall running demos as part of my past career as a video games producer. But this was still the first anime-fan orientated event I’d been too, and it was hard to deny the feelings of being an outsider. A friend of mine had forewarned me that it felt a little like gatecrashing your little brother’s party, and despite not having any younger siblings within a few minutes of being there I understood exactly what he meant.

London Expo isn’t purely an anime and manga based event – it also covers ‘genre TV’, comics and video games, but it was clear from just glancing at the hour long queues outside that London’s teenage otaku massive was out in force. Adorned in Naruto headbands and Haruhi wigs, and fueled by Pocky and anxious hormones, they had made their way to Docklands – London’s already decaying shrine to 1980′s capitalism, served by the world’s most rickety futuristic train system – searching for a side order of social acceptance along with their discounted manga. And before they even entered it was clear they were going to find it; there was already a buzz in the air, teenage-geek awkwardness giving way to unbridled enthusiasm as they nervously grasped their ‘free hugs’ signs and shouted out character names to make it clear that they recognised each others cosplay outfits.

As I stood outside the entrance, watching the milling crowds and smoking one last cigarette before I entered, my friend’s comments became even clearer in my mind, and I understood fully what he was getting at. I am old. Many of the kids here had been probably been coming to Docklands for years, and the already dated looking monuments to a now forgotten economic-futurism that towered around us must seem like ancient structures to them. I, on the other hand, can actually remember when all of this was fields. Well, patches of green and some pretty run down looking docks at least. But despite the gulf between my age and that of the majority of the attendees, I still didn’t feel completely alienated. Even though our tastes in anime may very well be out of sync, there was no denying I could feel a certain bond with them – at the very least, I could recognise my own past teen awkwardness, and feel slightly more then a little envy for their innocent enthusiasm.

Skipping the sweaty queues courtesy of a press pass, the main hall was slightly smaller than I’d expected, and suitably crowded. Fighting against the masses to get around didn’t take the edge off the enjoyment – it might not be Akihabara, but it’s hard for any anime fan to not enjoying nosing around stalls full of manga, DVDs, toys, phone pendants, Ghibli plushies and Gundam kits. Despite this I nearly came away empty handed, until I stumbled across the Ilex stall and not just Helen McCarthy’s new book The Art of Osamu Tezuka: God of Manga but also the author herself. Helen is one of the few writers on anime to deserve the title of ‘legend’, having written some of the most exhaustive reference books on the subject, and it was great to be able to spend some time chatting to her in person after previously only via the ‘net. She’s not just knowledgeable but charming with it, and made me determined to finally make it to some of upcoming her screenings at the Barbican – details of which she let slip to me, but for now I am sworn to secrecy.

Reading reports of US anime cons always leaves me envious of one thing above all – discussion panels. The idea of being able to interact with other anime bloggers and even to see and hear Japanese creators talking about their work is extremely exciting to me, but sadly was one area where London Expo was lacking. Despite the apparent interests of the majority of the crowd, there was only one anime related panel on the day I attended – an appearance from Masahiko Minami and Masahiro Andō of Studio Bones.

On paper seeing these two speak was an exciting prospect, and my main motivation for getting to Expo, but the reality was slightly disappointing. Marred by sound problems and running behind schedule the panel lasted just 20 minutes, and was focused entirely on promoting the extremely delayed UK release of Ando’s movie Sword of the Stranger – despite promises that there would be footage from their work on the upcoming Halo Legends project. In fact, the highlight of the panel for me was when a member of the audience asked a question about the as yet unreleased in the UK Eureka 7 movie, only for Minami-san to respond with “Have you seen it yet?” The questioner’s response of “no comment” met with much laughter from the Japanese guests as well as the floor, thankfully. At least they recognise the situation UK anime fans are in, and have got a sense of humour about it.

With the panel finished, that was nothing more to do than to have one last wander round, grab some noodles and then head back into town to start the long trip home. Despite my early reservations I had a good time, and more importantly perhaps was able to see others having an even better one. At some point I was going to call this post ‘Fear and Loathing in Docklands’, but that’s not only too much of a cliche these days, it’s also not fair. ‘Fear and Respect’ might have been more apt. I might be too old and miserable to be in their gang, but the UK anime teenage massive has my support. They should enjoy it while they can, and more power to them. Now where did I put my hair-gel and that Naruto headband?

Last week I had the pleasure of being invited onto the Anime 3000 Panel podcast – alongside Zac Bertschy from Anime News Network and Chase Wang from anime streaming site Crunchyroll – to discuss digital distribution. It was a great chat, and a lot of fun, so many thanks to host Sean Williams for having me on. If you want to check what me and the other guys had to say – or just laugh at my hilarious British accent – then hit the link below.

• Listen to Anime 3000 Panel – S02E07 – Digital Distribution