When Right Stuf first started talking “mystery license” a few days ago, my initial reaction was, “I bet it’s Maria-sama ga Miteru.”
I should buy a lottery ticket this weekend.
Hence, today’s announcement doesn’t surprise me. Marimite has always been one of those shows that, despite not appearing popular, still has its legions of dedicated fans. And with all of the shoujo ai themed titles being licensed and released nowadays, I figured it was just a matter of time before some North American distributor got it in their head to go and license the crown jewel of the genre.
I’m still deliriously happy, of course. Marimite is one of those rare, long-running franchises that only grows sweeter with age. It’s also one of a few select anime series I can get excited about watching at pretty much any given moment. For example, I’ve already watched the OAV series three or four times now, despite the fact it’s less than a year old.
So, the entire series has immense rewatch value, and has been at the top of my licensing and DVD purchasing wishlist for quite some time. A couple years back, I came within an inch of purchasing the entire series up to that point on R2 DVD during one of my many intoxicated visits to Akihabara, abstaining only because I expected it to be licensed for R1 release before long. I’m glad I waited; especially so, given that Right Stuf will be releasing the series in convenient seasonal boxsets at a very attractive price.
With the third TV season of the series set to air in Japan this Summer, 2008 looks to be the year of the Yamayurikai. Any distributor out there want to make it the year of Neo-Venezia while we’re at it?
>Any distributor out there want to make it the year of Neo-Venezia while we’re at it?
My exact thoughts. If RightStuf continues to pick up “niche” titles, I really hope Aria is next in line.
>>With the third TV season of the series set to air in Japan this Summer, 2008 looks to be the year of the Yamayurikai. Any distributor out there want to make it the year of Neo-Venezia while we’re at it?
This could shape up to be a very suteki year indeed.
Dekkai sugoi news da ne?
I kind of gave up on this ever happening after the Geneon-rumor thing went down the sewers, so I’m glad I was proven wrong. And seasonal boxets is an awesome release format, and I guess you’d be hard pressed to complain about the price either in these Bandai-Visual infested days :p.
:3 I watched MariMite because of the Lucky Star allusion.
And my, was it great. Loved the characters.
Must buy!
>>:3 I watched MariMite because of the Lucky Star allusion.
Even outside of IRC, korosora, you manage to depress me.
I really wish they would release a English or Korean dubbed version of ARIA DVD so I could buy them for my son and I. (Although I prefer sub over dub, there exist an earnest need for all DVDs to have English or Korean dialog in my household)
I’m a happy man, though I will be happier if they could confirm whether or not the DVD extras will be present in those boxsets.
And I hope for either RightStuf or Media Blasters to pick up ARIA.
Woo Hoo! Ahem.
“Yumi..”
“Hai. onee-sama?”
“I’m going to grant your wish tonight.”
“Eeeeehhh?!?!”
Jeff, I still re-watch the AMV you did of “Maria-sama ga Miteru”, Worlds Apart (Catholic Schoolgirls in Trouble)…
>I’m a happy man, though I will be happier if they could confirm whether or not the DVD extras will be present in those boxsets.
>Right Stuf says it will include the “specials” — comedic shorts that depict the series’ characters in “chibi” form — for their respective season.
I hope ANN wouldn’t be putting out speculative information as news. I’ve already put my preorders in so I do hope they come with the boxset.
Right Stuf’s press release confirms that the specials are included.
The only thing I hope for is that they don’t plaster the translated title all over the box. Right Stuf has a history of altering logos just for the sake of altering logos, but they’ve also been good about providing the original logos on reverse covers as far as the actual DVDs are concerned. You can’t reverse a box, though. I notice they’re using the Lillian Girl’s School logo on all their promotional material for the time being, however, so perhaps they’ll be sticking with that.
A friend of mine would be estatic about this news. I also wish it was the year of Neo-Venezia.
We need Hitohira next. It seems like a Right Stuf show.
Having been educated at a boarding school that values tradition in Canberra, AU, I felt immediately disgusted by the way the animators have stylized the school environment.
Others things that have interested (or bugged) me is that… why do all of these anime Christian schools all have beautiful 5-million-dollar exteriors that look like they were made from the Renaissance, and yet the classrooms interiors are all nice-and-plain Japanese styled? They still have black/green chalkboards, (seriously, when are instructors going to stop using them?), little tidy wooden desks, and a set of windows that face toward a very narrow hallway with wooden floors - even the huge assembly room looks completely, err, Asian-rendered. And why do they always have to have a gorgeous separate tea room for the student government - or should I say, the elite? (Do the Japanese desire to differentiate the rich from the common, the intelligent from the unsophisticated, that badly?) They think that these boarding schools are universities or something, with a fraternity, a tea house, and everything. And no, girls do not say “good day” to random people they meet - that was back in the nineteenth century.
