Apple TV has sent The Nerds of Color an exclusive sneak peek clip from tomorrow’s fifth episode of Drops of God, the multilingual French-Japanese wine mystery drama.
Continue reading “Exclusive Clip From Apple TV’s International Hit ‘Drops of God’”
Drops of God’s second season premieres this week on AppleTV. The television series’ first season, adapted from the popular manga of the same name, was initially set to be a limited series, but due to the overwhelming praise from critics (it’s still 100% on Rotten Tomatoes) and winning an International Emmy for Best Drama, the series was given a second season to continue newly-discovered siblings — Camille (Fleur Geffrier) and Issei (Tomohisa Yamashita) — on their journey into the mysteries of wine.
Continue reading “The Cast and Creatives Say Family is Still the Heart of ‘Drops of God’”
The popular fantasy-romance web novel Under the Oak Tree finally adds a new side story for fans: The White Dragon. Written by Kim Suji, the new web novel premieres on July 25 and gives a fresh perspective on the world of Under the Oak Tree, Manta’s most popular webcomic. The completed three-volume side story will be available exclusively on Manta.
Continue reading “Manta’s ‘Under the Oak Tree’ to Release New Side Story Worldwide”
At their panel at Anime Expo 2024 today, digital manga service Azuki announced a new partnership with light novel and manga publisher J-Novel Club (JNC) to distribute their manga via Azuki’s subscription service, as well as the addition of two new series from indie manga publisher Star Fruit Books.
Continue reading “Azuki Expands Manga Library with Series from J-Novel Club and Star Fruit Books”
Publisher TOKYOPOP returns to Anime Expo this summer as it announces plans and show exclusives for Anime Expo 2024. Included for this year’s event will be a slate of some truly awesome panels, special guests, and special booth activities and premiums (so many specials!) that will be available during the convention.
Continue reading “TOKYOPOP Announces Anime Expo 2024 Panels and Show Exclusives”
Josephine Chang and I will be covering this year’s Anime Expo and to start it off, we’ll be sharing a ton of press releases for all the exciting events and guests that will be coming! Yesterday, AX announced the attendance of Ryoko Kui, the creator of the hit manga series Delicious in Dungeon as a guest of honor. Check out the press release after the jump!
Continue reading “Anime Expo Announces Ryoko Kui as 2024 Guest of Honor”
When Apple TV+ first announced an adaptation of the hit manga The Drops of God, there was a little hesitation on adapting a story based on Japanese characters by changing the main character to a French woman. In hindsight, with France being the creators and largest producers of wine and the series being set around gastronomy and fine wine, it just made sense. Fortunately, the series is really well done — despite minor changes from the original source material.
Continue reading “Apple TV+’s ‘Drops of God’ is Good to the Last Drop”
LineCon, I mean, Anime Expo, is now upon us this weekend at the Los Angeles Convention Center and here’s a snippet of the things we are most excited about! From the countless activities, events, panels, and concerts that you can attend and all the endless artists & vendors you can support, there’s something for all the anime lovers guaranteed to swarm the halls:
Continue reading “Anime Expo 2023 Fever is Upon Us”
The countdown for Denis Villeneuve’s Dune is on! And though much of the world has seen the film already, a few territories are still waiting in anticipation for their journey to Arrakis. We in the US are still, of course, waiting for the film to hit theaters on October 22. However, Japan only has 11 days more, since the film hits cinemas there on October 15!
Continue reading “New Manga-Inspired ‘Dune’ Poster Debuts”
This year, The Nerds of Color has got your back on everything Anime Expo Lite! Be sure you’re tuned in on the program’s website to watch the online press conferences, and keep our tab open to catch live updates. This year, the expo is focusing on amplifying AAPI voices, as well as combating racialized violence with ticket proceeds going to Hate Is A Virus, a nonprofit community of mobilizers and amplifiers to dismantle racism and hate.
Continue reading “2021 Anime Expo Lite Live Updates”
It’s the first week of July and for the third time in a row, my fellow NOC writer Josephine Chang and myself will be back in the halls of the Los Angeles Convention Center among thousands of others (last year had 110,000 attendees) from July 4 to July 7!
I’ll get this out of the way right now — Alita: Battle Angel is not necessarily bad, per se. However, it is something of a disappointment and/or wasted opportunity given that the combined talents of Robert Rodriguez (The El Mariachi Trilogy, Sin City, From Dusk Til Dawn) and James Cameron (Terminator, Titanic, Avatar) ought to yield something phenomenal. I’m a huge fan of both, believing Rodriguez to be a master in the domain of stylish genre action, and Cameron to be a master of groundbreaking science-fiction. Thus, when the most I can say about it is that it’s “not bad” it should give you a good idea of how let down I was by a movie that had so much potential.
Continue reading “NOC Review: ‘Alita: Battle Angel’ is Less Than the Sum of Its Parts”
Film adaptations are often hard to crack, whether they are of the comic book, TV show, novel, or other type of variety. The stories being adapted may be timeless, and might lay the groundwork for a film adaptation, but hardcore fanbases are typically the hardest to please, accepting only the best out of their film adaptations to truly do justice to their passion for the material (spend any time at all on the internet if you don’t believe me). Oftentimes, we become fortunate enough to see certain types of adaptations finally begin to take a repeatable successful stride in this industry (as we’re more or less now seeing with comic book-based offerings from DC and Marvel). Then sometimes other types of adaptations, such as film adaptations of manga or anime, can take a bit more time to bake before the success stories can roll in (as we’ve seen with critical and box office disappointments, such as Dragonball Evolution, Netflix’s Death Note, or Ghost in the Shell).
