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 Sometimes you just feel like your energy is waning. You're tired and all you want to do is go home. And then you meet someone who inspires you, who makes you remember why you started doing something in the first place. Anime Expo is usually such a place for me. After working for a year, I get
to meet the people who inspired us to take up the banner of promoting anime
in the first place. Just being able to meet and say hello to people like
Izubuchi Yutaka, Kanno Yoko, Kawamoto Toshihiro, and Tadano Kazuko are
dreams that many anime fans all share. You want to be able to thank the
person who has brought so much entertainment into your life, to thank them
for giving so much of themselves for the enjoyment of others.And if you think about it, even going to conventions is a kind of service.
Many of these people don't make public appearances very often in Japan; if
they do, it is to promote a specific event or show. Several of Anime Expo's
Guests of Honor have commented that they do not get to meet with fans on
such an intimate level in Japan. Most of them find this interesting and
stimulating, yet at the same time, it can be more than a little frightening.Over the years, I've heard a lot of comments about one person being such a
"great guest" while another person wasn't. Put yourself in their shoes for
a moment. How would you feel if you were suddenly invited to a gathering of
people in another country where you didn't speak the language? Would you
be honored? Yes, but also probably more than a little nervous. It takes a lot
for people to fly across an ocean to meet with people they never thought
they'd be meeting. For many Guests, conventions are their first look at
fandom in the United States, and it is a double-edged sword.And Guests are people too. This means that they have thoughts and feelings,
and they should be able to enjoy conventions as much as the fans, albeit in
a different way. This means, for one thing, being able to walk down the
halls unaccosted by well-meaning but overzealous fans. Yet, despite this
risk, many Guests do take to the halls on their own. This year, Kanno Yoko
repeatedly wandered off into the various programming rooms and the Exhibit
Hall, as did Takami Akio and the people from Xebec Studios, and several others.I would like to thank all the Guests of Honor at Anime Expo who took time
out of their busy schedules at Anime Expo and gave up some of their free
time to talk with EX, especially Izubuchi Yutaka, Kanno Yoko, Kamimura
Sachiko, Kawamoto Toshihiro, and Takami Akio. The interviews with these
people begin in this issue and will run for the next several issues. And
hopefully, those of you who read these interviews will come away with a
sense of the interviewee as a whole person, not just a famous character
designer or director. I thank them all for their generosity and for the time
they gave so that their American fans—and fans around the
world—might get to know them a little better.
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The EX Men Publisher Editor in Chief Charles McCarter
Assistant Publisher
Associate Editor
Production Manager
Organizational Consultant
Copy Editors
Staff Writers
Production Staff
Contributors
SPJA Site Administrator
Special Thanks To:
Contacting EX All contents submitted to EX are submitted and published on the basis of full assignment of copyright, unless otherwise agreed in advance and in writing. EX recognizes all copyrights and trademarks. Where possible, we acknowledge the copyright holder. Please contact us if we haven't credited your copyright and we'll correct any oversight. EX is a publication of The Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation. EX: The Online World of Anime & Manga ©1996-1999 EX, The Society for the Promotion of Japanese Animation. All Rights Reserved. |
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