Also, as a side note, European boarding schools rarely make the girls wear seifuku anymore - the only places that still wears them are Japan, Taiwan (who, I guess, loves to copy anything Japan does), Hong Kong (rarely), Korea, and, although I’m not sure, the Philippines… and students also always share dorms.
The plot does seem quite intriguing though, when I read the summary online. Watch Lost and Delirous to get a true feeling of shoujo-ai in a correct boarding school environment: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-GQcCB0jMY
Why the hell is Marimite, a show in which very little actually happens, so damn popular?
I think it’s because it openly portrays a dominant/submissive relationship in which the sub maintains some independence and control–i.e., she does not become a slave.
In general, this would not be acceptable if the dom were male–but a yuri dom/sub pair is not only acceptable, but hot.
Exception: I believe one of the reasons The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is so popular is that Kyon actually exerts some control over the primal force that is Haruhi. If Kyon were the usual anime male wimp, the story would have been as limp as he would be. Kyon’s male dominance is acceptable because it’s camouflaged by Haruhi’s wildness, and because he so rarely openly exerts the control he has.
asdf, MariMite is the StarWars of Yuri anime/manga. It’s epic but nobody claimed it’s realistic in any way. You could just as well complain about R2D2 making bleeping sound when it should either communicate wireless or using human language. You could also think of EVA which used Christian symbolism mostly for its pure effect. Japan like to import artifacts from different cultures. Just look at sailor-style schoolgirl uniforms. That kind of clothing has nothing to do with Japanese tradition or standards at all. At the end of the day, they still prefer their own traditional ways. That’s why they still eat explicitely Japanese food even in anime that does not ever mention “Japan” at all. The same goes for interior design. Though I don’t think this is very specific to Japan, it’s only more obvious due the contrasts between Eastern and Western culture. On the surface, Europe imports a lot culture from America and America imports a lot from Europe but under the surface, they remain different cultures nonetheless. In other words, the victorian architecture, the uniforms, the rosaries, catholicism in MariMite is nothing but decoration. After all that’s only the set-up and it’s not what makes MariMite successful. It’s about the characters and their interactions. I think it’s sufficient to watch a single episode to realize that MariMite is something special (whether you like it or not) and very different (albeit not completely) from other anime in many aspects like character design (visually and non-visually), pacing, use of close-ups, plots. The way it makes a huge drama out of the silliest little problems and still manages to make you feel for the characters, is really unique.
Brutus: since this is a pretty realistic show, I would expect the environment to be realistic as well. Star Wars is irrelevant - that’s scifi - a whole different genre
Well - if you claim that all of this catholicism “is nothing but decoration” - I shall pity the series… it had so much potential. Maybe they could attempt to make a series WITHOUT those redundant decor that fits the eyes of those who only want eye candy.
“Europe imports a lot of culture from America” - what? when did America have its own culture? - unless you can call consumerism and gluttony as a culture…
“The way it makes a huge drama out of the silliest little problems and still manages to make you feel for the characters, is really unique.” - feel for the characters? No, sorry, not me.
It’s just every time those girls call “onee-sama… onee-sama… ONEE-SAMA!” It makes me shiver…
Nobody claimed Marimite is realistic. It certainly uses a lot of stereo-types. It may be more realistic than a sentai show but that’s it. I mean just explained yourself how unrealistic it is. At that point you should either accept it or scrap the show. If you don’t understand how StarWars relates to say StarTrek, just ignore that part of my comment.
Decoration isn’t just eye-candy. It’s about the setting as a whole, the atmosphere, the mood. While you could consider it just another show about “high-school girls”, it’s obviously quite different. The specific choice of a “catholic school” is probably more or less arbitrary - it’s not about catholicism or christians at all - but it sets it apart from those other school girls shows. Also because it allows the characters to behave differently, especially behave in exaggareted ways without becoming ridiculous. If you took the girls and put them into a normal school, it would all seem like comedy. I simply like how Marimite is so bold to be subtle.
Hollywood movies, TV series, hip-hop (at lot of music in general), coke and fast food are clearly all imported from the USA. Whether you call that culture, I don’t care. I don’t think there’s not much of a difference between praising a burger and a rice ball.
I certainly wouldn’t expect this show to work for everyone and know people who consider it just as annoying or silly as you do but the same people normally don’t like shoujo in the first place or only if it’s ripe with hawt lezbe action.
For the record, I like the seiyuu of Yumi quite a lot - despite not memorizing her name - and I’m also found of her roles in other anime. Same goes for Sei.