20th Century Fox invites you (and a guest) to a special early screening of Alita: Battle Angel in 3D Dolby Digital with The Nerds of Color in New York City!
Continue reading “Catch an Early Screening of ‘Alita: Battle Angel’ Hosted by The Nerds of Color”
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to step into a future crafted by master filmmakers Robert Rodriguez and James Cameron? Oh come on — I know you have! If you’re anything like me (and I’d be willing to bet the farm that on a site called “The Nerds of Color” there’s got to be several readers that are) the rhetorical question posed above certainly stopped being rhetorical after you saw El Mariachi, Sin City, Terminator 2, and Avatar.
Continue reading “Iron City Welcomes You: The ‘Alita: Battle Angel’ Immersive Experience”
Earlier this week, 20th Century Fox released a new trailer for Alita: Battle Angel! From visionary filmmakers James Cameron and Robert Rodriguez, the film stars Rosa Salazar, Christoph Waltz, Jennifer Connelly, Mahershala Ali, Ed Skrein, Jackie Earle Haley and Keean Johnson.
Continue reading “Don’t Underestimate The Latest Trailer for ‘Alita: Battle Angel’”
It’s the second day of July and Anime Expo 2017 is well under way! While the first official day has come and gone with a bang (along with the unfixed misfortunes of horrific Line Con), there are still three big days filled to the brim with events, guests, panels, and anything anime related. If you’re in the Los Angeles area, still don’t have plans, and want to check something out this July 4th weekend, definitely give Anime Expo a go!
Continue reading “Bigger, Badder and Hotter than Ever: Anime Expo 2017”
My time in Japan is dwindling down fast so I have been trying to travel a lot. I went to Tokyo last week to check out a video game exhibit (more on that another time) but my friend informed me that there was a Sailor Moon exhibit over at Tokyo City View, the observation deck in Roppongi Hills. Being a huge Sailor Moon fan, I knew I needed to check it out for myself.
Continue reading “The Exhibition of Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon”
In 2015, Nerdist announced that the live-action adaptation of the famed Japanese anime had been revived by directors James Cameron and Robert Rodriguez. Battle Angel Alita, a post-apocalyptic sci-fi action manga/anime written by Yukito Kishiro, is set in the 26th century and follows the female cyborg Alita, as she trains to become the world’s most deadly assassin. The latest report from the Robert Rodriquez/Jame Cameron production reveals that the filmmakers have their top three actresses for the lead role: Maika Monroe, Zendaya (who is the front runner), and Rosa Salazar. In other words: more bad news for Asian American actresses.
Continue reading “Battle Angel Alita Lead Role Once Again Devoid of Asian American Prospects”
Ever since I moved to Japan in 2011, I have been checking out Osaka’s (my current hometown) cosplay extravaganza, the Nipponbashi Street Festa. Every year around the end of March, hundreds of cosplayers, anime/video game fans, and photographers collide in Nipponbashi (aka Den Den Town), Osaka’s answer to Akihabara. Sadly, this was my final experience in witnessing this wonderful event as I will be moving back to the U.S. this summer.
As always, it did not disappoint.
Continue reading “Cosplay and Osaka: My Final Nipponbashi Street Festa”
Japan has long produced visual media that has captivated readers and viewers for decades. Manga and anime are two classic mediums through which fantastical worlds and profound characters come to life. Of all the hundreds of thousands of characters that exist in these worlds, there are a handful that share a close resemblance to African Americans. Though these characters are not always explicitly identified as black, they are heavily coded as black or Afro-descended. The aesthetic of black coded characters in anime and manga reflect the same ideologies of black males in U.S media and society. Popular series like Naruto and Samurai Champloo both use tropes of black males and demonstrate common ideas about their masculinity and how they are read by others. Hip hop is the vehicle through which Japan understands American blackness which manifests itself in various ways in Japanese media.
Continue reading “Black Masculinity as Performed in Japanese Visual Media”
Japan. The land of anime and manga. When those two are brought up, usually the district of Akihabara in the city of Tokyo comes to mind. Sure, Akihabara still is the mecca of countless arcades with floors full of games, stores full of anime merchandise, and tons of specialty stores that will probably have what you are looking for. However, Akihabara is not the only area where these things can be found.
Nipponbashi, otherwise known as Den Den Town, can be seen as the Akihabara of Osaka. While not the size of Akihabara, Den Den Town still caters to the needs of many nerds, myself included. The laidback and easygoing pace of Den Den Town is a lot more relaxing than the hustle and bustle of Akiba. Den Den Town is also home to one of my favorite events of the year: the Nipponbashi Street Festa.
Continue reading “Nipponbashi Street Festa: Cosplay Invades Osaka”
Last week, we brought you Black Girl Nerds’ account of the shooting of Darrien Hunt, the 22-year old Utah man who was killed by police for “brandishing a sword” that happened to not be a real sword at all. Depressingly, Hunt’s murder is part of an all too common pattern of high-profile killings of unarmed black men by those who have been sworn to protect and serve them.
The death of Darrien Hunt did not happen in a vaccum. In the wake of similar instances in Staten Island with Eric Garner, or Ferguson with Michael Brown, and Ohio with John Crawford1 — and these cases are just from this summer — the mainstream media and society in general is paying attention more than they ever have in the past.
